by Mae Doyle
On the opposite wall from the bathtub was a huge fireplace. Goreon hadn’t been kidding when he’d told me that Aruer had a fireplace in every room. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, focusing on the flames until I felt them grow warmer.
There. I wasn’t about to be cold when I was getting clean.
The bathroom also had a sink with multiple taps and spigots, thick, lush towels in autumn colors, and a fainting sofa that was covered with new clothes. Before I stripped, I ran my fingers over some of them, enjoying the way they felt on my skin.
Whoever made these for me had a lot of skill. I couldn’t want to find something comfortable to wear and try it on after I got clean. The tub was almost full though, so I left the clothes and turned off the water before slipping out of my clothes and into the tub.
“Oh, that is good,” I murmured as the hot water lapped on my skin. It was easily the most relaxing thing that I’d felt all day if not in weeks, and I practically melted into the tub, sliding down so far that just my face was above the water.
I hadn’t had a bath in years. Sara always took forever in the bathroom and I’d learned to take fast showers so that we didn’t end up late anywhere. Because of that, this was the first time in forever that I’d slid down below the bubbles. The water was a perfect temperature, and the bubbles created a soft purple foam that smelled and felt amazing.
I knew that I would have to scrub up and wash my hair eventually, but all I wanted to do just then was relax, so I stretched out, enjoying how my toes could peep up through the bubbles. It felt amazing.
In fact, I felt amazing. It was almost like I could forget all of the crap that had been going on with my family and the fact that I was stuck on another realm and relax.
After a long time, way past when my fingers and toes got wrinkly, I sat up and worked the spigots until I found something that resembled shampoo. The water should have been cold a long time ago, but it held at the perfect temperature.
I could stay here all day long if I didn’t have three gods that I had to deal with. They obviously wanted me to make a decision about what I was going to do, but the problem was that I didn’t even know. Not yet.
I didn’t want to stay in another realm, not if that meant leaving my parents behind, but at the same time, there was something about each and every one of the three of them that called to me and drew me to them.
If there was something to this fated mates crap then I was really screwed, because I felt the same longing and pulling to each of the gods. I didn’t think that I would actually be able to choose one of them if the time came.
That’s why it was best for me to get home. I nodded forcefully to myself, trying to convince myself of what I’d just decided and then turned the tap back on to rinse out my hair. It took a few minutes to get all of the shampoo out and the soap off of my body, but when I finally stepped out of the tub and pulled the plug, I was cleaner than ever and smelled amazing.
The clothes were all in gorgeous autumn shades. I choose a pair of jeans and a jacket. They were the only things in the pile that weren’t long dresses, but I wasn’t going to take Aruer’s hint. I really wasn’t that comfortable in a dress anyway, and if I was going to be exploring a new realm, I wanted to be as comfortable as possible. My gold dress was still in a pile on the floor as I changed, and I wondered what to do with it, but before I could worry too much about it, there was a knock on the door.
Chapter 14
I froze, half expecting the person or creature knocking on the door to go away, but the sound came again, louder and more insistent this time. I’d left the snow globe from Wydar next to my bed when I got up, but hurried to fasten the necklace and key from Suros around my neck.
That didn’t mean that I’d chosen him, and I didn’t want him to get the wrong impression, but it did mean that I was a girl who liked a little shiny jewelry.
“Who is it?” I called out, quickly running my fingers through my long hair to try to tame it. It was almost impossible, and my fingers kept getting tangled in it, but I’d have to deal with that later. “Who’s there?”
Nobody answered. I turned once and glanced at myself in the mirror, glad to see that I looked respectable for whoever was on the other side of the door. My hands shaking a little, I unlocked it and threw it open, but quickly breathed out a sigh of relief when I saw the young centaur standing there.
It wasn’t Goreon, but I would bet that they were related. They had the same high cheekbones and dark eyes, and his face lit up when I looked at him.
“I was beginning to think that you may have drowned in there and was getting ready to kick down the door. I’m Harters. You ready to go see the kings?” He seemed so happy to be getting me from the bathroom that I grinned at him.
“I was actually planning a walk around the gardens after my bath, and then I wanted to get something to eat.” The centaur’s face fell, like he wasn’t expecting that answer, so I quickly added, “would you like to go with me?”
“Oh, yes! I can show you all of the best places in the garden. You know, there are some secret places that Aruer keeps to himself,” he added over his shoulder as he led me down the hall. Thanks to the thick rugs on the floor, our footsteps were almost silent, and I had the strange feeling that I was sneaking out of somewhere that I shouldn’t be.
“Secret places?” That got my attention as I followed Harters out a side door and into the garden. “What kind of secret places would he have? And why?”
I couldn’t think of a single reason why a god would feel the need to have hidden secret places in his garden, especially since he had unlimited power.
Harters shrugged, the action endearing on such a young centaur. “I can’t tell you that. It’s just a secret. You want to see?”
