The Midnight Strider (The Chronomancer Chronicles Book 2)

by Reilyn J. Hardy

“Hey, how are you doing?” I hear Jace, his voice is gentle.

  I look around and he’s sitting up, with Rhiannon’s head in his lap. Her eyes have darkened, her skin is cracking. I force myself to crawl over to them but I stop briefly when I notice her wounds are bleeding through the bandages.

  I move a little faster. I try to get up from the sand. “Nova!” I yell as I get closer.

  Rhiannon’s gasping for air. Her body is trembling.

  “Jace, you have to get away from her,” Nova says, “you’re killing her.”

  He starts to move, but she grabs his wrist.

  “Don’t leave me,” she says. “I like the warmth.” When he stays, her hand breaks away from his wrist and he laces his fingers with hers.

  “You lied to me,” he says, his eyes water. “It wasn’t one of my brothers, was it.” He’s not asking. Rhiannon slowly shakes her head as her eyes begin to water too. Kina looks away, her hands covering her face.

  Nova looks at me. “Do something.”

  “What?”

  “You’re a necromancer, Artemis. Do something.”

  I start to shake my head. “I don’t — I don’t know —”

  But Jace is sitting there with her dying in his lap.

  I have to try.

  I crawl closer to the two of them and I don’t take my eyes off of Rhiannon. I put my hands against her side, and she winces a little. I want to pulls my hands back, but I don’t. Concentrate, I tell myself. Focus. You can do this.

  ‘It’s okay if you can’t.’

  No, I have to. I just — I don’t know what I’m doing.

  My hands slide off the side of her body.

  I don’t know what I’m doing. I can’t do it.

  “Anything you can do deals with time,” she says, her breathing is jagged and rough. “Mine ran out a long time ago. You’re still a chronomancer, Artemis, even if you don’t want to be.”

  Rhiannon reaches for my hand. She squeezes it tightly, but her grip is much gentler now. Any other day, she would have crushed my hand. I squeeze her hand back, but not as hard. I don’t want to hurt her. I never thought that’d even be a concern of mine. I put her hand back over her stomach and I scoot away from them.

  Kina leans into my shoulder and wipes her face.

  “Don’t leave me,” Jace whispers to her. Their fingers are intertwined. He pulls her up, holding her against his body and kisses her forehead. She smiles weakly, running her fingers through his wet hair.

  “You’ve proved you’re just fine without me,” she says weakly, and he starts to shake his head. “All those years, with Artemis. You were better off without me. Safe.”

  “I knew,” he tells her, he still shakes his head. “I knew you were never too far off. I knew you were there. You can’t do this to me, Rhiannon.” He wipes his face roughly with the back of his hand. “Please.”

  She touches his face with the tips of her fingers.

  “I didn’t think I would, but sometime over these last few months — I fell in love — with you.”

  Rhiannon slowly averts her eyes away from him, and she stops moving altogether. Kina covers her face as Nova drops to his knees on the sand beside me.

  “No,” Jace says as he puts his hands on her face, trying to get her to look at him. “No, Rhiannon! Please — come back! I love you — no —”

  I look away from them. I can’t watch this.

  I rub my face, and harden my expression, trying to keep myself from crying.

  I can’t fall apart again.

  Every living thing dies, Art. That’s why we cherish it while we have it. That’s why we respect the decisions our loved ones make for themselves. That’s why we love, and why we care, and why we hurt. Because everything dies.

  It hurts. It always hurts.

  Slowly, I get to my feet.

  “No, no! Where is she going?”

  I turn around as Jace touches the sand in front of him. Rhiannon starts to fade, disappearing from our sights. She becomes transparent, then hazy, before she’s gone completely.

  “The Underworld,” Benny says, his arm is wrapped around the mermaid.

  “Why didn’t the ship come?” Kina asks, her cheeks are damp; eyes are bloodshot.

  “Because she was already dead,” Nova mumbles. “She already belonged to him. She wasn’t a soul that needed to cross over.” That explained why there was no ship in Nevressea when Hennessy Thompson died.

