Chapter 25 #2
I tripped over something lying in the middle of the passageway—something soft and warm. And not breathing.
“Shava! Shava, you must get up!”
My voice got lost as the tunnel groaned and rocks shifted. My bloodmagick flashed against my skin as I called whatever strength it could give me as I hoisted Shava across my back. She was thin like all mud girls were, but long and lanky as I dragged her through the rubble.
Or tried to.
Was she even breathing? Debris fell faster and harder. I fought for every inch of ground, not entirely sure I was even fighting in the correct direction. It was so dark, and I couldn’t breathe.
I tripped over a boulder I couldn’t see and went down with Shava on top of me. Rocks and dirt went under my nails, in my hair, and coated my lungs.
This is where you finally die.
“Shava? Shava.”
My bloodmagick flared weakly and faded back into my skin, giving me only a brief glimpse of her slack, unmoving face. I put a finger to her neck, trying to feel for a heartbeat.
It was there, but weak and unsteady. I had to get out before it stopped completely.
Blood sluggishly poured from a wound at the back of her head, coating my thighs and knees.
That same rush of power and purpose that I’d felt with the dying Fireguard filled me.
Golden lines exploded across my skin, dissecting it like liquid lightning as my frustration and rage fueled my body’s fire.
“No, not going to do that. That’s for Nisar. Not Shava. Not …”
She’s dead anyway. So are you.
“No. NO.”
I could protest it as much as I wanted, but I couldn’t ignore how shallow my breaths were, indicating just how quickly we were both running out of air.
Assuming she wasn’t dead.
I felt her neck again, but this time couldn’t find her pulse. Wait. There it was. Weak and barely there.
Panting, I tried to settle her into a comfortable position and make my way out.
Only to find it blocked. Hard, unyielding rocks met my fingertips no matter which direction I turned, my scrabbling getting more desperate as I tried not to step on Shava in my panic to get out.
No way out. No way out.
“Don’t panic. There’s always a way out. Always.”
Not this time.
The odd energy around Shava was building. Did it have something to do with her impending death?
You can’t save her. Either you both die or you try something new.
I only had a mild sense of what to do, but the magick called to me. Settling back down next to Shava, I withdrew my blade. My bloodmagick hummed happily in my veins, pushing at me.
Do it. Plunge it into her chest, and feel her life blood spurt between your fingers. Just like the Fireguard, but this one will mean more, because SHE means more.
Were they my thoughts or the magick consciously imposing its will on me?
It would be easy to blame an extrinsic force, but I couldn’t deny my own need.
Desperately, I wanted to know what would happen if I completed this new kind of ritual.
Shava was dead anyway. There was no sense in both of us dying, right?
Do it. Hurry while she’s on the brink, and not yet dead. Then it won’t work. It has to be your hand.
Says who?
Still, the knife hovered over her chest, tantalizingly close to grazing her skin. I had to keep my other hand on her just so I knew where I was. I couldn’t see my own nose in the total darkness.
It’s just one strike. She’s so close already she won’t feel it .
I hoped so. My chest heaved with the exertion of trying to pull air into my lungs.
Survival. It was always about survival, whether it was with the queen, the dragon, M, the stupid mud boys, or anyone else.
Survival mattered above everything. It had to. There was nothing else, was there?
Love.
The small, tiny little flicker of something stayed my hand.
Love … love ? Like my mother’s love for me; a bastard child foisted on her? Like the queen’s love for both her boys, one doted upon and spoiled, and the other kept outside like a dog?
Love didn’t make sense to me; it was an abstract concept that wasn’t tangible! And yet I’d felt it warm my chest, and seen it clearly in my life and in the twins.
“Z …”
The knife nearly clattered to the ground as Shava’s hand grasped blindly for my wrist and weakly clasped it.
“We are trapped, Shava. We are running out of air. Don’t speak.”
“You came back for me.”
Her voice had a small tingle of surprise and wonder. It didn’t offend me, because I was still in awe and wonder about it myself.
“Use your magick?” she croaked out.
How was I supposed to explain to her that the only way was through her death? My magick wasn’t the magick of fairy tales and epic stories. My magick was raw, and dangerous, and brutal.
“Shava, I?—”
Her hand trailed up my arm, across my chest, and down the other arm to wrap around the hilt of the dagger.
“ ‘S ok. You think I don’t know what you did with the guard that day? Or Nisar? I went back with Cerys and Zariah. We saw the body. Cerys got freaked out. She begged Zariah to roast you until your bones turned to ash.”
