45. Chapter 45
The world swam, familiar sounds and sights crashing into Isla as she gripped the edge of the pedestal, blinking her eyes back into focus. Stomach roiling, Isla dragged her eyes around the chamber. Everyone looked as off-balance as she felt, as though they had woken from some strange dream.
Lyra sat against the wall, hugging her knees to her chest. Aurelia pressed a hand to her chest, eyes wide.
Next to her, Drae breathed heavily, his eyes on Aurelia.
Evric leaned one hand against the chamber’s stone walls, looking as though he might spill the contents of his stomach at any minute.
Isla locked eyes with Vaelin, the tendons in his neck straining as he fought to slow his own breathing.
He nodded, his jaw tight. They had all seen what Isla had seen.
The world seemed to tilt and Isla staggered, tightening her grip on the pedestal.
Vaguely, she was aware of Vaelin moving to her side, steadying her elbow.
The truths the shard had revealed threatened to snatch the air from her lungs.
The sacrifice that had been made so long ago that had doomed them all to a future they did not deserve.
The desperate actions of one woman trying to atone for a wrong that could not be undone.
And of course, the undeniable confirmation of Isla’s heritage, for even she could not ignore the resemblance between Etara and Isla herself.
Isla turned, slowly meeting Asmarin’s golden stare.
The Seer alone appeared unshaken and unsurprised by the memory.
The shock had rolled through Isla like a physical blow when Asmarin had walked into the memory.
The Seer’s appearance had been slightly different, her hair pitch black instead of silver, face smooth, with no lines marking her age.
She had been young - very young. But it had unmistakably been her.
Even in that era, she had carried herself with the same proud stature, expectant of respect and attention.
“You were there,” Isla said, unable to keep the wonderment from threading its way into her tone. “How?”
The faintest twitch at the corner of Asmarin’s lips. “The fae are not the only long-lived peoples on this continent.”
“But you knew,” Evric said, his tone accusatory. “You were there. You knew this was coming this whole time. And you did nothing?”
The Seer’s eyes flashed, the first sign of unrestrained emotion Isla had seen in the ancient woman.
“I did not do nothing. I did what I could, what was within my ability to do. I brokered a deal with the fae to see a perimeter wall built and magically fortified around The City. I prepared our defences, trained and armed our gate guards. I ensured the safety of Dunovar’s ancient histories and the memory shard — for centuries.
And I waited,” she paused then, looking to Isla, “for the one who could heal the cracks that had begun to form.”
Silence stretched, tight and wary. Isla swallowed. Vaelin brushed a thumb over the crook of her arm.
Evric scoffed. “So you did what you could to protect yourself. Still, you could have said something, told us what you had Seen, what you had lived,” he insisted, hands fisted at his sides.s
Asmarin was not cowed. “As I have already told you, what we See is often blurred, fractured. This is no secret. Beyond these walls, who would believe the ravings of yet another Seer? And even if they believed... what would you have had me do? Ask the Shifters and the fae nicely to stop their warring? Tell the fae to stop drawing upon the source? Suggest the Shadowborne put aside centuries of plotting for fae rule? Tell the humans to stop isolating themselves, to attempt to integrate with the much stronger, antagonistic fae?”
Evric ground his teeth, a muscle twitching in his jaw, the truth of her words slicing like a blade.
The Seer’s sharp eyes shifted to Vaelin, “Your own King dismissed Sereth Starfire's warning until it was too late, her funeral pyre igniting before his very eyes,” Vaelin flinched as though struck and Isla felt a sympathetic pang in her chest. “That is the nature of prophecy — it is often only believed once it is too late.”
“She’s right,” Vaelin ground out. His voice was raw, like he had dragged it over the sharp gravel of grief and painful memories. “So there is nothing we can do, then?”
“That is not what I said,” the Seer clipped. “You were all brought into Etara’s memory, thanks to this chamber amplifying Isla’s imprinting ability. As you saw, Etara left these memories for the Shardseeker to find, so they might piece together the answer to ending The Shattering.”
