But there’s no chance in hell I’m letting her walk off on me.
I grab her arm and jerk her back, only flinching slightly at the dangerous look in her eyes. “Well? Where is she?”
She throws my grip off. She doesn’t try to walk away again, but she seems to retreat into herself for a moment, and her voice is quiet and distant as she says: “That part is worse than any nightmare. It’s why I can’t hold him and tell him everything is going to be okay. Because it’s not.”
As she speaks, her gaze drifts to a small leather bag resting where she’d been sitting. I don’t try to stop her as she moves toward it; I just watch as she pulls out a locket that dangles on the end of a tarnished silver chain.
She offers it to me.
On its surface is a dragon-like creature, its wings wrapped protectively in front of its body.
“I saw that emblem on some of the Anima’s armor the other night.”
She nods. “A mark of the queen’s army. And that queen gave this back to me when she tried to recruit me into said army.”
“Gave it back?”
“Yes. The mark of that army is new. The one on the other side has been there longer.”
I flip it over with trembling hands, and a scuffed etching of bird with unfurled wings greets me. It’s clearly a bird. Clearly the same bird that I watched Soren summon a few nights ago, and that I just saw her summon. And now that I see it closer, that ‘mark of the queen’s army’ isn’t a dragon at all; it’s this same bird, just twisted in such a way that it’s almost unrecognizable.
I don’t speak for a long moment.
But my hands keep moving, fumbling until they’ve forced the rusty locket open to reveal a faded family portrait. And there they all are: Maric, next to a beautiful woman with silvery blonde hair. And in front of them is an unmistakable young Soren, seated beside a girl who does look like she could have been his twin.
She was telling the truth.
How am I going to tell him?
It would have been easier if they were dead.
That’s a terrible thing to think, but god, it’s true.
“The Queen came to power a little over forty years ago,” I say softly, now recalling Elric’s story as well, and then Carys’s theory about the way time moves here as opposed to on Earth. “Roughly fifteen years ago, in Earth’s time.”
“Smart girl,” Anika says with another of those sad smiles. Her eyes dart to the dark spaces around us; checking for eavesdroppers, I assume.
I’m surprised Liam hasn’t come after me yet.
I consider calling for him, but I’m afraid Anika will stop talking if I do—and I’m too far into this mess to stop now. So I simply fix my gaze on her and stare expectantly until she keeps going.
“We escaped the Anima after they brought us into this world. And in our quest to get back to Earth, we stumbled upon that place now known as the Dusk Palace. There, we encountered the beings capable of magic that could bring more creatures like the Anima to life. And my mother was fascinated by this new type of dark magic, I know, even though she pretended otherwise.
“She said she was learning everything she could in hopes that it would help us get home. But she simply wanted to make herself stronger. My earliest memories of her are almost all of her training, learning as much magic as possible— she’d always felt like she had something to prove, I think. And I believe she was also drawn to the idea of controlling creatures like those that had stolen us; an ultimate form of twisted revenge against the universe for the hand that we’d been dealt.
“Anyway, I’m not sure at what point it was that she forgot about going home and decided to become a queen instead. I’m not sure who gave her the idea, or what it was, exactly, that drove her to madness.... But nothing that I’ve tried has brought her back. I barely recognize her now, and it’s been years since we talked face-to-face. After I learned that she was planning to force her way back into Earth, and on bringing an army with her to prove her strength…”
She averts her eyes in shame.
“That woman is no longer my mother. She is sick. And I’ve come to terms with the fact that there’s no cure, and it’s too dangerous to keep trying to find one now that you’re here, and you’ve brought that key with you. And Soren…” She sighs. “You all…complicated things.”
“So what are you planning to do?”
“I’ve told you our goal, haven’t I?”
“You honestly want to kill her? Your own mother? And you expect us to help? If Soren knew—”
She jerks her gaze back to me, eyes flashing angrily. “So you understand why I can’t tell him. I’ve had years to make this decision, and I know it must be done. But we don’t have the luxury of time to allow my little brother to come to terms with it all.”
“But if we end up facing her—”
“She’s even less recognizable than I am.”
I glare at her.
“And for what it’s worth, I’m hoping you don’t have to help.” She reaches as if to take the locket in my hand back, but then simply closes my fingers around it instead. “Keep that for me, please.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m leaving for awhile. After that incident earlier today, I think it’s foolish to assume the queen isn’t going to soon have confirmation of you and the key’s existence. There’s only so much we can do to hide you at this point; I need to start gathering our forces. A potentially tricky operation—and I intend to come back from it, but…”
“But you might not, so you’re leaving your baggage with me instead of dealing with it before you go.”
The corner of her mouth quirks. “I think I see why he likes you.”
“Because I tell the truth?”
She closes up that leather bag, grabs her staff, and takes a deep breath.
“You should tell him before you go,” I plead. “He deserves to hear it from you—you can at least tell him who you are. Lie about your mother if you have to, but at least give him something.”
She studies me for a moment before she pointedly says, “He has something.”
