Eventually Dermot’s presence led her to a small opening, a dark hole hidden within the base of the mountain.
This must be the cave of which Nimue spoke. Every part of her body and soul, heart and mind, warned her not to enter. All but one, the one that sensed her brother’s presence within. She dismounted, her feet and ankles tingling as she landed with the cold, so she had to hobble a few steps before the feeling came back to her. She tied Bruce to a skeletal tree near the entrance before hovering at the threshold.
“Damn it,” she cursed after a long while, and entered.
Immediately, darkness engulfed her, leaving her blind. She tiptoed a few paces, hands feeling the way ahead, the walls slick with wet and damp. The air heavy, dense, making it difficult to breathe.
“Dermot?” She spoke into the cavernous hole. Nothing but the plonk of water dripping. Timidly, she lit a flame to her fingers, pulling a face at the grime it allowed her to see. She could feel Dermot, a whisper of him—a strange sensation. His life force was usually so strong, so connected to one another this spell never failed her. Now, she grappled at the edges trying to pull the faint feeling of him close. She wondered if this was the result of her soul spell. The disconnect not only to herself but her twin. She blew out hard at the thought.
There was shuffling ahead of her in the darkness. Emrysa stopped short. “Who’s there?” she demanded, pulling her fear deep inside. “Dermot?”
The shuffling did not stop, and Emrysa, though standing still, leant toward the sound, peering hard into the black ahead.
“Hello?” she called again, her voice muted by the damp enclosure surrounding her.
Again, the shuffling, the sound changing. Footsteps.
A bright purple light erupted. Emrysa jumped, then exhaled slowly.
“Nimue!” she said, relief pooling over Emrysa. “You got here! Where’s Dermot? Merlin?”
Nimue’s greedy eyes lingered over Emrysa’s body in her leather attire. She licked her lips before her features pinched slightly, yet she offered no answers to Emrysa’s questions but had an urgency of her own.
“Quickly, come. It’s your brother.”
“What?” Emrysa shrieked, wide-eyed. “What’s wrong with him.”
“I’ll answer en-route, come on. He needs your help.”
They raced along the corridors, both using their flames to light the way. Upon the wall, their tall shadows chased them as they ran deeper into the belly of the hovel.
“Is it the Council? Have they got to him? Do they know we’re here?” Emrysa’s questions tumbled from her mouth as fast as her feet covered the rank ground. She didn’t worry about avoiding the putrid puddles. She barely noticed they were there.
“It’s not the Council,” Nimue said, turning her head to Emrysa as they ran side-by-side. “It’s something else.”
“What then? Goddess damn it! Where’s Merlin? Is he with Dermot? Is he helping?”
“Don’t worry about Merlin. It’s your brother who needs your thoughts.”
Down they ran, deeper and deeper, the air heavier and heavier until the came into the great expanse—the dark heart of the cave.
“What the...” Emrysa trailed off. First her eyes were drawn to the monolithic fountain at the center, flowing with a dark and metallic twang of...
“Is that... blood?” Emrysa said, noticing the huge base of the fountain made entirely by skulls. Then her eyes trailed away to the ground, following the path of a smaller, thinner, fresher trail of blood.
She felt her world stop spinning, felt her fraying soul darkening.
“Dermot!”
23
Revelations
Of all the death and darkness Emrysa had ever seen. Of all the fear she felt when lost to the Forest Black and its terrifying essence. Of all the dread of the Darkness as it leaked into her world, killing her parents and everything she had ever known. Nothing—nothing—could prepare her for the sight that now stained her eyes and broke her heart.
“No!” She roared, fear paralyzing her.
The details formed in but a second. The five-pointed star, smeared with blood along the ground, the candles flickering black flames at each point. The bulk of her brother’s body at the center curled into a fetal position.
So this is why I can only feel a whisper of his presence.
“He’s dying?” Emrysa said. A question. A statement. She turned to Nimue. “Who... how? Who did this?”
