Once he was out of sight, he collapsed on the side of the road and heaved into the bushes. His body had gone ice cold, and he trembled uncontrollably. It was several minutes before he could pick himself up, before he could force his legs to carry him the rest of the way.
The door to Trista’s home felt like an impassable barrier, and he stood with his fist against the door, too terrified to knock. His breath came in great gasps, too loud for him to notice the sound of the door opening. Gentle hands wrapped around him, guided him inside and forced him to settle before the fire. Trista knelt down before him, her hands gripping his tightly. “Tomias. I need you to answer me. Does she still live? Please, by the Allseer, tell me she lives!”
He hadn’t even been aware that she’d been talking. Her words seemed fuzzy and distant, taking shape one syllable at a time until his mind could decipher it all. Does she live? Kir…
“She’s alive,” he gasped. “She’s alive, but she isn’t safe.”
“Tomias, what happened? Talk to me.” She grabbed his face roughly, tilting it so he had no choice but to look into her green eyes, bright with fear. “Tomias!”
“We aren’t safe here. We’ve never been safe.”
“Damn it, Tomias, what are you talking about?”
“I’m sorry. It’s too much, it’s too – I can’t focus.”
“I told you exhaustion was going to catch up to you,” Trista bristled. “You’re tired. You need rest.”
He grabbed her wrists, pulled her close, her face mere inches from his own. She looked frightened and he knew if he didn’t explain himself in the next few seconds, she’d likely beat him over the head with a frying pan. “I went by myself to talk to Nyson. I needed to know what would happen to Kirheen, to Garild. I had to know. He gave me a key, told me he’d give me the truth in exchange for my loyalty. And I opened the box, Trista. I opened it. It’s not real. It isn’t real. It’s never been real. The Darkness, the war…it’s all a lie.”
Trista’s eyes narrowed into slits and she pulled herself out of his grasp. “Did Fenir hit you in the head? What is wrong with you? You’ve gone mad!”
“This is madness, Trista. Everything we thought we knew about Sanctuary is a lie. It’s not real.”
“Stop. Just stop!” she shouted, pacing back and forth before the fire. “Do you even hear yourself?”
“Trista, I need you to listen to me. I am signing my life away by telling you this. And when I tell my brother, when I tell Garild and Kirheen, I will be sealing all of our fates. I can’t let Nyson live behind this lie. I can’t let this continue.”
She’d stopped her pacing and looked at him, really looked at him. She must have seen something in his eyes, some glimmer of truth. She raised a hand to her mouth, her features scrunched. She was quiet for a time. He could see her retracing her steps, thinking over the past, searching for answers. “No. No, it’s not possible. I’ve seen…”
“No, you haven’t. We never have seen it because it doesn’t exist.”
“The Darkness…”
“It isn’t real.”
CHAPTER 24
A scream, haunting in its sorrow, reverberated through the Circle of Rest. The sound sent chills racing up Tomias’ arms, and he quickly crossed the room to peer out the window. He glanced out just in time to see Isa being dragged away from her home, half carried by Burk and Grant. Her feet flailed wildly as she tried to stop them, to break away from their grip, her grief stricken cries echoing across the field.
Such a sound only meant one thing – Ian had passed.
Official word spread soon after. He’d died of an illness, the lie swallowed by all, but whispers of the truth could be heard, brief snippets of sanity in the chaos. Everyone knew the truth, but not a soul dared called the Union Master out for lying. Not a soul dared to call Herzin what she truly was – a murderer.
Kirheen remained a thrall to her own broken mind. Her seizures had become less frequent, her rest more peaceful, but her mind was still an impenetrable wall he couldn’t sort his way through, no matter how hard he tried. Defeat greeted him once again, and he reached towards her, wrapping her hand in his. He stroked the back of her hand with his thumb, slow and soothing, but he was only trying to comfort himself. This is it, he thought. One final attempt. She’d been trapped for too long. Any longer and she’d never come back as the same person, no matter what he did. If he failed her again, that would be the end, and he was becoming less and less sure he could live with the guilt.
