by D. Fischer
“Aiden. . .” he begins and then moves his hand to my shoulder. Hesitantly, as though I may burn him, he touches my shoulder and grips firmly. “You’re home. I don’t know what happened to you there, but you’re home.”
This isn’t my home. Nowhere is. But I understand the meaning behind it. I’m in the company of friends who would die to protect me and mine. I inhale deeply, wishing his words were true in the surface meaning – that I had four walls to call my own, a bed I could hold Eliza in, a normal human meal to consume instead of a wad of emotions. But I don’t, and I never will.
Besides, despite his implications, he can’t tell me the murmurs at my back are not filled with fear. It’s easier to resist consuming in this form than it had been when I appeared human, easier to ignore. But I can still feel it, and it taunts me just the same.
“I don’t belong anywhere, Dyson,” I say, leering at him. My words sting him, and he drops his hand. “Someone like me isn’t meant to exist. I’m a danger to everyone. You can’t tell me that’s not so, and you can’t honestly say, in good conscience, that you’d protect me from them when they need protecting from me.”
“They’re just shocked, Aiden,” he mumbles, but his eyes betray him as he surveys the onlookers. “Give them time.”
I scoff. “You and I both know we can’t stay here. We can’t stay somewhere we’re blamed for the deaths of many. Before we arrived, before all of this-” I gesture with my hands, “-they were fine. Content. Happy. Now, look at it.” That expression on the widows’ faces, on the friends of those who died, is etched on every face here. We’re blamed for bringing chaos to their doors and rightfully so. “We’re lucky they haven’t turned on us yet.”
“I know. We’ll come up with a plan after we hear what you have to say,” he declares. He and I both know now is not the time. These people need a moment to grieve, a moment to settle with this warped reality. They can’t do that with us here. “Do not leave until we do.”
Clenching and unclenching his fist, he frowns at the hand that was just touching my bare chest. Then he studies my shoulder. “You’re different,” he whispers in awe, stumbling for words. “Your skin . . . it’s familiar.”
Licking my bottom lip, I shift my weight. I don’t know how much to tell him about myself, but if I can trust anyone, it’s Dyson. “I have many abilities from each realm.”
Dyson curses under his breath, and Kat, fully clothed, approaches the two of us from behind. She looks at me warily, and I jerk my eyes back to Dyson with an I-told-you-so expression. In response, he kisses the side of her head, narrowing a glare at me.
“Katriane,” I greet, and the sound of my deeper timber stiffens her spine. It’s subtle, but I see it there. However, no fear wafts from her pores. It amazes me that she doesn’t fear me. But I don’t think anything will scare this woman – not after all she’s been through and seen. I had watched her struggle with her darkness before, and it’s a miracle she came back from it instead of giving herself to it. The darkness is addicting and much easier to allow control. If she could get through that, then she can get through anything. I look at her and see hope for myself.
“Aiden,” she breathes, her lips etched with sympathy.
I nod back to her and, skirting around them, duck into the teepee. I’m not good with sympathy, and I won’t accept it. Though I don’t like what I am, what I am will provide the strength I need to finish this in the coming days. Without this new thing that I am, I wouldn’t be capable.
Seconds later, they slip inside with little sound and linger behind me.
The teepee feels larger on the inside, but grief loiters. It tightens around my body like a vice. Katriane breathes a heavy sigh at the picture before us. Many of the dead still lay on slabs, taken by The Red Death after the battle. Blood is dried after leaking from every opening along their tattooed faces, evidential trails stuck to their cheeks like chalky tears. Erma is laid on a table next to Mitus’, and the wingless angels stand across from them, leaving a muddy path for someone to quickly tend to the most wounded. The elves who escorted them here linger around the angels, watchful, protective.
“Mitus,” Kat hisses and snaps her attention to the leader of this elf tribe.
Unlike the others, he’s clean. Soiled rags are at the base of his table, wadded and piled. Someone had cleaned him so his people could say their goodbyes without the evidence of his death. From here, he appears to only be peacefully sleeping.
