by K. N. Lee
I blanched. “That’s not—that’s not incorrect.”
“Of course, it is,” Ian said. “You’re not actually going to lose your mind. Literally means one thing. Figuratively means—you know what? I’m not doing this with you again.” He turned back to the monitors.
“You didn’t build it,” Raelyn said, touching my hand gently and immediately stealing back all of my focus. “You were never really a tech girl. You were more of the magic type. This came from a very impressive woman named Fallon.” Raelyn looked down at the floor for just a beat. “We miss her dearly. If you could remember her right now, you’d miss her too.”
“I have no doubt,” I answered out of respect.
“In any event, it’s a secret hub in the castle. From this room, we can see everything that goes on. We can keep an eye on our enemies and ensure we remain a step ahead of them. It’s why I needed you to be arrested. I needed you down here.” Ian pointed to a large machine pressed against one of the walls. There was a chair beside it, and in that chair, I could see the back of a man’s head, his hair dark and wavy.
“You needed me with this?” I asked, marching toward the huge, silver contraption.
“You’ll see,” Raelyn said, grabbing my hand as I neared the thing.
He pressed my palm against a screen on the center of the thing. It burned my hand. It burned so much so that I wanted to pull it away. Raelyn must have known as much, because he kept it pressed flatly, nodding at me to let me know this was what was supposed to happen.
In a few seconds, the burning past and he released my hand.
“What was that?” I asked. Looking at my hand, I expected to see it burned and mangled. Instead, there was no burn, there were no markings.
Raelyn motioned to the woman in the chair. She spun around, and as she did, my chest tightened. She looked just like me. No, it wasn’t that she looked like me. She was me.
“That,” Raelyn said with a grin on his face. “Is our way out.”
Chapter 18
“That’s me,” I said, looking the woman up and down. She was me in every possible way.
From the freckles across my face right down to the cowlick sticking up at the back of my head. It was disconcerting, even after all the disconcerting things I had been through up to this point. It was like looking into a mirror and having the mirror look back at you.
Which was to say that it was terrifying.
“That’s me,” the other me said in the exact same voice with the exact same expression on his face.
A feeling of shock laced with a bit of horror rushed through me. This me—the new me—thought she was the original me. Which, of course, begged the question as to whether or not she was right.
Dear gods and goddesses, what if I was the copy?
What if the reason I didn’t remember any of the things about my past life wasn’t because of a spell, as I had been told, but because I was some horrific science experiment? What if I had been brought here so that Ian and Raelyn could break that news to me gently?
If that was the case, then they would need to be educated a bit more on the definition of ‘gently’.
“You’re not me,” I said, panic rushing through me as the idea of what I was thinking about really solidified in my mind. “I’m me. You’re just-you’re-”
“Bryce,” Raelyn said, stepping between us, perhaps in an attempt to quash the madness that was most obviously blooming throughout me. “This is Breann, and no, she’s obviously not you.”
“Then why did she say she was?” I asked, realizing my body was actually shaking with nerves.
“I was working on your cadence,” the woman who looked like me, grinning with a mouth that looked exactly like mine. “The transformation affects the vocal cords, which causes the tones of our voices to match. Your rhythm and stuff is up to me though.”
“No one’s going to pay enough attention to you to see if your rhythms match up,” Ian said, stepping toward us too. “They don’t know Moira in this timeline. So, they wouldn’t be familiar enough with her to be able to say anything like that.” He shook his head. “All you have to do is sit there.”
“Sit there?” I asked, narrowing my eyes. “What are you talking about? What’s going on here anyway?”
“Like I said, this is Breann,” Raelyn answered. “She’s not you, but for the purposes of what we need, she will be.”
“She’ll be me?” I asked, swallowing hard.
“I’ll pretend to be you,” Bryce answered in my voice. “I’m part of the resistance. You picked me for this Moira, Your Highness. Your brother and I, we were very close. Eden was my best friend in the world. When he died, I wanted to do something to make sure that wasn’t in vain. I needed to do that. Making sure you got to sit on his throne seemed as good a goal as any.” She nodded. “It’s the right thing.”
“So, you’re going to pretend to be me and sit in that cell?” I asked, finally piecing everything together.
It was actually a brilliant idea.
“I’m going to give you the time and freedom you need to do what you need to do,” Breann confirmed. Taking a deep breath, she continued. “It’s not much of a role, but it’s the one can play.”
“It’s vital to the success of our mission,” Ian said. “And you’re the only one who can do it.”
“Why?” I asked, looking from one of them to the other. “Why are you the only one who can do it?”
“Because the whole world thinks I’m dead,” Breann replied. “When you cast the spell, the one that changed the world, you killed me with it. It was part of your plan, so that I could do what I’m doing now.”
“This?” I asked. “But, how would you know I’d be here? How would you know I would get arrested?” I looked over at Ian as the pieces snapped into place like the parts of a puzzle. “You brought me to those lands on purpose, didn’t you? You did it to ensure I’d be captured.” Turning to Raelyn, I kept going. “And you met me there on purpose.”