“It’s not the same. I’m not—”
She turns away.
“Coward.”
“Yes. In a lot of ways, I am.”
I’m shaking so much at this point that dangerous heat is starting to build around my wrist.
She glances over her shoulder, and her gaze trails to that wrist as she says, “Keep training. Elric knows where I’m going, and we know how to safely stay in touch with each other. I hope this isn’t the last time I see you, Worldkeeper.”
“I hope you get eaten by a dragon, coward.”
She hesitates, her expression so torn for a moment that I almost feel bad for her.
Almost.
But then she turns and keeps walking away, and all of the sympathy I might have felt for her is gone by the time she’s out of sight.
Chapter Fourteen
“You okay there, Little Wolf?”
“Yes,” I lie.
It’s been three days.
Three days of carrying around that awful necklace and keeping it hidden. Three days of carrying that even-more-awful knowledge inside me. Three days of avoiding being alone with Soren for too long, of not looking him directly in the eyes, of awkwardly changing the subject every time ‘Casandra’ has been mentioned…
I’d planned to tell the truth by this point, but I haven’t managed it.
So maybe I’m a coward too.
“Do you want to take a break?” The concern in Soren’s voice is obvious.
We’re supposed to be practicing. We’ve been at it for most of the morning, and now we’re alone—Carys is on guard duty, Liam’s off foraging for food, and Elric fell asleep an hour ago; I can hear the latter’s snores even though we’re a half mile from our proper camp.
This would be the perfect opportunity to talk to Soren.
I lower my sword and wander toward a nearby small creek, plopping myself down on a flat
rock along its banks.
“Something’s bothering you,” he says, sitting down beside me.
I try to laugh it off. “I can’t figure out what it might be—the red sky, the looming war, all the many disturbing powers I seem to possess…So many bothersome things to choose from, really.”
“But that’s all just a typical Monday for you, isn’t it?” he asks.
Chill bumps rise along my skin. A normal reaction to him being this close, and to that smile he’s giving me. And by this point, he knows the effect he has on me. So he probably doesn’t think anything of it.
He doesn’t realize that the real reason I’m uneasy is that I feel like the secrets I’m keeping from him might literally be tearing my insides apart.
“What’s going on, Elle?”
I give him that smile that I’ve perfected over the past couple days—the one where my eyes never quite meet his. “You were right,” I say, “I needed to take a break. I’ve been pushing too hard this morning.”
“Not like you to admit you need a break,” he comments.
“Just don’t worry about it, okay?” Irritation—more at my own cowardice than at him—makes my tone sharp. “Come on. Forget it; let’s just keep practicing.”
He looks at me uncertainly, but I’m already on my feet again.
The truth is I could use a break.
But as long as I keep swinging this sword, I don’t have to talk.
So that’s what I do, even though my muscles are aching.
I’m getting better at throwing magic through my blade, but after dozens of repetitions this morning, my aim is starting to suffer. One particularly bad misfire sends a bolt of electricity crackling into the trunk of a massive tree; it splits through that trunk and causes several large limbs to sizzle and sever. One of them nearly lands on Soren; he just barely manages to roll out of the way and shoot me a look that’s equal parts concerned and annoyed.
I’m half-possessed at this point, though, so I just grip my sword tighter and start summoning more electricity.
Soren’s hand is on my arm a second later, forcing me to point the sword at the ground. The blade still sparks with tiny bolts of anxious magic.
“We’re stopping,” he says, that hand gripping my arm even tighter, while his other hand reaches up and cups the side of my face, forcing me to look at him. “Something’s wrong.”
It’s all wrong, I want to shout.
The way he’s looking at me with no suspicion, the way my head is spinning with all the lies I’ve told, the weight of that necklace in my pocket… Nothing about any of this is right, and I think I’m going to be sick. Or I’m going to lose control of my emotions—and of that key inside of me—at the very least; the air around us is already beginning to hum with unsteady power.
I take a deep breath, and then I shove him away.
But he follows me, same as he did the last time I tried to angrily storm away from him.
Idiot.
Doesn’t he get how these angry storm-offs are supposed to work?
Clearly he doesn’t, because suddenly he’s in front of me, frowning. “Was it something I said?” he asks. “You’ve been weird ever since the other night. I know I said some strange things when I was hurt. I’m sorry if anything I said upset you.”
He seriously thinks my anger is because he confessed his feelings for me?
“Are you saying you take those strange things back now that you’re feeling better?” I ask.
He studies me for a moment before he answers, but his voice doesn’t waver when he does. “No. Of course not.”
I offer him a weak smile.
It would have been easier to keep lying to him if he’d said yes.
I don’t know what I’m going to say now.
But I get lucky, because Elric appears and interrupts us before I have to think of anything.
Unluckily, he looks rather pissed off.
“I sensed the key’s energy,” he snaps. “What exactly were the two of you doing?”
“We got a little carried away,” Soren says, his eyes still narrowed on me.
“I had it under control,” I say quietly.
