I rolled with difficulty so I could see behind me. Samara stood with her head thrown back, her short hair rippling in the wind. The lines of power wrapped around her arms, legs and torso, more than I’d ever seen before on another elemental.
Cactus was only a foot away from me. I held my hand out to him, pulling him close. The only person we were missing was my father. Peta picked up on my thoughts, yelling into the wind to me. “He’s by the old queen.”
As far as I knew, there was only one thing I could do. No one else seemed inclined to try and talk sense into Samara. Angling myself, I faced Samara while still lying on my back. I took a breath and stood, letting the wind catch me and throw me toward her. The speed of the wind slammed me into her so hard we went tumbling through the air three times ass over head before we hit the ground and the wind fell.
Her eyes were glazed and her lips were blue. “Destroyer.”
“Yes.” I slid off her and sat up in a crouch. “Sorry about that.”
She blinked a few times before she put a hand to her head. “I can’t let you go without doing something. They will think me weak.”
“Do what you must,” I said, pushing myself to my feet. “Only let me get my father home.”
The Sylphs rushed forward, all of them this time. But there was no malice in them. Apparently her show of force was enough to convince them. They fell at Samara’s feet on their knees, their hands raised above their heads and their eyes closed. I pushed through the crowd carefully until I was beside Aria and my father.
His eyes met mine first, and there was a tiny bit of clarity there, a hint of the man he’d been before Cassava had manipulated his mind. Before hope could truly spring forward, his green eyes narrowed and distrust replaced any emotion I might have seen there. Beside him lay the emerald stone, as if it had dropped from the heavens. Yet it had been in Cassava’s hand when last I’d seen it. I scooped it up as I crouched down, tucking it into my vest.
“How did you find me?” my father asked.
“I used a Tracker.” Exhaustion made my words soft.
His eyes narrowed farther, and his words were heavy with disappointment. “Using a supernatural? We will discuss this when we get back to the Rim.”
He shook his head, but unlike the shame I normally felt, there was nothing but fatigue. Ignoring him, I went to my knees beside Aria. Her eyes met mine and she smiled. “Give her the stone. She will need it.”
I glanced over my shoulder to where Samara walked through her people, touching them gently on the heads and shoulders. Connecting with them. “She kicked ass without help from anyone else.”
“She is the strongest of us. I’ve always known it. But wild, ah, she is wild like I was when I first took the throne.” Aria slipped the smoky diamond from her neck and handed it to me. The stone shook from the trembling in her hand and I folded my fingers over it.
Boreas, the only Ender who hadn’t charged Samara, went to his knees beside his queen. Tears trickled down his cheeks as he took her free hand and held it to his chest. “Mother, do not leave us.”
“Ah, my boy. How I love you. Protect her. She needs your strength and loyalty. And maybe even your love.”
He dropped his head to her chest, his shoulders shaking. His defense of her, his fierce loyalty, it made even more sense. Though her daughters did not love her the way they should have, her son obviously made up for them. To see their bond made the lack of bond with my own remaining parent that much more painful.
I buried my hands into the rocks. One last thing before we left. My mother’s spear . . . I wasn’t leaving it behind. Using the power of the earth, I searched through the rubble, seeking the weapon and pulling it toward me. The ground bulged and spit up my spear, right into my hand. Peta rolled her eyes. “Shouldn’t be able to do that either.”
I pushed to my feet and stepped back, unable to stay any longer.
“Larkspur, you have an armband?” my father said, stopping me.
“No.”
“You can use one of ours. I want you gone.” Samara’s voice cut through anything I might have said. She pointed at one of the Enders. He handed her an armband made of pale smoky quartz that mimicked the diamond I held in my hand.
There was no globe to use, though, no way to point ourselves home.
“We need to leave. Now.” My father’s grip was tight on my forearm, and his fingers dug into me.
“In a minute—”
“You would defy me?” He seemed truly confused.
