Black spots started to appear before my eyes as my body trembled uncontrollably.
This is how I’m going to die.
Slade brought me here to kill me.
Kiera released my wrist and my vision returned. Panting for breath, I looked at Slade, searching for some clue as to my fate. But his face remained stony and unflinching.
“What do you want?” I gasped.
Kiera ran her tongue over her fangs and I grew woozy again. “A tithe, Shaman. A tithe for only dancing in the dawn instead of the darkness. You have denied us, but you need our help now.”
“What kind of tithe?” I whispered, feeling my feet sink into the mud floor.
Kiera looked at Slade, who turned away. She looked back at me. “Some of your life force—mortal energy—equivalent to a year of your life.”
“My Queen, no! She—” Slade started to say, but he was cut off by her stare.
I looked desperately at Slade, who shook his head as if to pardon himself from any responsibility. “I would die a whole year sooner,” I whispered weakly.
Kiera turned her head to the side in an unnatural angle. She lifted a white hand and waved it in front of me. Suddenly, the landscape changed and all around me were bloodied, dead corpses of Créatúir. A decapitated gorgon head, eyes wide as though she knew her fate, rested in the lap of a dismembered siabra. A manticore, sliced into a million pieces, black blood running like a river across my shoes. A shapeshifter, killed while in mid-transformation, his wolf’s head and human body slit up the middle into two mirror images. Smoke emanated from the ground as Créatúir weapons lay fruitless across the landscape. Far off in the distance, I saw a moving pack of beings—Fomoriians—headed toward my neighborhood, ready to off the mortals living there. My neighbors. My family. I sunk to my knees and cried out, my arms outstretched.
There is no other way.
Suddenly, the vision disappeared and I was back in the cave with Kiera and Slade.
“Now you see. Now you know the consequences for not paying the tithe,” Kiera said, running her tongue around her lips.
“I have no other choice,” I whispered as tears fell across my cheeks. “One year of my life to find the Four Treasures. To save my world and yours. To save my family.” I held out my right wrist to Kiera.
Her dark eyes glinted as she saw the delicate wrist bones under my pale skin. She softly lifted my wrist to her face, tracing her tongue across the spiderweb pattern of blue veins.
I closed my eyes and silently asked Fiona for protection from the Beyond.
The pain was instantaneous, like a searing hot poker shoved into my wrist in two different places. The sound of bone crunching sickened me, but I didn’t dare open my eyes. I felt Kiera anchored against my body, paralyzing me. I couldn’t move away if I tried. Like a mosquito trapped in a spiderweb, I was helpless prey, my life hanging on the thin silver strings of mesh.
A calm came over me as I allowed her to drink my life force. A peace, almost. As though I would be happy to die right now.
But then she released me. I fell backwards into the dirt, landing hard on my back. I clutched my wrist to my chest, afraid to look up. I looked down and saw the two round holes from her fangs slowly close, the skin smooth and scar-free. As though no one would ever have to know or could know.
“Get up,” Slade said, bending down and grabbing my elbows. I allowed him to pull me to a standing position. His arm lingered protectively against my back.
Kiera’s eyes were closed, her mouth curled in a tiny smile. She exhaled as though in total ecstasy, her skin glowing from stolen human life force.
“A tithe,” she said, before opening her eyes and looking at me. “You may pass.” She extended a black-robed arm toward the boxes nestled in the alcove.
Not allowing myself to contemplate what I’d just sacrificed, I walked across the dirt floor clutching my wrist, my shoes sinking into the gritty mud. As I approached the boxes, they began to glow. I released my wrist and reached out to touch a box; when I got about two inches away from it, the flower latch moved and the box sprung open.
A holographic document appeared above it, floating in front of me. I leaned forward, but all I saw was a glowing, opaque white document, no larger than a sheet of paper.
Blank.
“There’s nothing on it.” I looked over at Slade. Yet as I looked back, gold writing began to appear on the page, as though written by a faraway spirit writing a grocery list. “Wait,” I whispered.
