by Tara Shuler
“Mother?” I asked.
She blinked at me, the color slowly returning to her cheeks. Her lips began to heal of their cracks, and she licked them with surprise.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Your Grace ability must be inside the crystal,” Alexi said.
“Then do you think my other abilities are, as well?” I asked.
“One would think,” Alexi answered. “Perhaps the crystal had to remove your abilities to rid you of the darkness, and now it is acting as a shield to allow the use of them while blocking the darkness.”
“That makes sense,” I said. I turned to Mother and took her in my arms, holding her tighter than I could ever remember. “I love you, Mother. I know I haven’t said that often enough, but I do.”
Will kneeled beside me and said, “So do I.”
She took one of us in each arm and squeezed us until we couldn’t breathe, and she said, “I know you do. A mother always knows.”
“Sorry to break up the reunion, but the storm is clearing,” Max said from the doorway.
“We can’t leave Mother,” I said.
“You don’t have to!” Mother corrected me. “I feel right as rain. Help me up and let’s get out of this infernal place!”
Will and I helped her stand, and she was remarkably healthy. Aside from some obvious weight loss and a dire need for a bath and clean clothes, she appeared to be her normal self.
“I have some clothes for you in my suitcase,” I told her. “I only have this one coat, but I have a bunch of sweaters you can layer, and clean socks.”
“That’ll be fine,” she said. “Let’s go!”
The snow had calmed to a light dusting, and it fell around us as we mounted our sleds and snowmobiles. Alexi and I stood together on our standing sled, and Mother was loaded into one of the multi-seat snowmobiles with Will driving.
“We still have no idea where to find Dmitri,” I pointed out.
We were just about to take off when Kai said, “I don’t think we have to. Look.”
He pointed upward toward the top floor of the building we’d just left, and Dmitri was staring down at us with a gleam in his eye.
“You made it at last!” he cackled, clapping his hands with glee.
Chapter Fifteen
My hands balled into fists as I glared at him. I wanted to badly to be able to have the ability to hurl a fireball at him or send the building crumbling in around him. But I had nothing, not even my regular abilities. I glared at him.
“You nearly killed my mother!” I screamed up at him.
“And you expect me to care?” he called down. “Come up here to my ballroom, Alice. Dance with me!”
I ran back inside the building as Alexi tried to grab my wrist to restrain me. I broke away, and inside the destroyed stairway had started to rebuild itself as though rewinding to a moment in history when it was first built. I dashed up the stairs, followed by our entire group.
At the top of the stairs was a single doorway, which I burst through. It was, as Dmitri had said, a ballroom. The floor was stunning marble tile, and great marble columns rose from the floor. Moonlight Sonata was playing, though I couldn’t tell where the music was coming from.
“Dance with me, Alice!” Dmitri said, and suddenly I was being pulled across the floor against my will.
Dmitri took me into his arms and began to dance to the slow, somber melody. Alexi, clearly enraged, started to dash toward us, but a flick of Dmitri’s hand knocked him back as though he were a mosquito being flicked effortlessly away by a finger. He slid across the floor and slammed into the wall.
I was nothing more than a puppet on Dmitri’s string. He whirled me slowly around the dance floor in time with the music, and I was powerless to stop him. Every time someone tried to approach him, to help me, they met the same fate as Alexi. Liam tried to knock him back, but Dmitri simply held up his hand to block him.
“Now, dear Alice, it is time,” Dmitri said, stroking my hair and staring into my eyes. “I believe you know Galen?”
Galen stepped from the shadows in the corner. Clearly he was under some sort of spell, because he moved like a mindless zombie.
“Your friend here as a surprise in store,” Dmitri whispered into my ear.
He released me from his sickening embrace, and my ability to control myself returned. I stumbled slightly, and then recovered.
“I know what you want!” I spat at Dmitri. “But you’re too late! It’s gone!”
“Clearly, you have no idea what I want,” Dmitri said.
“Oh, yes I do!” I shouted. “You want my Grace ability! You want to use Galen’s ability, along with your precious talisman, to drain my Grace ability and transfer it into your beloved Olivia!”
Dmitri’s face drained of color, and his lip quivered. “H-how did you know that?” he demanded.
“It doesn’t matter,” I told him. “What matters is you’re too late. My ability is gone. All of them are.”
“No,” he said softly. Then louder, “No! It’s not possible!”
I shrugged and said, “Then have Galen do his thing.”
“Do it!” Dmitri shouted.
Galen lurched forward, his eyes glazed over, his movements jerky and unnatural. He wore the talisman around his neck. Dmitri pulled a glass sarcophagus containing a raven-haired woman, remarkably preserved, lying silent and motionless inside, forward from the shadows.
Galen took my hands in his and held them. He squeezed them harder and harder, his face awash with confusion. I could hear Logan and his wolves growling behind me, but they could not approach or Dmitri would simply knock them away.
