Opening my mouth, I took in a deep breath, tasting the prey’s fear and the hunter’s blood lust. A split second later, I threw my left hand out to the ground and snatched the animal from the ground as razored talons skimmed the soft flesh of my arm, leaving four thin red lines as they passed. The bird’s squeal of disappointment shattered the mountain peak’s silence, and it flapped its wings ferociously to ascend again.
My heart thrummed so loudly in my chest I could feel its pounding in my throat. Excitement, wonder and pure delight raced through my body, spurred on by adrenaline. The fleshy sack of fur squirmed in my hand, and I opened my eyes. Looking into a guinea pig’s soft brown eyes, I couldn’t believe what I had just done, and stared wide eyed, and opened mouthed at it for what seemed like forever before Chassan interrupted my silent victory.
“Good!” He encouraged, running down the mountain slope toward me, his grin as wide as I’d ever seen it. In my hand, the little brown animal fought for freedom, and I lowered it to the ground, releasing it to scamper away.
“That’s pretty good for the first day!” Chassan beamed like a little league coach, his eyes a jovial mix of molasses and caramel.
He took a seat beside me and offered a bottle of water and one of the protein bars he had packed. Even if my mind had lost track of time, my stomach hadn’t, and it growled at the thought of food.
“Tell me, why did you chose the guinea pig over the eagle?” Chassan asked, resting his arms over his bent knees.
I thought about his question as I took a bite, puckering my brow as I chewed. The guinea pig or the eagle? Honestly, I’d never thought of killing the eagle as an option, even though it would have saved the guinea pig, and countless other animals, from certain death.
“I don’t think I’d ever choose to take a life, when sparing a life can accomplish the same goal,” I answered, nodding my head as I continued to think.
“You think death is evil?”
“Yes.” I nodded and hated my answer when his jovial eyes turned dark again. “Well, I used to.” I added, backpedaling and hoping to bring his good humor back. “In my world, yes. Death is seen as a bad thing. But, I can understand how death can be beautiful, selfless. I guess.” I shrugged helplessly, and looked at the ground, letting my hair fall over my face so I didn’t have to see his mood darken. “You have good powers too, right? It’s not all death and palm reading?” I tucked the hair behind my ear, chancing a glance at him as I did.
He shrugged, tossing a stone into the air.
“Define good.”
“Powers that help people,” I clarified, noticing that my breath was turning into a puffy cloud now that the sun was low in the sky and night was beginning to fall over the mountain.
“Are you cold?” He asked, seeing the shiver that shook my body.
I nodded.
Chassan’s gaze focused where the sun sat fat and low on the horizon, then moved up to a lumbering cloud bank drifting over the mountain, blocking the remaining bit of warmth. He drew in a deep breath, exhaling slowly. In amazement, I watched the clouds dissipate as if the breath of god had scattered them to the far corners of the world.
Next, he raised a hand in line with the sun, splaying his palm and curving his fingers ever so slightly, until the ball of orange aligned firmly in his empty grasp. Closing his eyes, he drew his brow taught, and raised his hand, pulling the sun with it.
I gasped, shrinking away from him, eyes darting from his hand, to his closed eyes, to the sun, which had risen back above the peaks, resetting time a solid hour. Between the combination of sun and clear sky, I was instantly warmed.
“Better?” He asked, looking at the goosebumps popped over the flesh of my arm.
“Better.” I mumbled monotonously. “How do you do that?”
“Sun god,” he answered, pointing a thumb at his chest.
“Don’t people notice?”
“If they do, do you honestly think they would ever believe I was doing it?” He shook his head as if the thought were ludicrous. “They’d blame it on global warming before they’d think it was me.” He snickered under his breath.
“Are you immortal?”
“Nope. None of us are. We bleed, and we die. If our powers wane, we become as weak as humans. But you know that.”
“Do you have to borrow breath like Sidhe to survive?”
He shook his head, upper lip and nose curled in disgust.
“Listen, Faye. I like you well enough. But, I have little use for your kind.”