At first, the writing just looked like symbols, like that weird “wingdings” font in Microsoft Word. Yet the longer I stared at it, the more the figures began to move, condense, morph.
Until it became words. I began to read out loud. “In the time before the time, the two realms were joined. The mortals and the Créatúir were one. One force, one race, living together. A peaceful life they—” I turned back to Slade and Kiera. “It stopped,” I said.
I moved to the next box and held out my hand until another glowing paper floated above, hovering next to the first one.
“Yet at the dawn of the Time of Iron, this race split into two. Those who became mortal soon forgot their Créatúir ancestors and feared their Créatúir cousins, forcing them underground into the Middle Kingdom. Into the hidden Other Realm.”
I tapped the adjacent box, and the next scroll appeared.
“The mortals embraced pursuits of the mind and intellect and lost their connection with the ethereal realm, both physically and spiritually.”
I cleared my throat and continued. “The Créatúir,
living in the ethereal realm, themselves split into two: the Light and the Dark. The Light bask in the sunlight and wind, the Dark in the shadows and moonlight.”
Finally I moved to the last box in the circle. “The mortals, as a result of their splinter with the Créatúir, became destined to live a life of fear of darkness, for they no longer have sight in the night, and fear of heights, for they no longer have magic. The Créatúir live on in the mystical realm, separated by a mere veil from the mortals.”
I turned back to Kiera and Slade. “We were all joined at one time. Light, Dark, Créatúir, human. We are all descended from one race.” I looked back at the circle. “How come nobody knows this?” I whispered.
“Lost. Lost in the stories of the past. Lost in the disregarding of history. Lost because the modern world and the future are more important than times gone by,” Kiera said.
“But it still doesn’t tell me about the Four Treasures,” I said as I watched the glowing documents flutter back into their boxes.
I noticed Slade and Kiera sharing a silent exchange.
“What?” I said.
“You did not tell her?” Kiera pointed a long finger at Slade. She bared her fangs and hissed at him as the red caps chattered beneath her robes.
Slade backed away, his pale face drawn in terror. “She would not have come otherwise. She needed to see the destruction for herself. She needed to see all of this for herself. To search for signs in the darkness. I had faith—I still have faith—that she will find the Treasures.”
“What’s going on?” I said, my head snapping back and forth between them.
“The middle box—the center of the ring,” Slade said.
I looked back at the ring of boxes and saw that in the center there was a small, empty platform with a square imprint. “Is there another box somewhere?”
“Somewhere,” Kiera said. “It was stolen.” She glanced at a beetle crawling in the low dirt ceiling above her. Reaching up, she pulled its wings off and dropped it to the ground.
“What?” I said.
“We were all given tainted food. When we awoke, the box had been stolen from our realm,” Slade said, his dark eyes growing cloudy.
“Well, what was in it?” I asked, my sh
oes squishing further into the mud of the cave.
“The legend says that the center scroll was the most revered. The most high,” Kiera said.
“Let me guess? It tells us how to find the Four Treasures,” I said quickly.
Slade and Kiera’s flat silence affirmed my assumption.
My life. I gave my life for this. For nothing.
I turned toward Slade.
“You knew this? You knew it wasn’t here, yet you brought me there! You made me risk everything again for nothing. For nothing! I left my friends, my boyfriend, everything to come here! I gave up a year of my life, paid the tithe to the Dark! And you LET ME!” I pointed my finger in Slade’s face, inches from his icy exterior. The cold began creeping down my index finger, a warning.
But I didn’t care. Didn’t care that Kiera’s blood droplets were forming a little inkblot design on my shoes. “Take me back home!” I shrieked.
“You will find out where it is. I know you will,” Slade said, his voice slightly broken.
“Okay, so tell me. Where is it? What did it say?” I folded my arms across my chest.