  “I’m gonna kill him,” Jace says as he gets to his feet. “I’m gonna kill him.”

  “Jace —” I say as I reach for his shoulder, he knocks my arm away from him as he turns around.

  “Don’t fucking touch me, Mae!” He turns away from me, twisting the silver ring on his pinky finger.

  “Jace, I’m sorry.”

  I watch as his back expands, shoulders lifting and falling with his breathing. His breathing is heavy, jagged and uneven from crying. He turns to face me, his eyes are red, watery and glistening. His face is still flushed.

  He doesn’t make eye contact with me though, instead, he looks down at the ring on his finger. I didn’t notice until now that it irritated his finger greatly. It’s almost like it's burning through his skin; the skin beneath it, broken and shining. It’s made of silver.

  “I never should’ve left,” he says softly. He inhales deeply, still keeping his gaze away from me. “I never should’ve left Harnsey.” His bottom lip quivers as he tries to choke back the tears attempting to push their way to the surface. “She’d still be here.”

  He crashes into me, wrapping his arms around me tightly as he cries. I try to keep my expression steady as I hug him back. I glance down at Kina, who’s wiping her face roughly with her finger tips. My thumb brushes against the cut in my finger.

  I know how to get on the Midnight Strider.

  My arms drop and I step away from Jace. I walk toward the edge of the water. There’s a large, black boulder sitting on the shoreline. Grabbing a seashell, I break it against the rock, and I carve the ouroboros symbol right into my palm.

  “What are you doing?” Jace says as he comes up beside me; his face is still wet.

  “Apollo’s not the only one we’re going to save,” I tell him, cutting the snake into my skin. “Rhiannon and Nadia are down there. We aren’t leaving them there.”

  I drop the shell and slam my palm down on the boulder in front of me. Almost instantly, the sky begins to darken, rippling through the clouds, as the sea begins to change. It gets rougher, pulling back on the shore line, and tumbling back onto the sand. I take a step back.

  It’s working.

  Benny slowly gets to his feet, his jaw is dropped. “You did it,” he says, his voice is barely audible. His eyes are wide. “I can’t believe it — but you did it.”

  I did it.

  “But remember what Rhi — Rhi —” Jace closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, struggling to say her name, “Rhiannon said?” he asks me. He glances at Kina, then at Nova, before looking back at me as I trudge through the sand to where he formerly sat and pick something up. “We can’t get on it.”

  “You can,” Benny says. “I can help. I can turn you guys into specters for a short amount of time. I can get you on it, I’m strong enough, but I don’t know if I can get you off. I don’t know how long you’ll stay — ghosts.”

  I turn back to Jace and reach for his hand after slipping the prism into my pocket.

  “We’ll get her back,” I say, placing the charm bracelet on his palm. “And I’m glad you left Harnsey. I need you. Are you with me?”

  He doesn’t take his eyes off of the bracelet until he curls his hand around it, tightening his fist. He looks up at me. “You and me,” he says, tapping my abdomen with the back of his fingers. He wipes his face and clutches the charm bracelet.

  Kina steps in front of me an
d grabs my hand. I wince from her grip.

  “Oh, so it does hurt. Good,” she says. “I was worried there for a minute.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say.

  Kina frowns. “For?”

  “You never signed up for any of this —”

  “I’m going to stop you right there,” she says, interrupting me. “Have any of you? Did my brother sign up for this? Rhiannon? Did you? I made my choice to be here, I made my choice to follow my brother. I’m more than prepared to accept the consequences of my actions. No one forced me to stay.”

  “I tried to force you to leave,” Jace mumbles, he’s standing beside Nova now.

  “And you can’t tell me what to do,” she says over her shoulder. “I like that. I don’t have to listen to him.”

  “No offense, Kina,” Jace says as he puts the charm bracelet in his pocket. “But I wish you guys had never found me. You guys were doing just fine without me, and Rhiannon would still be alive without you.”