“Five shards, five realms,”Aurelia recited quietly, and Asmarin inclined her head.
“She entrusted a shard to one representative in each realm, though I am the only original keeper that remains.
It is likely that the other shards are hidden or even kept under guard as relics — I fear those who possess them today may be unlikely to know their function.
I'm afraid they may not come as easily as this one did.”
“But you were there,” Evric repeated. “Can't you just tell us what the queen wanted us to know, instead of sending us traipsing across the continent?”
“No, I cannot,” Asmarin said with finality, and Isla’s stomach dropped.
She splayed a hand over it, as if that might help to calm the unease that seemed to roil there as the Seer continued.
“I do not know what memories Etara imbued into the shards, nor do I know where or to whom she entrusted them. I was not a member of her retinue during the time she and King Roan fought in their own attempt to prevent The Shattering. I did not even know what to expect from the shard for which I have been keeper all this time,” she said, her gaze shifting to the stone.
“All I knew was that it would give you the knowledge you required to seek the others.”
Isla's heartbeat pounded in her ears as the weight of the conversation hit her like a blow. You are the Shardseeker. How was she supposed to do this? Why her? She had barely made it to Dunovar in one piece — now she was expected to travel to all four corners of the continent in search of ancient relics that may or may not still exist? And all in the faint hope that when - if - she obtained all of these memories, she’d be able to put the pieces of the puzzle together in a way that might prevent a world-ending calamity.
She nearly laughed, the words she had spat defiantly at Vaelin a lifetime ago drifting back to her.
I’m just a healer. What could I possibly have to do with any of this?
“If they failed, what chance do we have?” Isla heard herself speak as though from somewhere far away. She blinked and the present seemed to crash back into her as she looked to Asmarin.
The Seer met her stare with something like sympathy. “That is in large part why Etara left you these memories — a map of what she tried, and why it failed, and how you might do it differently.”
Isla fisted her hands at her sides to stop their trembling, feeling as though she had been swallowed by the dunes themselves, the weight of the sands pressing down on her from all sides, stealing the air from her lungs.
Her throat tightened with a sharp ache. As though searching for an anchor she turned to Vaelin, only to find his eyes intently fixed on her.
Without looking away from her, he spoke, his own voice ragged. “How do we locate them?”
We.
A warmth seemed to glow in Isla as she held his gaze, spreading from her chest to the very tips of her fingers and toes.
He tilted his head slightly to the side as if to say, Did you really think I’d let you do this alone?
She swallowed, nodding curtly, hoping that her eyes conveyed every emotion, every word she couldn’t say aloud. Thank you. Thank you.
Lyra cleared her throat. “I’ve been gathering bits and pieces of information from ancient texts that mention relics that may or may not be the shards, in hopes of answering that very question.
I’ve spent the last two years tracing threads of information through centuries of broken timelines to present day, in hopes of providing the Shardseeker with some sort of map,” she looked at Isla, her gaze heavy with sympathy.
“It wasn’t until recently that I realized that the Shardseeker was… you.”
Isla swallowed hard, finding herself unable to speak.
“So what have you found?” Vaelin asked Lyra.
“I started with Vaelora — or Vaeloria, as it used to be called. It was more difficult in some ways, given how large the realm is, but easier in others, given how long-lived the fae are in comparison to humans. It was more difficult to trace the connections in the histories that related to Terravern, but I’ve been able to uncover some leads there as well.
There’s little and less information about Askeldrath—”
“That’s because they’re illiterate savages,” Evric interrupted.
Across the room, Drae growled low in his throat and the temperature in the room seemed to warm slightly.
“Just because we favour oral histories and generational knowledge over the written word doesn’t mean we’re illiterate, you prejudiced asshole.
