Hands reached her, pulling her clear, out from under the thrashing sail and ropes, away from the broken mast. Misha hauled her to her feet and she leaned heavily on him from need and shock more than anything else.
‘Bastien,’ Grace shouted. ‘Where’s Bastien? He was right beside me.’
The sail caught in the wind again, snapping back with a crack like thunder. And she saw him, lying there, sprawled on the deck, not moving.
Daniel and Jehane were first to reach him. Grace tried to throw herself forward but the harper still held her, refusing to let her go. As she shouted and screamed at Bastien to wake up, her friends turned him over, lifted him gently.
Rain lashed against his face and blood turned it red.
Grace tore herself out of Misha’s arms and grabbed Bastien, trying to wake him. He opened his eyes, stared at her groggily. He was dazed. She hoped it was nothing more serious than that.
‘Get him under cover, now,’ she barked to Ellyn. ‘To safety. He needs a healer. He needs…’ Damn it, someone needed to get things under control. They had a Zephyr on board the ship, one who was clearly out of control. Bastien was down. She had to fix this.
She darted over the fallen mast and sail, climbing up to the wheel deck and Captain Pardue. She was aware of Jehane on her heels and Daniel too. Misha and Ellyn grabbed Bastien, trying to get him below decks to safety. If this ship went down in a storm stirred up by a rogue Zephyr, it wouldn’t matter where they were. They’d all end up at the bottom of the sea.
Pardue screamed her orders over the howling wind, her knuckles white on the wheel.
‘Where’s the Zephyr?’ Grace shouted but the wind snatched her words away.
‘The what?’
Grace grabbed her, more to pull herself in closer than to pull Pardue away from the wheel. That would be suicide. ‘The Zephyr? On board?’
‘Larne, but he’s not strong enough to control this.’
‘Where is he?’
‘Bow! He always takes watch at the bow.’
At the bow. About as far away from Grace as he could be. That’s where she had run into him earlier. She couldn’t see him now, not with the amount of spray coming over it. She couldn’t see anything. Just water everywhere. Water in the air and water coming to get her again.
‘Daniel, Jehane, with me,’ she shouted, unsure if they could hear her or not. It didn’t matter. She was going anyway and she was pretty sure they’d follow.
She jumped across debris and struggling crew, people trying to hold the ship together, running as if her life and everyone else’s depended on it, because it did. She could feel it now, the hum of magic, the touch of the Maegen, running through her. The dark tide beneath it shuddered out of synchronisation with the light. The hollow pit inside her gnawed away but she ignored it. She had to.
And then she saw him, the kid she’d spoken to yesterday, clinging to the bow rail, drenched to the skin. The power radiating off him bent the wind and rain around him.
‘You have to stop this!’ she shouted.
He turned, shocked and terrified, his eyes aglow and his hands still wrapped around the rail. His legs splayed out beneath him. He looked afraid, terrified.
‘I can’t! I’ve tried. It won’t—’
Another wave hit, bursting around him and almost throwing him off the boat completely. But shadows surged forward, tangling him in their unnatural grip.
‘Got him,’ Jehane shouted. ‘Now what?’
A blast of wind slammed into him and the Shade lost his footing and his grip. He slammed to the deck and slid towards the dipping bow but Grace dived on him, pinning him there so they didn’t lose him to the storm.
The Zephyr shook himself free, terrified and overwhelmed with his power, the Maegen running wild inside him.
‘You’ve got to get control of it,’ Grace yelled. ‘Larne, isn’t it? Larne? Please, you’ve got to—’
Tears streamed down his face. ‘I can’t. I told you. The Maegen, I reached for it and it changed. It’s dark and it’s terrible. It’s eating away at me. I’m empty inside. I—’ He stiffened, his whole body going rigid, and then he threw back his head screaming. The wind joined him, buffeting the ship, waves crashing up over them.
The cry cut off and he jerked convulsively. When he opened his eyes, they were dark, dark and endless as the void. He smiled, a slow, wicked smile, and the voice that came from his mouth was not that of a boy. It clung to the wind, crawling over her skin, and she knew it.