“I—I don’t know. Only current Créatúir Shaman can read it,” Slade repeated.
“Yeah, but didn’t anyone else ever read it?” I cocked my head to the side, already knowing his answer.
“No, there wasn’t ever a need,” Kiera said, waving a black-clothed arm in front of her. “History doesn’t usually catch our attention until we need to learn from it. The scrolls were forgotten about, and anyone who knew what they said has been gone for many centuries.” She scraped a black fingernail against her fang, sharpening it. “But you know all about escaping the past, don’t you Shaman?”
Focus, Leah. Get out of here. Lie.
“You know, I think I know where to find the box. I need to go back to my world, though, to find it,” I said, as steadily as I could muster.
“No—” Slade started to say.
I held up my hand. “Slade, I have to go back.” I didn’t wait for his response before turning away. “I’m ready,” I said to Kiera. I followed her back through the damp tunnel, back to the throne room.
“Hungry?” Kiera asked lazily as we closed the door behind us.
“No, I’m good,” I said quickly.
“Smart girl, she is,” Kiera said to Slade. “Too bad I can’t feast more on her.”
I shivered. “I think I should go back to my realm now.”
Kiera didn’t look convinced. She studied a red cap peeking out of her skirt, reached down, and casually dug into his face with a pointed black nail until she’d poked its eyeball out. The eyeball went rolling toward the floor. As the goblin howled, Kiera brought her finger to her mouth and licked it with a black tongue.
“Um, I need to go back and find the last box,” I said again, as my stomach turned.
“Shaman.” Kiera gathered her skirt and took a step toward me. “Tell me. How did the Fomoriian demons come back when we defeated them so long ago?” I flinched as she pointed her fingernail at me and traced the outline of my collarbone through my shirt. As my pulse beat incessantly, I could feel the goblins under her skirt bumping against my legs, pinching at my jeans.
I knew I could out Melissa and the construction project and all who were involved. And it would have served them right. But I remained focused on the bigger picture: getting home. Besides, it would only anger Kiera more; only fuel the Créatúir mistrust of humans more. So, even though Melissa didn’t deserve it, I protected her.
“It doesn’t matter. Don’t worry about that. I’ll take care of it,” I said quickly. “But I can’t help you here. I must return to my world.”
Slade looked at Kiera, waiting for her approval. She opened her mouth slightly so that I could see her fangs pressed against her bloody lips. She ran her black tongue up and down her fangs, as though contemplating my mortality.
“Let her return,” she finally said to Slade. She walked over to him, skin glowing, and placed her hands on his shoulder. “But come back soon, Shifter,” she whispered to him.
“Yes, my Queen.” Slade walked over to me. He held his hand out and I placed mine into it.
“Time to go,” he whispered.
I closed my eyes and said the chant.
Within seconds, I was knocked off my feet and slammed into the ground. When I opened my eyes, I saw Slade standing above me. And behind him, the glorious sight of my house.
Twenty-Five
How long have we been gone?” I asked Slade as I stood
up and brushed off my jeans. The night was dark,
the stars in the sky bright and shining. The soft glow of the kitchen light emanated across the lawn, illuminating frostbitten blades of grass. Inside my house, I saw my dad walking across the kitchen floor.
“What’s happened?” I shrieked as I looked around me. On the grass, a dusting of snowfall, light and fluffy, lay like a blanket, threadbare where blades of grass jutted out like miniature spikes. I turned to Slade. “It’s winter!” I reached forward and clutched his arm, a chill running through my hands. “How long have we been gone?”
Slade’s cold, dark eyes shone in the moonlight as he softly looked down at me. “Two months,” he said quietly.
“Oh no!” My face crumpled as I lowered my head into my hands. “Alex, my family, my school, everything—” My voice broke off as I began to sob.
“Strange,” Slade muttered. I felt his gaze upon me. “Shaman, it was humor. Two days. We’ve been gone
two days.”
“What?” I said as I lifted my tear-streaked face to him.