“Why?” I was floored. Why would anyone hate the Sidhe?
“Why? They abandoned this world. Danu had a purpose here. We all did. But when the old ways started to fall, she turned her back on the world instead of fighting for it. I don’t believe what she did was right.”
“She built LisTirna so that humans would never have to die at the hands of the Sidhe again.”
“She created LisTirna to save herself and the whole pack of demigods she created. I’ve been around just as long, but you don’t see an entire population of half-breed sun gods, do you?”
“They haven’t abandoned the world. The portal is still open and they can move freely.”
“Yeah!” He snorted in disgust. “They come back...to destroy the very thing Danu was entrusted to protect.”
“That’s not true. Not all of them.” I started to argue, but stopped when I realized that Chassan was saying exactly what Dayne had. The Sidhe were a million miles from where they had begun.
“Most of them. You are an odd exception.” Chassan answered, nodding his head.
“Are we done?” I stood, ready to leave so that the conversation of how odd I was didn’t go any further.
“Sure.” Chassan stood, brushing dirt off his pants. He tossed me the fleece jacket wrapped around his waist, and began to lead me back down the mountain.
Chapter Eighteen
Death
“Do you smell that?” I asked with a wrinkled nose when we neared the village. Overwhelmed by the metallic stench that hung heavy in the air, I pulled my collar up over my nose. It smelled of Paititi.
“Death,” Chassan whispered the word, letting it linger on his tongue as he picked up his pace. I followed close on his heals.
The village was quiet and oddly somber as we walked the streets, each family huddle in their huts.
As we approached the king’s palace, a procession led by the shaman exited and began parading ceremoniously away. He held a single golden bowl reverently aloft as their ritualistic chants filled the air.
“What is going on Chassan?” My heart sagged in my chest, and a sick feeling wrapped its cold fingers around my stomach
At the palace doorway, Anyi’s mother stood silently, watching with red rimmed eyes as the small bowl made its way down the street. Bile rose up in my throat, knowing that golden bowl had something to do with Anyi.
Chassan ran the final strides to where she stood, inquiring in their strange tongue what was happening. His words were rushed, and when she answered, his face went ashen.
Turning to me, he gulped hard, and fixed me with an ochre glare that was molten hot.
“Anyi is sick. They have bled her and will make a blood offering to the gods to save her,” he blanched as he said this last part, knowing as well as I did that there were no gods left to save her. My brain went into overdrive, frantic at the thought of what they were doing to poor little Anyi.
“Chassan they can’t bleed her. They’ll kill her. You know they will.” I was beyond desperate, pacing in circles, wringing my hands, thinking of my little friend and knowing I was the only chance she had. Bleeding was the most archaic medicine there was. Any fool knew that. I grabbed Chassan’s shoulder, pleading as I looked from him to the woman’s tear streaked face. Desperate to save Anyi.
“It’s their way. We cannot interfere.” His face went ashen and his shoulder turned to stone under my fingers.
“Chassan you have to let me save her. She can’t die. I won’t let her.”
I whispered into his ear through clenched teeth.
“They would know what you are.”
“No, they won’t. I’ll use herbs or something to cover my tracks. Please, Chassan. I can do this. I can use my power to protect her like we were meant to. Let me do this.”
Chassan looked into my pleading eyes, his lips tightly pursed, and with a great sigh, turned back to Anyi’s mother. There was a tense conversation I didn’t understand, Anyi’s mother’s eyes flying from Chassan to me as he spoke. Finally, she nodded her head, and ushered us into the little girl’s room.
Anyi lay lifeless on the bed, perspiration running down her forehead, hair slicked to the pillow, and her beautiful black eyes closed. Breath caught in my throat. Desperate seconds passed before her tiny body stirred with life and I could breathe again. There was still time.
I rushed to the bedside, pushing her servants away as I cupped her tiny hand, bringing it to my cheek. The nightgown she had worn earlier that day, still stained brown at the hem, had been cut from her body to cool her down. Dampened sheets of linen draped her slight frame, trying to bring down the fever that raged through her body. On the inside of her elbow an angry scab was forming were the shaman had cut her open to bleed. From this wound a single trail of blood trickled down her arm and stained the wet linen bright red.