Askeldrath is also filled with active volcanoes — lava isn’t exactly conducive to bookkeeping. ”
“Enough,” Aurelia said, silencing the men and turning back to Asmarin. “In the memory, Etara referred to five realms,” she noted. “What is the fifth?”
Isla felt her brow furrow with confusion, realizing the truth of Aurelia’s words.
There were only four realms in the continent.
The tapestry Etara had run her fingers along rose in her memory suddenly — Isla had recognized it vaguely as a map of their continent, but it hadn’t been quite right.
It resembled the world she knew, but looked as if it had been drawn by someone who hadn’t been confident in the exact shape of the realms. The borders had been unfamiliar and larger than Isla knew them to be.
Other oddities had stood out, too -- Askeldrath had been too verdant, Terravern less wooded, Dunovar peppered with settlements, Valeora less far-reaching.
And to the north, a fifth landmass that didn’t exist.
“The fifth realm we referred to then was Velithor,” Asmarin said.
“But Velithor was destroyed,” Isla said, and it felt like dragging her voice over broken glass.
Asmarin inclined her head slightly, “It was. And it is true that the moment King Roan’s bargain was sealed, Velithor as we knew it then ceased to exist. However, the remnants of the realm continue to exist today, in a place that is seldom spoken of, and even more rarely visited.”
Isla watched as a flicker of recognition crossed Aurelia’s face.
“The Isles,” Vaelin said, his expression grim.
“Yes,” Asmarin said simply.
“Well that’s just great,” Evric said dryly, dragging a hand over his face.
Isla squeezed her eyes shut, wanting to ask what The Isles were, and why the fae in the room seemed so taken aback by their mention, but she wasn’t sure she could handle much more of this conversation.
“I suggest,” Asmarin began, “you all take the evening to rest and absorb what you have learned here today. We can reconvene in the morning to decide on next steps.”
“We’re on a bit of a clock here, unless I’m missing something,” Evric snapped.
“The illness is still killing people, the earth is dying, and war is well underway. There is a literal cataclysm barreling down on us, and searching all of the realms is going to take some time. Not to mention, if we do manage to find these shards, only Isla can unlock them. If we’re going to do this, we need to get moving. Fast.”
“And where do you propose we start, firewielder?” Drae drawled.
“We?” Evric snapped at him.
“How do you expect to get in and out of Askeldrath in one piece without me?” the Shifter returned.
“I haven’t decided yet,” Evric shrugged, “But seeing as they kicked you over the border and left you for dead, something tells me you won’t exactly gain us a welcoming committee.”
Drae glowered at Evric, whose mouth quirked up in a savage smirk, knowing he’d hit his mark.
“Do the histories suggest any sort of pattern?” Aurelia asked Lyra, ignoring them both. “If one shard is intended to lead us to the next, is there any indication of which realm we should search first?”
Lyra grimaced. “It’s not that simple…”
As Lyra answered Aurelia, Isla stepped forward, peering at the memory shard, letting the conversation drift into the back of her mind.
It looked so unassuming, a chunk of unremarkable rock left in a forgotten chamber.
She blinked, a memory of the ancient fae king - Roan - smashing the original memory stone into five jagged pieces.
She tilted her head, eyes tracing the shard, and that soft humming rose again in her ears.
Without thinking, she reached out a hand, brushing her fingers gingerly along its jagged edge.
The shard alighted with golden webbing, tendrils licking eagerly up Isla’s forearm.
Her eyes flared wide as a vision rose in her mind.
A dense forest, a mixture of pines and firs, bare branches reaching into seldom used trails like eager fingers.
A heavy, eerie mist coating the forest, mountains to the north and the churning seas to the east, a ghostly laugh on the winds.
Shadows in the treeline. The rushing of a waterfall, and a scream splitting the air.
She gasped, and Vaelin was there, steadying her with a hand to her upper back.
“I’m okay,” she said, breathless.
“Terravern,” she said aloud to the group, and everyone fell silent as they turned to her. “The next shard is in Terravern.”