Chapter 50 The Elegance of Ether
The Destitution Of Death
The golden shield dissolved.
Kat was barely aware that her sword fell from her grasp.
She watched her father lunge for Tam and gather him in his arms.
Kat forced herself to move forward on shaking legs.
The ring of steel sounded behind her. The men must have been released from the hold of the earth and vines. Somewhere in the distance, she thought she heard children screaming. Thunder cracked overhead, but she couldn’t move her eyes off Tam.
“Please. No.” She heard her father’s broken words. “No. Not my son. Not Tam. Why… No. No, no, no.” Tears ravaged Finlay Ashowan’s words as he reached up and touched his son’s pale, still face. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”
Kat fell to her knees as she stared at Tam’s lifeless eyes.
Her body shook. She reached out with her magic to feel his thread. To try to find some sense that he was still there; some hope that he could be brought back.
But there wasn’t one.
Cold nausea rolled through her as she touched his hand.
Rain fell, making it difficult to discern that the sun had just begun to rise.
Warmth gathered and spilled out of her eyes.
Her twin.
Her brother.
Her brother who had always been there for her. Who had saved her life in more ways than one time and time again. Who had always been the one she could go to. Her brother who had been her anchor his whole life. Her peace.
There weren’t words she could say.
Her body was heavy.
He had been… He had been the one helping them all back up when they fell. The quiet supporter that was always overlooked.
Kat’s grip tightened on his wrist.
Fin sobbed, and that sound alone ripped her heart in two.
Her father who had always been goodness personified.
He cried as though his world had ended.
Though in a way the world had ended. Their world.
Their world where everyone they loved was safe. Where they were a part of making everything right.
There was an abrupt silence that made Kat wonder if she had gone deaf.
Not that it would matter if she did—but she distantly thought how that could not be the case, because she could hear rain and hail splattering heavily against the ground.
“My boy. My son,” Fin whispered as he pressed a kiss to Tam’s wetted black hair.
Kat didn’t think anything else could hurt her in that moment. Nothing short of her own sons dying could make her feel anything similar to what she felt then.
But then she heard her mother’s voice.
“Tam?”
The lone name was said weakly, quietly… As though there had barely been any breath used to speak.
Annika Ashowan appeared from the darkness and rain. She knelt in front of Tam’s knees and laid her hand against his heart.
Fin raised his bloodshot eyes to her; the word devastation was too mild a term for the emotion in them.
The loud, primal cry that broke out of Annika’s body echoed and touched something deeper. Something beyond loss.
Kat had never seen her mother cry before.
Never witnessed her losing complete control of herself.
And it turned out that seeing it was a torture Kat didn’t know she could survive the aftermath of.
There was no doubt in Kat’s mind that the world would forever carry that sound. Somewhere deep in its bones, that kind of grief had changed the world. Forever.
★ ★ ★
Eli walked slowly out of the castle. At her side, Kraken trotted grimly with his head down.
She heard the duchess’s scream.
Her knees buckled.
She barely swallowed past the lump in her throat.
The Ashowans appeared completely unaware of their surroundings, not noticing that the briefly resumed fight had once again ceased at the sound of the duchess’s scream.
They couldn’t be aware that every soldier was staring at the scene with a mixture of disbelief and pain.
A few of the Daxarian knights lowered themselves to their knees and bowed their heads.
The king, Eric, stood two feet behind his wife. His eyes were filled with horror and shock.
Eli forced herself to keep moving. There wasn’t much time.
They hadn’t wanted his family to see this part. Tam had wanted to go alone to see the first witch with the Lobahlan sword Wixim had given them.
To make matters even worse, the three princes, Luca, and Penelope had beaten her outside, and were all standing a short way behind the house witch.
Eli numbly appreciated that Tam’s cause of death could not be seen, thanks to the duke cradling his son in his arms.
She reached the children first and touched Luca’s and Penelope’s shoulders.
“Go back inside,” she ordered quietly. “You can’t see this.”
Luca spun around, tears in his eyes, while Penelope stared blindly at Eli, her face ashen.
“Mom, he’s not… Dad’s not… He didn’t, right?” Luca’s voice was high and fearful. The threads of hysterics were already pulling tight in his face.
“Please go inside for now, Luca. We need to take care of him.”
Hearing this made the princes turn around as well.
“He’s dead!” Antony burst out.
Eli looked at his tearstained face as the rain and hail battered the earth. “We need to fix that. I need you to please go inside. Now.”
Antony opened his mouth to argue, but Charlie stalked toward the castle first, his chin lowered. Then Asher grabbed Antony’s hand and buried his face into his brother’s shoulder.
Begrudgingly, the remaining two princes trudged back up to the castle through the mud, tears already carving tracks down Antony’s face.
Penelope and Luca remained in front of Eli, prompting her to slowly kneel to the ground and gently reach up to touch both children’s arms.
Kraken sat with his head bowed.
“Luca. We need to work quickly to make this better. Can you trust me?”
“It will be okay, though, right? You promise?” Luca asked, his hands curling into fists at his sides.
“I promise I will do everything in my power to try.”
Luca stiffened at her careful wording but gave a slow, serious nod of understanding.
He looked over at Penelope and grabbed her hand. “Come on.”
She didn’t respond. Her mind seemed to be somewhere far away, but she allowed Luca to drag her off.
Seeing the children’s reaction helped steady Eli’s resolve. She came back to her feet. She had not liked this plan, but… there was no other choice. Even after talking with Kraken, it was clear. Not if they were to keep Luca completely safe.
