Chapter 12
KALLIE
All sense of time vanished.
Kallie didn't know how many hours or days had passed or even where she was when she opened her eyes. When she woke, she didn't even know whether she faced reality or some figment of her imagination. Every time she came to, a different sight greeted her.
Sometimes, she awoke to trees above her, as golden rays of sunlight seeped through the forest canopy and birds hopped from branch to branch. The breeze kissed her cheek, and the calming scent of cedar and oak brushed her nose. Other times, the sound of a roaring waterfall was the first thing she heard before she felt the kiss of the too-vibrant sun on her skin.
Right before dread filled her bones once she took note of the rock where Fynn sat.
And then there were the other visions and sounds that flashed before her--ones she could barely make sense of before they vanished.
The mazes the king built beneath the castle, the sweat soaking her limbs as she ran through them.
The plethora of bruises that covered her arms and ribcage in a macabre design only her father could dare hope to fashion.
Graeson beneath her, her hands wrapped around his throat.
The screams that ripped from her lips as she was dragged away from a home she had long-since forgotten.
The countless fires that she had survived but now threatened to take her.
Every time one of those nightmares appeared, Kallie pushed them away as fast as she could, fighting them at every turn before they had a chance to swallow her whole.
Yet they persisted. They came at her, one after another, endlessly.
But she could do nothing to stop them, although she tried.
So, whenever the sky appeared, the brilliant green leaves rustling in the wind, and a comforting warmth pressed against her back, Kallie tried to hold onto those moments for as long as she could.
But without fail, voices would soon sound, though her senses were still too disoriented to parse them.
"She's waking," a familiar voice would shout.
Followed by another more melodic voice saying, "On it."
When the darkness swept over her and the heaviness of sleep covered her bones, Kallie could do nothing but sink into that feeling, welcoming the never-ending shadows.
Kallie heard the waterfall before she saw the water's surface sparkling in the sunlight, unnaturally blue and blinding. She squinted at the foam that formed where the water rushed into the lake and sighed.
"Why is it always here?" she asked, not bothering to look for her brother, for she knew he would be here. When Fynn was near, the world was different: a little brighter, a little lighter, as if his very spirit soaked the earth.
"That is what you wish to ask me?" Fynn asked incredulously beside her. "Why we are at the Whispering Springs?"
Kallie shrugged. "It is as good of a question as any, is it not?" she asked, without bothering to turn around, her gaze fixed on the waterfall.
She could almost make out the entrance of the cave behind it. The ghostly outlines of the statues of Pontanius and Sabina loomed inside.
It had only been a few months since she had first visited the springs with Graeson, yet so much had happened since then. And yet, it felt as if nothing had changed. She still didn't have a crown, nor had she proven herself worthy of one.
Instead, here she was again, being dragged across the continent.
When her brother remained silent, she wrapped her arms around herself tightly and muttered, "You have told me little as it is, Fynn. You can at least answer that."
"I have told you plenty, Kallie, but you refuse to listen."
Kallie groaned and strolled forward, her feet sinking into the cool, damp sand along the shore. Although Kallie hadn't heard him approach, Fynn now stood beside her.
Brushing a hand through his hair, he sighed. "We are here because this place is embedded with Pontanius and Sabina's spirits."
Kallie's brows furrowed. Perhaps that was why there was a strange energy here. "Is this a dream?" Kallie wondered.
He paused, then said, "Of sorts."
"How can it be a dream of sorts ? Are we here, or are we not here?" Kallie asked, perplexed as she stared out at the water.
Whatever this was seemed unlike any of her other dreams. It was visceral and vivid in a way she couldn't quite fathom. The water looked and felt real. She could feel the coarse grains of sand scrape her skin. She could smell the moss in the air. And yet...
"In the physical sense of the word? No, we are not here , Kalisandre." He peered at her from the corner of his eye and smirked, his brows arched. "I am dead, after all. I no longer walk the mortal plane."
"The mortal plane?" she repeated, sparing him a glance.
