SURRENDER (The Ferryman + The Flame)

by Rhiannon Paille

  He cringed, but nodded. “Right. Just ...opposite of me.” She frowned and switched directions. He smiled. “Fair enough. Taking this slower, then.” He tried again as he lunged forward and tapped his stick against hers. “Step back and switch directions.”

  She followed him and gave him a crooked smile. She wanted to please at least one elder in her life.

  “You have the movements, now you will protect your thoughts against my intrusions.”

  Kaliel sighed, ready to try defending herself. They slowly backed through the forest. Mallorn stayed quiet for a long time.

  “Flower,” he said with a stern look.

  Kaliel frowned, growing determined to block him. The girls in the corridor, the shadowy shapes that took them, she had to be strong enough to resist them. She wouldn’t be like the others and give up without a fight. She wouldn’t have to face the foe if she stayed in Avristar, if the Valtanyana never found her. Part of her knew hiding from him forever wasn’t much of a plan, but it was all she had for the time being. His stick tapped against hers as she lunged backwards. She focused harder on shielding as Mallorn tried to penetrate her thoughts.

  She didn’t let him through.

  “Very good,” he said.

  She only nodded. An owl hooted in the distance, a rabbit scuttled through the trees, which whined from the sharp winds clawing at their leaves. She cringed, her thoughts drifted to the dream of the Ferryman. She repeated the word Ferryman in her mind, over and over again, while Mallorn’s expression remained. She glanced behind her to make sure she wouldn’t step on anything. The barn was in the distance behind her and a bit of relief wash over her.

  “Ferryman,” Mallorn said as he tapped his staff against hers. His eyes met hers with awe as he stopped and stood straight, his body rigid.

  Kaliel dropped the staff at his feet and raced to the barn. There were things she couldn’t tell him—the whole of her parable and the dream about Krishani. Part of her was afraid he would look at her differently if he knew the truth. She was determined to steal what little innocence she had left. Giving him a chance to help her control her abilities was all she planned on doing. They had been through the tattered manuscripts a thousand times about the Flames, there was no information directly relating to the Amethyst Flame. Even though he was trying to help she didn’t know more about what she was before she arrived. She reached the barn and ducked inside. The horses were asleep in their stalls. She stumbled over to Umber.

  “Can you hear me?”

  “As always,” he said.

  “Let me hide in your stall?”

  “Why hide from Mallorn?”

  She darted around the horse and slumped in the corner. “I messed up.” She rested her head against the wood, tears rolling down her face as she fixed her gaze on the hooves. She didn’t want to tell Mallorn she was in love with the Ferryman. Nobody knew about Krishani, he was a secret she’d never share.

  “You cannot avoid him forever,” Umber said.

  “For now I can.”

  Kaliel dreamt of the lake. Her feet dangled over the ledge as she stared at the horizon. The waters were shrouded in a thick mist that curled around the surface of the shore, rising towards the hill she was on. She stretched out her arms and yawned, gazing at the sandy beach below. It was tan, littered with stray twigs and rocks. She got curious and leaned forward, wanting to see the beach up close. She would have to go down the hill and over the rocks if she wanted to stand on the beach. The gargoyle cave scared her away, the gangly creatures frightened her. Unlike the merfolk they didn’t seem gentle at all. As she bent over, she sensed commotion in the cave. She perked up and watched as darkness fell across the lake, turning the waters black.

  She frowned as a gargoyle emerged from the cave, scrambling on all fours towards the grass. It was one of the gargoyles that were said to protect Avristar. A boat pressed up against the shore, and Kaliel moved her gaze down the hill as people approached. She stiffened. Krishani was there. Why was he there? She scrambled to her feet and clambered down the hill. She was careful to stay concealed as she watched the heads of the elders drifting through the trees. She darted between the spruces, trying to find him. Her hands clawed at branches as she got turned around, confusion welling up within her as a deep ache forced her to clutch her chest and crouch to the ground. Her knees hit the spruce needles in the grass followed by her hands.