Nimue did not answer and Emrysa didn’t wait for her as clarity overcame her fear and she raced to Dermot. His eyes flickered open to catch her own, horror etched on his handsome features. Then, he flickered. His entire body, in and out of view.
Emrysa slammed to a halt, her toes a whisper away from the blooded sign on the ground.
She spun to Nimue, who’s face contorted into glee.
“It’s not him.” Emrysa said in disbelief. “It’s... it’s a trick.”
Nimue slow-clapped. “I very nearly had you, didn’t I?” She clicked her fingers and the image of Dermot disappeared leaving an empty space but, an empty space in which Emrysa knew was made for her.
“What sort of dark art is this?” Emrysa spat, feeling now the power of the mark seeping from the bloodied pentagon. She felt the pull of her soul ebb toward it but fought it all the same. Emrysa flicked her fingers outward, casting an attack spell at Nimue, who caught it with a deathly smile and returned the gesture. Emrysa ducked, and side stepped, careful not to step a foot into the pentagon, then threw a fire spell creating a flaming wall between them. Then, as fast as she could, Emrysa fled.
She had to find her brother, no matter what. Nimue did not pursue, and instead, stayed behind the walls of flame laughing a cool and measured laugh. “You think so much of yourself that you would believe to woo me as you did Merlin, you pathetic, vain, creature!”
Emrysa ignored Nimue’s voice that chased her along the cavernous corridors. She could see the sliver of light ahead, braced her eyes for the shock of light and all but threw herself from the cave.
Half blinded by the light, she scrabbled to Bruce who whinnied. He started pulling back from the tree he was tied upon in panic, eyes wide with fear. The leather reins stretched but did not snap. She managed to calm Bruce long enough to untie him, mount, and swing around when the spell came.
It pelted the horse with so much force, he screamed, rearing as high as possible. Emrysa gripped his neck. His scream cut short. His warm muscular neck turned to hard stone beneath her touch. The horse’s entire body solidified.
“Shit!” Emrysa slid from the now stone horse, falling to the ground with a thump and then another blow struck.
This time hitting Emrysa.
This time pounding not only her body.
This time, turning all she knew into blackness.
24
Power and Magic
The chants echoed in the great expanse, the voices ringing back and repeating the call again and again.
Old words.
Strange words.
Words that should not be spoken.
Her head hurt, and it took several long seconds for Emrysa’s sight to focus, to lose its blurred edges. She made to rub her eyes, but her found her wrists were bound behind her back. That’s when the pain hit. She groaned and tried to gather herself from the cold, wet ground to her knees, but she couldn’t maintain the energy needed. She collapsed, a loud crack as her head hit the ground with a splash upon her face—a metallic twang of warm blood splattered across her lips.
In a haze, her head spinning, her eyes followed the sound of the chorus.
The Alchive Council—and leading the chants, Nimue.
The double-crossing bitch!
The entire escape plan had been a trick. The Council had always known she would come here, she knew this as true as her own heartbeat. They didn’t follow her here, instead she had stupidly followed their orders.
Emrysa groaned as she struggled once again to her knees, resting upon forearms and elbows
, she tried to shuffle forward, but the confines of the blood-smeared pentagon kept her in place. She could not escape its boundary, held within the grips of the black-flamed candles.
This was a dark art—something the Alchive Council should never condone. But they no longer resembled the Council kept in place to protect. Not with their floor-length black hooded cloaks that all but concealed their faces in shadow, deer skull headdresses with ornate antlers sharpened and bejeweled.
On they chanted.
“Why?” Emrysa sobbed, as a whisper at first, then finding the strength of her voice. “Why?”
Only Nimue broke the chant and stepped forward from the congregation. “Power,” she said simply. “Power and magic.”
“But you know, you know I’ve done nothing to deserve this condemnation, nothing!”
“Did you not use a soul spell? A dark art? Did you not create a portal into another world? Bring its darkness into ours? Kill you parents? Your entire staff?” Nimue asked sweetly.