They were out of time. The trial was set to take place the following morning. He could either break through her mind and rescue her or lose all hope of saving his students. Trista was curled in a chair across the room, visibly upset by the events that had happened over the past few days. She stared out the window solemnly, flipping a small vial of liquid end over end, the purple substance sloshing back and forth with each turn. Fenir stood at her side, quiet and sulking.
“Trista. It’s time,” Tomias said softly.
Her eyes snapped to his, her hand stopping and closing around the vial. With a shaky breath, she stood and approached the bed side. Reaching down, she tilted Kirheen’s face towards her. “Lift up her head.”
Tomias gently lifted her, cradling her head while Trista dumped the contents of the vial in her mouth and forced her to swallow. It was a massive dose of a mind altering plant, meant to break open the mind and bolster their powers. It was also highly frowned upon. If anyone knew they’d used such a substance, they’d be facing exile, or worse. Like it matters any more…
Trista stepped back, the vial slipping from her fingers. It fell to the floor with a soft clink and she stumbled back to her chair. She leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees, her hands cupped in silent prayer. All there was left for her to do was watch and wait and hope that nothing went wrong. Tomias looked down at his own vial, the bright liquid both inviting and terrifying. He sat down and uncorked the concoction.
“Careful, Brother. You better come back to us.”
“I’ll try my best. Fenir, if I don’t…”
“Stop. I already know. Now go save her.”
A sickly sweet taste coated his tongue as he threw back the vial, and he waited for it to take effect. He didn’t wait long. It hit him rapidly, an overwhelming drowsiness slipping into his very bones. His eyes rolled back, and the last thing he remembered was sliding off his chair and onto the floor. When he opened his eyes, he was no longer in the same world.
He stood at the edge of a forest, looking into a clearing lush with tall grasses and plant life. A breeze whispered through the trees, pushing him forward. He went willingly, enjoying the feel of the sunshine on his back, the grass tickling his bare feet. A few feet ahead, a girl lie in the grass, her back to him. Her hair was long and ashen, splaying out behind her like a waterfall. He smiled, realizing it was his friend, that he was looking at Kirheen. He ran towards her and knelt down in the grass by her side. He grabbed her shoulder, rolled her towards him, and the illusion shattered.
Her eyes were frozen in terror and a black tar-like substance dripped down her cheeks as if they were tears. Her mouth was open, her teeth stained a terrible black. As he pulled away from her in horror, black tendrils attached to his hands, the threads keeping him linked to her. The grass around them melted away, leaving behind hard unforgiving earth, scorched black as if it had been burned. Pools of black tar spit and bubbled, making disgusting slurping noises as bubbles rose to the surface and popped. The air was filled with terrified screams, and he wanted so badly to cover his ears, to drown out the sounds.
He managed to get to his feet, and he stumbled away from Kirheen, breaking the threads that had attached them. He shambled off into the distance, hoping to find a way out of the nightmare he’d found himself in. The tree line had disappeared, and any means of escape was lost to him. There were more bodies along the way, and each one he turned over was Kirheen. He saw her everywhere. The body half lying in a pool of sludge had her ashen hair. The bod
y torn and ravaged shared her storm colored eyes. Everywhere was ashen hair and pale skin corrupted by the Darkness.
He wanted to give up, to escape, but he saw something up ahead, alive and moving. Like the corpses he had seen, the figure had Kirheen’s light hair, but she was frail and terribly thin, rocking back and forth in front of another corpse he couldn’t see yet. Before he could reach her, she turned towards him. Her bony finger reached out, jabbing in his direction accusingly. “You killed him,” she spat. “All your fault. All of this. You did this.” She moaned, inky tears tracing lines down her pale cheeks. She wailed as he approached, and her rocking resumed.