I shook his hand off. “I need to speak with Samara before we go.”
Samara wore no crown; she still wore her Enders leathers . . . yet she was the queen. I could see it in the way she held herself, the tip of her chin. Even the blood splatter on her leathers that spoke of the fight for the throne. I’d made the right choice. Even if the mother goddess didn’t like it.
I bent a knee and lowered my head. “I will not fight you.”
The Sylphs around us sucked in a collective breath. Cactus let out a single soft word. “No.”
Through my bond to Peta, I felt her concern. And her pride in me. That was enough to keep me where I knelt. I no longer cared what my father thought of me. I would follow my heart.
“Look at me,” Samara said. I slowly raised my head and lifted my eyes to hers. “Only because Aria spoke your sentence do I not kill you where you kneel. Leave from this place, Destroyer. Never return. Your life will be forfeit if you ever place foot in the Eyrie, wherever it may be.”
I stared up at her. “That’s it?”
Her eyes narrowed and every muscle in her body seemed to tense at once. “I will not go against her last words. I would like to take your heart from your body and cast it from the highest peak. But I won’t. For her.”
That was more along the lines of what I’d been expecting. I held the smoky diamond up to her. “A last gift from your queen.”
She frowned and took the jewel from me. She knew what it was, but her face gave nothing away.
My father approached from behind, and clamped his hand on my shoulder. “Take us home, Larkspur. The Rim awaits.”
Samara handed me the armband and our fingers touched for a brief second. Her eyes met mine and I saw all the emotions I too felt. Anger, fear, relief. She and I were too alike in too many ways.
“Good luck, Samara. You’re going to need it.”
I looked to Cactus, seeing how much I’d hurt him both in body and spirit. He was bruised and battered, blood trickled from his lip, and yet he stood there, waiting for me. “I’ll take my Cactus first, then come back for you, Basileus.”
Cactus’s eyes softened and he smiled. I’d called him mine.
“No. You will not.” My father pushed me down, and the ground softened to squeeze my legs.
“I love him and I am done leaving him behind!” I snapped.
“He is a half-breed who does not belong in the Rim!” my father roared, and I flinched as though he’d hit me. He might as well have.
“Lark, I’ll go with Shazer. Wait for me,” Cactus said. His eyes locked on mine, and the smile in them was enough. “It will be okay, Lark. Just go.”
With my hand on the armband, I paused for a moment. I felt as though I’d betrayed Cactus . . . again. Peta, once more in her housecat form, put her front paws on my bent knee.
“He will be all right. The Bastard will take him home faster than you realize.”
I looked at the armband. “This won’t get us home.”
My father put his hand over the band and took it from me. “It will tune to me. It is a secret of the bands. They always take a ruler home.”
He twisted the armband counterclockwise and the world dissolved around us in a rush of air.
And I was sent hurtling into my father’s memories.
CHAPTER 25
“hh, Ulani. My love, my heart. Help me,” he whispered. “I can no longer see clearly and my mind . . . it is not my own. I fear what will happen to Lark if I do not write this now.” Basi
leus put both hands on the rough wooden writing desk and lowered his head to the blank piece of paper.
The scent of eucalyptus curled through the room as Fern stepped through the door. Her belly bulged with their child and she cradled it gently. “Basil, what are you still doing up?”
“I am working, Fern.” He softened his voice. “Go to bed, I will be there soon.”
She smiled and ran a hand over his shoulders, her touch soothing some of the fear in him. Ulani’s spirit had been right, Fern had been a good choice. “Come to bed soon, the sickness has only left you. I don’t want it to come back.”
He nodded and kissed her hand where it lay on his shoulder. “Of course. You are right.”
Still smiling, she turned and left the way she’d come in. He waited until he heard the telltale creak of their bed as she lay down.
Picking up the feather to his right, he dipped it into the inkwell and put the tip to the paper.