“You were there. That’s not all true, you know it, you were there.” Emrysa looked into the deep eye sockets of the deer skulls covering Nimue’s face, hoping to reach the eyes beneath. “That’s not how things happened!”
The chants continued. Louder now. The congregation stepped forward.
Nimue reached into her cloak and pulled out a book. A book of shadows. The Cheval Book of Shadows. Seeing it in her hands, it was wrong, all wrong. Emrysa sobbed. She knew how bad this looked, the blood spells she thought, chastising herself for the madness that allowed her to create those things in the first place.
“Emrysa, we have to rid the world of you and your power, of what you may become.” Nimue whispered now, crouching just inches away from the blood-smeared pentagon that was her prison. “We cannot allow you to become what you may. We cannot allow your bloodline to take magic away from this world.”
“Nimue, please. Why are you doing this to me? Why?”
“Because I want the Cheval power in my hands.”
Nimue clicked her fingers—black flames flickered from her fingertips. The killing spell, Emrysa thought and her only thought was the fear that her brother may fall to the same fate.
And as if thoughts could summon, he appeared.
“Emrysa!” Dermot yelled as he reached the dark heart of the cave, beside him, the young maid Rhian. Merlin closed in behind, skidding to a halt, frozen at the sight.
“What is this?!” Merlin raged. Emrysa had half a notion to be a least a little thankful that none of this was his doing. That he, too, had not double-crossed her. Nimue wasted no time and cast a spell as quick as lightning that crashed into Merlin’s chest and this time, he really did freeze to the spot, his red aura disappearing completely in Nimue’s stranglehold. Dermot managed to miss the blow, but it was enough to trigger something in Emrysa, something primal.
Despite the forces of magic holding her, she roared, bracing herself as the pain came, bracing herself as she breached the invisible barrier stained with blood.
Bracing herself as the last fiber of her soul split and tore away from her body completely.
25
Divided
Some pain can be described, it can be sensed. The pain of grief, the pain of heartbreak, betrayal, or the severing of a limb. There is an understanding of its depth and of its healing, and of time and place.
This is not what a full severing of the soul feels like.
It was as if the universe exploded inside her chest—stars, comets, worlds, black holes—all pushing themselves against the containment of her body. An excruciating torture as if she would erupt from the inside out. She howled, a sound belonging to the very pits of hell buried beneath their feet. The blood-spell prison erupted into blackened flames, smoke swirling through the dank air. Emrysa writhed, jolting with agonizing movements.
“Emrysa!” Dermot yelled. Rhian clung to him, tears dripping down her youthful face.
She tried to reply. She wanted to say something, anything that would make her brother believe the torture was not as bad as it looked. A lie. The biggest lie and she felt her sinews tear, her bones crunch. She tried, but when she opened her mouth, a colossal scream emanated.
The sound blasted everyone from her. Like felled trees they crashed to the ground.
The Alchive Council staggered to their feet, reformed, Nimue at its front.
Emrysa welcomed death now. Welcomed an end to the insufferable pain the blood prison caused when she broke through its barrier.
As if Nimue knew her thoughts—and of course, she did, Emrysa remembered her mind probing since their very first encounter—Nimue cast. Yet instead of the death spell, she sent only more pain. A torture spell. The darkest of incantations.
Emrysa should have passed out with the pain, she knew it. Nobody could withstand this much suffering and still live. But Nimue was keeping her alive. Keeping her alive to feel it all.
“Stop!” yelled one of the Council members. He threw off the deer scull headdress and whipped down his hood to expose his wizened face, his wild grey hair and flowing beard. “This is beyond us, Nimue. Stop. It’s barbaric!”
“Shut up, Ffroth!” Nimue yelled. “Or you’ll suffer the same result.”
The young pretty witch seen from the scrying board also threw off her mask in disgust. Several other members followed suit and discarded their ceremonial wear, removing their masks to expose faces ingrained with disgust and unease.
