by Tricia Barr
The blonde said that he could only tell her the truth she wanted if she decided to leave. She assumed he meant permanently. Looking down at Joran snuggling into her, the thought of leaving him shot terror through her.
The blonde had failed to include one very important thing on his list, so there was at least one thing that Joran wasn’t lying to her about. He did love her. And she loved him, almost more than her heart could contain. Was that love enough to look the other way, to accept all the things that were wrong? So very, very wrong.
“You make all of this worth it,” Joran said. “You have no idea how joyously happy I am to have you here with me. Together, we will rule the world.”
“Together…” she said softly, savoring the word.
He took off his clothes and tumbled into her embrace, once again making her forget her woes and give in to the love she needed more than air, more than food, more than anything in the world.
The warmth of the sun felt amazing on Phoenyx’s arms and face as she and her three best friends sat outside a pizzeria in London. This was the first time since Joran’s exhumation that the sky had cleared, and the world was bright and warm despite the underlying autumn chill. Phoenyx sucked in the sunlight with each breath, tempted to strip down right here at the table to soak it in with every inch of her skin.
“There he is,” Lily said excitedly, peering her head to look somewhere behind Phoenyx.
Phoenyx looked over her shoulder to see Sam crossing the street and coming toward them. He had asked them to meet him somewhere in town to discuss some very big news, and it had been a unanimous vote to find a pizza place. The cuisine at the castle was strange, to say the least. All the ingredients were things that Joran had been used to eating in his time, but prepared with both new and old techniques. Lots of pheasant and turkey legs and curious cabbage dishes. Meals with him were like renaissance festival fare cooked by Emeril. They were interesting, but not the kind of thing you want to eat all the time.
The idea of melty cheese and zesty sauce titillating her taste buds was a big win, as was any excuse to leave the castle and the watchful eye of King Psycho.
Lily stood up as Sam jogged over to the table, and to the surprise of the rest of the them, the two openly and unabashedly kissed. A passionate kiss, like they hadn’t seen each other in years.
Sebastian hooted and clapped, and Phoenyx and Skylar decided to join in the applause as well. Seeing Lily get her little slice of happiness made Phoenyx’s heart swell, and nothing could wipe the smile off her face right now. Even more so when she saw the waitress coming with their pizza behind the couple.
When Sam and Lily pulled away, they both sat down without breaking eye contact, smiling all the while, like they were the only two people in the world.
“So, Sam, what did you call us here for?” Sebastian asked, jovially waving a hand in front of Sam’s face.
“Oh, yea,” Sam said, remembering himself and acknowledging the others at the table. The sappy look on his boyish was washed away by a serious expression. “I think I found something that can end this completely.”
“What do you mean?” Phoenyx asked. “Can you reverse the spell that released Joran?”
“Not exactly,” Sam said. “But my idea does involve reversing magic. You said that it was a dagger that made Joran immortal, that made all of you immortal, right?”
“Yes. The dagger can stop the aging process of any living thing that is stabbed with it,” Phoenyx said.
“Not just stabbed anywhere,” Sebastian corrected. “Stabbed in the heart.”
Phoenyx remembered. She had recently stabbed herself in the heart with the dagger. That was an experience she would not soon forget.
“Do you know how it works?” Sam asked. “Was it a spell or ritual that gave it that kind of magic?”
“No, it’s made up of a metal and a stone that fell to earth from space,” Skylar said. “For whatever reason, when the metal and stone are used in conjunction with each other, they naturally have this immortalizing property. I’m not sure if it’s magic or science, but whatever it is, it happened all on its own. No one gave it that power.”
Sam considered this for a moment. “Do you still have the dagger?”
Phoenyx nodded. She kept it in her backpack at all times. It was too valuable and powerful an item to ever leave it unguarded. Until they could destroy it, carrying it around was the only option.
“I think I can reverse its magic, make it so that getting stabbed with it would undo the immortality it originally gave,” Sam said.