‘Come to Thorndale, beloved. We hunger for you. We cannot wait.’
And suddenly there was a chord. Music filled the air, drowning out the wind and the waves, a frantic, mad tune, rising up and down the scales and then plunging on into a melody which took sudden shape. The sound was all-encompassing, breaking over them all and driving the Zephyr to his knees. Grace staggered forward, looking for Daniel, and he was there behind her, holding onto Misha who stood, iridescent with power, harp in hand. He must have grabbed it from their cabin and come to find them. To help in the only way he could.
Misha was a fine musician, she knew that, but she’d never really thought there was much use to be made of a Lyric. He’d helped Ellyn, soothed her and comforted her with his music. But this… this was different. Now, the storm itself stilled for him, for his music, for the power flowing through him. The Maegen, which had been thrashing around her, unmanageable and terrifying, stilled abruptly. The wildness bled out of it as the tune turned softer, slowing as its rhythm slowed, and bit by bit Misha tamed the storm, brought the Zephyr back under some form of control. Not his exactly. Grace knew it wasn’t like that. But his music soothed the world, and the boy fell, sobbing, to the deck. The storm abated, and the clouds overhead cleared.
Misha’s tune tailed off and the sudden silence felt unexpectedly disorientating. There was only the sound of calm seas and a soft breeze. Behind them, the sailors shouted but their voices seemed so far away. Grace picked herself up and stumbled across to where the boy lay. He was so small, lying there, limp and exhausted, his chest moving fitfully. But his eyes, when they opened, were his own again. She managed to pick him up and drag him to safety, other hands coming to help her.
‘Be gentle with him,’ she warned the sailors. ‘It wasn’t his fault. Take him below to the Lord of Thorns. He’ll help him.’
And then she remembered Bastien, the blow to his head, the blood and that dazed look in his eyes. Divinities, she’d only just got him back.
She rushed by Misha, paused to press her hand to his shoulder and then thought better of leaving him there.
‘Thank you,’ she said. He looked exhausted now, having sent his power out into the world, quelling an unnatural tempest. ‘I’ll need to talk to you but – I’ve got to check on Bastien. And the boy. You… You should rest.’
Daniel held him close, arms wrapped tightly around his lover’s waist. ‘He will. I’ll make sure of that. Interrogate him later, Grace. Go.’
Bastien… he was hurt. And the boy… he had spoken with the voice of the Deep Dark. How Misha had saved him, she didn’t know. Perhaps Bastien would.
But she couldn’t get those words out of her mind.
‘Come to Thorndale, beloved. We hunger for you. We cannot wait.’
Chapter 19
The light of the Maegen surrounded him, wild and furious. It was like standing in the heart of a storm made of light and power, a hurricane composed of pure rage. Bastien was lost in it, flotsam and jetsam in the tempest, buffeted and broken. The more he struggled for equilibrium, the more the world slipped through his fumbling fingers.
‘Bastien,’ said the voice. Not her voice, not the one he longed for. This was another voice. From another time. A voice he had never thought to hear again. ‘Bastien, remember.’
The boy was only a teen, not even a man. Slim and delicate, thick hair falling over his face and a stupid, oversized sword in his hands. He had Rynn’s nose and jawline. Or rather, she had his.
‘Bastien, please.
’ Lucien Larelwynn fixed him with that look, the look that he always used, even when they were boys. Even when…
But they weren’t boys. His memories were better but still scrambled. This was something new. Perhaps Rynn’s antidote had opened doors to more than just the recent past.
‘I remember, Lucien. I remember everything now.’ It took a moment before he recognised the voice as his own. And the lies too. His memories were still scattered.
Lucien Larelwynn smiled, a half-hearted, broken smile. There was nothing more tragic. He always knew Bastien better than he knew himself. ‘No you don’t, Bastien. Not really. You remember some. But not all. You need to go back, right back. You can remember, if you try, but only if you really want to. We need to make it right. You have to remember.’