Dear Larkspur,
The sickness you saw me carry was not a sickness of the body, but of the mind. It was as if Cassava had planted a booby trap in me, and when she could no longer manipulate my actions, she set it off.
I do not know how long I will have where my mind is fully functioning. I pray this will pass, but I fear it never will. I fear the damage done is irrevocable.
He paused and dipped the pen again, the sound of the tip scratching on the thick paper the only noise in the room.
I loved your mother, more than any other woman in my life. You need to know that. I knew she was a child of Spirit. I knew she would give me half-breed children. I didn’t care; I wanted both you and your brother. I loved you and your brother for everything you were. Beautiful, sweet babies who were mine in a way Cassava would not allow me with my other children. I tell you this because I remember the things I have done. The words I have said, and I see how they have torn at you. How they have broken you, and it pains me beyond all I can describe.
They were not my words, daughter. Never have I seen you as less than the rest of our family. You have always been the one I pinned my hopes on. Cassava believed Bramley was to be my heir, the one my throne would fall to.
But she does not know the truth.
You were the one, Larkspur. You were always the one with the fire in your heart, and the power in your soul. From the time you took your first breath, you were the warrior Fate decreed would change our world.
I name you as my heir, Larkspur. Should I fall, or should my mind break, you will be the one to see our family through. There is none other who can do this; the mother goddess has made it clear you are the choice for the Rim.
I love you, daughter. No matter what happens, know my love for you is true. You have always been the one I loved the best. The one I pinned all my hopes on.
Again he paused and dipped the feather, but this time he stopped with the tip hanging over the paper. The black liquid dripped off the tip, leaving a blob on the bottom of the page that spread in a shape he knew all too well.
The raven’s wings spread wide across the page, and he shook his head. “No. I must finish this. Blackbird, be gone from my mind!”
I wobbled, even though I was on one knee in the Traveling room within the Rim. The memory would have brought me to my knees if I hadn’t already been there. Claws dug into my leg. I turned my attention to my familiar. “Peta, did you see—”
“No. I felt things that were not you.”
“What are you two talking about?” my father demanded.
The doors burst open and several guards poured in.
Everything jumbled together. The journey, the destruction of the Eyrie, the death of Aria, my father’s memory, the oubliette. I slumped forward to my knees.
“Father, Vetch tried to kill Bella and me. The guards will corroborate,” I said.
The guards nodded one by one.
“Why would your brother try to kill you?” His eyes were filled with confusion.
“Because he thought he was the named heir. Because Cassava set him on us.” Slowly I pushed myself to my feet, though I was anything but steady. “I need to rest. You need to name an heir.”
I walked out of the Traveling room, Peta right with me at my side.
One of the guards, Arbutus, caught up to me. “I will see you to your room, Princess.”
I snorted. “Where is Raven?”
“Gone, missing for the last week.”
“And Blackbird?”
Arbutus shrugged. “I don’t know who that is, but none with the name has been here.”
I stopped. “I need a message sent to Bella and Ash. Tell them the queen is dead. And give Bella this.” I took the small leather pouch from my side and turned my back to Arbutus. I pulled the emerald stone from my vest and dropped it into the bag. It was the best I could do with what I had at hand.
I gave it over to Arbutus.
He bobbed his head and turned back the way we’d come. “I’ll take the message myself.”
I should have been happy, but the truth was, I knew Blackbird was far from done. Likely he was licking his wounds and preparing some new trap for me. Then there was my father’s memory I’d seen. It tore me up from the inside out. Knowing he knew he was losing his mind to the damage Cassava had done.
We reached my room and I slipped inside, closing the door behind me.
I’d lost my father, just as I’d found him within his memories. A rough tongue flicked over my cheek, swiping away a tear. I dropped to the bed, then rolled my head so I could tuck my face against Peta.
“Lark, what did you see?”
Carefully I pieced the words together. “The letter, I’m sure it was the one he sent to me in the Pit. The one Blackbird took. He’ll have destroyed it by now.”
