Chapter 25 Eryx
ERYX
Ember marched me through the halls of the lyceum, moving quickly, her eyes furtive. It was obvious that what we were doing was not allowed, that we should not be here. Somewhere in the distance, from within the building itself, there was trouble brewing.
The sound of voices raised with alarm came from within.
Though no extra footsteps sounded next to me, a figure appeared.
I reached out to touch Ember’s arm. Her head swiveled, eyes wide as she tried to focus on the noise from inside the building and what happened here at the same time.
I placed one finger up, the signal to hold. She nodded.
“Cassandra?” I whispered.
The spirit turned to me. She was dressed as the people in the frescoes had been, a flowing white gown and heavy gold jewelry adorning her.
Her face was a bit different now, the lines of her features more defined somehow, as though I’d always seen her through a blurred lens before.
She looked like Rhiannon. She smiled faintly as she materialized. Ember took a sharp breath next to me.
“You must go,” she murmured. “You and Rhiannon must close the way. Even now, the humans grow closer to finding it. The third Blaire is not so foolish as the first was. He has been tracking your progress.”
Ember’s mouth fell open. “You are Cassandra?”
The spirit nodded. “I masked myself as much as I could the few times we met. I have a bit of a way with magic.”
Ember took hold of my arm. “This is the queen’s sister, Eryx. Rhiannon’s aunt.” Ember glared at Cassandra. “She doesn’t have a bit of magic; she’s one of the most powerful mages that ever lived. And she disappeared when Rhiannon was just a little girl.”
I knew it. I knew she was connected to Rhiannon in some way.
The signs were all there, but it was so unheard of for there to be Maere that were unknown to us, that I’d dismissed it as some sort of mirroring.
Some feature of the trap to make both Rhiannon and myself feel affinity for her.
But the truth was that she’d needed both of us all along. Her niece and Magnus’ nephew.
The first time we’d encountered Cassandra in her corpse garb, she’d struggled so hard to tell us this. The next generation is the answer. Find the key and find the truth.
“What is Blaire looking for?” I asked.
Cassandra gestured to the walls around us. “He is looking for this. He is looking for the answer to immortality. To find magic and release it. To keep it for his own.
“But he cannot do that, not just because it would destroy the world—and it would. But because humans were not made to bear the weight of magic. It is a blessing that they cannot wield it—but they have mistaken it for a curse.”
Ember’s eyes widened. Her hand closed around my arm as Cassandra’s words sank in. I nodded at her as I fully understood. Our powers, our talents, they were a burden.
Humans were jealous of the things we could do.
But they didn’t know the ways it harmed us.
They didn’t understand the sensitivity it created, the way the world and all its cruelty were all the harder for it.
The way that even light could hurt us, or too many sounds or smells.
They had no idea that to carry these talents meant allowing the world to hurt us, with absolutely no barrier.
They thought we felt nothing. That our power shielded us, made things too easy for us. But it was the opposite. We felt it all. That’s what our powers were. Us feeling the entire world, all at once.
And Blaire wanted to unleash that onto humanity.
To live forever, because he saw it as a way to gain more power.
This had never been about overwhelming the world with the dead.
The first Blaire had let Magnus think it was because that is what my uncle had wanted. But Cassandra had seen through that.
“You tried to tell Roman, didn’t you?” I asked.
She nodded. “Hundreds of years before I married Magnus, I came to your father and told him how important it was that we make sure no doors to the underworld were allowed to go unprotected. I didn’t know that telling him about the island would cause us both to forget.”
Ember looked as though she might cry. “You didn’t know about the spells? About what they would do to you?”
Cassandra shook her head, as though in slow motion, staring into Ember’s eyes. “Because I was not sanctified—because I had not gone through the rituals you did, it did more than just make me forget. It ruined my ability as a Seer, destroyed my magic.”
“But you did remember, eventually,” I said, wondering how she’d known to protect the door to the underworld.