We? There was no ‘we’ about this. Lucien Larelwynn was hundreds of years dead. And go back? What did this phantom from the past think he was trying to do?
‘I am going back.’
‘No. Really. Go back. Right back.’
He didn’t mean Thorndale.
Lucien reached out, his hand trembling, and he pressed it to Bastien’s head. The pain was immediate and complete. It was agony. Something tore through him, a lance of betrayal and desperation, loss and misery, the feeling that the once-king had ripped something vital out of him and stolen it away.
‘Someone always has to die. I’m so sorry, Bastien.’
The same force hurled him away. He fell; fell down into the depths, into the darkness.
Shadows smothered him, the Deep Dark swarming over him. He was trapped here, lost, drowning in the source of magic itself. And here below, the Deep Dark was stronger than ever. He could see it spreading, reaching out avaricious tendrils into the world beyond them. It laughed at him, stuck there and sinking. It was strong, so strong. Stronger than it had ever been before. He could see its escape routes, its ways out and the many, many lives it tainted, infecting so many. He shuddered, staring at the enormity of it. How was he to fight that?
How could something like that ever be contained?
He tried to still himself, to focus and remember, just as Lucien had instructed. Blood. Blood in the water. He could see it, spreading out like ink, dark and red. He could taste the thick coppery tang of it on his tongue and in the back of his throat.
Blood was the key. It opened the door. There was always a sacrifice. A willing sacrifice.
Not Grace. It would not be Grace.
He tried to breathe as that endless and terrible thing clamped itself around his throat. Long-fingered hands – too long to be human – closed over his face and pulled his head back, exposing his neck, the nails digging into his eyes, burrowing into his brain. A blade kissed his Adam’s apple.
Remember.
Larelwynn blood.
The girl laughed. She threw her Valenti white-gold hair over her shoulder and smiled. Her blood glowed within her veins. Her laugh echoed around the cave like the light reflecting on the rough roof overhead and the water boiled before her.
‘It’s beautiful,’ Rynn said.
Blood fell into the luminous pool, feeding the magic, transforming it.
A knife clattered to the stone floor, blood pooling around it. So much blood.
Bastien tried to cry out but his voice was gone. Another figure stood over him, something dark and terrible, eyes aglow with magic, a thing of stone and shadows with an implacable soul as old as time itself. Something he had no defence against.
It wore his face. Divinities help him, it wore his face.
And beside him there was a woman. Made of fire. Unmistakable.
‘Beloved,’ it said.
The cabin seemed smaller than before, the place where he and Grace had made love, where she had tried to make him whole again. But Bastien was more broken than either of them knew. Broken in ways that couldn’t be explained. Blood stained the bedclothes and the pillow now. His blood, he realised. His head pounded more than he could ever remember. More than a hangover, more than a headache. More than lyriana root. It felt like his skull had been split open and glued back together. Right where Lucien had touched him.
Grace sat beside him, holding his hand, her eyes closed. But the moment he moved, she opened them, gazing down at him. There was a flicker of alarm on her face. Perhaps it would never go away. The shame of it washed through him like nausea.
‘Take it easy,’ she said. He could hear the exhaustion in her voice, see it in her face. ‘You were knocked out.’
‘By what?’
‘One of the masts fell on you.’
He pushed himself up anyway. His body ached everywhere, his head most of all. But it didn’t matter. The power behind that storm had been mageborn and out of control.
‘Who was it? Who turned nightborn?’ His voice grated against the inside of his throat and he swallowed hard. Grace brought a flask of water up to his lips and, after only a moment of hesitation, he drank gratefully. It was Grace, after all.
‘A Zephyr. He’s crew on the ship.’
What had happened to him? Had they killed him? Bastien had heard of that turn of events before. A Zephyr on board a ship going hollow and the crew hurling him overboard to save themselves. He’d seen the Zephyr on this ship. He was only a boy, but sailors were superstitious. And while a Zephyr could be a boon, they could also be a curse, especially if they lost control. Like this. Bastien had felt it in the air, in the wild wind, in the storm itself. Magic had whipped it, drove it, and made it tear at the ship, ready to drown them all. In the moments before the mast knocked him out, he had seen it all. After Iliz, he should have checked each of the mageborn present before they set off. He should have offered to balance their powers and do all that he normally did when a mageborn paid homage to him, the Lord of Thorns. But all he’d been thinking of was Grace.