I expected disgust and horror. Instead, she sounded … understanding? And yet … that bitch Cerys. I knew she’d had it in for me.
My lips pinched together.
“Cleary, he didn’t, ” I breathed out, using precious air.
“He … owes you much. We owe … you much. Least we could do. Least I can do.”
It made sense logically. I helped to establish the network of tunnels, and bring in materials to feed and clothe everyone, and make life bearable. I used my connections with the Fireguards to keep us safe and supplied. This entire operation would collapse without me.
And yet … was she giving me what I thought she was?
Could I take it?
The second question was far easier. Yes, I would take it. Because that was the only way you got ahead in life—by taking. No one would give you anything, and if they were foolish enough to do it, well then, who was I to disrespect their choices?
So … what is this, then ?
I hesitated further. I didn’t enjoy doing anything I didn’t understand and this? This was … complex. If I was on death’s doorstep and our positions reversed, would I do the same?
I couldn’t quite say. Logically, I knew it made sense for one to give up their life to save the other. No sense in both of you dying, after all. And yet … until I was actually dead, could I give up the fight to live?
I wasn’t sure I could. Or would.
So what was her motivation?
You don’t always need to know or understand everything. Time is running out. You will asphyxiate. You both die, or only she dies.
I had taken care not to love at all in my life. I’d loved my mother, but that had brought me nothing but agony and pain. I refused to love Clover, or dote on any of the kitchen girls.
But Shava? I had let her in. She’d wormed her way into me, and look at me now; indecisive, afraid, and unsure.
Shava truly cared for me, and did so more deeply than I did for her. I was possessive towards Shava, but to give my life for hers? I couldn’t. Why could she?
Why?
Love.
Stupid. Nonsensical. Ridiculous.
I was at a crossroads: a turning point of oblivion. I’d done rituals so far and had kept from getting too addicted to how it made me feel, and to keep from reveling in the pain. It had been easy to keep myself emotionally distant and control the magick. Could I continue to do so?
“Zeph—yr. Do it for others. Or I don’t want it …”
I lost the last bit of what she said, the air almost non-existent. Her hand went limp, fingers slipping off the handle.
Now or never.
“You want this,” I argued to no one, and brought the dagger down as hard as I could into her chest before I could second guess it.
The last remaining bit of air left her lungs in a choked gasp, her lips quivering and twitching as her body tried to unconsciously suck in air that no longer existed. Magick spiked and swarmed around me, thick and potent.
Take the heart. The one she loves you with, mocked my inner dialogue. Or was it the magick that already coursed through my veins from the other rituals?
This magick was living, breathing chaos; a force that reflected everything back out with violence. Love was stupid. Love was weak. Love brought nothing but pain and hardship.
Her eyes rolled back in her head. She was about to pass out. That wouldn’t do. This magick relied on the pain of others. The more potent, the better.
Pain I would have to cause Shava.
She couldn’t pass out.
Chaos.
White magick.
Two coexisting branches of bloodmagick that balanced each other made perfect sense. I would have to write a treatise on it.
Assuming I survived.
With a grunt, I pushed the knife down vertically, creating a large gash in her chest. She couldn’t scream, she couldn’t cry out, but her eyes shot open in silent agony.
You have to do it.
Yes.
Fuck love.
Something twisted and broke inside of me.
I ignored the ache, cutting deep horizontally and severing tendons and muscles. I kept my eyes on my work, clinical and detached.
But I wasn’t detached, not at all.
I was dying inside.
Agony shot through my chest, eclipsing any pain that had come from the botched ritual on my leg.
Shava’s hands fluttered weakly around my shoulders, grazing gently along my arms and neck.
Gently, because she had no strength. If I didn’t have a blade and was systematically carving out her heart, it could have been a lover’s caress, like we’d shared so many times before.
Turn yourself off, or it will kill you.
Naive. Dumb. Survive.
I cut downward, then a final horizontal cut. Ripping open my robe, I cut deep enough to bleed on my chest in the same configuration. Sheathing my knife, I reached into her chest and felt her still beating heart against the pads of my fingers.
And ripped it out.
Magick exploded from my skin, burning gold fire up and down my body.
I couldn’t scream, because there was no air. My mouth opened in a silent contortion of agony.
Just like Shava.
But it wasn’t agony, was it? It was the most glorious holocaust of burning and power and destruction and heady pleasure that defied description.
My body burned and ached, and I gathered all of it to me greedily, sucking it in like I’d never feel it again.
The pain numbed gloriously like I’d had a drug or too much wine.
“Thank you,” I sobbed. “Thank you!”
I took the power, and threw it outward.
The world exploded.