Chapter 65
I’m not sure exactly what I expected, but Murtagh’s newest business endeavor—the building he’d allegedly stolen from Gruffud—is a far cry from it.
The archer and I are lucky to touch down, fairly unscathed, within the building.
Her bow and arrow clatter to the floor before her body follows.
I’m left speechless, watching her dissolve into tears as I stand there. Useless.
“Koko!” someone exclaims.
My head whips up, my fists already poised for attack when the woman with the long braids appears. She rushes forward, a few others behind her, then stops abruptly. Her hazel green eyes dart around wildly before she sets a seething glower on me. I nearly wither on the spot.
“What the fuck happened?” she asks. “Where is Durvla?” She looks down at the archer, weeping on the floor.
“Chiyoko! Where’s Durvla?” Panic laces her voice, and I look up just as someone barrels into me with full force.
Arms wrap around my torso, hair that isn’t mine tumbling into my eyes as I’m crushed in a smothering embrace.
“Winnie. You’re alive. You’re alive.” Neris practically shakes me. I remain boneless, numb.
The Dreamwalker had come to rescue Tiernan, only to end up rescuing me instead … and sacrificing herself. I’m overcome with sickening guilt. The woman with the long braids is on the floor, her arms wrapped around the archer—Chiyoko—while the girl continues to sob.
When Neris finally releases me, I take in the other worried faces in the room.
A curvaceous woman with a deep brown complexion stands aside, one hand crossed over her chest, the other over the lower half of her face.
Beside her is a man with auburn hair, and two other redheads keeping a small distance.
They step aside, letting Murtagh walk through. I pull myself up to my full height, uncertain of how to respond to this familiar person from what feels like a totally different lifetime.
He approaches me, his ordinarily mirthful face drawn in melancholy. His arms clasp mine, and he says, “I’m glad you’ve made it.” He gives my arms a squeeze, but I can only nod.
My face is damp as Neris tugs me away. I follow her, but I’m unable to process much of anything. We got out of the castle.
But now Rheon has the Shadow Wielder he sought.
Shite …
“Winnie, what happened?” Neris whispers.
“I …” The words slip out of my grasp, and I shake my head again.
Neris holds my face between her palms. Firmly. “You’re all bruised up.” It’s the least of my worries—in fact, I don’t feel any pain. For the first time.
And I almost wish I felt something rather than nothing.
The older woman makes her way across the gallery, getting onto the floor with the other woman and Chiyoko.
She whispers soothing words, and they pull Chiyoko to her feet.
Her face is a blotchy mess, but as she stares across the room at me, the resemblance to Tiernan is glaringly obvious. His sister? Guilt rushes over me anew.
I need to get away. I wish I could head outside, but that would be dangerous and stupid. Instead, I march toward the doorway at the back of the room, hoping that it will lead me anywhere that isn’t here. That isn’t this moment.
A whooshing sound fills the room, a chill glossing over my skin seconds before a loud sound and startled shrieks follow.
I turn as a small vortex of shadows swirls on the ground from where Chiyoko had just been moved.
The shadows recede very slightly, enough to reveal that a body lies within it.
A woman. She tries to sit up, but her arm gives way under her and she slips back onto her side.
“It’s Durvla!” Chiyoko shouts.
Everyone rushes toward her only for shadows to whip out at them.
“Ava, do something!” Chiyoko says, jabbing the woman with the braids.
Ava faces the shadows, her hands up, but nothing happens. More shadows whip out, sending everyone another step back. Neris mutters a slew of swear words beside me, her elbow linking with mine and squeezing.
“Ma, can your light get through enough to at least soothe her?” Ava asks the older woman.
The woman nods, rubbing her hands together and taking a deep breath.
Her hands glow a warm white light as she steps forward, the shadows receding slightly, bending around her like water around a stone.
The darkness seems almost reluctant, pulsing, as if it has its own life force.
I watch as the mother-daughter duo work together to get close enough to Durvla, to reach through the dark mist, the older woman’s hand resting on Durvla’s arm before Ava follows.
In the blink of an eye, her powers die out, and Durvla lies still.
“Is she breathing?” Ava asks. Her own breath goes out of her as she leans close, pulling the neckline of Durvla’s top away for her mother to see.
Tears blur my vision as Durvla is flipped onto her back, as Ava’s mother—a Healer, by the looks of it—gets to work, her hands running over Durvla’s body from head to toe, healing light emitting.
Ava turns, looking at Chiyoko and then me. “Somebody explain what happened, dammit.”
Neris nudges me again. Chiyoko still seems too overcome to speak, so I take a breath and explain to the best of my ability what happened back in Paramount. The auburn-haired man eventually volunteers to take Durvla downstairs to one of the bedrooms. Everything seems to happen too fast and too slow.
Somehow, I get my legs to move. I get cleaned up, my mind turning over a million things at once.
Somewhere between washing up and putting on fresh clothing, the sobs begin.
It takes me a while to realize that the sound is coming from another room and not from me, though my heart feels heavy.
I stand in the corridor, an oil lamp flickering as if it’s about to die out, and I listen to the gut-wrenching cries.
Durvla begs to go back to Paramount. To save Tiernan.
Her words are half incoherent, half lucid.
Then there’s abrupt silence.
I lean against the wall, my eyes squeezed shut as I sink down to the floor. As I listen to the quiet that seems so much louder than anything else.
Everyone is kind to Neris and I, which feels unnatural given that this is my fault.
As with everything, Neris takes this new transition with the utmost grace.
The Healer, Alys, suggested that it would be best to keep Durvla in a sleeping state—for the sake of her overtaxed body and her mental state—so things remain almost deathly silent. As if everyone’s afraid to wake her.
