Chapter 34
Nothing. I was floating in nothing.
A thump on my chest had me gasping and trying to suck in air when my lungs felt like they’d collapsed. I’d had broken ribs before, and this was close to that.
“Breathe, Harlow! Breathe!”
Bryony, that was her voice. Another thump against my chest, which didn’t help the sensation of having broken ribs. I opened my eyes to see Bryony crouched beside me.
“What . . .” I croaked, my voice sounding like I’d been on a bender for a month. “Happened?”
Bryony picked up the final two chalices, the simple bowls, both cracked down the sides. “You drank both, and that . . . has not been done for a very long time.”
I swallowed hard, afraid to ask. “Who was the last to do it?”
“Nocta.”
I winced. Of course it was.
“You aren’t to blame for the sins of your father, dear. I’m just glad you made it through.” She laid the chalices down. “Now, are you well enough to stand?”
I looked around. I was back inside on Thalienne’s couch. “How long was I out?”
Bryony glanced at the clock by the room’s edge. “About an hour. The circle was taking too long. I was worried that something had gone wrong.”
Mom. Typhon. Dungeon. Morrigan . . .
Opie.
I shoved my hand into my pocket – she’d put the locket back in for me, thank the gods – and dragged Calypso out of my pocket, sick with fear.
The second I touched the locket, I knew something was terribly wrong.
Usually, it was warm to the touch, almost as though it was alive. Now though, it was cold as ice.
I flicked the latch open with my thumbnail and stared down through a charred, black hole, straight through to the ground. The locket had been destroyed.
What had happened at Neverthorn to destroy the siren’s well?
“No, no!”
“Harlow, calm yourself. So much happens when you are on this journey –”
I held the locket up to Bryony. “No! It’s not the journey. This was a two-way communication between me and Calypso, the siren in the wishing well at Neverthorn! But now I can’t see or hear her. It looks like her well is just . . . gone!”
“I wish I’d known,” the older woman said with a wince as she took the locket from me and rolled it in her palm. “I’d have had you leave it behind. There is so much power in the journey, I’m not at all surprised it fried your connection to the siren.”
“You mean it’s not that the well is gone –”
“Exactly.”
While it was a relief that Neverthorn was likely still standing, without being able to communicate with Calypso, I couldn’t even check on Opie. Which meant even without everything else, it was time to go back to Neverthorn.
“I’ve got to go.”
I stumbled twice, scrambling to get to my feet. Without really thinking about it I reached for my bond with my friends – they weren’t far – and pulled on it, beckoning them with my hands, crooking all my fingers at once.
“House Phoenix and I must go back to Neverthorn. I don’t know if the ritual worked, but I can’t wait for Thalienne.”
I dragged my socks and boots on, lacing them as fast as I could.
As I stood for the second time, the door swung open, and I locked eyes with a less-than-pleased Typhon who swept into the room with my housemates flooding in behind him.
I couldn’t help it, my eyes welled up a little.
Everything I’d seen, having the Morrigan herself tell me that Opie was in trouble?
It was . . . pushing me to breaking point.
“Harlow. What’s wrong?” Typhon’s hand cupped my elbow, gently, even if his voice was a demanding rumble.
“I’m fine. But we need to go right now.” My voice trembled. “Opie’s in trouble. I don’t know what’s happening, but we need to get back to Neverthorn. Now.”
“Agree one hundred percent,” Fable said, moving closer, her face a mask of concern. “Let’s go.”
Typhon gripped my hand, helping me keep balance. “What do you mean, Opie’s in trouble? How do you know?”
Bryony peeled his hands off me and shooed the others to give me room.
“The journey Harlow just went through shows her past, present, and future. I am not saying to ignore them, but there are times that we need to not rush. This is one of them. You don’t know that they are literal, or even a message for right now. ”
I pulled free of Bryony. I knew what I was saying would sound like madness to the others.
“Look, I was there, at the final battle between Arthur and the Morrigan. I saw the field, I was watching and then . . .” Her eyes .
. . goddess, her eyes had burned into me.
“The Morrigan, she spoke to me. She shouldn’t even know who Opie is, but she looked straight into my eyes and warned me that Opie is in danger. ”
Marina cocked her head at me. “H-how is that even possible? The woman has been dead for thousands of years . . .”
“The visions show you what you need to see, whether people are alive or dead – they speak to you for what you need.” Bryony sighed. “But again, it does not mean the danger is immediate.”