Galen began to tremble. Then he shook as though he were having a seizure. He held his breath, and his face grew redder and redder. His temples bulged with throbbing veins, and his eyes popped, bloodshot and swollen. Finally he released his breath and sank to his knees, too weak to stand.
“She speaks the truth,” Galen said, his voice monotone and dull.
“No!” Dmitri shouted. “No, I need her Grace! I need it now!”
Dmitri lashed out, sending a shockwave of energy blasting through the room. The wave held all of us captive, sending jolts of pain coursing through us every few moments.
I was pinned against the wall via an intense, unseen force. I felt as though I were in a wind tunnel with hurricane force winds slamming into me, whipping my hair about my face and stinging my skin.
Alexi lay motionless in the corner, knocked unconscious by the shockwave. His cloak was rumpled around him, and a few strands of his white hair fluttered about. I tried to scream for him, but the words would not come.
As my eyes shifted around the room, I saw nothing but the motionless bodies of my fallen comrades. Nearly all of them were motionless, and a few groaned and tried to crawl toward me.
This couldn’t be happening. I was Chancellor. They had believed in me when I hadn’t believed in myself. They had trusted me enough to follow me blindly into this battle. And I had let them down.
I closed my eyes, oblivious to the world around me. My heart slowly began to thump with the rhythmic vibration of the crystal’s resonance. The crystal!
With every ounce of my strength, I reached into my pocket and retrieved it. I held it fondly and whispered, “You said to bring you to my enemies. Here we are.”
I held it out toward Dmitri, my strength draining rapidly from the exertion of pushing against his forcefield. He peered at it oddly. It rose from my palm and made its way toward the center of the room. It hovered there for a moment, and then began to grow. It grew, and grew, larger and larger still, until it reached its full height.
With a loud hum, it began to pulse with a bright violet light. It sent a bolt of purple lightning toward Dmitri, knocking him down and pinning him, convulsing, against the floor. A bolt surrounded the sarcophagus, and it shattered, sending shards of glass glittering to the floor like tinkling diamonds. Moments later it shot a bolt at me, causing intense, blinding, fiery p
ain to course through me. I screamed and struggled to free myself. Finally, I fell to the floor.
The crystal fell silent. It was dark and quiet. The room was hushed, and I struggled to my feet. All around me my friends and family lay silent. My eyes shot to Dmitri, and I glared at him with the rage of a thousand suns. My fists were balled, and I began to approach him.
He held up his hand to knock me back, but nothing happened. He tried again, but nothing happened. He began to act bizarrely even for Dmitri. He made all kinds of strange motions, but nothing happened.
“What’s going on?” he demanded, his voice quivering. “What happened?”
My face lit up with a maniacal grin. I knew what had happened. I could feel it. The crystal had taken Dmitri’s abilities. It had taken every one of them… and given them to me. I could feel them surging through me, pulsing like the energy of the crystal itself. I chuckled and flicked my hand toward him, knocking him into the wall across the room.
“Oof!” he grunted as he slammed against the wall. “Alice! L-let’s talk about this, shall we?”
I continued to slowly approach him. I was gritting my tech viciously, baring them like a wolf about to lunge at his prey. From the corner of my eye I saw a hint of blackness. I turned toward it and saw a wraith. Behind it came another, and then another. Soon the room was filled with them, and they danced around me.
“My, my,” I said. “Look what I’ve got.”
Using only my mind, I told them to attack. The wraiths began to close in on Dmitri. I turned and began to walk away… toward my friends and family. Toward Alexi.
He began to plead with me, “Alice, stop this! Please, Alice! The darkness is gone! Alice, I’m sorry! Please tell Alexi I’m sorry!”
I heard him scream as the wraiths surrounded him. I ignored his cries as I approached my fallen family. I knew exactly what to do. No longer was I afraid. No longer did I have no guidance. I knew what to do, and I did it.
I closed my eyes and held up my hands. I pictured each and every one of them. Alexi, Liam, Kai, Max, Jamie, Will, Mother, Logan and his pack, and all the Council members. Their faces flickered in my mind like an old silent movie.
I was warm. So warm. I could see the light of my Grace radiating, though my eyes were shut tight. It reached out from me in dozens of golden tendrils, connecting with them and pulling them back from the darkness. They began to stir, and I could hear them moving and speaking one-by-one.
“Alice?” Alexi called to me.
I recognized the warm wetness as it began to drip from me. It seeped from the corners of my eyes. It poured from my nose. I licked it away from my lips and tasted the briny bite of blood. It poured from my ears and surged down my neck like waterfalls.
I opened my eyes, and my world was red. Redder than anything I had ever seen. It was deep, deep crimson, and coated with a glossy sheen. My eyes slowly scanned the room, and I confirmed that everyone was recovering. And then I fell. Tumbling, tumbling into a pit of black.
I’d like to tell you I woke from this darkness as I did all the others. I’d like to say that Alexi and I found our happily ever after, and that everyone else found theirs. Unfortunately, life doesn’t always work out the way we hoped.
This time, I wasn’t fated to awaken in a soft, warm bed, surrounded by my friends and family.