“We needed to make sure you got down here,” Raelyn said. “And I needed to make sure those guards didn’t hurt you.” He sighed loudly. “For some reason, you cut off your knowledge of magic when you cast the spell. I have no idea why you did that. You’re so stubborn.”
“I already told her she was stubborn,” Ian replied.
“That’s another thing,” Breann said. “The transformation might make me look like you, but it doesn’t give me a connection to magic. If they try to cut my hair and test it, they’ll realize I’m not you.”
“And then what will they do to you?” I asked, staring at her.
“What they’d do to me isn’t important,” she answered, and in that instant, I knew the answer.
“They’ll kill you,” I said.
“Completing your mission is important,” Breann said. “Doing what we have to in order to ensure the future of the empire is more important than one life.”
“You’re willing to give up your life so that I can sit on a throne?” I asked. The idea seemed preposterous.
“I made a promise to your brother,” Breann said, steeling over. “And this isn’t just about a throne. It never was. Though, to answer your question, if this was only about making sure that the rightful heir to the kingdom, the good and just woman I know you to be, was where she needed to be, then I would absolutely give my life for that. It alone is a well worthy cause.”
“This is about the darkness, Moira,” Raelyn said. “It’s about stopping the darkness.”
“I don’t even know what that means,” I admitted, feeling a creeping dread spiral inside my gut.
“I know,” he replied. “You took that away from yourself as well.” He looked over at Ian and then back at me. “There’s only one man who can help unlock all that you’ve lost and help us in our cause.” He took my hand and gave it a squeeze. “We have to find Jasper before it’s too late.”
Chapter 19
“I’ve heard that name,” I said, remembering the man from my dream and
the bright light he brought me to. “He’s a man. I’ve seen him.”
“You’ve seen him many times,” Ian said, motioning for Breann to head out.
I watched as the woman, wearing my face like it was a party mask, gave me a nod and headed toward the now closed cave door. As she did, Raelyn tapped a few buttons near the monitors and the door opened up. Turning to the monitor that showcased the cell I had just been sitting in, I watched as Breann made her way inside and closed the door, sealing himself to my fate.
“This doesn’t feel right,” I said, reacting to the pang of guilt that settled across my chest as I watched her lay across a bed meant for me. “She’s going to get herself killed.”
“Breann is a soldier, Moira,” Raelyn said. “She knows what she’s in for. If she dies in this pursuit, it will have been her choice.” He ran a hand through his hair and I noticed the way the darkness of his locks seemed to lighten as they reached the roots. “You don’t rob a man of his choices. Your brother used to tell me that.”
I blinked hard at her. “You and Eden were very close,” I surmised.
She looked at me for a long moment. “It was a complicated situation,” she finally said in a soft voice.
“Ruston was your mentor,” Ian said, breaking into the tangent Amaya and I had forged into the conversation. “He had been your father’s mentor, too, even though your father was much less magically inclined than you.” He shrugged. “Eden always took after your father more, what with both of them being the warrior type and all that. As strange as it sounds, you were more like your uncle.” He shook his head hard. “Aside from the whole ‘megalomaniac’ thing.”
“Of course,” I muttered.
“In any event, your birthmark really did the trick,” Ian continued. “When you turned sixteen, and your mark began to glow with magic, it really solidified that you were on the right track with your penchant for all things mystical.” A smile graced Ian’s face. “Jasper always said he could feel it in you, and after your sixteenth birthday, you began to feel it yourself. You weren’t just studying magic anymore. You weren’t just obsessed with it. You were able to channel it. You became one of the most powerful magical forces in all the empire. You were an asset. People began to think you should have been emperor instead of your brother, even though Eden was older.”
“I would never-”
“You didn’t,” Ian interrupted me. “You told the whole of the empire that your brother had been trained for this, that he had been born for this.” His smile went somber. “The two of you loved each other very much. So, you continued your magic,and as it grew, you felt a connection to the universe. You spoke of other worlds. You spoke of the connections between them. You spoke of light and the way the light created and would create.” Ian took a deep breath. “And then, there was the darkness. You spoke of a thing, of a creature born of the darkness, of a creature that was the darkness. You started to wake up in the dead of the night, covered in sweat and screaming about how he was on his way. The Lord of Chaos; I think that’s what you called him.”
Ian slumped against the wall as he recounted the events.
“I’ve never seen you as afraid as you were then. I’ve never seen anyone as afraid as you were then. Even when your uncle took the throne, even when your brother died, even when the empire fell, your mind was still on the darkness.”
“Ruston helped you with it, though,” Amaya said, cutting in. “He helped you tap into the magic inside of yourself, the deepest magic. He helped you to understand that there was another force, and that force had a chance to be greater than any darkness, than any Chaos. He made you believe it, and then it started to get worse.”
“Worse how?” I asked, my body tensing up.
“The dreams kept coming. They got more intense, and then-one day- you couldn’t see,” Raelyn said.
“Couldn’t see?” I asked.
“Your eyes went black,” Ian said. “Everything went dark. Jasper fixed it, but he said you were tapping into it...or that it was tapping into you.”
