Chapter 19
He intended to give them privacy, but Elric knew he was also running from what he saw in there. He refused to believe something had happened to Jessamine. Yet he had to face the truth. Her magic had a different color, a different flavor. That terrified him.
His brother’s spell had not worked. He would know if it had worked, surely. Other gods were easy to recognize, and his little gravesinger was not yet housing a goddess. But what if the spell took time to work? What if, somehow, Ajax was manipulating the spell he’d woven, even from a kingdom away?
Too many questions burned in his mind, and he couldn’t focus on finding the answers when she was right in front of him.
All he could think about was the beloved curve of her cheek, or the way that her entire being lit up his whole world.
Then he started fearing what his life would look like without her.
Anxiety poured in the moment he thought about losing her.
He would never be able to come back from that.
This was why he’d stayed away from the other witches.
He knew what it was like to grow attached, and he knew how limiting it could be.
When one of them needed help, he had to have a clear mind.
That was his duty. It was his role. He was the god who protected them.
The god who did everything he could, even at his own expense.
But he was unwilling to do that for anyone else when Jessamine made his entire soul burn.
Scrubbing his hand with his face, he tried to ground himself with fresh air.
Even out of the cave, though, he knew he would have to return to it.
The old memories still clung to him. Gripping his shoulders as though pulling him back toward the darkness.
They wanted him to remember all the things that had been done to him here.
All the things that he’d tried hard to forget.
Covering his eyes didn’t help. All he could see were the memories every time he blinked, and if he wasn’t careful, he was going to get lost in them.
So he took a step away from the madness. Another step. Another. Elric forced himself to head into the forest and sit down on a fallen log. He kept his back to the cave the entire time, focusing instead on his heartbeat until all the thoughts melted away and he could think clearly once more.
Ajax’s spell was a complicated one, but Elric had always been good at unraveling other magic. He knew how to mimic spells and how to change them over into his own control. If he could figure that out, then perhaps he would know how to stop his brother.
He’d almost gotten ahold of the solution when he heard a shout from the cave. At first, he wasn’t sure what it was. Perhaps the two women had found an answer to their question. For that, he would be grateful. At the very least, the witches deserved that.
But then another shout came from closer, and this one made his blood run cold. He recognized the fear in those tones, even if he couldn’t understand the words.
Standing, he ran back toward the cave as Sybil emerged from the shadows. Her dark eyes were large and wide, panic setting into her features as she caught sight of him.
“Elric! It’s Jessamine. There’s something wrong.”
He didn’t stop to ask what had happened, he just bolted into the cave. A thousand things could have gone wrong, but none of them would stop him from saving her.
Jessamine lay on the floor, her hands curled into her chest and her back bowed the same as the last time.
Trails of blood dripped from her eyes, running down onto the stones beneath her.
Wherever her blood touched, flowers bloomed.
Bright blue primroses with glistening gold centers, as though they had been dipped in the ichor of the gods.
She looked like she was in so much pain, but somehow, she was smiling. Those pretty, berry-red lips that had always trapped his attention were stretched in a wide grin even as her unseeing eyes stared above her.
The image was as concerning as it was eerie. She wasn’t right. This wasn’t normal. She shouldn’t be bleeding like this and yet somehow enjoying every second of it. As he watched, foam peeked through her lips, slowly trailing down her cheeks.
Sybil stood beside him, wringing her hands with worry. “What can we do?” she asked.
“I don’t know.” And that was endlessly frustrating.
Had his siblings felt this way when they were gods, or was he the only one so lacking?
Elric knelt by Jessamine’s convulsing form, taking one of her stiff hands in his and holding on to it tightly.
This was their only connection, and he hoped that through whatever was happening, she could still feel him holding on to her.
“Elric… I don’t even think she’s here with us.”
Staring into her eyes, he could agree that was the truth. Blood now coated those lovely dark orbs, turning them one dark color, which made his stomach churn. She shouldn’t ever have to endure something like this.
But then he realized the blood in her eyes was slowly turning black. Like his magic was leaking out of her again.
Or perhaps something else entirely.
“Sybil,” he murmured. “You remember what happened to the last gravesingers?”
“Of course I do. They sacrificed themselves so you would remain trapped. But you kept all their souls. I remember the others finding out that their souls had never crossed over. You were… You trapped them all in that realm of yours.” Sybil swallowed. “What are you trying to say?”
“Their souls are part of what makes up my realm. Their hands dragged me down into the darkness more times than I could count, and they were the ones that held me there.” He stared down into Jessamine’s eyes, black tears leaving lines down her cheeks.
“I fear they may be trying to do the same to her.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.” Nails biting into his palms, he looked at Sybil and tried to impress upon her the importance of what he was about to say. “I’m going to get her back. But neither of us will be here, in our bodies. I need you to watch over us, Sybil. Can you do that?”
She dropped to her knees beside him and held her hands over both Jessamine and his. “With my life, Deathless One. Your bodies will be here for you to return to.”
“That is hard to believe, considering where we are.” He nodded. “But I believe you, Sybil. Not because you have always been a devout follower of my coven, but because I consider you a friend.”
The determined expression on her face didn’t budge. She gave him a firm nod and then tangled their fingers together.
He allowed his conscious mind to return to the land in between.
The purgatory where all souls had to wander before they would eventually see a light.
If he let them. Elric had spent far too many centuries tormenting souls who had ended up here to believe that everyone and everything eventually found the light.
He knew how hard it was for them, and he knew that Jessamine couldn’t have gone that far yet.
Her soul might have wandered from her body, but that did not mean she had died.
He stepped into the darkness, watching the gray light dance over the ripples his footsteps caused. Pretty. Magic could not replicate the dark ripples that were so black no light could penetrate them.
But unlike many of the times he’d stepped into this kingdom, there were no hands grabbing at his ankles. No gravesinger souls who wanted to remind him of all the evil deeds he had done and just how much he deserved to be punished for them.
“You locked them up,” he reminded himself as he strode into the darkness. “You chained them to the darkness and, therefore, they cannot find you.”
Another voice whispered in his mind that souls could not be chained. He had done the impossible to them, and only because he thought himself above all those who came through this place.
He might be a god, but even he could not control human souls forever.
Elric knew he would find her with the other gravesingers.
A knowledge deep in his gut pushed him toward where he had locked away the others of her kind, certain that they had summoned her to their side.
The black leaking from her eyes, the way his magic had exited her body, and the golden light that had coiled around her—it wasn’t all a coincidence.
The gravesingers were meddling from beyond the grave. Now, he needed to remind them why that was such a bad idea, and why he had locked them up to begin with.
He found them right where he had bound them all.
Chained to the bottom of the darkness, the water lapping at their hands and feet.
But they weren’t exactly the same as they had been.
In the distant past where he had ensured they would remain quiet and stop trying to control him, they were just shadows of themselves.
Smudges of darkness that had no features, no faces, barely even recognizable as who they used to be.
Now, he could tell there were details burned back into their forms. Some of them had faces now.
Features that he vividly remembered as they were stabbing into him with their athames and all the other implements they used to cause him pain.
He recognized one of them in particular.
She’d been ruthless in her cruelty, understanding far too well that pain meant she got more power from him.
Others had the impression of hair now. Delicate strands that had once captivated him because he knew that they were soft, and soft things had never been given to him. He’d always wanted to touch those strands, even knowing that these witches were going to hurt him.
Somehow, they had loosened their chains as well. A few of them had freed their hands, some of them a leg. They had all turned toward something in the center of their clustered shadows, and already Elric knew who that was.