“We can’t risk it. Especially not now.” Something in Elric’s tone is off.
Soren must notice it too, because he looks at him and asks: “Especially not now? How is now any different from before?”
He takes a deep breath, eying the reddened skin of my wrist. His gaze lifts to mine expectantly, and I sigh and hold it out so he can extract the key for safety’s sake. We’ve done it enough times now that I hardly flinch. Nor do I think about trying to stop him; I can’t deny that I feel tired and unstable, and letting him hold it means one less thing for me to worry about.
“Bad news from Casandra, I’m afraid,” he says as he works his extracting magic.
We make our way back to the campsite, back to Liam and Carys, before he gives all of us the details.
“There is a clan of creatures known as the armaros to the north of here. Humanoid and intelligent; they’re practicers of a powerful sort of magic they refer to as kanbo. We expected them to come to our assistance when called, but apparently the queen has won most of them over since we last spoke. So when Casandra attempted to approach them for help, they responded less than favorably.”
“Less than favorably?”
“As in, they took her to the Queen instead.”
Liam and Soren both curse.
I squirm uncomfortably, knowing what I do about the relationship between her and that queen.
“We should hurry and go help her, shouldn’t we?” Carys suggests, though the fear in her tone makes the suggestion sound rather unenthusiastic.
Elric shakes his head. “The queen will want the key in exchange; I’m sure she’s hoping we’ll run recklessly to the palace with it in our possession. And Casandra wouldn’t want us to risk this, of course. Besides, she managed to get a message to me—so there’s still a chance she’ll be able to escape on her own.”
He doesn’t sound particularly confident about that last part.
The necklace in my pocket feels a little heavier, suddenly.
“But in the meantime, we need to move again soon, I’m afraid.” He looks pointedly at the key in his hand. “And to keep our trail faint. Some of the armoros are capable of mind-reading, and Casandra won’t be easy to break—but it’s possible they’ll manage to get some sort clue about our whereabouts out of her. So rest until nightfall, and then we’ll head out.”
The others stay and continue to question him, but I’m happy for the excuse to slip away.
I feel Soren watching me leave.
He doesn’t try to stop me this time.
I wait until I’m well out of sight of the others before searching for a somewhat comfortable patch of grass and settling down on it. I stare at the sky, contemplating my dilemma.
Pack first. It’s like the ultimate sin in the world of shifters that I come from—to walk away from that pack you belong to. Away from your family.
And yet, I did it too.
More than once, actually.
Most recently, I left Liam and Carys without telling them the truth, same as Soren’s sister left him. I was only trying to protect them. I suppose Anika was doing the same thing. And Liam and Carys eventually came around and forgave me, so maybe Soren could do the same?
But if she doesn’t come back, if he never gets to see her or talk to her again…
It’s not really the same at all, is it?
I pull the necklace from my pocket and open it up, studying the family portrait once more. Soren’s eyes were piercing, even as a child. Still brilliantly green, even with the faded quality of the photo. And I can’t meet them any easier than I’ve been able to meet grown-up Soren’s eyes these past few days.
I snap the locket shut and clench it tightly in my hand. My head is throbbing, and all I want to do is sleep until all of this pain goes away.
Apparently sleep eventually catches up with me,
because the next thing I know, I’m blinking my eyes open, and I’m not alone.
“I came to check on you,” Soren says.
I sit up, smiling a little at his thoughtfulness.
And then I see the tarnished silver chain hanging out of his clenched fist.
He watches the smile disappearing from my face, and he’s quiet for a long moment afterwards before he unfolds that fist and softly asks, “Where did you get this?”
Lie, shouts the coward in me once again.
But I can’t.
“I should have told you I had it. Casandra gave it to me. She told me to—” I reach for him, but he scrambles back and out of reach.
“Who was she?” he demands, getting to his feet. “Why did she have this? Start talking. Now.”
I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.
I’m not good at this sort of thing, and I just want to go back to our practice session from earlier. I just want to swing a sword. To throw magic. To hit things. That’s what I’m good at, not this—
“Elle.”
“You can guess, can’t you?” I say, miserably.
I don’t want to say it out loud.
“I want you to tell me I’m wrong,” he says, his hand clenched so tightly over that locket that his knuckles are turning white.
Something in his voice makes it impossible to turn away from him, even though I desperately want to.
I get to my feet as well, and I force myself to look into his eyes.
“She lied to you that night by the fire,” I say gently. “I heard her talking to you, I heard her tell you that your mother and sister were most likely gone but…it’s not true. I know it isn’t.”
“How do you know? How can you be sure…?”
“Because I caught her summoning those birds you told me about. And she told me she was your sister, but I didn’t—”
“No.”
“I should have told you.”
No, she should have told him.
But she isn’t here so—as I predicted—I’m the only place for his anger to go.
“No. She wouldn’t have left without telling me. She had to have known there was a chance she wouldn’t come back—”
Silver and Shadow (The Canath Chronicles Book 2) Page 14