Eli rounded the Ashowan couple and carefully avoided looking at Tam. She wasn’t sure she could have faith in the next part if she did.
“Duke, Duchess, I am very sorry, but there is no time to explain. Please go back inside with Tam and keep him by the fire. If you can, start doing chest compressions. Do not stop. Kraken and I will try our best to bring him back.
Eli could feel hundreds of pairs of eyes boring in her back, along with the Daxarian queen’s and king’s, but it was the duke’s and duchess’s gaze she braced for.
The house witch’s face came up first, life and hope instantly sparking in his expression while the duchess whirled around.
“What do you mean?” Annika demanded.
Eli couldn’t quite hold her wild gaze, but it helped that Katarina stood up from the ground and had also turned to look at her intently.
“Kraken and I are going to go see about bringing him back. Bring him inside immediately. I am sorry you had to see this, but please hurry. Otherwise he may not be able to come back right. I can’t move very quickly yet, but it is important.”
She was starting to worry that they would insist she explain more, or that she would need to urge them again, but in an instant Kat dove for her brother, scooped him up with a flaring of her aura, and bolted with incredible speed to the castle.
Fin rose, his jaw set with determination.
Annika darted to his side, and as a unit they retreated to the castle without another word.
Eli blinked in awe.
Then, as she was about to turn to Kraken to verify he was ready to go, Eric appeared in front of her.
“Can you really bring him back?” he asked quietly.
She jerked her chin stiffly as the rain plastered her hair to her head. “I’m not completely certain, but I will do what I can.”
Eric nodded, then swept his sights over to the army, which was experiencing an outbreak of murmurs. “Do whatever you can. I’m guessing the plan is to tell everyone that Tam was possessed and that his death and resurrection obliterated the devil?”
Eli bowed her head. “Yes.”
Eric nodded again. “Got it.”
The king lowered his head, his hazel eyes darkening as he faced down the army. “And is the devil gone?”
“If I do it right, he should be,” Eli explained, though it was a much more complicated answer than that.
Eric allowed himself a half smile of relief. “Good. I’m sick of fighting against my wife.”
“THE ASHOWANS HAVE RETREATED! ATTACK!”
Eli whirled around to face the army beside Eric, her eyes flashing.
It had been one of the witches.
A snarl started to build in Eli’s throat, but she was startled back into silence when a screeching roar rang out, and a large, golden scaled body landed with a thud on the ground in front of her and Eric.
Wixim stood between the castle and the army.
“I’ll deal with this,” Eric managed after overcoming the shock of Wixim’s appearance. “Go get Tam.”
Eli inclined herself slightly, then looked down at Kraken who—under any other circumstances—would’ve been hilarious to look at given his drenched state.
“Alright. You show me how I get to the Forest of the Afterlife, and I’ll remember not to change back into my human form while there.”
Kraken blinked.
Eli let out a steadying breath, then shifted into her beast form. She could hear the army’s alarmed shouts and clamoring at the sight of her other form, but Wixim looked over at them, his lips curling into a smile before he winked.
She gave a low purr in response.
“ LET’S MOVE, KITTEN!” Kraken roared as he bolted across the field toward the west, where the King’s Forest lay.
Kasha took off after him, easily catching up thanks to her greater size, despite being slower even in her beast state. However, just before she could ask him to describe the funny glimmer out of the corner of her eye that Kraken had said she was supposed to see, he veered right.
She followed, and as they made it around the corner of the castle, he darted left. Kasha blindly followed, but as she did… she saw it. The flicker of another scene. Trees closer than they should have been…
Did she need to chase it more?
She skidded to a halt and looked down at Kraken, who had stopped and was sitting licking his paw.
“I saw it! I think, anyway… Don’t we have to keep going?” she asked breathlessly.
Kraken put his paw down. “We’re here. Tam should be close.”
Kasha balked.
She was in the Forest of the Afterlife? Already? It was that easy?
She looked around, and realized…
It was warm and sunny.
It wasn’t rainy with hail. And when she looked behind herself, the castle wasn’t there. Instead, she saw an ocean of bright-green grass spread over rolling hills with a lone dirt road that seemed to lead to nowhere.
She looked back in front of herself and noticed trees she had never seen the likes of before. They towered higher than any castle or palace she had ever seen, with bark and branch shapes that did not exist in reality.
Birds chirped peacefully, and her body felt… lighter. All aches and pains had disappeared, and she felt fully energized.
She sniffed the air…
Mint. Frankincense.
Tam, she thought, her heart fluttering.
She galloped forward, straight for the first line of trees. She bolted around trunks wider than carriages, hopped over flower clusters of the most brilliant blues and purples, until at last she came to a clearing.
Skidding to a halt, she found Tam, leaning his shoulder against a tree trunk with his arms crossed. His gaze was fixed on something in the distance.
He was whole. He was himself. He was unharmed.
On quaking legs, Kasha approached him.
He turned, his eyes widening in surprise, sparking panic in Kasha that he had had his memories taken from him by Death on his way to the Forest. Kraken had warned them that could happen…
But then he said, “I think you’re even bigger than before.”
Kasha couldn’t even be mad over his insensitive comment; she gently pushed her head into his chest.
“The Gods are just talking with Aradia. We’ll speak to them afterward.”
Kasha didn’t say anything, but her heart raced in her chest.
The next part would be difficult, but… it would be okay. If she was with Tam, anything was possible.
It had to be.