The Echoed Realm

by A. J. Vrana

  It worked. The hand around Ama’s throat shot up and struck the raven so hard he flew across the room, crashing into the remaining shelves before he was able to slow himself. It was a split second, but it was all they needed.

  “No!” Miya shouted as Gavran slumped to the floor and struggled to right himself. As she spun towards Kai, Ama launched up and head-butted him in the nose. He pulled back, blood gushing. Ethereal feathers of midnight and violet engulfed Miya like armor as the dream stone flashed. Taken by fury, Miya released a war-like scream that momentarily felled the border between worlds. The sound distorted as it pierced through the physical plane and the dreamscape alike, sending Kai crumpling to the floor as he clamped his hands over his ears.

  Dark mist shuddered against his skin, battling to stay inside.

  The anger drained out of Miya faster than it’d filled her up, her otherworldly shroud vanishing alongside it. “What did you do?” she whimpered as she realized that Kai wasn’t alone.

  “Yes…” came a gleeful hiss as putrid breath washed over her.

  It was Rusalka, now clinging to Miya’s back.

  Staggering to his feet, Kai grabbed the wall for support, then curled in on himself.

  “What did you do?” Miya asked again, her voice quaking with fear.

  “I had to get rid of her,” said Kai. “This was the only damn way.”

  The miasma slithered over him, coalescing in his left arm. He tried to make a fist, to contain the spasms, but the entity subdued him, bending his fingers to grotesque angles.

  Kai grimaced as his joints were folded beyond their limit, but he didn’t dare make a sound—a stubborn refusal to give his nemesis even an inch.

  Something about him was different. Even while Abaddon haunted him, he retained his autonomy. Sure, the phantom terrorized him, made him live in constant trepidation, but Abaddon never controlled Kai.

  And Miya had never feared him; she knew that no matter what Abaddon threw their way, Kai wasn’t dangerous. The brothers were forces that clashed, but neither had the strength to overtake the other.

  This was different.

  They were joined—not just by an enduring grudge, but by the very fabric of their souls. It was like they’d been stitched together, the suture too deep and painful to rip apart.

  “You’re integrated with him,” said Miya. “With Velizar.”

  He finally looked up, his face hidden under shadow save for the stream of red emanating from his eyes. “Yes.”

  A weak croak drew Miya’s attention, and she glimpsed Gavran hopping forward as he shook out his injured wing. She sighed with relief, but the reprieve was fleeting.

  “You knew this would happen.” The words were directed to the demon at Miya’s back.

  “Of course I did. Why do you think I came to you?” Rusalka tittered. “Have you forgotten what Abaddon did to me? I wasn’t supposed to die, but I was murdered in your place, Dreamwalker. When I said there was another responsible, I didn’t just mean your enemy. I meant you as well.”

  She circled around like a shark, greeting Miya with her vacuous smile. “I will have revenge on all three spirits: First, Velizar, who set the cycle in motion, then his brother, who enabled him for far too long. And finally, you, who lives while I and so many other innocents died. You will lose the one you love most by your own hand. That is your punishment.”

  “No,” Miya shook her head, her voice breaking. “I won’t do it.”

  How could she? There was no promise that could bind her to murder. Even if Velizar had taken possession of someone else—Mason, or a random stranger—she would not take anyone’s life to appease Rusalka’s vindictiveness.

  “But you must,” cooed the demoness. “The only way to kill Velizar now is to kill the one he is a part of.”

  I don’t care, Miya wanted to scream. Sickness swam in her stomach as memories pummelled her like stones—her first meeting with Kai, reiterated throughout the aeons. An injured wolf and a lonely girl who always found one another beneath the willow. They fit together like the two pieces of her broken dream stone.

  Even if Miya could spend the rest of her life without him, he was still a part of her story—a god from her fable—and she’d be a fool to allow a promise made in deceit hold her hostage.

  “I won’t do it,” she said, her gaze fixed on Kai. The tremors grew stronger until she knotted her hands into fists to keep from shaking. Turmoil swirled between the witch and the wolf. Despite everything he’d done, she knew he was fighting back with the only tools he knew how to use. He didn’t deserve to die. Besides…

  “I still love him.”

