Chapter 40
Chapter
Forty
When all seems lost, come back to the beginning. That’s what Wraith told me. I wish I knew what it meant.
— From the journal of Violet Andrever
In my dream, I was on a balcony, looking toward the mountains in the distance, the path to the ocean barely visible with the dim light.
“Hey, kiddo.”
I turned around. Violet sat behind me, her feet propped up on the balcony’s railing. She put down the dagger she had been fiddling with, and ran a hand through her thick, dark curls, dragging them away from her forehead.
“We have to talk.”
I sat down in the chair next to her.
“Time’s running out,” she said.
“You think I don’t realize that?” I knew it was wrong to take it out on Violet but I couldn’t stop myself. “I still have no idea what I have to do. It’s not like you left me clear instructions or anything.”
“You have all the puzzle pieces. You just have to put them together.”
“You really can’t give me more than that?”
“I told you to remember, didn’t I?” Violet’s eyes flashed in the dim light. “Memories are a powerful magic. Use them.”
I woke slowly for once, instead of bolting upright after my dream. Her words rolled around in my mind. Did I truly have all the puzzle pieces? My mind tumbled to the biggest puzzle piece of all—Starfire, whatever that was.
Could that be the key to all of it? What the faction wanted? How to fix the Veil? The secret of the prophecy?
And maybe, the first step to figuring out how to reclaim my homeland from the forces that threatened it.
I rubbed my temples. Violet was insistent it was somewhere in the memories, so that’s where I’d go. Griff was going to be pissed that I was doing this without him here to anchor me, but I had to try and he wasn’t here to stop me.
“Show me everything about Starfire.” I closed my eyes and opened the door to the storm that was Violet’s memories.
The familiar whirling white mist swirled through my mind before slowly solidifying into two figures.
Zachariah was immediately recognizable, and the other was a young Violet, maybe eight years old. She was bouncing around, chattering as they walked down a path in the garden. He had an indulgent smile on his face, the kindest expression I had ever seen on him.
“And where are we going today, Da?” She started skipping down the path, weaving in and out of trees.
“It’s time for you to start your training.”
She peered at him from behind a wide trunk. “I’ve already started my training.”
He ruffled her hair affectionately as she rejoined him. “This is for a different power. A special power.” He held out his hand and she took it, swinging from his arm.
“What is this power?”
“A special one for princesses of this realm.”
Images flashed through my mind, speeding through the rest of the day, until it slowed down and unfolded.
Violet was sitting on the ground, knees tucked under her chin, crying. “I can’t do it, Da. I don’t know what you want from me!”
Zachariah let out a frustrated sigh, and Violet cried harder. With effort, he spoke calmly. “It’s your first day, child. We’ll try again later.”
The mist swirled in, spinning me around, disorienting me, before resolving into an older Violet, just approaching the cusp of womanhood.
Gone was the childlike adoration of her father. In its stead was frustrated tension that I sympathized with. “I’m trying, Father!” she spoke through gritted teeth.
“Clearly not hard enough,” he fired back. There was nothing of the indulgent father in his hard features. This was the Zachariah I knew.
Violet launched into a standing position, fists clenched at her sides. “Nothing is good enough for you, is it?” Tossing her curls over her shoulder, she stormed from the room.
“Violet, I have not dismissed you.” His voice echoed behind her. “Violet, get back here!”
The scene changed, and I startled as Nana came into view, younger than I had ever seen her.
“Nothing I do is good enough, Mam! Nothing!” Violet was pacing, throwing her hands around.
“Violet, listen to me.” Nana calmed her enough to have her sit and held on tight to her hands. “Your father is obsessed with power. Always has been. Always will be. But you, my darling girl, you will always be enough. You are more than enough. You are perfect just the way you are.”
Violet looked up through tear-soaked eyelashes. “I don’t think I’m the Orlaith. I never have. I just know in my gut, it’s not me.”
Nana kissed her head. “Then it’s not you. Your father will survive his disappointment. He’s survived every other disappointment he’s brought on himself.” Nana wrapped her arm around Violet’s shoulders. “You, my darling, are perfect just the way you are.”
The mist obscured my vision, but I heard voices clearly.
“You’re pushing her too hard!” I knew that voice. Had heard it every day of my life in what I had thought was every situation. But I had never heard that sharpness, that anger from Nana.