“Two days,” he said again and smiled, revealing incisors as pointy as vampire fangs.
“The snow—why—” I sputtered.
“Record early snowfall,” Slade said.
“Oh thank god,” I said, slumping my shoulders forward and exhaling.
Then, the fury returned.
I ran full-speed toward Slade and threw my body weight at him. I shoved him as hard as I could, my arms jarring against his solid frame. He stumbled back across the lawn as I collapsed to the ground, panting.
I knew he could’ve killed me then, but I didn’t care.
In fact, I might have welcomed it.
“Shaman, you’re lucky I can keep my anger in check, unlike many of my shifter kin,” Slade said, as he picked himself up off the ground.
“Your anger? Your anger? You took me there! Brought me to Inis Mor! Said I’d be safe! You let me sacrifice my life, literally, when you knew there was nothing there the entire time! How dare you!” I was still on all fours, my words spitting into the grass as my fingers curled downward, scraping snow and mud into my nailbeds.
Slade walked toward me, the jagged tips of his black hair bouncing across his white cheekbones. He grabbed my shoulders and pulled me to a standing position. “I know. I am sorry for the tithe. I didn’t know Kiera would ask for one. But the Four Treasures. The box. Tell me where it is.”
I shrugged, breaking his embrace. I surveyed him coolly, my eyes narrowing. “I have no idea.”
“Is this a joke? Tell me where the box is!” Slade reached out, but I stepped aside.
I raised my eyebrows “I have no idea. I lied.”
“You lied? To my queen?” Slade shook his head and briefly shifted into wolf form before standing upright again. “Cheat. You have cheated us all. Cheated yourself and cheated our world.”
“Cheat? Really? Because I just got cheated out of a year of my life. Che—” I stopped suddenly as my brain buzzed.
Cheated. Cheating. Brooke’s stepdad cheated on her mom. The weird box she saw Melissa carrying.
“I might have an idea.” I reached into my jeans pocket and pulled out my cell phone. I flipped it open and turned it on. The screen flashed, at first just a scrambl
ed digitized picture. “Come on, come on,” I muttered. I prayed my little jaunt to the Other Realm hadn’t disrupted some random megabyte in my phone. I doubted Motorola’s insurance policy covered Dimension Shifting While on Other Realm Vacay.
“Yes!” I said as the welcome screen appeared. I went into my address book and selected Brooke’s cell phone number.
“What are you doing?” Slade asked.
“Relax,” I hissed at him.
“Oh my god! WHERE have you been?” Brooke screeched into the phone as she answered it.
Oh. Right. I’d disappeared for a few days.
“Um. Sick again. Darn pneumonia,” I said. I should’ve just gone all the way and snapped my fingers like gosh darn it—those pesky lil’ germs.
“Whoa. I’ve been so worried, since you were only at school for like a second this week. Not to mention Alex’s been out of his mind, worried about it. It’s been really cute, actually,” Brooke said.
Oh. Right. Alex.
“You’re not going to miss Homecoming, are you?”
she asked.
Oh. Right. Homecoming.
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world. But Brooke, listen. Remember that weird box you said you saw Melissa carrying into your stepdad’s office? I need you to describe exactly how it looked. And I mean exactly, Brooke,” I said quickly.
“Why? Do you have some kind of lead? Did you see them together?” Brooke asked, her voice rising.
“No. Just a hunch. Seriously Brooke, what did it look like? It’s really important.” Slade took a step toward me. I backed away a little and hissed, “Stop.”
“Stop what?” Brooke asked.
“Nothing. Please. Just tell me.” My voice was nearly becoming whiny.
“It was a box. I think it was made out of wood,”
she said.
Did I really just figure this out?
“Or maybe it just looked like wood. Anyway, it kind of looked like a messenger bag or something. Maybe a purse. Or even a box that you get a dozen donuts in,” Brooke mused, as though she was just mentioning random objects.
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