Tears were in my eyes and washing over my cheeks. I wiped at them with the back of my hand, and tried to still my racing heart. I would save her. I had to save her. I was all she had.
Chassan loomed over me, staring down at the little girl wasting away on the bed.
“I’ve never done this by myself,” I whispered.
“Do you doubt you can save her?”
I sighed, not really knowing the answer. My heart screamed yes, but my mind still doubted my human frailty.
“You were created for this, Faye. If your powers would come alive to save a guinea pig why do you doubt they would awaken to save someone you love? You are the only hope she has.” Chassan crossed his arms over his chest and stood solidly behind me like a sentry, looking down at Anyi with zero emotion registered on his stoney face. He was right. Even though I hadn’t exactly controlled my magic, when I needed it, it had come alive and I had snatched the rodent from death. I looked back to Anyi, certain that when the time came, my magic would awaken for her too. I nodded my head and sighed again.
“I cannot do it with everyone watching me,” I whispered through my veil of hair without moving my lips.
“They will go to bed soon. Play the part until they leave.”
Chassan retreated to a corner of the room with great confident strides where he watched from the shadows.
“Chassan?” I furrowed my brown, concentrating on Anyi’s hand in mine instead of looking at him.
“Yes?”
“If I can’t do this and she…” the word dies refused to pass my throat and I choked on it. “Will you?” I didn’t have to say anymore.
“Of course, I will. But it will not come to that.” He answered and leaned back into the shadows, all but disappearing from the room.
For hours I nursed her as a human would, placing cold compresses on her head, and trying to get her to drink. She sputtered everything I offered from her parched little lips and I feared she would be too far gone by the time I would be able to really save her.
Slowly, the servants trickled away and her mother fell into a deep sleep.
“Don’t worry about the mother, I’ll take care of her.” Chassan made his way to where the mother lay and rested a hand over her brow. A few seconds later he stood in the doorway, his back to me as I bent over the child.
I recalled the night with Hannah. They way I had calmed myself and then pushed that calm into the dying horse. I remembered the way Dayne had brought life back to Hannah, Phin and myself and the way Arabette had tried to take it.
Hovering over Anyi, I synced my breath with the ragged little gulps of air she took, tasting the sickness spewing from her lungs. My heart beat heavily in my chest, pounding so hard I feared my ribs wouldn’t be able to hold it.
With trembling hands, I reached out for her chest, which felt as sparse as a new born kitten’s under my touch. Her own heartbeat was shallow, weak and too rapid to do any good pumping fresh blood through her body.
My touch seemed to calm her heart, and I willed the power surging through my body at that moment to flow out of my hands and into her failing frame. I called on the strength Chassan had woken in me. I pulled it from the depths of my body, the back of my spine, the core of my heart, and pushed it into her, pressing my hand more firmly to her chest as my power began to burn hot against my palms. Her body sank into the mattress under the weight I pushed against it. A weight that should have broken her flimsy ribs. Then I waited, listening to the wheezing sound of life leaving her body. Finally her heart calmed, slowed to the brink of death, and the fire along my spine erupted.
That was the moment she would live or die. With the breath of death pushed from her lungs, I closed my eyes, and lowered my lips to hers.
A great inhale pulled all the remaining sickness from her body, its putrid stench rushing into my lungs and causing my chest to convulse in a way that nearly sent me to my knees. My head flew back. I cried out in agony as the pain from her body seared into mine. I didn’t know if I had the strength to finish what I started. In my hand, Anyi’s chest lay motionless, a few seconds more and she would be gone forever.
With all the strength I had I forced the foul sickness from me, gasping for clean air as I lowered my head again. With my lips pressed tightly against hers, I summoned every ounce of strength from every living cell in my body. I focused on the feeling of life coursing through me—the rise and fall of breath in my chest, the beat of my heart, the whoosh of blood—and settled it all into a single breath.