On the ground before her was a pale figure, tall and lean and masculine. He had white hair, his dark eyes open and alive with accusations despite the fact that he was very, very dead. For a moment, Tomias thought he was looking at himself, that it was his corpse lying there. But there was something different about the face, something slightly off. It was Fenir. A dagger had been plunged through his heart, the veins around the wound turned black with corruption.
He collapsed next to his brother and frantically reached for him, but as his hands pressed against his body, he fell apart in his hands, skin melting away into the black sludge that coated everything around them. He began to cry, all hope leaving his body. He curled up where his brother had been and let all the feeling bleed out of him, let it burn away until all he felt was an aching numbness deep within his soul.
There was no telling how long he stayed that way. Time held no meaning in such a place. Seconds felt like hours, hours like days. He was woken by a gentle touch, and when he opened his eyes, Kirheen stood over him. She was wearing blindingly white robes, the edges stained with black. She looked clean, untouched by the corruption bleeding from the world around her.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her tone light with curiosity. He blinked, thinking her a mirage, some sort of strange apparition that would disappear if he moved too quickly. She remained where she was, looking down at him with a contemplative stare. “You don’t belong here.”
Tomias laughed in disbelief and sat up out of the muck. It was her. He’d actually found her. “You don’t know how happy I am to see you. You’re alive!”
“And why wouldn’t I be? I never died.” A noise caught her attention and she glanced about nervously. “You need to leave. You shouldn’t be here.”
“I came here to find you, to help you escape. Kirheen, you’re trapped inside your mind. This isn’t real. We need to get you out.”
“No!” she shouted. “We can’t leave! There isn’t anywhere to go. The Darkness has taken everything, but I can still push it back. There is still time. We’re all that’s left. If we don’t do something, if the corruption anchors itself to this place, all will be lost. You must help me!”
Trapped so long in her mind, Kirheen had completely lost sense of what was real and what was her dream. To her, she really was fighting the Darkness. She was doing what she’d always been trained to do. Only the Darkness wasn’t real, it didn’t exist, but there was little hope of convincing her of that, not when all of her senses were telling her otherwise.
“Kirheen, everyone back home is in terrible danger. You need to return, to go back to Sanctuary. If you stay here, they’ll all die.”
She shook her head, her expression pained. “But I can’t leave this place. Not yet. There is so much to do, so much…” She began to wander off, pulled by some call he could not hear. Before she was out of reach, he grabbed her arm, his hand leaving black stains on her robe.
She glared at him over her shoulder, eyes flashing with malice. “Let go. I have to get back to my work.”
“That work isn’t here, Kir,” he said calmly, meeting her gaze without fear. “Look around you. Look closely. Does any of this feel right to you? You are the one that isn’t meant to be here. You need to wake up. Come back with me and we can save your friends. They need you.”
She considered his words, her head swiveling away from him, eyes scanning the burnt orange horizon. “You are real, aren’t you? I’ve been trapped here for so long. I forgot… who I was, who I am. Who am I?”
“You are Kirheen. My student. My friend. You can be free of this place. All you need to do is wake up.”
Her hand found his, her skin soft and warm as her small fingers entwined with his larger ones. “I can leave this behind?” she asked hesitantly. “I can go home?”
“Yes, yes you can. Just wake up.”
She smiled and closed her eyes. With a crack, the ground gave way beneath their feet and he was startled awake, gasping for air as he sat upright. Trista jumped back, giving him space while he reoriented himself to less dreadful surroundings. He was drenched in sweat, his robes soaked through, and he shivered as a chill settled over his skin.
He pushed himself to his feet and took several uncertain steps towards the bed, towards Kirheen. He watched her face intently, looking for any sign of movement, any hint that she was still alive. Breath held tight, his heart pounding painfully against his ribs, he sat in anticipation. Eyelids fluttered, and then her stormy gray eyes were locked with his. A sob escaped his chest, and he pulled her to him, wrapping his arms around her tightly. He held her for several moments, until hands pressed against his chest, pushing him away.