  Rusalka’s face contorted. “This was your deal, Dreamwalker. It’s on you to fulfill it. Or I’ll simply have to find a new target—your father, perhaps? He came so close last time. You were lucky he never found you in those wretched woods.”

  Miya spun towards the monstress when the panic threatened to swallow her whole. “You’re just like Abaddon!”

  “I was his victim!” Rusalka howled back, sickly slime spewing from her mouth.

  “You’re a victim who’s become like her abuser! You’re stuck in his cycle!” Miya’s muddy green eyes ignited. She refused to budge, even as Rusalka’s venom spattered across her skin and burned her like acid. “You’ve taken his place. You’re enacting his will even in his absence. You proud of that?”

  Rusalka’s eyes swelled with tarry rage. Her mouth drew impossibly wide, her saw-toothed maw unhinging as her nostrils flared. Grabbing Miya by the hair, she yanked her back and exposed her throat. Her nails plucked at the soft skin beneath Miya’s jaw. “I will kill everyone you love. It’s your choice. Lose one or lose them all.

  From the corner of her eye, Miya saw Kai blunder closer. He was grasping his left arm, fingers twitching erratically as if out of his control. His breath drew in with a ragged wheeze, his skin caked in sweat as he struggled against the entity scraping away his volition. Miya stretched back and searched for Kai—the real Kai hidden beneath the heap of torment Velizar had all but crushed him with. As if feeling her call, he looked up and found her.

  His eyes no longer bled fire. They’d returned to their warm mahogany brown, his pupils ringed with their usual red tinge.

  With malice slicing into her jugular, Miya did the only thing she could think of. She smiled at Kai, then whispered the words she wished she’d told him aeons ago, before Velizar drove a blade through their hearts.

  “I love you.”

  52

  Kai

  The floor wouldn’t stop tilting. Miya’s words had barely formed on her lips, but he’d heard them loud and clear, echoing in the hollow chamber behind his ribs.

  But the fucking floor wouldn’t stop tilting.

  Kai felt like he was in a snow globe being shaken by a toddler. Every time he tried to step in the right direction, the annoying brat governing his universe shook the glass ball and left him tripping over his own feet, lost in a blizzard of helplessness.

  That rotting mermaid had his girl.

  Ama flung herself at Rusalka, but it was no use. She was a vengeful creature that couldn’t be killed by ordinary means. Only the Dreamwalker could slay a spirit, and this one played by its own complicated rules. The white wolf plunged right through her, tumbling into a chair before jumping back up and glowering. She was joined by Gavran, who dive-bombed the monster several times before she cut a thin line across Miya’s throat. It welled with blood, painting Rusalka’s nails red. Her grudge was strong enough to harm the people she was attached to. For the Dreamwalker, her claws were as real as any blade.

  Just then, the kitchen doors flew open, crashing into the adjacent wall.

  “What the hell is going on here?” Crowbar stood in the entryway, a still-lit cigarette between her lips. She scanned the room, eyes lingering on Miya’s bent form before she spotted Kai. The anger bled from her face alongside the colour. She was now sheet-white, ghostly shock invading the space left behind by the outrage. The plastic bag d
angling from her wrist slid off her hand and plopped to the floor as she went slack-jawed.

  Ama pivoted towards her, voice fear-stricken. “Dahlia—”

  Before she could finish, Crowbar jumped onto the back counter and retrieved her namesake. Clapping the steel into her palm, she hopped down and scanned the room. “It’s here, isn’t it?” She was hoarse and breathless, her cheeks moist. “The thing that killed my sister!”

  Rusalka threw her head back and unleashed a discordant laugh. “What’s this? You actually told this poor girl the truth?”

  Kai hadn’t, but he saw from Miya and Ama’s heartbroken expressions that they’d been left with no other choice. They’d given Crowbar new wounds to heal.

  The bartender homed in on Miya, whose contortions only confirmed that something had a hold of her. Miya flinched, attempting to jerk free, and Crowbar saw her opening.

  “Don’t!” Kai’s protest was a pathetic croak as he was lambasted by Velizar’s infection.