They were all quiet for a moment, and Phoenyx tried to make sure she understood what he was saying.
“You really think that’s possible?” Skylar asked.
“How?” Lily asked.
“I’ve been spending all of my free time in the archives, going through their history books and diaries and grimoires,” Sam said. “And I stumbled onto a passage of one spell book that talks about reversing the magical properties of an object. The spell was originally for something completely different, but I think I can tweak it just for the dagger.”
“So, if you do this, the dagger’s power would be forever altered?” Sebastian asked. “No one could ever use it for becoming immortal again?”
“Yes,” Sam affirmed.
“What would happen to a normal person if they got stabbed?” Phoenyx asked.
“The same thing that would happen with any other sharp object,” Sam answered. “If the spell works, the magic should only work on someone who had been previously stabbed. But you have to plunge it into his heart, just as with the first stab.”
“So in one hit, it will make him mortal and kill him,” Skylar said.
“Exactly,” Sam said.
“How long will it take you to do this?” Phoenyx asked.
“I don’t know. The problem is, I will need the help of other witches. I’m sure no one at the Lodge will be willing to help.”
“That’s not a problem,” Phoenyx said. Once Sam had come to them that night after he set Joran free, she had messaged Marcucio and told him everything. He had been tempted to fly to London right then and there, but Phoenyx wanted to save him from any possible danger, and assured him that they could handle this—even though she didn’t know if they could. “You forgot that you have other witch friends, friends who would do anything to help you.”
Sam cocked his head in question.
“Marcucio and all your friends in New Orleans,” Phoenyx said. “We met them when we were trying to find you. Marcucio would take a plane here in heartbeat if you asked him.”
Sam’s face lit up. “He won’t have to! Oh why didn’t I think of that before?”
“What do you mean?” Lily asked.
“I don’t need other witches to be with me in person, I just need to channel their magic,” Sam explained excitedly. “None of them has to come here! If they were willing to chant over the phone, that will be enough. We could even have this done tonight!”
“That’s great!” Phoenyx said, matching his excitement.
“How will you test it?” Skylar asked. “How will we know the spell worked?”
“I was thinking about that on the way over here,” Sam said. “We can’t test it on any of you, so we need a guinea pig, literally in this case. Or some sort of small creature that I can easily contain. I’ll pick up something at a pet store on the way back, stab it before I alter the dagger, and then stab it again once the spell is cast.”
Lily winced as he was saying this. She never could bear the thought of any creature getting hurt. But Sam’s plan was sound, and necessary, and Lily knew it.
“How soon can you get me the dagger?” Sam asked, looking around at each of them.
Phoenyx looked around her in paranoia, making sure no one suspicious was looking at them. She had spent the better part of her existence searching for this dagger’s components, and now that she had them all intact, she wasn’t too keen on letting anyone else have it. She was even hesitan
t to let Sam take it, not because she feared he would use it, but because it would mean giving up the ability to guarantee its safety against those who might try to take it—namely those at the Four Corners.
Satisfied with the oblivious nature of the passersby, she snuck her hand into her bag and pulled out the dagger, which was wrapped in a pillowcase from the hotel in Prague, and slid it to him across the table.
Sam took the dagger and stowed it in one of the large pockets in his cargo pants. “I will work on this all night, as long as I can recruit Marcucio and a few others to help. I’ll let you know as soon as I have it done. If it doesn’t work, then we’ll just keep looking for another option.”
“Thank you, Sam,” Lily said, putting her hand over his. “We couldn’t do this without you.”
“Nevermind the fact that we wouldn’t have to if it weren’t Sam in the first place,” Sebastian said, winking at Lily when she scrunched her face scoldingly at him. “You know I’m just kidding.”
Sebastian lifted a slice of pizza from the tray that had been set on the table, and watching the cheese stretch out into delicious strings before breaking inspired Phoenyx to greedily grab a slice herself.