He released her from his embrace, but took her hands in his, afraid that if he broke contact, she might fade away. But she was there, real and alive and tangible. “You’re alive,” he half laughed, unable to stop the smile spreading over his face.
She laughed too, a soft pained sound. “Why wouldn’t I be?” she asked quietly. “I never died.”
CHAPTER 25
Garild felt the unfamiliar building heat of anger, felt it grow hotter and hotter until it was burning holes through his broken heart. His entire life he’d been calm and collected, following rules and instructions without the slightest bit of resistance. He’d never felt something so all consuming, and he welcomed the way it swallowed him whole. It was a distraction, something to focus on so he wouldn’t think about what he’d been told, about the lie that had formed everything.
His whole world had been flipped upside down when Tomias told him the truth. The Darkness was a lie. His powers had meant nothing, his bond had meant nothing, the faith he’d had in their cause, in Kirheen, in himself, it had meant nothing at all. Everything he’d known had been an elaborate fabrication to keep them from the outside world. What do we do now?
Tomias had told him he wasn’t safe, that Nyson had threatened his life, but he found he no longer cared. The plan was to run, to escape from the confines of Sanctuary, but it wasn’t an option he was willing to entertain. He didn’t want to run. Believing in the lie was easier than believing in the truth, it was easier than facing his own feelings.
Tomias, Fenir, and Trista were in the other room, preparing to wake Kirheen from her endless slumber. As if it will change anything, he thought bitterly. She’s not going to wake up. Her mind was so broken, the damage beyond repair. Even if she lived, she’d never be the same. Even through the veil of his anger, there was still a part of him that yearned for their success, that wanted her to live, but he didn’t plan on being around to see it happen.
A servant came for him in the early hours of the morning. He was alone in the front room, the others fully occupied with waking Kirheen. It was easy to slip out the front door, to disappear without having to say goodbye. He glanced over his shoulder, taking one final look at their home. His soul ached. Everything he’d wanted had been in that house and now he was leaving it all behind.
The servant leading him down the winding path was a middle-aged woman. Her auburn hair rested at her shoulders, and she wore faded gray robes, as drab and lifeless as her personality. She didn’t speak a word as they walked to the Temple of Trials, and not even the faintest flutter of emotion crossed her features.
His thoughts drifted to the other servants he’d seen over the years. He’d always thought them so dedicated, th
eir focus unwavering, but he was starting to see through his initial judgement of them. There was something odd about them, something empty. The workers were just people that hadn’t been strong enough for what Nyson had planned, and yet they seemed so devoid of emotion, shambling about from place to place as if they were nothing but husks of their former selves.
“Are you all right?” he asked the woman, watching her face closely for any sign of acknowledgement.
Her eyes were dull and empty, and she didn’t even so much as glance his direction. She kept moving, her eyes locked straight ahead, walking with the same steady stride she’d been using since they left his home. He asked her again, purposely raising his voice in hopes of startling her. He was greeted with silence. It wasn’t as if she were simply ignoring him, it was like she’d never heard him at all. It was deeply unsettling, and he hung further back, not wanting to be close to the woman.
They passed under the thick branches of the giant wraith wood tree that formed the Temple of Union. It loomed over him, casting web like shadows across his face as he looked up. The temple had held so much meaning to him before. It was where they’d undergone the union ritual, where he’d felt his heart flutter at the sight of Kirheen sitting across from him, knowing that after that moment, they would be bond mates forever. It felt like a lifetime ago, a fading memory, a dream. To think it held so little meaning after everything that had happened.
The Temple of Trials came into view, a place he’d been lucky enough to avoid throughout his youth. It was a long, narrow building tucked away in the trees. It looked perfectly ordinary, but the years of stories he’d heard about the place filled him with a strange sense of dread.
The Allseer Trilogy Page 21