  Gavran bolted for Crowbar’s weapon. His talons clinched the curve of the rod as he flapped furiously, trying to guide the bartender away from danger. Ama grabbed her from behind and pulled her farther from the demoness at the center of the room.

  “What are you doing!” Crowbar fought back, now sobbing uncontrollably.

  Ama tightened her grip, the human girl no match for her strength. “Stop! You can’t clobber your sister’s killer with a stick!”

  “I don’t care!” Crowbar shrieked, now kicking and throwing herself back at the white wolf.

  Kai couldn’t breathe. He didn’t know if it was because of Velizar, or because something inside him had finally broken for good. None of this should’ve been happening, but it was…and it was all because he was weak.

  You don’t have to be weak.

  “Shut up,” Kai rasped.

  The only way to stop her is to get to her first. He felt Velizar’s teeth grating against his spine—like there was a second body sprouting from the dark ooze flooding his insides. Slice up her heart, Destroyer.

  “You said that wouldn’t work.”

  It won’t work for long, but then we’ll have the pleasure of cutting her down again. We can hold her down together.

  Kai’s left arm began to spasm, jerking towards his hunting knife. No matter how hard he tried to wrangle it back, his traitorous hand wouldn’t obey, so he snatched the weapon with his good one.

  His left arm was dying. Bruises settled into his fingertips, and black veins erupted from the taint, spidering up his wrist.

  Velizar was a poison—a caustic fume withering Kai from the inside. All throughout time, they’d wrestled for control, until competition devolved into brutality. Their cycle of killing one another had never actually ended. How many times had Kai butchered his brother? How many lifetimes had been wrecked by their contest of egos, by their stubborn refusal to do the most obvious thing in the world and simply walk away?

  Kai stared at the knife, recalling how he’d driven it into Rusalka’s heart, how he believed so brazenly that it would eliminate her the same way it’d eliminated his other problems—including his brother.

  But it didn’t work. It never worked. Violence and destruction defined him, just as Velizar wanted. His brother had once called himself the king of spades, though Kai wasn’t sure which of them that applied to.

  Was Velizar really the king of spades, or was he merely the king’s hand?

  Kai understood now why his nemesis had chosen to fester there. Hands enacted wills. They were a testament to the mind’s control over the body. What better way to rob Kai of his autonomy than to take the hand that wielded his own blade?

  Kai gripped the haft tighter. “She can’t help you,” he called to Rusalka. “But I can.”

  The demoness sneered at him. “What are you on about, wolf?”

  “I know what you want, and I can give it to you.” He turned the tip of the knife to the floor. “Let her go, and I promise I’ll end this.” He glanced at Miya. “I’ll do what she can’t.”

  Rusalka’s grip on Miya’s hair loosened, and a cruel smile spread across her face. “Oh? Will you slit that pretty throat for me, precious thing?”

  Miya darted back, her wide eyes grabbing hold of him. “Don’t—”

  “It’s all right,” Kai said softly and offered her a faint smile. He looked past her, locked eyes with the raven guarding Crowbar, and nodded in gratitude.

  Gavran tilted his head to a near-right angle, and the boy’s voice echoed in Kai’s mind. You are a god of the Hollow and the realm that echoes within. Reality is your playground. Shape it as you see fit.

  Kai knew what he had to do.

  Velizar had tried to convince him to take the blame for what’d become of them. He wanted Kai to accept that they’d be better off as a single being so they couldn’t keep repeating the same mistakes. Most of all, he wanted Kai to believe that the Dreamwalker was their enemy.

  But it was all a ruse; the question of whose fault the past was didn’t matter. Velizar’s goal wasn’t reconciliation; it was control. To destroy Kai’s sense of self, to strip him of agency. They couldn’t keep fighting if one of them was a slave to the other.

  Kai raised the knife.

  I don’t know what you’re planning, his brother’s frantic voice interjected, but you can never be rid of me!

  Kai’s arm throbbed with the force of Velizar’s compulsion, but he was a stubborn son of a bitch, and he wouldn’t be bested by a clingy zealot.

  You are nothing without me!