  She looked again, Krishani was pacing through the trees. She felt his anger, sadness and fear as she helplessly watched him go past.

  Why are you leaving me? She desperately needed to know. Kaliel remembered the boats, the gargoyle. She scrambled through the forest brush, being careful not to make noise, to cry out. She reached the edge of the tree line and watched the crowd of elders, Lord Istar, Lady Atara, and others gathered around the boat. Krishani stepped into the boat. Kaliel raced to her feet and placed her hand on the side of a tree, trying to steady herself while attempting to comprehend what was happening.

  Krishani turned and raised his head, his blue and green eyes staring into the crowd of elders. They looked pained in a way she couldn’t understand. She stepped away from the tree, shock and anguish tightening in her gut. Her foot caught on itself and she tumbled down the hill towards the array of elders, landing on her hands and knees in front of them. They all looked at her with forlorn expressions, none of them said a word. She pushed herself up and looked at Krishani. He appeared so downtrodden, like he would rather crumble to dust than be on the boat. He looked away from her.

  “Are you leaving me?” she asked.

  He hung his head as the gargoyle pushed the boat into the mists. The elders vanished and she cried out as she stood on the ledge, watching the boat drift away and out of sight.

  “No.” She gasped. Her eyes snapped open and she shook her head, noting she was back in the barn. It was a dream. Her heart pounded so loud she heard its pulse in her ears as she sputtered and attempted to breathe. She clawed at the walls as she fought to stand.

  “Careful child. What troubles you?” Umber said.

  “Krishani will leave me,” she said.

  “That cannot be.” Umber grunted and scratched his hoof on the ground in apparent discomfort.

  Kaliel felt the roughness of the wood under her frail hands as she pulled herself up and fell against the side of the horse. She felt so dizzy as the revelation of losing him hit her. She pressed her cheek into the fur and closed her eyes, trying to find her feet. Her hands pushed at the horse and she stumbled awkwardly through the barn and out into the forest. It was pitch black, the sky void of the moon. She wrapped her arms around her waist, trying to hold herself together. It was useless. All she could think of was Krishani’s arms around her, his sweet nothings whispered in her ear, his lips on hers. She desperately wanted to be in his arms; no more Mallorn, no more lessons, no more dreams, no more Flames.

  All I want is this and nothing else, she thought bitterly as she traipsed through the trees.

  The border between Nandaro and Orlondir wasn’t far. She needed to race against this twist of fate and find him before the unthinkable happened.

  Dizziness swept her under as she fought to separate the shapes of the trees from shadows. She ran her fingers along the bark and turned and turned, winding through the spaces between the trunks. She tilted her head upward, tracing patterns of black leaves against midnight blue sky. She sighed as she continued to fight her way through the night. Desperation overwhelmed her as the longing for his warmth hit her again. She kneeled on the ground and let out a sob. Her limbs went weak as her elbows touched the ground and she buried her face between her hands. Tears spilled onto the grass. She was helpless and out of time.

  There’s nothing I can do, she thought as she pounded her fist on the ground. She rolled on her back, hands rubbing her stomach, begging for some kind of comfort to come. She saw the waterfall in her mind’s eye, and heard Krishani’s voice in her head. I won’t surrender.

  “He promised he never would,
” she whispered as the wind rustled the trees. She curled the blades of grass under her fingers and ripped them out of the soil. Her chest heaved in spurts of anxiety. She had no idea where she was anymore. Orlondir seemed too far away for her to travel on foot, and he would be gone before she could reach him.

  “What troubles you, child?”

  Kaliel jumped. She looked around, trying to place the voice. She stretched out her arms and felt for anything near her. There was a tree to her right. Her hand traced along the trunk and she realized it was older than the others. She dropped her hand and crawled over to the tree, aligning her spine with it. She let out an exasperated sigh. She longed to go back in time, to erase the words of the Great Oak, to stop the foe from seeking her, to live in bliss from her past, yet she knew none of that was possible.

