Chapter Three
Thyra
My heart pounds, thudding in my chest as I run as fast as I can.
Desperation fuels my speed.
I have to get away from the man dressed in black steel, whose savage green eyes stripped my soul bare. He’s highborn, I’m sure of it, and he must be an Iron Fae because he carried an iron blade.
But highborn Iron Fae have brown eyes. All of them do. It’s an accepted fact.
The smoke thickens around me as I sprint out of the alley and race between buildings, following a maze-like path northward, deliberately weaving back and forth.
I have to get to my father, but I can’t risk leading any highborn to him.
How did he not foresee this?
I’ve lost count of the number of times he woke me in the middle of the night, telling me we had to move because his Oracle power had shown him danger in our future. Oracle visions are meant to prevent harm. If we’d left this village days ago, this destruction wouldn’t be happening.
A shocking possibility occurs to me: Did he see these events and keep them from me?
The question nearly drives me to a standstill.
But, if so, why?
I have no answers to these questions, and now is not the time to ponder them.
Along every path I take, villagers are either running from their homes or fleeing into them, although neither option will provide them with safety.
High above me in the sky, two more golden serpents appear, along with two more eagles, as an aerial battle rages, increasing the threat to everyone on the ground.
Tiny, fiery embers glisten in the air, floating down toward rooftops, where they smolder, filling my path with smoke.
Within moments, I can’t see further than a few feet ahead.
The charred smoke of burning iron fills my chest.
The thudding of rapid footfalls behind me fills my heart with dread.
The Frost Fae are following me.
Well, maybe I can force them to do some good.
Casting a quick glance at the sky, I make out the shapes of serpents and eagles through the smoke, and now, I deliberately run in their direction, taking a dangerous gamble.
Multiple fireballs blaze brightly above me, and I follow their trajectory, running as fast as I can along their path.
If the Frost Fae are following me, then they’ll have to contend with the Ember fire and, hopefully, put a stop to it.
Loud curses reach me through the smoke, and I recognize the Frost woman’s voice, confirming she’s nearby.
Her voice falls behind me moments before icy-blue power blazes across the air above my head, colliding with the fire in the sky.
At least I could help the villagers a little.
Turning once more, I weave back around buildings and along further streets, finally confident that the Frost Fae have fallen far behind me.
It’s safe now to slip quietly along the pathway leading to the carpenters’ workshop.
I’m nearly to my father, but the silence in this part of the village is eerie.
Behind me, screams shatter the air, the chaos filled with the thumping of running feet and sizzling magic, but here, the silence is oppressive.
I slow down, creeping the final distance to the workshop at the northern tip of the village.
A haze of smoke wafts across the wide, pebbled courtyard at the front of the structure. The building itself has two large doors, both of which are currently wide open, so I can see right in. Within the workspace is the silhouette of the boat Father was working on.
Normally, there are other villagers working here. I didn’t expect them to stay while the village is being attacked, but I don’t see…anyone. Not a soul. Nobody even taking refuge.
I pause at the corner of the nearest building before I reach the workshop, pressing up against its cool wooden supports while I remain in the shadows, wary of making any sound.
A groan reaches me across the distance. “Thyra.”
It’s my father’s voice.
He wouldn’t call me if it weren’t safe.
I hurry from the shadows but keep my footfalls silent, which is a feat in these boots, as I move swiftly in the direction of his voice. Past the far left corner of the carpentry workshop and around to the side.
No!
I smother my cry of alarm as my father comes into view, where he has collapsed against the side of the building, his legs curled beneath him, and his left side leaning against the wall.
A knife protrudes from his chest.
I’m at his side in a heartbeat, kneeling beside him, my hands hovering above the blade’s hilt. If I pluck it out, he’ll bleed badly, but if I leave it there…
“Father.” My whisper is strangled. “Who did this?”
I try to identify the knife’s owner from its features, but it’s a simple weapon. There are no markings on it. Its hilt is wooden, a darker wood than any I’ve seen before, and the small portion of metal visible between the hilt and Father’s chest shows its blade isn’t iron.
Horrifyingly, it doesn’t look like the kind of knife a highborn would wield.
