Chapter 8
You are not your father, I reminded myself furiously as I stared at the gate and my two friends beyond it. You barely knew him. He didn’t raise you. You are your mother’s child. And Belina Daygon . . .
Was a kind, loving, amazing person.
Never forget that.
I turned and shot Liam a glance, and he nodded.
He felt confident it would be okay, which made me feel a little better . . .
“Okay, but just out of curiosity,” I said, knowing I was stalling but unable to help myself, “has anyone else besides Nocta –”
“Sage Thalienne, please come to your office immediately,” a disembodied voice called over an invisible sound system. “Sage Thalienne, please come to your office immediately, there is an urgent situation that requires your attention!”
“For the love of all that is whimsy and wisdom, these people can’t function for five minutes without disturbing me,” Thalienne said with a snort of disgust. “Liam . . . go back across the loch and check for any stragglers. I’m expecting at least a handful more this morning.
Have Hannah and any others wait to cross the threshold until I’ve returned.
You two, come with me. I’ll have my secretary Mrs. Drummell show you the way to House Draconell and House Kelpish,” she said, beckoning Marina and Ross to follow her as she swept off.
I watched them go; my body bathed in icy sweat. Respite from the gallows at least for the moment. Unless . . .
If that ‘urgent call’ was about us and our escape from Neverthorn, we were up Shit Creek without a single paddle.
The gates slowly closed and as soon as they were shut tight, Liam turned to me.
“Do you think the urgent situation might have to do with Tarquinius or the Senate?” I tried to keep the panic at bay, but it was right there, under the surface.
Just waiting for me to lose it again.
“No.” He pulled his hand out from behind his back and repeated the rune he’d apparently cast. “I just set a whole slew of shellycoats loose and no one is as good as Thalienne at catching them. They’re fast and mischievous and often slip away even once you think you’ve captured them.
It will take at least an hour to find them all.
I needed to get her out of here, so she doesn’t .
. .” he trailed off and shot me an apologetic smile and motioned at the gate.
It felt like my eyes tried to pop out of my head. “Oh my gods. So, she doesn’t have to see this gate fucking murder me? Great.”
“So she doesn’t see what happens when you go through,” he corrected.
“If the gate didn’t kill Nocta, it’s not going to kill you.
That said, with you being as powerful as you are, I can’t say how the gate will react and the last thing we need is you calling attention to yourself.
In fact, I’m going to get the others so we can get you all through before she comes back.
Marina and Ross made it through okay, but with the glamor in place and you all being House Phoenix, who knows what might happen? I’d rather play it safe.”
I was about to protest his use of the word ‘safe,’ but he was already yanking me into a quick hug, giving me a bit of his warmth, and I hoped a bit of his belief in this system.
“We’ll figure out what to tell her about why you guys went through the gate when I get back.
Ask for forgiveness, not permission, right?
Just sit tight!” He cupped my cheek so quickly I wasn’t sure I hadn’t imagined it, then he was gone, leaping into the boat and rowing away before I could ask him just what the hell I was supposed to do until he got back.
Twiddle my fucking thumbs?
You see, that was a huge miscalculation on his part, because with all that free time, and the anxiety right under the surface egging me on, it took me less than five minutes to work myself into a mental freak out and start pacing.
What if Thalienne got back before Liam did? He said it would take time to round up the shellycoats, whatever they were, but who knew? Maybe she’d get someone else to do it for her.
This is his turf. He knows better than you, a little voice reminded me.
“But your gut is your bread and butter,” I murmured. And my gut was telling me to go through that gate.
Now.
Before I could change my mind.
Before Thalienne got back and labelled me as ‘of Nocta.’
And, most of all, before my friends got here – especially Fabes – and had to watch me get fried like a fucking churro.
“Just knock on the door, step through, let lightning smash into you . . . no problem.” I clenched both hands into fists, then turned toward the gate.
Whatever I was going to face, I wanted to do it alone.
Maybe needed was a better word than wanted.
The long wooden timbers seemed to call to me, a low hum in the air . . . and did those heather flowers around the base bend a little closer, or was that just the wind pressing in from across the loch?
Before I could change my mind again, I snapped my knuckles against the massive door and it slowly began to open, giving me that stunning view of Heathermoor.