“Well, mostly,” Sebastian added through a mouthful of pizza. “Now Sam, what are your intentions with our precious flower here?”
Lily frowned and blushed as she reached forward to daintily place a slice onto a paper plate.
Phoenyx found herself watching Sam, waiting for his answer. Lily really was their precious flower, and she was not the kind of girl a guy could just have a fling with. But Sam didn’t seem like the kind of guy to do that either.
“I don’t know what my intentions are,” Sam said, and then turned to Lily and said, “I just know that I’m crazy about her, and I would do anything for her.”
“Good, because if you break her heart, I’ll break you,” Sebastian said coolly before taking another bite.
Sam chuckled. “Duly noted,” he said, then kissed Lily, and she shined with joy.
Seeing Lily’s reaction to Sam reminded Phoenyx of the way that Ayanna lit up whenever she kissed Joran. Phoenyx didn’t understand Ayanna’s love for Joran, and yet she understood it perfectly. Ayanna woke up to a brand new life and fell in love with Joran instantly, and even after she witnessed Joran kissing Phoenyx, the love was still there. Phoenyx had seen it in her eyes when Ayanna had looked at Joran at dinner last night.
Ayanna’s love for Joran defied logic. Ayanna was getting a glimpse at Joran’s darkness and it didn’t matter. Her love for him was something that went beyond the physical or the rational. It was something true, something deep, some form of ancient magic. The same magic that made Phoenyx and Sebastian find each other life after life. It was just too bad that Joran had strayed so far from the man Ayanna deserved him to be.
“She came to me last night,” Skylar said to Phoenyx, but the whole group turned to him. “Ayanna. She came to our room when the rest of you were at dinner.”
“And you’re just telling us now?” Sebastian asked.
“I was considering whether to mention it at all,” Skylar said.
“What did she say?” Phoenyx asked, on the edge of her seat.
“She’s getting suspicious of Joran,” Skylar replied. “She knows that he has been lying to her about a lot of things. When I first saw her standing at the door, looking at me like she knew me, I thought she remembered, that she somehow reclaimed her memories. But when it became obvious she hadn’t, I knew that I couldn’t push toward them. Not yet. Not while she’s still so vulnerable in Joran’s clutches. She asked me to look through her memories of all that Joran had told her and tell her which parts were lies. So that’s what I did. I didn’t tell her what the truth of those lies was, I just confirmed her suspicions.”
“Well, it’s not her becoming herself again, but it’s a huge step in the right direction,” Phoenyx said excitedly. “It means she trust us.”
“Or that she at least trusts Skylar,” Sebastian interjected.
Phoenyx nodded, remembering her strange interaction with Ayanna before dinner after Joran had ambushed Phoenyx. Just because Ayanna now knew that Joran was a lecherous snake didn’t mean that she trusted Phoenyx any more than she had. Phoenyx had purposefully played the villain in Ayanna’s love story. That kind of hatred wouldn’t be so easily dissolved.
“Why didn’t you tell us before?” Sebastian asked Skylar.
“I didn’t want anyone getting their hopes up and doing anything foolish,” Skylar said, the only one who didn’t yet partake in the pizza. “But now that Sam has this plan, if it works, we won’t have to worry about how to bring Ayanna back to our side. Once we kill Joran, she will be safe, and we can tell her everything, help her remember.”
“You really think she’ll listen to us after we kill Joran?” Phoenyx asked, knowing that Ayanna would be a raving mess if Joran were to die.
Everyone was silent for a moment, and they all came to the same realization—killing Joran might mean losing Ayanna forever.
“We don’t have much of a choice,” Lily said softly, her pretty face puckered in empathy. “Joran has to be stopped. And I can’t bury him again. We were wrong to do it before. No one deserves that kind of suffering. It’s awful…but killing him is a mercy, and it has to be done. We can only hope that Ayanna will forgive us eventually.”