  “He’s being forced to leave me,” she said.

  “Then it was not meant to be.”

  The words stung her heart. “But it was.”

  “And now it is no more.”

  The words crushed the last of her strength; darkness engulfed her in its cold embrace. Her eyes drooped closed and she slipped away into the abyss.

  Wansa.

  The words were clear as crystal, but she couldn’t understand them. She was ...somewhere. Underground maybe. A crypt? She opened her eyes. Torches flickered on the walls. She felt the sticky ooze beneath her feet as she assessed her surroundings. Pain stabbed her stomach. She put her hand there, putting pressure on the imaginary wound, but as she peered through the bars she saw a girl pressed up against the wall. She was being tortured.

  Corza.

  More words in a language she didn’t understand. Kaliel watched her with delirious attention. The girl’s eyes were closed and her mouth moved, mumbling something. Kaliel moved towards the cage and curled her fingers through the spaces between the bars, pushing her face into the iron to get a better glimpse.

  The girl’s wrists were in shackles, her midnight-black hair matted against her face. Her eyes darted back and forth underneath their tan lids. Kaliel backed away from the bars and stumbled through the muck as she turned and tried to claw her way through the catacombs.

  Behind her was a tunnel. She entered it and raced towards the end. There was something familiar about the place. She passed by the tombs and felt something holding her back. She pushed, but it was like she had hit and invisible wall. She stopped and stretched her arms out to the darkness; it pushed her away. Kaliel dropped her arms to her sides. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as footsteps pounded down the stairwell behind her.

  She flushed with fear as she tried to stay calm and still. There was a splash behind her and her heart did a double jump. She clenched her fists together and gritted her teeth. She trembled to the bone and her mouth threatened to erupt in a succession of screams. She held her lips together and stifled the faint whines in the back of her throat. A sharp strike of flint sounded against the stone, and she cringed as she turned to witness the foe.

  En guyen naha lin sanse.

  Kaliel understood it this time. The Flame inside of her struggled with all of its might to emerge. As she closed her eyes, it rushed out of her. She took a sharp breath as she looked at the people in the cell. There was a body on fire next to the girl now, flames smoking out of his form as the foul smell grew thicker.

  The one with rosy pink eyes stared at her and the meaning of the words flooded her mind. Run. Hide. He will take your soul.

  The foe didn’t seek to kill the Flames, he sought to possess them. Kaliel felt sick to her stomach as she fought to bring herself out of the dream, back to reality, back to the place where she could find Krishani, warn Mallorn, tell the elders everything she had seen. She tried to close her eyes, but she felt like they were fused open as the foe crouched beside the girl and presented a tiny crystal clear orb. She watched as the pink essence from the girl’s eyes flowed into the orb, turning it into milky pink vapors. The foe stood as the girl slumped to the side, dead.

  Desperate, Kaliel tried to back away, but the foe turned his gaze towards the darkened tunnel. His white-lightning eyes sparked, making contact with her amethyst enflamed ones until everything fell away into awful blackness.

  There was a light tap on the door. Krishani raised his head, his face hidden behind his hands. He wanted to deny existence, move backwards in time, stop the Ferryman from dying in the first place. In the weeks since Kaliel left, the Elmare Castle had grown cold. He was a pawn in their games. Even Hernadette refused to make eye contact with him while she sorted out the herbs he would offer to the Gatekeeper.

  Melianna, on the other hand, had been chirpy. As she measured him for the robes, she chattered on about the battles her father and his men fought in the Lands of Men. The conversations only made him more depressed that no matter what he wanted, not once had they bothered to mention Kaliel.

  In addition, Kuruny was nowhere to be found. After that night he encountered her in the hallway, she had disappeared to some unknown place. He longed to speak with her more about the land she returned from so he could understand what he would face when he arrived.

  That was the worst of it. The Ferryman followed death. It didn’t matter where Krishani went—he would find death and it would find him. A thought he didn’t want to relish.