“Wait, dummy! Take me out of your pocket first.”
Calypso’s voice made me jump.
“I would hate for our only form of communication to get cooked.”
I fumbled with the locket and set it on the ground. “Good call.” Because, as much as Calypso herself was something of a wild card, she was my lifeline to Opie, Phyllis, and Bandit.
Staring up at Heathermoor, I still hesitated. There was no figure walking toward me this time. No Sage to see me through.
I took a few short, sharp breaths through my clenched teeth, pulled the blank pendant out from under my shirt so it was clearly visible, and leapt headlong over the threshold, like jumping into a frigid lake instead of taking it a step at a time.
Funny, I never thought I’d be able to describe getting hit by lightning.
The flash of light burned my eyes, brilliant and so bright everything disappeared.
The world around me froze, and there was a ping of the pendant being smashed as if it were being struck, not by lightning, but by a sword, the clang of metal on metal unmistakable.
My vision blurred as my body went weightless, floating above the ground, or maybe flying?
I couldn’t be sure. Hell, I couldn’t have told you what my name was in the moment the gate reacted to me crossing the threshold.
There was no air in my lungs. I’d say I blinked, only there was no movement of my face. It was more like . . . one moment I was in my body, and the next I was out of it, looking down at me – or Hannah, to be precise – caught in an unrelenting stream of lightning and power.
My toes barely touched the cobblestones, grounding me as the lightning arced and danced, holding my body with my arms flung backward and out, and my head thrown backward so far that my golden hair hung halfway to my ass.
That can’t be good.
I tried to swim back to my body through the air. Only, I seemed to be just as trapped here, hanging above myself, as my body was trapped in the lighting. At some point it had to stop, didn’t it?
There was only so much a body could take, even from the power of a tiny lightning bolt.
But the gates were sentient, just like Neverthorn, right?
And, if they knew I was Nocta’s daughter?
Then maybe they’d try to kill me, doing what they could to protect those within, just like the ones at Neverthorn had done.
My heart stuttered and I clutched at my chest, panic blooming.
Ah shit. This was not just a marking of a house. This was a full-blown execution.
I did the only thing I could think of to try and save myself.
I begged.
“Please! I’m not like him! I need to train here so I can stop him!”
Nothing.
“Please. I’m not . . . I’m not dark like him.”
But doubt pressed against my chest as the words passed silently through my ghostly lips. Because I’d had moments where I’d wondered . . . was he as bad as they said?
Was I as good as they thought?
My heart fluttered again – none of that mattered right now. If they were right . . . If Nocta was the epitome of evil, then me dying meant my friends would die, too.
And Opie would be left alone.
If I was a threat to the gates? Then let me be a threat.
Anger snapped through me, cutting through the fear. I pulled on my magic, seeing a thread of it connect my body and soul, and I spun a rune that I didn’t know. A combination of release and a shockwave of power. I directed it not at the gate, but at my own body.
The rune hit and the world turned back upside down. I saw through my own eyes for just a moment, then everything went dark and . . . wet? Something jabbed into my side and I rolled, the water soothing my rune-casting hand.
Air, I needed air. I couldn’t breathe. Floundering, I got to the surface and sucked in a lungful of air as someone – Fable – shouted my name in the distance.
“Harlow! What are you doing in the loch? Are you okay?”
I lifted a hand and gave her a thumbs up and coughed out, “Peachy.”
Shit, I sounded like I’d been breathing in campfire smoke for days on end.
With some difficulty, I swam to the shore, the icy winter water welcome after the heat of the gates.
The blast had sent me a good fifteen feet out into the loch, and, if you added in the space between the shore and the gates .
. . easily forty feet. Good thing I’d landed far enough out I’d missed most of the shoreline rocks.
Most, I realized with a wince as my side throbbed, an injury making itself known.
Ellie reached me first, her hands going straight to the burn marks. “What happened?”
“Went through the gate. It . . . didn’t like me.”
I sighed with relief as her magic sunk into me, soothing away the injuries, both on my hands and the spot where a rock had connected with a couple of my ribs. “You’re getting good at this . . .”
“It’s okay,” Ellie said. “The worst of it is gone, but this mark on your throat, where the pendant pressed . . . I’ve faded it but it’s still there and –” she sucked in a sharp breath. “Oh no.”