My voice chokes with horror. “Did one of the villagers do this to you?”
But why? My father and I have no enemies here. We’ve worked hard, never asked for more than food and a place to sleep, kept our heads down, and avoided conflict at all costs.
Father’s arm shakes as he raises one strong hand to grip my shoulder. He’s a lean man, his shoulders not as broad as some, but he proved to me time and time again that the strongest are not always the biggest.
“Spirits forgive me,” he whispers, his voice a weak rasp, his dull, black hair falling across his face and sticking to the beads of sweat forming on his forehead. “I didn’t foresee this.”
I’m filled with bitter relief that he didn’t deliberately keep these events from me, but it’s concerning that he didn’t foresee them. Worse is the blood seeping through his tunic and the rage growing within me.
“Who did this to you?” I press again. “Father! Who?”
I need him to tell me. I need to know which villager is responsible. I may never be able to seek justice, but at least I’ll know.
“I thought I had more time,” Father mumbles, his blue eyes now glazed, a sight that sends cracks through my heart. “My visions… They didn’t warn me… I thought I had more time…”
Tears burn my eyes, and my voice chokes in my throat.
No. Please.
Since I can remember, my father has been preparing me for the day when I might become the Oracle, the day he would no longer be here to protect me, but I didn’t believe such a day would come so soon.
I told myself his power was too strong.
He would always foresee danger before it happened. He would even foresee his own death and prepare me for it.
This…would never be possible.
I grit my teeth, a desperate promise on my lips. “You won’t die here.”
Reaching for him, I prepare to slip my arms around him, to help him to his feet and carry him away from the smoke and the screams of battle. I’m determined to bind his wound. To save him. I just need to get him somewhere safe first.
His grip on my arm tightens so much that he stops me.
“Unwrap the blade,” he says.
I freeze. Can only stare in shock, certain I hadn’t heard him correctly. “No, Father, you told me never to—”
“Unwrap the blade.” Between the sweaty strands of his hair, his faded blue eyes are rapidly brightening, a sign that his power must be flooding his mind. A sign I don’t want to acknowledge because it means he’s close to death.
“Unwrap the blade and your path will be clear.”
“No.”
The blade he speaks of is hidden in our home. I’ve never seen what it looks like beneath the aged, ivory silk in which it’s bound.
I’ve never touched it. Father forbade me from ever coming into contact with it until the time was right. Given that the time hasn’t been right for all twenty-five years of my life so far, I assumed he meant never.
He also refused to answer my questions about it. Just as he commanded me never to ask about my mother, so too he told me never to question him about the blade he has carried with him for as long as I can remember.
I curbed my curiosity long ago and trusted him.
Now he’s telling me to unwrap it?
Now…when I can see the life ebbing from his eyes and his voice is becoming weaker and…
“No.” I rapidly shake my head, struggling to focus on him through my tears as I deny the extent of his wound. “Keep fighting. Don’t die on me. Don’t you dare!”
“Thyra. Daughter. You know what happens when the Oracle dies.”
The next will rise.
I know this. And yet, I can’t stop shaking my head.
His hold on my arm doesn’t weaken. “You must prepare to come into your Oracle power now—”
“You aren’t dying!” My voice has risen to a loud whisper. Overly loud. Dangerously so. But my hands shake, and my mind whirls, and I want nothing more than to stop what’s happening.
A tear trickles down Father’s cheek, and then, even more quietly, “I’m already dead, Thyra.”
A cry leaves my lips at the awful realization that his power must be allowing him to speak during these final, precious moments, even though his heart has already stopped.
“No.” I shake my head. “No. Please.”
“Your Oracle visions will come to you soon.” His voice sounds like an echo, becoming fainter.
“Beware, daughter, for I know not what the blade’s curse will do to your Oracle visions.
I know not what manipulations you might experience once you unwrap it.
I’m sorry… So sorry, Thyra, for the pain you must now endure. ”
His words wash over me. He’s talking about my power, about the blade and a curse and manipulation, but none of that can matter to me right now when I’m about to lose him, and there’s nothing I can do to stop his death.