“She must be ready!” Now that tone of voice from Zachariah I knew well. Nothing ever changed with that man.
The mist shifted, and I found myself standing next to Violet, still a teenager.
She was crouched on the floor of a balcony, peering through the window at her parents and their shouting match.
“She is the Orlaith—” Zachariah started.
Nana cut him off. “And if she’s not? You are destroying your daughter. You’re destroying your family. And you don’t even know for certain that your reading of the prophecy is correct!”
Zachariah stumbled back. When he spoke, it was in a softer, almost hesitant tone, contrary to any other I’d ever heard from him.
“If I’m wrong… if Violet isn’t the Orlaith…
then we’re doomed. The Veil will fail. It’s already begun.
Starfire will be in the grasp of the enemy.
All of us will become demons like the rest. It has to be her.
She has to be the one to access Starfire and protect us all. ”
Nana moved toward him, a glimmer of love long suppressed showing in her eyes. She reached out to touch his shoulder, but he recoiled away from her hand. Hurt flashed over her face before she locked it down.
The mist swirled and I had to shove my way forward through it, clawing at it to get out of my eyes.
Violet appeared to be the age I’d met her and was pacing back and forth in front of Garrett, who sat leaning forward in a chair, his elbows resting on his knees, chin in his hands. The position was so familiar to me, I felt my heart clench.
“You know of Starfire?” she was saying.
“I’ve heard mention,” he said warily.
“Of course you have. You know every secret,” she said under her breath before continuing at a normal volume.
“It’s the key to all of this. Bound to me.
Bound to her. And bound to him. But how to use it, what it truly is, has been lost. And we need to buy time.
All I can think of is erasing it. The memory of it.
From past and present. Erase it so completely that the darkness itself doesn’t remember it exists. ”
Understanding dawned on his face. “I can do that,” he said slowly.
Abruptly, she stopped her pacing and faced him. “But she must be able to access the information when she’s ready. You will have to tell her.”
Instantaneously, without the mist, I was back there.
Standing on that battlefield. Watching my parents, running hand in hand over to the edge of the cliff.
I heard Violet’s thoughts clear as day. I didn’t want this for them.
It was supposed to be me. It was always supposed to be me that made the sacrifice.
Wraith said it was me. Why am I not enough to fix the Veil and drive back the darkness?
What’s the point of all this power if they have to die too?
Her eyes swung toward me—or rather, me in her memory standing before her.
I heard echoes of the man in the cave, the one she called the Wraith.
“You are one, but not the One. Orlaith will come when all seems lost. When darkness has overtaken the sun, the golden one appears. She will come for answers and lead this world into a new beginning. Offer yourself up to the hands of the gods and let Starfire flow through you.” His voice changed, becoming softer, like a lover’s would.
“Give yourself to it and let it keep you until I come. I will find you in the next life.”
That’s what that passage meant! Lexa has to live.
I felt her make the decision and watched from the other side now as she slammed her palm into my forehead.
I felt her memories flow out of her and into me.
She gave me everything, not knowing what I was going to need.
Her relief surged through me as she realized it hadn’t all been in vain.
This was just her part to play, one battle in the great war. A chapter in the story of the universe.
I came back to myself. Sunlight now blazed through the room, revealing how long I’d been lost in the memories.
Well shit. The man who was basically my father-in-law—now that was a scary thought—had destroyed any mention of Starfire in history and then disappeared. How the hell was I to learn what this was and how to use it?
With Griff still out dealing with the chaos of the Veil, I had only one option.
I tracked down Finn, finding him in the first place I checked—the library. He greeted me with a distracted smile, before doing a double take. “What is it, Lexie?”
“I need to talk to you.”
He settled back in his chair. “Talk away.”
I twisted my hands together, wondering where to begin. Although in some ways, this was going to be easier with Finn than it would have with Griff. Finn didn’t tend to retreat behind a mask and would hopefully be more forthcoming than his taciturn brother.
“I went through more memories. It seems like the darkness wanted Starfire for itself. That was the reason it continued to set its sights on our kingdom. Violet decided the best way to protect the kingdom was by removing all mention of Starfire from the past, present, and future, at least until I was ready for it. And she asked the one person she thought could do that.”
“Da,” Finn breathed.