Fynn hummed, folding his hands behind his back. "There is the world of the living, the world of the dead, and the world of the gods."
"Am I dead then? Is that it?" The very thought filled her with dread as she shifted uncomfortably.
Fynn chuckled. "No, you are not dead, sister." He tilted his head toward the sky, smiling softly with amusement. "Although from what I have gathered, my wife did knock you out cold."
Hesitantly, Kallie reached up and felt a bump on the back of her head where Dani must have struck her. She couldn't remember the incident clearly. But as she tried to recall it, anger bloomed.
Her hands fell to her sides, her nails biting into the flesh of her palms and knuckles blanching. Kallie could sense Fynn's eyes on her, but she refused to meet them as the memory of the fight resurfaced.
But the more she mulled the fight over, the more she realized she could do nothing about it. Not here.
By the gods, Kallie still didn't even understand where here was.
Fynn kicked at the sand. "You and Dani would have been best friends, you know. Always looking for logic rather than accepting things for what they are."
Kallie recalled thinking the same thing once upon a time, how the two of them would have grown up together, how they would have studied and trained together with the twins and Graeson.
But that was in another life, one that Kallie could never return to. One she never truly possessed.
"Her forgiveness will not be easy to earn," Fynn said after a moment.
Folding her arms over her chest, Kallie scoffed. "I do not want her forgiveness. I do not wish for the forgiveness of any of them."
Her brother snorted. "That is a lie."
"It is not," Kallie spat. "I do not care what they think of me."
Fynn laughed, and the sound bounced off the cliffs as if to haunt her. "You care more than you think."
Kallie rolled her eyes. "And you call me the liar."
Fynn turned to her, then took a step closer, staring at her with an intensity that Kallie could not ignore despite her efforts. "Tell me this: why do you believe you don't want their forgiveness?"
"I don't believe it; I know it, Fynn," she said pointedly.
He brushed his hair back and looked at Kallie with such sadness. "By the gods, Domitius really does have his claws deeper in you than I first thought."
"What?" Kallie exclaimed, stepping back. "No, he doesn't."
"Then why is it that the first thing you ask me is why we are in this place? Why isn't it about the dreams you've been having? The memories that Terin has been pulling from the back of your mind?"
"Terin can't--" Kallie swallowed, her eyes narrowing. She retreated another step. "Terin is not Esmeray. He cannot access my memories."
"He can't while you are awake, but when you are asleep?" Fynn smirked, the twitch of his lip sending a spike of anxiety spiraling through Kallie's bones. "The mind is a pliable thing, sister. You should know that better than most.
"It is why you can manipulate people and bend them to your will. It is why I could read people's thoughts, why our mother can strip one's memories. People often underestimate Terin because, on the surface, his gift appears to be just the ability to knock people out and slip through their dreams. But they are gravely mistaken to underestimate him. He can manipulate their very dreams. He can bring another person--dead or alive--into one's dreams, for he can open a world between the living and the dead.
"That, dear sister, is why we are here. Terin has made it so. But that is not the extent of his gift. Our dreams often reflect our past. Our nightmares are the tragedies we wish to forget, the mistakes we wish never to relive.
"It requires immense concentration, but Terin is able to grab someone's memory and weave it into a dream." Her brother gazed over the waterfall, at the roaring water crashing down.
Kallie shook her head in denial. "You speak nonsense."
With a sad smile, Fynn peered back at Kallie. "I speak the truth."
Kallie bit down, the muscles in her jaw twitching.
Fynn cocked his head to the side. "What have you been dreaming about, Kallie?"
"Nothing," Kallie mumbled, dropping her gaze to look at the sand.
Fynn stepped closer. "Dig deeper. Recall the dream before this. Where were you?"
"I don't know," Kallie whispered, hugging herself tightly as a gust of wind swept over her and tangled in her hair.
Fynn gripped her shoulders, shaking her slightly. Without meaning to, Kallie looked up, but it was a mistake. His brown eyes seared into hers as if Fynn was trying to look into her very soul.