  With his last ounce of willpower, Kai balled up his betrayer-fist and pressed the cursed thing flush against his side. Spinning the hunting knife in his right hand, he aimed the point downward. “I’ll be a better nothing without you.”

  Then, he brought down the glinting steel.

  Kai bit back a scream as the blade pierced his gut. Blood blossomed over his shirt, the dark fabric failing to disguise the wet stain as life spilled from his wound. Every cell screamed in rebellion as blistering fire erupted over his skin, but he refused to let go. Defying his impulses, Kai sawed through tendon, muscle, and bone, cleaving through ribs and moving towards his heart.

  “Get out,” he growled through clenched teeth, the knife juddering in his white-knuckled grip. “Or die with your precious baby brother.”

  You’re bluffing!

  Kai’s lips pulled back into baleful grin. “Think I won’t die for her?” He tugged the blade closer to the beating mass in his chest. “You’ve got a short memory, brother.”

  No!

  No!

  No!

  Velizar’s fury gored Kai’s senses as he repeated the word like a futile mantra.

  You dare!

  You dare!

  You dare!

  His protests grew louder, the groans rising to a skull-piercing shriek.

  The air fled Kai’s lungs, and he wheezed desperately. Stars bloomed before his eyes, chairs and tables blurring into wobbly doubles as his legs shook from the strain. But Kai endured. Lifetimes of deadly conflict with Velizar curdled into an ultimatum.

  He’d carved up Rusalka’s heart. Now he would carve out his own.

  A roiling pressure pushed on the blade from inside him. It squirmed between his broken ribs, writhing to escape. Unable to fight the thrust any longer, the knife came free. Kai reeled back and dropped it, the pain overtaking him. He crashed into the wall and fell to his knees, gripping his abdomen as it spewed red and black. A tarry, foul-smelling liquid poured out of him, and as it did, the veins that pulsed with darkness along his left hand faded to a light blue.

  The thick, mercurial substance that left his body bubbled like hot oil. It undulated against the floorboards, losing itself in the cracks as though trying to disperse.

  “He’s escaping!” Rusalka shrieked, her voice laced with panic.

  But no one was listening.

  Kai detected every pair of eyes in the room on him. He curled into a ball, sight bleary and teeth chattering. He
rolled onto his back and whimpered, the skin around the wound searing as though branded.

  Then, he felt Miya drop next to him.

  “Lambchop…” he murmured deliriously.

  “Shut up, you’re bleeding to death!” He couldn’t bring himself to look at her—not yet.

  “I’m fine.”

  “You just stabbed yourself!” She tried to staunch the flow with a towel, but it was like putting a Band-Aid over a gunshot wound.

  He finally found the courage to open his eyes, and the worry on her face ate him alive. “Rotting Mermaid…is right.”

  Miya glanced at the floor, but the black ooze was gone.

  “You have to go…fuck him up.”

  “I don’t care about that right now!” Her hands shook against him.

  He could hear Rusalka crying, her monstrosity giving way to something fragile now that her rage was faltering.

  “Oh, get a hold of yourself!” Ama snapped at her, then released Crowbar and rushed towards Miya. “Kai’s right. You should follow that…thing. It could be your only chance to finish him.”

  Miya didn’t move. “But—”

  “I’ll take care of Kai!” the white wolf silenced her.

  Miya swallowed and nodded slowly. “Just give me a minute.”

  Ama sighed but conceded. She retreated to the corner of the room with Crowbar and Gavran, watching Rusalka’s every move. The mouldy washcloth seemed wrung out, albeit begrudgingly. Her only shot at revenge was to let the Dreamwalker do what she did best.

  Crowbar had long stopped fighting to swing at a murderer she couldn’t see. Her hands were pressed over her mouth, her eyes bloodshot as tears rolled over her fingers. Ama wrapped both arms around her, and she collapsed against the white wolf’s shoulder, overcome with grief. Crowbar had witnessed one of the many twisted endings that might’ve awaited her sister and brother-in-law had things played out differently. Kai and Miya could’ve been Vincent and Sydney, only Vincent had no way of surviving what Kai had just done to himself.

  Miya reached for Kai’s hand. Twining their fingers, he squeezed to let her know he was still breathing.