“I think that’s one thing that we can all agree on,” Skylar said, staring down at the table. “Sentencing him to an eternity underground darkened all of our souls, even though we didn’t remember it until now. We can’t make the same mistake again.”
The rest of them nodded.
“Well, Sam, I hope you can make this work,” Sebastian said, “because if you can’t, we may be stuck with Joran for a long time.” He raised a fresh slice of pizza into the air above the center of the table. “To Sam’s spell,” he toasted.
The rest of them followed suit and repeated, “To Sam’s spell.”
The survival of billions, of the entire planet, depended on the spell working, but it could mean losing her oldest and dearest friend. Was it wrong that a small part of Phoenyx secretly hoped the spell wouldn’t work? Was the fate of the world worth gambling against her sister’s soul?
Ayanna
As the day wore on, Ayanna’s heart grew more and more conflicted. The hours she spent in Joran’s arms last night had been a welcome vacation from her suspicions against him, but as soon as he fell asleep beside her, the reservations came flooding back. Her sleep had been restless, filled with nightmares of Joran sucking the life out of large crowds, or forcing the redhead into his bed. But worse still was the nightmare of Joran discarding her, casting her out of his life forever.
How could she be so distrustful and frightened of someone, and yet need him so much that it hurt?
She had so many questions buzzing through her head all day since she had awoken. She had hoped that talking to the blonde would give her answers, but it only gave her more questions.
What power could she possibly have that she wasn’t aware of? Wouldn’t she have accidentally used it by now? The Bound Ones and Joran all had elemental powers—Fire, Water, Earth, Air and Soul. There was no sixth element, not that she was aware of anyway. What if her power was something more subtle, something not as fundamental or cardinal?
And what had she been doing all the time that Joran had been buried? Air told her that she hadn’t been buried with him. That at least explained why she remembered doing so many things she couldn’t possibly have done if she had been stuck underground, like reading all those books, or playing with all sorts of gadgets from all different eras of technology.
Joran hadn’t been specific about when they had supposedly risen from their earthly tombs, but Ayanna gathered that it was a very recent turn of events. Deep down, she had always known that Joran lied about her history in that regard.
But he most certainly had been buried, of that she was certain. How could she possibly have survived knowing t
hat the man she loved more than anything was suffering in such a horrible way? Had she spent all those thousands of years trying to free him? Even though she must have known all that time that his powers were something abominable.
Joran stayed busy for most of the day, which left Ayanna alone with her thoughts. Joran was planning his next attack, something Ayanna found difficult to support or accept. Why did Joran have to do this? She understood that he wanted to change the world for the better, but why do it this way? He believed that his powers were a sign from a higher power that he was meant to reform the world. But what if they were a test, and he was failing?
Ayanna needed to change his mind, to make him see that what he was doing was wrong. But how could she do that without angering him, or making him turn on her? She knew he loved her. Even if he was seducing the redhead behind her back. She had to believe that his love for her was strong enough to hear her out, even if it wasn’t strong enough to keep him faithful.
With Joran away on business, Ayanna would have loved to talk more to the Bound Ones, to get more answers about her past, but they had left in the early morning and had been away all day. Joran had told her they were enemies, but Ayanna wasn’t so sure. Joran had lied to her about plenty of things, so maybe they could be trusted.
Air could have openly told her any manner of bad things about Joran, but he didn’t. In fact, it seemed he told her what she wanted to know with as little accusation against Joran as he could. Joran said that the Bound Ones would lie to her, but her instincts told her that what Air said was true, and that anything the rest of them could tell her if she asked would also be the truth. She trusted her gut far more than she trusted Joran’s word.
Shortly after lunch, Joran found Ayanna reading in the library. The book, Pride and Prejudice, was one that she must have read hundreds of times, because as she read it, she remembered what would happen next before her eyes found the words. Further evidence of Joran’s lies.