"Yes, you do. Think back, Kallie." Fynn squeezed her shoulders harder. "Where were you? Who were you with?"
Kallie blinked.
"I--" The words were caught on her tongue as she riffled through her mind. But no matter how much she tried, she couldn't remember.
"Come on, Kallie," he whispered, his gaze skimming across her face, searching, pleading. "If you still remain loyal to Domitius and truly believe he cares for you, then why are you afraid to recall the dream?"
Kallie took a jilted step back, causing Fynn's hands to fall from her shoulders. Fynn, however, took a step forward as well, matching her.
A scene flashed before her eyes, but she shook it away. She didn't want to think about it. She didn't want to see whatever it was he was trying to make her remember.
Kallie retreated further, but the moment the sole of her foot hit the sand, her ankle rolled.
Kallie hissed in pain as she fell to her knees.
"Kallie," Fynn said warily.
"I don't remember!" Kallie shouted, squeezing her eyes shut.
"Yes, you do!"
Kallie flinched, but it wasn't Fynn's voice she heard.
"You are weak, Kalisandre!"
She pressed her palms against her ears in an attempt to block out the noise. But no matter how hard she pressed or how hard she tried to ignore it, her father's words slipped through, ripping through her palms and filling her eardrums.
He shouldn't be here , she thought. He can't see me like this. He shouldn't--
"Despicable!" her father shouted.
Tears burned her eyes and rushed down her face as she shook her head. But even as her head pounded, as she pressed her palms harder against her ears, her father's words kept coming.
"You are pitiful. Yet you want a crown? Ha!"
This was wrong.
All wrong.
Whatever her brothers were trying to show her was a lie--a facade, a charade. A fabricated story to get her to believe them and convince her to betray her father.
"This isn't real. This isn't real!" Kallie shouted.
"Just because you refuse to remember does not make it false," Fynn said, his voice a faint whisper in her ear as if he were yards away. "You cannot keep running from your past, Kalisandre."
"You're wrong!" she cried. "You're lying! He wouldn't--he loves me!"
She tried to hold onto the truth, to the father she knew, the man who raised her, cared for her, and trained her.
Her brother's tone was sad, distant now. "A true parent does not need you to prove your worth to them. You have to know that."
Kallie shook her head. Agony ripped at her lungs as she screamed, a blood-curdling noise pouring from her throat. Still, her father's voice seeped out and wrapped around her limbs, strangling her.
"You want power? You desire a throne? What kind of ruler falls to their knees? What kind of ruler crumbles at the sight of blood? Sacrifices must be made, Kalisandre!" he roared.
Her cheeks were damp, and her screams became mangled as her father's words surrounded her broken body.
They squeezed, twisted, and pierced her heart.
"You are weak," he spat.
Her mind felt as if it was being torn apart as past assignments from her father resurfaced: various names written in elegant handwriting on slim envelopes, a vial of poison given to a lord who had disagreed with a ruling; another poison given to a man who had spoken aloud a name which should have stayed forgotten; a dagger pressed into the hand of a guard who had seen too much.
"No, no, no," Kallie repeated, gripping her hair.
Her brothers didn't understand.
"Sacrifices must be made for the--" Kallie groaned in pain as she tried and failed to repeat the words she had been trained to say.
"You are unworthy."
"No!" Even though she knew he could not hear her, she shouted anyway.
"You are nothing ."
Pain seared through her head as if her very mind was on fire.
What were her brothers doing to her?
"Stop it! Stop!" But no one listened, and the pain continued as her brothers rifled through her mind.
With her arms wrapped around her knees, her body shook, and her lip quivered as tears ran down her face and the screams continued to pour from her lungs.
Someone tried to reach out.
Fynn? Terin? Her father?
She couldn't tell. Either way, they tried to cut through the noise, beckoning her.
But her name was no more than a whisper on their lips. They tried to shake her, to stir her, but she threw them off as panic overtook her body.
Kallie kept rocking as she continued to cry and scream into the air.
Then, when she thought she couldn't scream anymore, darkness consumed her whole.