This time, I wasn’t fated to find my way back again.
This time, I wasn’t fated to awake at all.
Chapter Sixteen
Or so I thought…
As I lay there contemplating what surely must have been my doom, consumed by darkness with only my thoughts to let me know I was still clinging to life, I felt the queerest sensation pulsing in my abdomen.
A warmth the strength of a thousands suns began to swell inside my belly. I was overwhelmed with the deepest sense of love I had ever felt in my life. Something was pulling be back into reality. Something strong, incredibly powerful. Something overwhelming.
The warmth surged through me, zapping my body back to life and filling me with a sense of purpose unlike everything I’d ever experienced. I lifted my head and peered toward the source of this sensation, and I could see my belly glowing with this intense golden light. Instinctively, I cradled my belly.
A crowd began to gather around me, silent with wonder at what they were seeing. I heard my mother’s voice weeping, but as I looked into her face she was crying tears of joy, her face beaming proudly.
I looked back down, filled with realization. My own eyes filled with tears that reflected those of my mother’s.
“Auriel,” I whispered to my stomach as tears spilled down my cheeks. “Your name is Auriel.”
*****
The days that followed were brighter than any I had ever known. We returned home and began to decorate for Christmas. The whole compound was decked with boughs of holly and cedar. Lights illuminated every room, every bannister, every hearth. A giant Christmas tree filled the foyer, rising up to the ceiling where an angel adorned the top, looking down upon us with her warm, comforting smile.
Mother had moved in. Will, too, along with Jamie, who he’d asked to be his bride. Even Max and Denise were staying with us through the holidays.
On Christmas morning we had all gathered around the tree to open gifts. Alexi and I had gone into his study to sit by the fireplace and open the gifts we’d wrapped for each other.
I fingered the shining paper he’d so lovingly wrapped around mine. I plucked at the edge of the ribbon he’d so carefully tied around the package, and it unraveled and slipped to the floor. Then I delicately opened the paper and removed the small box inside. It was a silver bracelet containing a number of silver charms.
“There is a pair of rings to symbolize our bond that can never be broken,” he explained, pointing to the interlocking silver rings. “And a piano because I know how you love to play. There is a palm tree because of your love for the beach. And the heart, of course, symbolizes the never-ending love I have for you. And this,” he said, gently touching a tiny baby rattle, “is for our darling daughter.”
“Oh, darling, it’s so beautiful,” I gushed. “It’s absolutely perfect!”
“I will add more charms as time goes on,” he told me. He took the bracelet from its box and fastened it around my wrist. I turned it this way and that, admiring the way it sparkled in the light from the fireplace.
“Now open yours,” I told him.
Alexi picked up the box and lifted it’s lid.
“It is empty,” he said, his eyebrows knitted in confusion.
“Like my heart was before I met you,” I said.
I smiled and pulled another box from behind me and handed it to him. He lifted the lid on this one and found it nearly overflowing with candy hearts of all colors.
“And this one is full of love, like my heart is now,” I said. “Because of you.”
“Darling,” he whispered, setting the box on the floor and taking my hands in his. “I love you so much.”
“I love you, too,” I said, our eyes locking.
I leaned forward and kissed him, taking my hands from his and wrapping my fingers into his long, white hair. My lips parted, and he began to kiss me more passionately.
“Dinnertime!” Jamie chimed from the doorway. When she realized what she’d interrupted, she added, “Oops, sorry.”
Alexi and I reluctantly parted, and we both laughed lightly.
“We’re coming,” I said.
A thunderous knock sounded at the front door just as we’d all sat down for Christmas dinner. The scent of succulent ham and sweet potatoes dripping with brown sugar glaze set my stomach to rumbling fiercely, but I waited patiently as Alexi answered the door. He returned with a letter addressed to me and bearing no return address.
Confused, I opened it and pulled the contents into my hand.
Dearest Alice,
Many happy blessings upon you for the upcoming birth of your beautiful daughter, Auriel. I hope it will be a most joyous occasion. I am
looking forward to meeting you. Have a very Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year.
Yours, Olivia
The letter fluttered to the ground, and I looked up at Alexi, my heart pounding in my throat.
“She’s alive,” I whispered.
Before You Go!
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About the Author
Tara Shuler is the author of several paranormal romance books for the young adult genre. She loves reading and writing about vampires, werewolves, ghosts, witches, demons, angels and other paranormal beings.
Tara lives in Georgia with her husband, children and two cats. She loves spending time outdoors, cooking, digital painting and art, watching movies, and spending time with her husband and kids. Her favorite place to hang out is the beach, though she rarely has time to go.
Her taste in music is eclectic, ranging from classical piano to country to heavy metal and nearly everything in between.
Favorite Song: Rock Me, Amadeus by Falco
Favorite Movie: Top Gun
Favorite Food: Soup (especially vegetable)
Favorite Animal: Red Panda
Favorite Book Series: Harry Potter
Favorite Author: J.K. Rowling
Table of Contents
Copyright
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