Neris and I sit side by side on the couch of the common room, my entire body humming with a dull ache that reminds me I have no more elixirs as the adrenaline finally starts to wear off. Neris silently combs through her golden curls.
I cannot get the image of Radika holding that blade to her throat out of my mind. Even now, there’s a small cut on her neck. I shake the thoughts from my head, reminding myself that she is safe. She is alive.
Father however … My throat knots again, and my eyes burn.
“I cannot believe Rheon somehow succeeded in transferring powers,” Neris says as if she’s read my mind. She peers at me through curls partially covering her eyes. For a moment, there’s only silence, then she asks, “Can I tell you something?”
“Of course.” My voice comes out raw.
Neris hesitates, averting her gaze to the overly patterned carpet. The swirls and multitude of colors do nothing to help my already aching head, so I turn my focus back to her.
“I’d briefly entertained the idea of having magical abilities,” she says.
My spine straightens, my muscles whingeing, and Neris breathes out an embarrassed laugh.
“I know. Ridiculous after everything I’ve seen you experience. But what if I’d drank that potion? What would’ve become of me? Would I turn out like how you described—?” She leaves her sentence unfinished, an apologetic look on her face.
My heart sinks again. “It doesn’t matter. You didn’t drink the potion.”
“But I could’ve. And sadly I think, given the chance, there are many who would.”
Silence stretches between us for a moment.
“But don’t worry, I might not have the magic, but I want to brush up on my fighting skills.”
My heart tugs awkwardly as I remember all the times we spent training with Father.
His skills are now within the hands of yet another corrupt sect.
There was recognition in his eyes for a brief moment.
Can whatever was done to him be reversed?
My chest feels hollow, but I cannot return to Paramount to find out.
We cannot even remain here in Mainland for much longer; it’s too dangerous.
As much as I’ve hated masquerading as someone I’m not—within the Zenith, within my own household and the Pendrys’—the thought of leaving Barr na Cahar feels scarier. The unknown is always scary. But it will never become known if I don’t find the courage to face it.
In the middle of the night, I’m ripped out of my sleep by a voice practically shouting in my ear.
I have not forgotten you, Terraforger. And I suggest that you never forget me. I am Fury, and even after my end, I will always remain in the hearts of you fickle mortals.
I frantically search the dark, but I don’t need to see the glowing red eyes to know who speaks to me. But why is she always so bloody cryptic?
Do not ignore the Calling any longer. Caiolair’s reign will soon be upon us.
I feel the heat of the goddess and, briefly, I see a blazing axe rising in front of me and slashing through the air.
With a shriek, I cover my head, prepared to be smote.
“Winnie!” Neris exclaims, grabbing my arm in the darkness.
My pulse races, outrunning my thoughts, and it takes me a moment to reel in my panic. When I finally do, all I say is, “I’m fine.”
The Purists were wrong about many things, but the gods certainly are at work in some capacity. Unfortunately, so is the Zenith—and it’s worse than I could’ve imagined. My father … Will Mother ever learn the truth of him? Would Arionna? What has become of them? Of the Pendrys? Why do I even care?
Unable to get back to sleep with so many thoughts churning in my mind, I head into the common room as soon as Neris drifts off again. I sit near the fire and close my eyes, enjoying the warmth.
Soft footsteps enter the room, and I jump, but it’s only Murtagh. The older man smiles warmly at me.
“Sorry to startle you, lass.” His voice is gentle as he crouches so that he’s level with me.
“It’s alright. I couldn’t sleep. I … just don’t understand a lot of this.”
“I’m not sure any of us understands. Not fully at least.” He rises to sit on the stony platform in front of the hearth, leaving some space between us. “I believe you ken that I was good friends with your da.”
I nod.
“He sent word shortly after the incident at the castle, speaking of great atrocities occurring within the walls. He feared for his life.”
I keep my mouth shut.
“I dinna ken what happened after, but I ken that while he served the queen, toward the end of her reign, we agreed that the rebels aren’t to be feared.
In fact, the rebels are the hope of Erleya—they might be a quiet force, but they fight against tyranny and corruption.
Against the Purists and the Zenith, the darkness that threatens to destroy our kingdom.
Through wee acts. But even the littlest acts matter.
” He stares into the fire wistfully. “We do what we have to do to survive, and to help those without the means to survive on their own.”
Also gazing into the fire, I ask, “Do you think the gods are real?” I turn my head back to Murtagh as a smile slowly spreads across his face.
“Oh, yes. I believe that they choose some of us to carry out tasks we would otherwise not have the courage to carry out on our own.”
My ribs constrict my heart. I think of my visions of Fury and of Winter. Damarlach and Magdin. Their confrontation within my head about the oppressors and the destruction of the gods. Even now I’m unsure of what to believe. “But not all the gods are on the right side,” I say.
“Aye. That’s why we have our own conscience and free will, young Gwyneth.” He stands stiffly from the small platform and straightens his nightshirt. “I hope one day you will be reunited with Eurig.”
My heart pangs.
“He’s always been proud of you. His artistic daughter with a heart of gold and fists of steel.”
I laugh through the tears gathering on my lower lashes. “He said that?”
Murtagh laughs. “I ken you’ve had a lot of people telling you who they think you are or who you should be, but don’t forget that you ken yourself better than anyone else.
” It reminds me of Tiernan’s words back in the brig.
Murtagh turns and makes for the doorway, pausing before he leaves.
“Try to get some sleep. Even warriors need rest.”
A heart of gold and fists of steel. I chuckle and shake my head again before sighing. I do hope to see him again someday, but if I never do, I’ll try my best to make him proud.