“We did not come here for this disgusting show, Nimue,” Ffroth roared. “We came for the prophecy, to save the future of magic. If this is what it takes to do so, then magic would be better off dead. Stop, I command you. There is another way!”
Ffroth cast toward Nimue, but as he did, so did many of her followers, creating a safe barrier around her.
“Bloody magic,” Ffroth scoffed, and reached into the folds of his gown for a tiny vial of bubbling liquid. He threw it at Merlin, the glass smashed before his feet, green smoke rising to undo the spell Nimue had place upon him. Ffroth gave a satisfied nod. “You can always rely on silence,” Ffroth muttered to himself, already knowing Merlin would have what it took to help stop Nimue’s wrath.
“Emrysa!” Merlin yelled, now alive with rage.
Dermot, Ffroth, Merlin, the young witch, and several Council members who had discarded their robes, now cast at Nimue, splitting the Alchive Council into two. Nimue’s followers continued to cast a safe barrier of protection over her, relishing in the pain and torture the powerless Emrysa lived.
And Emrysa watched it all with acute clarity, the spell working on her senses to feel everything. Everything in vivid detail. Which was how she noticed the turning of Nimue’s fingertips. Her deep inhale before she changed her spell. The slant of her shoulders that told Emrysa exactly where Nimue would cast. Emrysa’s bloodshot eyes turned to her brother. To Merlin. The old man and the Council members trying to help her. Rhian, the maid so like her younger sister, helpless and powerless, hiding behind a small rock.
Nimue was going to kill them all.
Anticipating the exact moment Nimue would turn her spell around with the acuteness of the details the prissy pale bitch had bestowed upon her, Emrysa dug deep. She combined all her pain, all her torture, all her fear. All her lost hopes. Lost dreams. The million details of her future life that now lay broken beneath her feet. All of it, she hauled it into one last spell.
A spell of protection.
To protect the ones she loved. To protect the ones capable of loving her.
In a flash, Nimue spun to her left. Emrysa dropped to the floor, but before the relief of pain leaving her body could be felt, she cast.
The protection spell flew from her hands with one agonizing yell, hurtling toward her tribe. It would reach them before Nimue’s spell. Emrysa’s smile quickly melted away with the sound of the whirling Darkness.
It had found them. Empowered by the faerie roads. It had found them all.
Just as Emrysa’s protection spell hit its intended
targets, so the black mass roared into the heart of the chamber, belching acrid smoke and covering the walls with mold and decay, its thundering boom deafening. It caught Emrysa’s protection spell and morphed it. The glittering gold shimmering on her targets now glittered with black. Dermot, Merlin, Rhian, the old man first to stand up for her, the young pretty witch who quickly followed, half of the Alchive Council who tried to help her, suddenly gasped in pain. Their hands shooting to their collar bones as blackened smoke swirled from between their clasped fingers. When they released their hands, it was not protection spell placed upon them, but instead, a dark mark etched upon their skin.
Two crescent moons back-to-back.
Just like the sign Emrysa had seen on her dead parents’ chamber door.
Screams rang out. The Darkness would kill them. Kill them all.
Succumb to me, it whispered in Emrysa’s mind. She would never. Never.
Succumb to me and in return I shall pardon their lives.
The world stopped turning. She watched everything in slow motion.
I have to do this, don’t I? She asked herself. I have to do this. Succumb to the Darkness to save the ones I love.
She stole one more glance at her brother, whose kind heart propelled him to risk his life as he pulled Rhian crying from her hiding place before the Darkness got to her. He yelled out for her, for Emrysa, all the while. She watched Merlin, desperately trying to hold back the Darkness with the help of the old man and the pretty young witch, but no matter their magical prowess, the Darkness was too much. She could see the strain on Merlin’s face, see it in the way his weakening hands shook with exertion.
Perhaps there’s a way I can control the Darkness if it’s within me. If I succumb. Perhaps I can shape it. Stop it from spreading. Contain it?
Raven Heart Page 9
