Half-Born (Half-Blood Chronicles #1) (The Half-Blood Chronicles)

by Ivy Baum

  Goosebumps covered my arms. There was a shift in energy in the room—and I felt that invisible undertow I had come to recognize.

  Lucan’s pupils had gone entirely black.

  He turned to Vissarion.

  “No!”

  I had thrown out an arm, ready to step in front of him. Ready to fight for him.

  But as I gathered my energy, I felt another great shift in the room. I glanced over at Sol and saw that his own eyes had turned dark and inhuman.

  He can’t. He’s a Cipher, too.

  But Sol didn’t seem to care. There was a burst of white light, and I could’ve sworn I felt the air itself pulling apart.

  I heard screaming, though I didn’t know whether it was from me or someone else.

  And then, all at once, the energy sort of folded in on itself. The room went back to normal.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Sol, still standing, and thought, It’s okay. He’s going to be okay.

  Then he swayed, and I knew that something was wrong.

  A moment later, he collapsed.

  Chapter 63

  I crouched at his side, frantically feeling for a pulse.

  I felt nothing at first. Then—a weak flutter under my finger.

  He was alive. But his face was empty, slack in a way that I’d never seen before. Even my mother, that horrible night, hadn’t looked so empty, so…drained.

  I heard a noise and looked up. Lucan was getting to his feet, though I hadn’t seen him fall. I watched as he straightened, still shaky, but growing stronger with each passing second.

  Shaken—but intact.

  My heart sank.

  Sol had sacrificed himself for nothing.

  I heard footsteps and looked up, eyes swimming with tears. Lucan stood over me.

  “I really thought he knew better than that. I’m going to have a headache for hours.”

  Through the pain and shock, I felt a strange sort of distance—a sense of looking down on this scene from a million miles away.

  I gazed at Lucan as though seeing him for the first time.

  His world was simple. He existed to cut a violent swath through the world, eliminating obstacles without a second thought.

  With a flash of clarity, I understood.

  It was how I had to be. If I wanted to survive, and to get Sol and Vissarion to safety.

  And so I closed my eyes and let the empty channel open up inside me.

  I thought I heard Vissarion call my name—but the outside world was already fading away.

  The hatred and fear I felt for Lucan fed the river of energy inside me, made me feel invincible. I drank it in, until it was more than I could stand, until I could no longer differentiate myself from the violent, pulsing energy.

  When I unleashed it, it was as though I’d been emptied out entirely.

  I opened my eyes, sure that I would see Lucan reduced to a smoldering pile of ash.

  But as the tide of energy receded and the world swam back to me, I was aware of a single, unmistakable sound—laughter.

  Lucan smiled. “Now that you’ve tapped me on the shoulder, shall we dance?”

  I didn’t think I had anything left. But as I opened myself up, it happened again. I felt as though I were turning myself inside out—until there was nothing left of me.

  When it was over, I was doubled over, trying to remain upright. I looked up through blurring vision.

  There was a burnt tang in the air. The floor around Lucan looked as though it had been scorched. But he stood there—unharmed. Untouched, even.

  The only difference was the unnatural brightness in his eyes.

  I felt myself sway. I knew I was losing—but I could barely muster the energy to be afraid.

  Lucan frowned. “That’s it, then? All you’ve done is whet my appetite.”

  Something was wrong. The thought seemed to come from far away.

  He’s not getting any weaker. If anything, his strength seemed to have grown with each attack.

  Sweat prickled my forehead. What was I missing?

  People were talking—or maybe it was just Lucan—but their voices faded in and out.

  I tried to pull the energy inside me once more. But a moment later, I found myself on my knees, unsure of how I’d gotten there.

  I wondered if I would pass out—or die. The prospect no longer seemed terrifying.

  I closed my eyes. When I opened them, Lucan was in front of me.

  “I have to say, I’m disappointed. You showed such promise, that first time. But it looks as though it’s come to nothing.”

  That first time…

  The words stirred something in my memory. I followed the train of thought like a spark in a dark forest.

  What had he said, that day in the motel?

  Plenty of raw power, but where’s the finesse?

  I had taken it as a throwaway insult. But what if it held some deeper meaning?

  What if it held the key to unlocking my true power?

  Another distant voice intruded.

  Different, this time—Melantha’s.

  “Stop toying with her, Lucan. Either leave her alone or finish her off. We have more important things to do than toss around this rag doll.”

  Rag doll. Yes, that was what I was. A hollow, empty vessel.

  And Lucan was stronger than ever.

  Then it clicked—the first piece of the puzzle.

  All of my energy had poured into Lucan. Everything I threw at him—he absorbed it.

  It had to be part of the Cipher magic.

  Now I was the empty one.

  You’ve felt this way before.

  I thought back to that night outside The Lofts. I had been left alone in Sol’s car, and had relaxed into some sort of empty place.

  That was where I had to go now.

  Always, before, the empty space had pushed into me, had made me hollow. Now I pushed back, and like a door swinging backward on its hinges, I pushed into the emptiness.

  And then I was on the other side.