Grace must have sensed his concern. She smiled at him. ‘It’s okay. He’s safe. He’s sleeping.’
He stared at her, trying to fathom it. What had she done? ‘Is he… what happened? How did you stop him?’
‘Not me. Misha, of all people.’
Her answer couldn’t have surprised him more.
‘Misha Harper?’
‘Yes. He used his music. I’ve never seen anything like it. He calmed the storm and brought the Zephyr back to himself. I didn’t even know it was possible. It’s like something out of an old story.’
The air around him shook and a dreadful sense of foreboding swept over him. Lyrics couldn’t do something like that, could they? It shouldn’t be possible. His dream of the Maegen returned to him and the world shifted around him.
You have to remember.
Remember? Something out of an old story, she’d said. He remembered old stories. He remembered them as if they were yesterday. Memories of years ago, of Lucien, of the Magewar…
But the pact was broken, Marius Larelwynn was dead and Bastien had gone into the Maegen to rescue Grace, breaking the confines which had held the Deep Dark back for so long. He needed to get to Thorndale as soon as possible. He needed to find the source of the Maegen and find a way to purge it, to contain the Deep Dark again. More and more of his people would be infected. It would run from mageborn to mageborn, taking them over, turning them into nightborn and possessing them. And then the Magewar would be upon them, all over again. This time, he didn’t know if he would be able to stop it.
The Lyrics of old could do incredible things. Those that went hollow were dangerous in the extreme. The power of music could bring down castle walls, reduce the strongest warriors to shivering wrecks, inflame tempers until people killed each other, or steal their will to live until they took their own lives. Lyrics had been feared. But since the fall of the Hollow King – since Lucien had bound him and the two of them had formed the pact – the power of all mageborn had been diminished.
Misha wasn’t that strong. Not strong enough to calm a storm. He was a good musician, skilled and dedicated to his art. But his magic was only a small part of his talent. His mag
ic wasn’t powerful at all.
He wasn’t strong enough to do that.
‘I need to see him, Grace.’
‘Of course. He’s with the captain. She didn’t want him out of her sight.’
‘Misha?’
‘No, the Zephyr. He’s just a kid, Bastien, and he doesn’t seem to be any threat now.’
No. She didn’t understand. ‘Not the boy. Misha. I need to see him now. Grace, he could be in terrible danger. We all could.’
Bastien slipped by Grace and headed for the cabin door, his legs unsteady. She swore and moments later she was beside him, sliding beneath his arm and supporting him. At least she didn’t flinch this time when he touched her. He’d thought, last night, that everything might have been forgiven but now… now he wasn’t so sure.
‘This is a terrible idea,’ Grace scolded him. ‘You aren’t up to this. You could have been killed when that thing came down.’
Bastien shook his head. He wasn’t that lucky. ‘Probably not. There isn’t time, my love. This is serious. Misha could be at risk even now.’
‘Misha? Why? He was fine. He didn’t even seem tired.’
It was worse and worse. Bastien tried to sort through the scrambled memories that had reasserted themselves. If he was honest, he had shied away from examining anything too closely. There was just too much.
But Lyrics… since the Magewar they were the gentlest branch of the mageborn. They were artistic, creative, the ones who were most overlooked in the greater scheme of things. They made music. What could be wrong with that?
Until they went hollow. Then their power increased, their magic became unstable… It wasn’t like other mageborn. Perhaps because of the nature of their magic. The way it played with emotions, stirred up memories, drove others wild with passion or despair.
The ship was peaceful now. At least there was that. Daniel and Misha were up on deck, which wasn’t Bastien’s ideal situation. Too exposed, too public. But that was beyond his control and he couldn’t waste time.
Nightborn: Totally addictive fantasy fiction (The Hollow King Book 2) Page 16