  “Jace, how can you —”

  “Dad’s killed innocent people, you know. Dad, Champ, probably Dapper and Effie, and who knows who else. They killed a child’s mother. They drowned her, Kina. An innocent. You know Coin? His mother.” He turns away from her. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it was because of us, our family, that people thought the werewolves switched sides. Who’s side are we on if we’re killing innocent people? Attacking innocent cities? Nevressea did nothing to deserve that invasion and yet our family? They didn’t even hesitate.”

  “I’m on your side, Jace.” Her eyes are watering again. “I’ve never killed anyone! Living or dead! Don’t talk to me like that. Please. Jace —”

  He just shakes his head and rubs his face with his hands. He walks away from us.

  “Are you okay?” I ask Kina.

  “Are you?”

  “You’re just like your brother,” I say.

  Her eyes look over to him and she wipes her cheek.

  I remember when I almost killed Jace, when I was suffocating him in Nevressea, and he asked me if I was okay. He was always asking me if I was okay. I didn’t realize it at the time, but it wasn’t because he thought I couldn’t take care of myself. He was just being my friend, he looks out for me. From my own insecurities, I turned it into something it wasn’t.

  “He doesn’t mean it,” I tell her as we both look at him. He’s looking out at the water raging before us. I know he can hear me.

  “I know,” she whispers.

  “Hey.” I touch her arm and she looks up at me. I open my arms. It takes her a few seconds, but she takes my offer and hugs me.

  “Why couldn’t you be my brother,” she mumbles into my shoulder. I look up at Jace and I see him glance in our direction. “Why couldn’t —”

  “Kina,” I say, hugging her tightly. “I wasn’t even a good brother to my own twin. I’d give anything to have another chance. To do better. Because not everyone gets a second chance. Your family thought he was dead. But he’s not — and as many brothers as you have — there’s only one Jace.”

  “Why are you lecturing me?” she asks.

  I let her go, and my hands move to rest on her shoulders. She averts her eyes at first, but eventually brings herself to look at me.

  “I was told that sometimes it helps. Sometimes people have things to say that we need to hear, even if we don’t want to hear it. And it’s important that we hear them,” I say. Kina glances over at Jace, who looks away from her when she does. “Rhiannon’s part of his family too. He’s just hurting, Kina. We all are, in different ways.”

  I tap her back with my fingers and nudge her to talk to her brother. She inhales deeply and nods. My hands drop from her shoulders and she walks over to him.

  I turn around and Nova’s standing there. “I don’t care what you say,” he says, crossing his arms, “you’re still the same kid. Just older.”

  “You think so?”

  “You keep acting like you don’t care about anyone but yourself,” he says as he nods toward Jace and Kina. “But if you didn’t care, why bother? Why bother with anyone else and their problems if they don’t matter to you?” He looks back at me. “You’re a good kid, but you’re not alone, so stop trying to push everyone away.”

  “I’m not, I’m —”

  “I know what you’re doing, Artemis. You’re being a pain in the ass on purpose so people will leave on their own. So you don’t have to lose them in another way. You want them to choose, and you don’t want them to choose you. Because you seem to think that choosing you, somehow seals their death wish.”

  “Mother Nature was right,” I say.

  “About?”

  I shrug my shoulders and glance at the stockstill hanging around his neck. “Thanks.”

  “I’d still be in Mithlonde if it weren’t for you,” he says, running his finger along the lace of the stockstill. “I’d be in my fifties right now if it weren’t for you. You help people, Art. But you need to understand something: it’s not your fault if you can’t.”

  “She’s gonna be okay, right? They’re gonna be okay?”

  “Whatever happens,” he says, “the point is that you tried. I know your family. The good parts, and the bad. They all got to where they are because they didn’t give up.”

  It’s weird to have him say it. He knows my family. I mean, I knew he did because of the way my dad treated him, but he was older than my dad. He knew my grandparents.

  My grandfather. He was with them.

  “Even my uncle,” I say.

  “Especially your uncle,” he says. “He just dedicated himself to the wrong path.”