  It was a place of undisturbed stillness and eternal silence—the cold of absolute zero, a true vacuum.

  The Quiet Place. I did not know whether the name had come from within me or somewhere else. The difference no longer seemed to matter.

  Out of the silence, I heard a voice from the past.

  Sol’s voice, warm with laughter. You want a magical training montage! Sorry, but it doesn’t work that way.

  This is magic we’re talking about. It’s not like it’s a sword and you’re going to hold it upside-down.

  Those words transformed my understanding.

  I had been doing it all wrong.

  My magic had always started with anger, fear, humiliation. That was why it was so often kick-started with adrenaline, in life-or-death situations. In those moments, as the energy flowed through me, I became little more than a vessel.

  Lucan had implied as much. I’d been channeling a brute force energy with no finesse of my own.

  But my magic could be so much more than that.

  It was time to turn the sword right side up.

  I was no longer the vessel. I had reached into that alien place and stole the power for myself.

  And now that it was in our world, I could do anything.

  I turned my attention on Lucan.

  He was arguing with Melantha—but I no longer heard—or cared about—his words.

  I focused on him. And then, using the strange power I’d taken from that other world, I took back the energy he’d stolen from me.

  Distantly, I was aware that someone was screaming.

  I blinked, and slowly I found myself back in this world.

  Lucan had collapsed. He wasn’t dead—I knew that, though I didn’t know how.

  Melantha was staring at me, eyes wide with horror. “What are you?”

  I felt a moment of incongruous humor.

  What am I? Just another half-blood bastard whose father couldn’t keep it in his pants.

&nbs
p; With every second that passed, I felt myself returning to this universe. It was as though the fabric of my being was being woven back into place.

  No. Before that happened, I needed to finish off Lucan. To obliterate Melantha and the other Blood Right soldiers.

  And then, perhaps, I’d go back to the Arena…

  I pushed back into that empty space prepared to bring more of that power back into the world.

  This time, though, something went wrong.

  Time seemed to stop—and then the world disappeared.

  Chapter 64

  Or rather, I did.

  One moment I was connected to both worlds, standing in the doorway between the normal world and the strange, quiet place.

  The next, I was gone.

  I could still see the stone-lined corridor, Lucan and Melantha and Vissarion and the Blood Right guys, all frozen in a lifeless tableau. They were there—but I was not.

  I had been removed. Now I was completely in the Quiet Place, and the door had swung shut behind me.

  And now that I was here, I wasn’t sure I liked it.

  It was a vast, cold place, a place of eternal silences and some unrecognizable life force that was nothing like my own.

  Back on Earth, a figure appeared.

  A woman—I was sure it was a woman, though I couldn’t see her face—in a violently red cloak.

  She spun in a slow circle, as though taking in the scene.

  When she got to Lucan, she stopped. She seemed to be carefully weighing everything in front of her.

  I studied her, trying to use my powers here to discern her identity. But every time I got close, reality itself seemed to bend and shimmer, like a face distorted under water.

  Then her magic began to work.

  The power, I knew, had come from this place—the Quiet Place. It was the same power I’d used—only she was infinitely more experienced.

  And then everyone disappeared. Well, almost everyone.

  Lucan and Melantha and all the soldiers were gone.

  Sol remained collapsed on the stone floor, and Vissarion stood there, frozen.

  For just a moment, I felt the stranger’s attention go to Sol.

  Could she help him? Bring him back?

  I felt a desperate desire to call out to her—though I didn’t know what I would say.

  But I had no voice. Not on Earth, anyway.

  The hooded stranger vanished without a trace.

  Then the universe around me seemed to shudder, and I was back in my own world.

  I felt pain—a pressure beyond imagining, like my body was imploding.

  It lasted for some indefinable span of time until, mercifully, everything went black.

  When I awoke, the pain was gone.

  For some time, that was all I knew or cared about.

  Then the fog began to dissipate, and the memories came creeping back. And with them—a sense that there was a lot more that I didn’t know.

  I was still in the Capitol—I knew that much.

  I was lying in a giant featherbed, plush and luxurious.

  It was a sharp contrast to the almost spartan furnishings of the room: stone walls and floor; no window; and lights that were distinctly pre-modern. The only other furniture was an old-fashioned porcelain washbasin and mirror—and a single chair.

  Looking at that chair, a new memory surfaced.

  Someone had sat there. The woman in the red cloak, her face still obscured in shadow.

  The chair was empty now. And suddenly I didn’t know whether the memory was real or the product of my fevered mind.

  There was a knock.

  I sat up, checked to make sure I was wearing something decent—I had no memory of getting undressed and being put to bed.

  When I determined that I was wearing something, I called, “Come in.”

  Sol stood in the doorway.

  Just like that, all thoughts of the mysterious woman in the red cloak disappeared. As I watched, Sol’s face broke into a wide, helpless smile.

  And then I remembered—Sol, sitting by my bed. Day after day, and some nights, too. I’d been in and out of consciousness, in various states of semi-wakefulness. It seemed like every time I awakened, Sol had been there.