One single breath. An instant that could take life or give life.
I exhaled until my lungs felt as if they had stuck together and never expand again.
Then I waited, lips over hers, expecting her body to somehow change beneath me, to show me that I had saved her. But there was nothing, and tears stung like fire behind my eyes.
When I pulled away, I gasped, clutching her little hand in mine.
Anyi’s eyelids fluttered and her beautiful black eyes opened again. A weak smile curled her lips and she brought a frail hand up to rest on my cheek. Relief washed over me from my head all the way down to my toes, turning my insides into a giant party. I turned my head into her sweaty palm, kissing it, tasting the hot salty tears that spilled over my cheeks. The moment was so overwhelming I nearly melted from her touch, relief singing sweetly into every inch of my body.
Only the celebration was short lived.
As soon as her hand left my cheek, reality set in, and the force of her sickness raged through me, convulsing my muscles, straining my bones, settling an ache into my core so violent it stole every bit of air left in my lungs. The walls sucked in toward me, swirling to a sickly grey color.
“You’re going to be okay, Anyi.” It was no more than a gravely whisper, using the last remaining breath fleeing from my body as I collapsed on the cold stone floor.
“Faye!” Chassan yelled and scrambled to grab me before my head hit the ground.
An instant later, I was in his arms, cradled against his broad chest, flying down the darkened hallways of the palace. The steady strength of his footfalls smacked loudly against stone, echoing in my ears, but seeming a million miles away. We broke free of the palace walls and into the cool morning air, my head rolling weakly against his shoulder with every stride. Chassan’s breath became a cloud of steam in the early morning air and it puffed over my sallow cheeks. Grey dawn was creeping into the village on ghostly fingers. In that pale mist, a golden color began to glow, and Chassan tucked his head to hide his transformation from human eyes.
One look into his strangely honeyed eyes told me all I need to know, and I whimpered against his shoulder. Chassan’s magic was waking up
.
Death was coming.
With his chest heaving so hard it almost tossed me from his embrace, he ran the remaining distance to our tent, laying me on my bedroll and flying around the tent in search of something. A tiny fire burned low in the fireplace. But it was enough. The flames kissed my skin as if it were the breath of life to a drowning man. I groaned, knowing what I had to do if I was going to live.
Chassan dragged a hand down his face and over the back of his neck as he flew around the hut in a helpless way. His body morphing before my eyes into a prowling hunter who stalked death from the shadows.
“What do I do, Faye? What revives your magic?” He rifled through his bag with trembling hands, still searching for something, trying to ignore what was happening to his body as if it might go away. Furious beyond compare, he scattered the bag’s contents to the floor in frustration when he found nothing, hurling the empty canvas sack against the wall in a fit of rage.
Weakly, I raised my hand to dismiss him, knowing he couldn’t see what I was about to do. It was immediately met by the solid wall of his chest. He grabbed my wrist, hand circling Dayne’s bracelet, and pressed my palm into him. His T-shirt's soft fabric radiated sun-like heat and thrummed with the rhythm of his magic. Beating so wildly against my fingers, his heart felt as if it would’ve jumped into my palm if it could have. Only, I was too weak to breathe borrowed breath again or tell him to leave me. Chassan looked helplessly into my eyes and wiped a strand of hair away from my fevered brow.
His body spasmed in a wild way, his chest beginning to heave the way it did when the animal inside him awoke. His grasp on my wrist became vice-like, and a feral posture bent his body like a prowling cat. Still glowing their odd ochre color, his eyes found mine, and I weakly wondered if this was it. If my life was ending in this remote village so far away no one would ever know what had happened to me.
Only, something was different. Chassan was no longer the sun-god I had called from Machu Picchu’s stone. For the first time, I saw something other than confidence and disdain in those golden orbs. Hiding behind the maddened swirls of honey and molasses was the tiniest prick of fear, the tiniest sign of humanity in what I had thought was a god made of stone.
Son of Sun (Forgotten Gods (Book 2)) Page 16