  Another knock on the door. He sighed and looked around his small room. There was nothing but what had been there since the day he arrived. He closed his eyes again and tried to push away the sadness, the very urge to scream at Melianna. Profanities wouldn’t help. He sighed. There was no way to stop this.

  Sweet surrender, he thought as he lifted his head towards the door that was already creaking open.

  He stomped his foot on the floorboards as he stood and the door shut with a bang. He ran his hands down the robes. They were embroidered in gold and loosely hugged his form. He shuffled towards the door and placed his hand on the doorknob. As his fingers gripped it he had another thought race through his mind: The Valtanyana. When would he encounter them? He shook his head. That was fear he didn’t need to carry. Corruption festered in every part of the Lands of Men. The Daed were crawling from every hole and crevasse they could find. Whoever sought Kaliel was much more dangerous than those he would encounter. He hoped she could evade the Valtanyana until he was strong enough to return to her.

  “Krishani,” a voice on the other side of the door said.

  He turned the handle. Melianna stood in the hallway, appearing nervous and bothered. She took off down the corridor, swiftly leading him to where the Elders waited.

  Kuruny watched from the shadows as the Elders gathered in the main hall. The spectacle made her sick. She had to get to Krishani somehow before the insanity continued. She peered around the corner up the grand staircase to the east wing and caught a glimpse of Melianna’s satin blue slippers. She pulled away and pressed her back against the stone wall.

  The Elders arranged themselves in a line leading out to the courtyard. Kuruny recognized half of them, the others appointed during her extended absence. She glanced at the torch bearers. They were in twos, rounding the end of the processional. Lord Istar and Lady Atara were somewhere near the front in the midst of the courtyard. Kuruny was disgusted with her father. He wanted to keep her from the Lands of Men due to the hex, and yet refused to break it, and refused to allow her to join in the affairs of the land.

  She scowled as she recalled the tasks she endured over the past few weeks. There was nothing she could say to him that would allow him to reconsider his decision, to consult with the Gatekeeper before sending his most prized apprentice to his death. And she was certain Krishani would die. She stifled a sigh as she recalled the fact she had barely escaped with her life. What would they do to someone like Krishani? It wasn’t as though his kinship wasn’t clearly marked. Even that cloak couldn’t hide the pointed ears, the mismatched eyes, or the pale white skin. All the men she had encountered were tanned, muscular and hairy. How they wouldn’t see him as a demon was be
yond her.

  She turned her attention to the processional as she watched the torch bearers exit the main hall. Her heart leapt out of her chest as she realized they were truly going through with it. She peered around the corner. The castle was empty. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She tiptoed towards the archway as she slipped outside into the courtyard. She hid behind a bush and watched them cross the bridge. The processional turned left as she scrambled across the yard, careful to keep up, but careful to stay hidden. They began down the forbidden trail to the top of Tirion Mountain. No one ever ventured up there save during the Fire Festivals, and even then, only a select few were given the honor of hearing the voice of Avristar.

  The sky gave off the last rays of sunlight, as the midnight blue of the night and a blanket of stars crept across the horizon.

  Kuruny’s pulse quickened as she skipped over the bridge and watched them enter the forest path. She paused. She couldn’t go walking a few steps behind them. The path curled, but if even one of those torch bearers looked behind them, they would spot her plain as day. She calculated the distance, and what it would cost her to forge a path through the trees. The processional trudged on and as Kuruny found herself lost in thought, it moved out of sight. She cringed and dove into the trees, doubting her options were any wider. She pushed branches out of the way as she clumsily traipsed over the forest brush. She had to move faster. Krishani was at the front and she was wasting time. She sighed and scrunched up her nose in disgust. Begrudgingly, she quickened her pace and soon saw flickers of more torchlight, and the bobbing heads of Elders. Each of them had their head down in meditation. She snickered to herself and hoped they felt ashamed of their decision.