“Of course.” Peta stretched out further, yawning. “He’s not a fool.”
I closed my eyes, feeling like I was missing something. Something out of reach that if I could put my finger on everything else would make sense.
Peta was right, Blackbird was not a fool. I thought about the final thing my father had said. Even now, with Cassava and Blackbird gone, he couldn’t understand how destroyed our family was.
Dysfunction on a royal level.
“You need to sleep, Lark. Close your eyes.”
There was no use in arguing. Already the warmth of the bed, the comfort of Peta beside me, and the knowledge that my father was back where he was supposed to be, lulled me into dreamland.
Once there, my dreams were anything but restful. I saw Ash banished, Cactus whipped with the lava whip while Cassava shrieked with laughter, Peta skinned and her hide put on Samara’s back. None of the dreams made any sense.
The last was a dream I’d not seen for months. My mother and Bramley killed by Cassava. I held my mother in my arms, sobbing. Her dead eyes stared up at me, empty of soul, empty of anything that made her my mother except the brilliant blue color.
“You have failed me, Lark.”
I shot straight up in bed, panting for air, tears streaming down my face. I wanted to believe it was yet another game of the mother goddess . . . but I couldn’t be sure. And that doubt hurt me as much as the thought of failing her. I pressed a hand to my eyes and struggled to control my emotions, but the heart pain would not leave me.
Peta slept soundly as I dressed and slipped out of the room into the hall. The night beckoned to me as I walked out of the barracks. The pull of the dark was a visceral sensation that tugged my feet forward until I stood in the center of the blasted field, where everything lay dead around me. Slowly, finally, the dream faded.
My ears caught the shuffle of cloth on cloth, and the faintest snap of a twig underfoot. I held my ground, even as my body tensed. I called the power of the earth to me and held it tightly.
“Blackbird, I’m surprised you would show your face.” I kept my back to him.
“Lark, please. Call me Raven.”
“You are not my brother.” I turned then to stare at him. He wore his cloak, though it di
d not cover his face for the first time.
His face was drawn in lines of fury. “You think you killed her. You think you’re stronger than her?”
“Cassava?” I snorted. “She is nothing without the emerald stone.”
“Do not push me, Lark. I could kill you where you stand,” he snarled. Lies, they filtered through the air to me. He couldn’t reach the earth’s power here where the land was dead. I could. And I held the sapphire stone still. I had three elements to his four.
“Then why don’t you?” I took a step toward him and he moved back. “That’s what I thought. Even with all that power, you are a coward at heart. Every time we’ve faced each other, you’ve run. Any time you’ve been hurt, you flee with your tail tucked between your legs like the incestuous cur you are.” I stalked him with every word.
“I will rule the Rim, Lark. I will be named as the heir. Even now Father is writing a new will. Not this piece of dog shit.” He shook a piece of paper at me.
The note I’d seen my father writing in his memory. Blackbird truly was a fool to still be carrying it around. Or maybe . . . maybe he couldn’t believe what it said. That I was the one Father had loved the best.
“I have no desire to rule, Blackbird, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let you take the throne.”
He held out his hand and red lines of power raced up his arm. With a snap of his fingers, fire burst up in a full circle around us.
“Then let us see who is truly stronger once and for all. Does your promise still stand? That you would never hurt me? Or are you a liar now too?”
My jaw ticked as I struggled for words. “A promise predicated on a lie is no promise. We end this now.”
A flickering figure to the right of us walked through the flames. The mother goddess glowed with power, her dark hair floating on an unseen and unfelt breeze.
“You are both my chosen ones. I forbid you to fight.”
I raised my eyebrows but did not take my eyes off Blackbird. “You are the reason he ran from the other fights, aren’t you?”
Blackbird sneered. “I am no coward. I am obedient. To both my mothers.” He gave her a bow from the waist.
Windburn (The Elemental Series Book 4) Page 21