“The Chaos Lord or whoever?” I asked, fear brimming cold up in my stomach.
“He had found you somehow, and he was either going to use or destroy you,” Ian said. “That’s when we knew we had to act. We had to hide you. So, when your vision came back and you were yourself again, you cast this spell. You hid yourself from the world and from magic. You crafted a plan. You said it was the only way any of us would have a chance to stop what was coming.”
“Thankfully, since we had no connection to the magic, you left us with our memories,” Raelyn said. “We knew everything you didn’t, everything save for one thing.”
“What thing?” I asked. “What didn’t I tell you?”
“Jasper was connected to the magic too,” Ian said. “We was almost as much at risk as you. So, you had to hide him, too. You had to cut him off from everything. You did more than that, though. You turned him into a failsafe. You made it so that there was only one way Jasper would ever be found again, only one way he’d ever regain his connection to the magic and be of any help.”
“What way?” I asked, my throat drying up. “What did I do?”
“The darkness is very dangerous,” Raelyn said. “You knew that if you fell, the world would need someone. Something went wrong with the spell. You’re supposed to remember things by now. You’re supposed to know how to tap into the magic the way you used to. We need Jasper to help you do that. Otherwise, we don’t stand a chance.”
“Then, how do we do that?” I asked simply. “What failsafe did I put on him to keep him hidden and how do we take it off?”
Raelyn turned his back on us then, and the room seemed to be sucked of all of the air.
“Your life,” Ian said, taking a step toward me. “The failsafe states that the spell only breaks and that Jasper is only set free of it when you die. So, I’m afraid, you find him, we’re going to have to kill you.”
Chapter 20
“I’m sorry. What?” I asked, my eyes going wide and my hands clenching into fists at my sides. “I’m fairly certain I misunderstood you.”
“Oh sorry,” Ian said, stepping closer, clearing his throat, and raising his voice a little. “I said we have to kill you.”
“Oh,” I muttered, stepping back and looking at the floor. “So, I didn’t misunderstand you then.”
“Don’t worry,” Ian replied, lifting his hands out in front of him as if to show me he knew what he was doing. “You won’t stay dead.”
“We don’t know that,” Raelyn replied, his voice harsher and more cut than I was used to hearing it. “We don’t know any of that.”
“We know that Moira left it here for us,” Ian said without turning to him, with his eyes still pinned on mine. “We know that, at least, she thought it would work on her.”
“Me?” I asked, looking from one of them to the other. “I left another spell here?”
“Raelyn took a deep breath and answered, his tone weak and lilting. “It was a failsafe for your failsafe, I suppose.”
“I was nothing if not prepared,” I muttered, realizing I kind of hated the person I used to be and the massive amount of unnecessary hoops she expected me to jump through now.
“You hid Jasper well, and I suppose you thought you’d set this up in case you needed him.” He shook her head. “It’s a spell that effectively kills you for thirty seconds and then brings you back to life. It wouldn’t be for long, but the act of your death, even technically would theoretically be enough to break the spell hiding Jasper.”
“Technically? Theoretically?” I asked, scrunching my nose. “It sounds like there are a lot of qualifiers to this course of action.”
“Exactly!” Raelyn said, turning to Ian quickly. “You see, Ian? Even Moira knows this isn’t the right thing.”
“You can’t say that, Raelyn,” Ian answered. “This isn’t Moira. At least, it’s not all of her. The Moira we knew, the Moira we trusted with our lives, left us this for a reason. We have to
trust her again. We have to do what she would have wanted.”
“Why?” Raelyn asked. “Why should we trust her? She obviously messed up the initial spell. Otherwise, she would have gotten her memories back. Now you expect me to believe she didn’t make some minor miscalculation with this one too?”
“A minor miscalculation-”
“Is all it would take, and you know it,” Raelyn interrupted Ian. “One wrong word, one out of place flick of the wrist, a heavy hand with an ingredient; any of those things could have and would change the chemistry of a spell.”
“Moira was smart,” Ian said. “She was capable.”
“Was she that capable?” Raelyn shouted. “We’re talking about life and death. We’re talking about actually killing someone. Was Moira worthy of that much confidence?”
“Moira is right here!” I shouted, unable to listen to this anymore. I was me. I wasn’t dead, at least, not yet. I wasn’t lost to them anymore. I was standing in front of them, and I could speak for myself.
“This isn’t about you,” Ian said. “At least, not this version of you.”
“The Under it isn’t!” I shouted again. “I’m the one you want to effectively kill. I’m the one you want to use as a labrat to find the man who can fix all of this...maybe...technically...theoretically.”
“Raelyn isn’t capable of being objective when it comes to this particular issue,” Ian said.
“That’s enough Ian!” Amaya said, blinking hard and looking at me in a strange manner.
“I’m just saying,” my best friend muttered in a whisper. “This is the fate of the entire world. Should we really let our emotions dictate our actions right now?”
“Yes,” I said looking at Raelyn and seeing something I had never seen in my entire life before, at least, not in the life I could remember anyway. “You do believe in me, do you?” I asked, peering deeply into his eyes.