I paused and glanced around the garden. I really wanted to take some time to get to explore. Somewhere a little way off I could hear water in a fountain tinkling as it fell, and the trees overhead were loaded with fruits that I’d never seen before. They were large and red and partly hidden in the gorgeous autumn leaves. If I were alone, and not on a tour of a realm I’d never been to, I’d simply climb up the tree and grab one so that I could try it, but I wasn’t sure what the centaurs milling around would say.
Farther out from the castle there were huge fields growing giant vegetables that looked like pumpkins. Even though it was autumn, the sun was still high in the sky and giving off enough heat and light to make the gardens productive, but when I looked closer, it was easy to see the bit of frostbite damage on the leaves and how some of them were yellowing.
It was a gorgeous garden, sure, but I was still in the realm of Autumn, and so it was going to have some damage. Still, it was more incredible than anything I’d ever seen on earth. I could only imagine what the garden in the Summer realm would look like.
Harters was about twenty feet ahead of me, tapping his hoof. “Are you coming, Emily? Don’t you want to see the secret part of the garden?”
I paused. How did this centaur know my name? It was possible that Aruer had told everyone that I was here and was his guest, but nobody else in the garden had come up to me or talked to us. In fact, they all seemed to be ignoring us.
“I’m coming,” I called out, but even then I took slow steps towards him. He was a kid, that’s all. Kids hear things that they’re not supposed to, and they find places that are supposed to be hidden and show them to guests. I didn’t know what I was getting worried about, but I didn’t have a reason to be.
Harters was just being a kid, centaur or not. That meant that I was totally fine.
After I reasoned through this, I pulled my jacket tighter around my body and followed after him. The one thing that Aruer hadn’t thought about giving me were shoes, and I didn’t want to put on the same ones that I’d worn since getting here. They pinched my feet and were uncomfortable, and I was much happier going barefoot.
“Come on, we just have to make it through these bushes!” Harters pointed excitedly through a clump o
f thick bushes that I hadn’t noticed before. It was almost like they’d suddenly appeared in the middle of the garden, but I thought that it was strange that they would have been hidden from sight just moments before.
“I’m coming, Harters,” I called back. We pushed through the bushes together. They were thick and tough, and I tried to ignore the fact that they were pulling out bits of my hair and scratching my arms. I paused when I heard a distinct rip and looked down, but the tear in my jacket was tiny.
Biting my lip, I waved my hand over the spot and was thrilled when the threads slowly knitted themselves together.
Harters started at me in awe. “You know more magic than I thought that you did. You must be pretty powerful, aren’t you? What else can you do?”
What else could I do? I frowned and thought for a moment, but I couldn’t think of any good tricks to show him, then I had a good idea. We were both struggling against the bushes, and I took a deep breath and blew out the air.
Immediately, the branches that we were trying to push through pulled apart, leaving a gap large enough for us to walk through side-by-side. I gasped and clapped my hands. The bushes trembled a little with the effort of being bent back, but they didn’t snap shut as we walked through them.
“How deep do we have to go, Harters?” I asked. We’d been walking through the bushes for a few minutes now, and I was beginning to wonder exactly where we were. First, they’d seemingly appeared out of nowhere. Now, they were deeper than they should have been and I didn’t want to get lost.
I looked back over my shoulder, fully expecting to be able to see the gardens and the castle, but the branches were slowly closing behind us. They were silent as they moved, so I’d had no idea that it was happening, and I reached out to stop them, but Harters grabbed my wrist.
“We’re almost there, Emily. Aren’t you excited? Don’t you want to see my surprise?” He asked, his voice almost trembling.
“Your surprise? I thought that you said this was Aruer’s secret place?”
Harters shrugged and turned away from me, walking deeper into the bushes. I stayed where I was, trying to think.
Should I follow him? Where the hell was this young centaur leading me, and why was he so intent on taking me there? I must have debated for too long, because branches brushed against my back as I stood there thinking. The path was closing behind me and I hurried to catch up with him.
“Oh, Emily. You’re going to be so surprised, I can feel it.” There was a slight difference to Harters’ voice, and I paused. Something about the way he was speaking was familiar. Something about the timbre of his voice and the way he paused between words made him sound like someone I’d heard before.
Recently.
Someone I was terrified of. I stopped again, this time planting my feet firmly. “Harters, you need to tell me what’s going on right now.” A chill ran over me and I shivered, but I knew it wasn’t from the air.
Something wasn’t right in here. I was stuck in this giant bush from hell with a young centaur I didn’t know and I had the distinct feeling that something wasn’t right. My mom had always told me that I was too gullible, and if she could see me now, she’d be shaking her head.
But he was just a kid, right? Harters was just a little kid and they could be weird sometimes, so there wasn’t any reason for me to think that he was going to hurt me.
He turned and looked at me and I gasped at the way his eyes grew dark and the color started to swirl and turn. A light mist rose from the ground around him and, as I watch, his entire body started to twist and change.
His front legs shortened and melted back into his body while his torso lengthened and straightened, making him walk on his back legs, which no longer had hooves. His fur melted away and was replaced by clothing. A long dress hung on his frame, but his body swelled to fit it, making the dress fit smoothly on him.