I looked at her, my gaze sharpening. “But you would agree that there is danger to Opie if I was warned in the vision? That everything I saw in that vision was . . . true?”
Bryony gave a slow nod. “Yes. Yes, everything you see in your journey through the circles is true.”
I looked to my friends and Typhon. “I know it’s crazy. I know it. And we were leaving anyway, we just need to move faster than we thought.”
Not even those poor, wretched prisoners, or my sweet mother and every word she spoke to me, that needed to be dissected and savored and cherished. Not even my childhood memories –
I spared a look at Typhon, my heart pinching in my chest as an image of his face as a little boy, fierce in his furious defense of me, flashed in my mind.
Shut it down, woman. Opie is all that matters. The rest you deal with when she’s safe.
“If something happens to Opie because we didn’t get there fast enough . . . I would never forgive . . .”
I didn’t dare to finish the thought.
A soft shuffle of skirts from the room’s edge turned us around. Thalienne stood in the doorway, her face lined with worry.
“You’re right, Harlow. Your time here is finished. Perhaps at some point we will be able to complete the journey to your magic that you’ve started, but for now you must go.” She stepped forward. “I had hoped we might have longer to prepare, but things have moved faster than expected.”
A prickle of dread crept up my spine. “What happened?”
“Mallachtan and a squadron of Senate Runecoats have sailed across the loch and are approaching the main gate. I fear Liam didn’t have enough time to implement all the roadblocks we’d hoped for. We have minutes, at most. You may not be able to leave.”
My guts clenched – I didn’t want to delay our departure. This place had become something important to me, but it was Opie drawing me forward. “We can help you fight.”
A chorus of immediate agreement from my friends.
Thalienne held up a hand. “Things are going exactly as I planned, even if I’d hoped to have more time. You and your friends must go now if you are to make it out ahead of Mallachtan’s arrival.”
I blinked. “Planned? How can a Senate invasion possibly be part of your plan?”
Thalienne spun and headed to the door. “I don’t have time to explain everything now. You’ll just have to trust me. Stay alert and keep your friends close.”
She donned a heavy black cloak and slipped out the door. My head still swam with the vision, the elixirs and the fear of all I’d seen, but I forced my legs to move, accepting Typhon’s help as we followed, with the rest of House Phoenix close behind.
Ellie brushed her hand against mine and a second flood of healing left me refreshed again. I squeezed her hand and she squeezed me back. “We got you. We’ll get to Opie.”
The brisk air cleared my head some as we hurried across the grounds. The distance seemed to have shrunk since I’d walked with Liam in the other direction toward Thalienne’s cabin.
Typhon strode next to me, his face grim. I brushed a finger against the back of his hand, just a touch.
He didn’t look at me, but he returned the gesture, hooking his index finger around mine, for just a moment. “We will get you to her, Harlow.”
“I know. We have to.” I swallowed back the emotion, surprised that there was no panic leaping upward to tackle me to the ground.
“Almost there,” Ross said. “I can see the top of the main gate.”
But we were too late.
A clipped male voice demanded Thalienne’s presence, “. . . by order of the Senate!”
Twenty feet ahead of us, Thalienne strode up to Mallachtan.
He was just inside the gate, about a dozen feet. Not close enough to get slammed by lightning, which was disappointing. It seemed only fair that a Dwimmer who’d tried to kill the entire school get at least a portion of lightning tossed at him.
He made a motion to the beach on either side of him. “There’s no point in fighting it. I’ve got fifty more Runecoats crossing the loch behind me. Resistance is futile.”
Ross grunted. “How long do you think he’s waited to use that line?” Gary stuffed back a guffaw but the black humor of the moment infected House Phoenix until we were all – even me – openly laughing.
He’d threatened us with a sci-fi catchphrase. From the bad guys no less.
Mallachtan’s eyes shot to me, his face tightening.
Then he turned to my friends . . . and I could almost see him counting, making the connection.
Then back to me at rapid speed. I held up both hands this time, saluting him.
I didn’t care if he figured out who we were – we’d be leaving as soon as Thalienne dealt with him.
And I believed in her – she could hand him his ass on a platter.
Thalienne stood alone at the threshold of the gate, facing them all down with poise, as if welcoming an unwanted, bloodthirsty Senate official was just another day in the office.
The humor fled and my gut twisted as I watched her hand a folded parchment to Mallachtan, who snatched it from her grasp with a triumphant sneer.