  Now he grasped the chair, which looked heavy and uncomfortable, and moved it to the bedside. I thought of the last time I’d seen his face, slack and lifeless.

  There was no trace of that now. I could almost tell myself it had never happened…

  He took my hand.

  There was something different about his face. He looks older.

  How long had I been out?

  Shakily, I found my voice. “What happened?”

  He smiled gently. “We’re still trying to piece that together.”

  “The last time I saw you, you were…” My voice suddenly became stuck in my throat.

  I thought you were dead…or worse.

  He shook his head. “What I did was stupid. Not that I regret it. But I acted out of instinct. When I saw what he was about to do…”

  I squeezed his hand. “Thank you.” I frowned, feeling a wave of vertigo. There was so much I didn’t know. “What happened to him? To Vissarion, I mean?”

  “He’s fine.” A fleeting smile. “Busy working with Tyrus to rebuild the Capitol.”

  “Tyrus?”

  “The head of House Orikon. You remember—the bald guy?”

  I smiled. “Right.” The guy who didn’t want to kill me.

  “So much of the Assembly was slaughtered...well, there was a bit of a power vacuum. I think Tyrus was planning on taking over anyway. He’s the provisional leader of the Aristoi now.”

  “What about all the—others?”

  I didn’t know how to frame the question. What about all the purebloods who had supported Atameus?

  Sol shook his head. “A lot of them are gone. Many more are keeping a low profile.”

  “So…we won? The purebloods won’t fight us anymore?”

  “No one’s going to kick you out of that fluffy bed, if that’s what you’re worried about. No one’s talking about hunting down half-bloods. But I wouldn’t overstate the situation.”

  Atameus was dead. His Council of Elders was gone. And now the progressive faction was in power. What was that, if not victory?

  Sol seemed to pick up on my thoughts. “Things are…better. Just don’t mistake the situation for something it’s not.”

  I raised an eyebrow.

  “The old leadership is gone—that’s true. But this place is full of the same bunch of assholes. Just…a lot less of them.”

  I shook my head and fought off a wave of vertigo.

  So many unanswered questions.

  I studied Sol, looking for some sign of the damage that had been done. “How did you—?”

  He quirked a smile. “Survive?”

  I nodded, and just as quickly, the smile fell away.

  Suddenly, he didn’t look certain about anything.

  “I honestly don’t know. When I came to, Lucan and his men were gone. Vissarion was there. And you—”

  He stopped, looking shaken.

  I didn’t want to talk about me—or any of that. Not yet. So I prompted him gently, “You tried to use your Cipher powers on Lucan…”

  “Yes.” He seemed to be on more comfortable ground with this. “I shouldn’t be alive. When I attacked Lucan, it was like my entire power backfired on me. The details are a little hazy, but—well, let’s just say I’m glad I don’t remember much of it.”

  I thought of the woman in the red cloak, and of the lingering gaze she cast upon Sol. Was that how he’d survived?

  But what had she done?

  Sol frowned at me. “Vissarion says you fought Lucan. He said it looked like you were winning, even.”

  “I’m not sure I’d call it that. But…I did survive.”

  I was not ready to talk about the Quiet Place yet. Not even to Sol.

  He shook his head. “Well, whatever you did, it worked.
He said you just kind of collapsed. Understandable, given what—and who—you were up against.”

  Everything I’d seen—the frozen tableau, the woman in the red cloak, Blood Right disappearing—no one else had seen it. No one knew what really happened.

  For Vissarion, it must have seemed as though Lucan and his army had simply vanished into thin air.

  I frowned. “How long was I—?”

  Asleep? Unconscious?

  Sol’s face was grim. “Nearly two weeks. We brought their best healer, but even he couldn’t say what was wrong, or whether you would even—”

  He looked away.

  “What happened, Kes? They told me that Lucan and his men just disappeared.”

  He obviously wanted to avoid saying Melantha’s name. Well, I could hardly blame him.

  I nodded.

  He seemed to hesitate. “Some people are saying that you did it.”

  There was a question there.

  I shook my head. “It wasn’t me. But I saw what happened.”

  I told him about the mysterious woman in the red cloak, and how I was certain she had been the one to make them disappear. I did not tell him about my own magic, or the Quiet Place.

  Or how she’d stopped me from killing them.

  Sol wasn’t as shocked by this as I would have guessed. In fact, he mulled this over calmly. “You think she was on our side?”

  “She definitely wasn’t on theirs.”

  Another long silence. Sol was pensive.

  I hadn’t answered all his questions—and I knew that.

  “How did you fight him?” he asked at last. “No one can fight a Cipher.”

  “I don’t know.” I smiled wanly. “Maybe I just got lucky.”

  A pause.

  “Could you do it again?”

  I hesitated. “I don’t know.”

  Not if the woman in the red cloak had anything to do with it.

  The silence deepened, and I could tell that he knew I was holding back. But he didn’t press me.

  The truth was that there had been many strange moments from the time I spent healing. But one memory stood out, and as I gazed past Sol, to the now-empty corner, I knew it was true.

  I just didn’t know what it meant yet.

  Chapter 65

  The woman in the red cloak had sat in that chair.