The power fades from his eyes. The tension drains from his body. This man who raised me and protected me and stood so tall and honorable, and now…
His hand drops from my arm, but I catch it, holding on as tightly as I can, refusing to believe he’s gone.
“Wake up.” I search his face, desperate for him to speak again, desperate to hear his voice, no matter what dire warnings he has for me that might fill me with confusion and fear. “Wake up!”
Tears flow down my cheeks, and I can’t stop them, can’t stop myself rocking forward, my forehead pressing to his as I grip his hand so tightly, I’d hurt him if he were…
Alive.
“Please. You have to live.”
He is more than the Oracle to me. He is my family, my only friend, the only person I could trust, and he spent his life protecting me.
I, in turn, protected him. We looked after each other. We hid together, eking out a humble life in plain sight, and now…
Closing my eyes, I sink into my grief and let the tears fall. The world is burning down around me, the roar of flames and crackles of burning wood bursting at the edges of my hearing, but at this moment, I drown in a terrible silence.
The silence that comes when the former Oracle’s Sight is no more. The space between the death of one and the rise of the next.
Slowly, very slowly, I place my father’s hand on the ground, intending to release him only for long enough to close his eyes with each of my thumbs, the gesture of respect he taught me.
“For he shall See no more,” I whisper, choking on these final words, as I begin the prayer to close his eyes. “For he shall—”
I gasp as my descending hand brushes an object wedged between his leg and the wall, and a sharp jolt of energy shoots up my arm.
I flinch backward as fast as I can. What…?
My mouth falls open to see the ribbon of aged, ivory silk trailing across my father’s ankle.
The wrapped blade. It’s here.
I recoil from it, the unbreakable rules Father taught me, making my movements instinctive.
Never touch this blade. Not even the cloth it’s wrapped in.
He gave it a name once: The Dragonstone Blade.
It was the one time he let slip more information than I believe he intended, telling me it was forged on an anvil made of dragonstone.
Later, I found out that dragonstone was the name given to the rare, melted-then-hardened bones of fire dragons.
Apparently, their flames were hotter even than Ember fire.
The blade’s name alone made me shudder, although I couldn’t be sure why. Dragons were vicious creatures, but we no longer needed to fear them.
Now I’m frozen, my heart slowly breaking while the haze of smoke increases around me.
Father must have retrieved the blade before he was stabbed. Probably when the first flames exploded, and he realized we would have to run again. Then he must have come back here, keeping away from the heart of the battle to wait for me, only to be stabbed.
Tears blur my vision, threatening to overwhelm me, but one thing keeps me upright: He would not want me to die here.
He would want me to escape. Even if I have to run through my grief, swallow my anger at fate, and force my fear into my pounding feet.
He would never want me to give up.
The battle in the distance hasn’t abated. At any moment, the Frost Fae could come upon me. The Iron or Ember Fae could fly across the air above me.
Worse, if their kings are here, then pure destruction will follow.
Once again, Father’s long-ago warning echoes in my memory, a fear I’ve held for as long as I can remember.
The three kings will stop at nothing to get to me.
I’m determined to disappear, and I need to take this blade with me. I don’t yet understand the blade’s history, but just as Father kept it hidden, so must I. At least until I can find out more.
Before I can second-guess myself, I wrench the wrapped blade out from where it was wedged.
As my fingers close around the ancient silk, golden light bursts from beneath the material.
Startled, I gasp before I freeze uncertainly, the blade’s hilt pinched between my fingers.
Unlike the sharp jolt of energy I felt before, this light is mesmerizing, beautiful, beckoning to me like the first rays of summer sunlight, promising only warmth.
A sense of safety fills me. Everything will be okay. This blade is mine, and I’m protected now.
Suddenly unafraid, I close my fingers more tightly around its hilt.
Then, like a beast, the light lashes out, striking across my hand as sharply as claws.
A new surge of energy rages across my palm, and this energy isn’t calm. Not soft or warming or captivating.
Sharp, bone-breaking, soul-crushing power rages up my arm and into my chest. Straight into my heart. Tearing and clawing and cleaving.
Consuming me.
Agony shatters my rational thoughts. More pain than I can bear. Scorching power rips me apart, and all I can do is scream.