Her.
Making the dress fit smoothly on her.
I didn’t want to look up at her face. I already knew who it was. I never should have followed anyone out of the castle, and now I reached out for Aruer, trying to find him with my aura. He’d told me to simply reach out or call for him if I needed him and he’d be there right away, and just then I needed him more than ever before.
Hell, I expanded my aura, closing my eyes to put as much power as I could behind it. I looked for Suros and Wydar as well. Any of the three would come for me, I knew it. Any of them would be there in a second to try to save me from what I was facing, but I couldn’t find them.
It was like I was locked behind a door, hidden away, and completely out of touch with all of them.
“You think that they’re going to be able to find you here?” Etris’ voice dripped sarcasm and I finally forced myself to look up at her. She looked the same as she had in the church, filled with rage and hate, her eyes constantly shifting, constantly moving as she looked at me.
They were pools of darkness and I couldn’t find a drop of mercy in them. “Why do you think that they would come for you, Emily? They know that you belong to me. You belong to my knife.” She pulled her hand from behind her back and held the same knife that she’d had in the church.
The symbols and runes in the blade were glowing brighter than ever before and I had to rip my eyes away from them and look back at her face to keep from trying to run.
Not like there was anywhere for me to go. The bushes had sealed shut behind us, and we were penned in. There was a small circle of space where the two of us stood, but not nearly enough room for me to try to make a run for it.
Etris had me backed into a corner and she knew it. She grinned at me, her gorgeous face splitting into a foul smile and I had to force myself not to step back away from her. She was terrifying, and the fact that she wanted to murder me scared me even more.
Oh, and the fact that she totally could and nobody would know about it. I’d followed her here willingly and hadn’t bothered to worry about whether or not anyone would know that I’d disappeared from the castle.
My Aruer probably still thought that I was in the bathroom.
Wait. My Aruer? There I was again, claiming him. Claiming all of them. That was something that I was going to have to try to figure out later. I wasn’t sure what I felt for Aruer or the other gods, but I was pretty sure that claiming him for my own – even in my thoughts – wasn’t necessarily the best way for me to handle my emotions.
“Do you have anything you’d like to say before I kill you? Because you know, Emily, that you have to die. It was foretold by your ancestors back when we made our pact, and there’s no way that I’m going to let you out of it now.”
I shivered at her words but did my best to look as brave as possible. The thing that kept me from falling apart and falling to the ground in fear was what my dad always said to me growing up.
In fact, I heard this more than I would have liked, probably because I wasn’t that great at making friends. Remember, Emily, that you’re stronger and braver than you think. And when your back is against the wall, there’s always something that you can do to get yourself out of the situation.
Okay, my back wasn’t technically against a wall just then, but I was kinda screwed. Caught in the bushes with a crazy goddess who wanted nothing more than to slit my throat and then let my blood pool on the ground.
It was dramatic as hell, and there was just one thing that I really hated.
Drama.
I guessed that I did have one thing to say to her after all. She was grinning at me, the dagger clutched in her right hand, slowly raising it up above her head, obviously about to bring it down on top of me to kill me.
Taking a deep breath, I squared my shoulders and dug my heels into the dirt. When I was little my mom had always worked in the garden and had told me that it was the best way for her to get grounded and really draw energy from the earth.
Seeing that my mom was the most powerful witch that I’d ever known, I figured that paying attention to what she had to say was a pretty g
ood idea. If nothing else, it would at least help me feel a little less desperate and on the edge before she killed me.
“You can go to hell,” I told her, then I exhaled hard, throwing my hands down at the ground at the same time. Energy poured out of me and slammed into the ground, pulsing right back up through my feet.
Chapter 15
I didn’t know if what I’d done was the right thing or the completely wrong thing. Magic ripped through me, scorching my feet and making me feel like I was completely stuck to the ground. It tore up my legs, the sharp energy of it making me open my mouth to scream, but nothing came out.
It felt like I’d stuck my finger in an electrical socket and had all of the power of a small city pouring through my body. I felt the tiny hairs on my arms stand on end and the hair on the back of my neck prickled. If that was what channeling energy felt like, then I wasn’t sure how long I could handle it.
It was intense. My cells screamed and my blood seemed to boil in my veins. I reached way down into myself to try to find the power and control that I would need in order to focus the magic I’d harnessed, but it felt like it was just out of reach of me.
Every time I seemed to get my fingers on it, it slipped a little further away. I could feel my resolve weakening, and I gritted my teeth. If I gave up then all of the magic that I’d been able to summon would suddenly disappear and Etris would kill me, no questions asked.
Honestly, though, I was surprised that she hadn’t already killed me. I risked a glance at her, surprised to see her frozen in position where she’d been standing. She was obviously more interested in what power I had and what I was able to do than trying to kill me just then.
Her head was cocked slightly to the side like she couldn’t quite believe what she was looking at. It was my best chance for being able to attack her without having it come back to bite me in the ass, and I knew that I had to act fast or I was going to lose it all.