Cassandra smiled, though there was so much grief in her eyes, I wondered what she’d had to sacrifice for her memory. “Yes, though that is a story we don’t have time for. Eventually, I remembered, and regained some of my power.
“And I returned to Orphium, having changed my appearance so much that no one recognized me.” Grief lined her face as she closed her eyes.
She looked so much like Rhiannon in that moment that I would have done anything to prevent a future where the woman I cared for was so marred by the past. “I married Magnus to protect the island, but also to protect humans. They are not so bad as we sometimes make them out to be.”
Ember sucked in a breath. “No group of people is as bad as those who misuse their power.”
Cassandra nodded. “You are wise, Ember Verona. You and my niece have the power to change this world for the better. To be better than the Authority, the Consulate, and even the Trinity.” The sounds from inside the lyceum had turned from urgent to panicked.
Cassandra gripped Ember’s arms. “I wish we had more time. You must get to my sister, and to Myrine. They must prepare a host here. They must hold the line.”
Ember nodded, glancing at me. “You okay with her?”
“Yes,” I agreed. Ember broke into a sprint, her footsteps loud on the marble floors as she disappeared. “What do I do?”
Cassandra’s relief was palpable, but she wasn’t finished.
“Magnus hasn’t crossed over, Eryx. That is why I stayed, originally, it’s how what you and Rhiannon called the ‘finger trap’ of Oleander Cottage was made.
I never meant for so many to perish.” Her eyes were wide, her mouth turned down with the weight of so much guilt.
She looked behind her, as though seeing something I didn’t.
“I will deal with him as best I can, but I may need your brother’s help. ”
I nodded. “Of course. If Ares can end him, once and for all, he will. I don’t know how Magnus got around him to begin with.”
Cassandra looked behind her again, and this time there was terror in her eyes. “You have to go. Use the key to the basement. Cut off the passage to the island in the underworld. Rhiannon will know what to do.”
Rhiannon will know what to do. She would, but that didn’t mean I did.
I had a vague awareness that my body was not here, that I was only here in some sort of facsimile.
I also understood now that the people of Otrera were the mages of lore—they were the witches—the originators of all parapsych powers.
“Wait,” I gasped. “I need to get back to Rhiannon. My body is in the Library of Amarante.”
For the briefest of moments, Cassandra looked confused. Her forehead wrinkled as she worked things out, then smoothed. Her arms stretched towards mine. “Take a deep breath.”
I nodded, not wanting to distract Cassandra from what she did.
Corporeal fingers wrapped around my hands, warm and comforting.
Somewhere, in a distant place in my mind, they tore my hands off the plinth in the Library.
The hallway melted away, and I stood at the bottom of the stairs in Oleander Cottage.
Rhiannon was racing down them, Lara close behind her.
She practically tumbled into my arms, startled by my sudden appearance. But she didn’t miss a beat. “Blaire is going to invade the island. He’s looking for the secret to immortality. There’s a door somewhere in the underworld.”
I nodded. “It’s already happening.”
Lara, who had stopped on the stairs, shook her head. “Ember took you to the Library?”
“Yes,” I said as I steadied Rhiannon. “I’ve been to the island, and I saw Cassandra there.”
“She’s my aunt.” She didn’t look up at me. “I never even knew she existed.”
But Ember had. What would Rhiannon do when she found out? Now wasn’t the time for telling her, I knew that much.
“She said you’d know what to do,” I replied.
Rhiannon held up the keys we’d found. “We have to get to the basement.”
So, we were going through the door to the underworld. Behind Rhiannon, Lara had the sense to look concerned. “Calypso is on her way to help Ember. Sera needs to stay here with Briony. She’s still not strong enough to go.”
I nodded. “What about Ares?”
Rhiannon smiled weakly. “He’s afraid of what might happen on this side, if the dead get free. He’s assembling a team to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
Our bases were covered. All we could do now was go help. “Let’s do this, then.”