  “Nova —” we both look and Benny’s standing with Jace and Kina. “Could you come here for a sec? We gotta talk about the ghost thing. It’s only a matter of time now.”

  The once bright sky has turned to night. Darkness has fallen around us. I take a step back and look over at the mermaid whose barnacles are beginning to fall off. Her skin is turning into a fleshy color while her anemone hair begins to split into thick curly red strands. She’s becoming human. But the process seems slow, as the skin forms over scales.

  “So you’re the Earth Shaker’s daughter?”

  I sit down beside her.

  “And you’re one of Father Time’s kids — and Mother Nature’s. You know, technically that makes us cousins.”

  I close my eyes.

  The Earth Shaker is my uncle? This just keeps getting worse. But as her skin begins to clear, and her eyes begin to lighten, I can see the resemblance. She’s a little darker than me, but just as many freckles. Or maybe I’m kidding myself.

  I probably still have more.

  My cousin is a biracial girl with a red-bronze complexion. Red kinky hair, green eyes, and a freckled face.

  I used to hate being biracial, but in Newacre, I was surrounded by people who all looked the same. It’s nice to be around someone who looks like me, even if it’s not by much. “I’m Artemis,” I say, reaching my hand over to her. She only looks at my hand.

  “Antigone,” she says, still looking at my hand. “What am I supposed to do with that?” She looks up at me.

  “You shake it,” I say.

  “Why?”

  “I don’t — I don’t know. It’s polite, I guess.”

  “To share germs?” she asks, staring at my hand.

  “I guess,” I say as I laugh.

  “We usually just whistle at each other,” she says as I put my hand down on my knee.

  “Yeah — that means something else on land.”

  “So I’ve heard,” she says, glancing over at Benny.

  “Did you whistle at him?”

  “More or less,” she says and laughs. “I wasn’t talking to him, but I think Benny takes what he can get. He’s a flirt.”

  “I know, when we met, he was on top o
f me. While I was sleeping.”

  “What a creep —”

  “Here,” Jace says as he approaches us. He takes off his shirt and offers it to her.

  “Hey!” Benny says as he comes over to us. He starts unbuttoning his own shirt. “I should be doing that, not you.”

  “Your shirt won’t cover anything, it’s too small.”

  “Thank you,” Antigone says as she takes it from Jace. She puts it on and covers herself as the rest of her body finishes its transformation. “I figured everyone was bound to see everything anyway.”

  “I know that feeling,” Jace says.

  “Me too,” Kina adds. “You should try wool.”

  “Guys!” Benny shouts to us, buttoning his shirt back up. He lowers his voice, “it’s coming.”

  Chapter TWENTY-SIX

  phantom faces

  The foremast and the mainmast break the surface of the ocean; the crow’s nest and the torn sails follow. The ghostly ship of the Midnight Strider begins to manifest as it emerges from the water. When I turn to the side, Benny is fading in and out of sight, as are Jace, Nova, and Kina.

  I face forward again as the ship approaches. The closer it gets, the realer it looks. Old, rotting wooden boards, ripped sails blowing in the wind. The ship looks abandoned, but I know it’s not. A figure appears at the front; it’s facing us, and then it disappears.

  Reappearing right on the beach before me. Square jaw, black hair hanging in his face. He towers over us. Antigone grips my arm.

  “Look who we found in our domain,” Antigone says, shoving me forward as she releases her grasp.

  I’ve never intentionally pretended to be my brother.

  “Apollo?” he starts, his eyes are wide and his nose flares. “How did you —”

  “You guys keep letting creatures out of the Underworld. Did you seriously think he wasn’t going to try to escape?”

  “Where’d you get the shirt, Ann?” the man says, acknowledging the shirt messily buttoned over her body. It’s long enough to be modest.

  “My dad, off of one of the prisoner’s in the Pitch,” she says as she grabs my arm again. “You want him back or not? I’m sure Drarkodon isn’t going to be too happy he got past you and your brothers. You should be lucky my dad wasn’t feeling generous enough to return him to his sister.”