His son, Jaemes, is standing by his head, facing me. Spine straight, he fixes on his father’s face then sweeps the husk with a slow movement of his chin. He doesn’t shed a single tear, but his jaw works at a frantic pace, keeping his sorrow at bay.
Under the watchful attention of Tember, Eliza tends to the wounded angels who came through the portal, only glancing up to me when she feels me staring. There’s not much Eliza can do for them except murmur reassurances as she cleans the blood from their skin. Even as I watch, their self-healing is knitting them back together.
Shushes silence the quiet chatter, the order for silence barked by Erline when she and the sandman dip inside. The flap of the teepee door feathers against Sandy’s calves before he moves away from it and settles next to Dyson, as quiet and as dark as a shadow.
The fee’s hands are tightly clasped in front of her, her eyes only on Erma’s dead body next to Mitus’, glistening despite their black color. Slowly, she walks to her friend – her sister - and she runs a hand through the tight red curls. A few of the strands catch on her neat and clean nails that appear as if she hasn’t lifted a single finger to help this village but hasn’t had the opportunity to file them smooth. With a deep inhale, she bends sluggishly and presses her lips to Erma’s still damp forehead.
“May your spirit soar with the Divine, sister,” she murmurs. Lifting her gaze to Jaemes but only meeting his back, she adds, “I am sorry for your loss.”
Without turning to her, Jaemes inclines his head, the words acting as a single blow themselves and cracking the exterior of his capped grief. Tentatively, he grasps his father’s fingers and folds them in his own. I watch a tear slip from his eye and splat against their joined hands.
The elf warriors shuffle from the angels to Mitus, slicking through the mudded path. When they reach him, each touches a part of his exposed body, murmuring “father” with cracking voices. It hits me then, almost like a physical blow: these elves are Jaemes’s brothers.
“What happens now,” Jaemes asks, stepping back to allow his brothers room. He turns to Erline and angrily swipes at his wet cheeks. The callouses of his hands scrape against the soft flesh, and the black tattoos have dried salt trails as though these aren’t the first rivers spilled from his eyes today. The bow strapped to his shoulder and the quiver next to it sway at his sudden movements, clinking to the quiet shaking sobs of his kin, to the unfairness of it all, to the heartbreak that sings a bitter melody to each and every soul from beyond the teepee. I can feel it. Taste it. The voices in my head echo it, carrying the tune.
“Now?” Erline questions. Slow and measured, she sighs deeply and strokes Erma’s hair one more time. “Now, we put the dead to rest and raise a new elf as tribe leader.”
Jaemes scratches his jaw. “Who’s the new leader?” he asks, looking at his brothers over his shoulder. His tight braid, painted in white, sticks to the feathers of his arrows as he does so.
“You,” Erline mulishly says.
He whips back to her. “Me?” Slowly, his brother’s look to the back of his head. There’s no hatred there, no jealousy. It’s as though they expected it all along or perhaps knew it. “No.”
“Yes,” Tember answers, striding through the muddy path between beds to get to him. A certain power radiates from her along with a lingering otherworldly scent. I blink toward it, having not expected such a change. “I’ve been told it is so.”
Body still and void of breathing, he watches her. He doesn’t even blink as the words of truth seem to bounce against a stubborn wa
ll in is head. Breaking his silence, he slams a fist next to Erma’s legs, rocking the table. Eliza startles at the action and flicks an annoyed glance in his direction, then continues inspecting the area of severed wings of a white-faced angel.
“I am not the leader! He did not leave this position to me.”
The teepee grows utterly silent at his shouting. Beyond me, Kat mutters something to Dyson quietly enough that I can’t hear it. Not that I’d pay attention, not when Jaemes’s fear, the first fear I’ve truly felt from him, batters against my body. I clench my teeth, fighting the urge to drink it in. I won’t take advantage of a man who just lost his father and his creator.
Dark charcoal eyes trail to the ground as he searches within for answers. They skim over the small puddles while he dives through many memories. Is he trying to remember a time when Mitus decided his fate if he were to die?
He grips his bowstring tight, white-knuckled, and mumbles his next words in disbelief. “He wouldn’t have.”
Closing the short distance, Tember trembles before Jaemes, a barely contained surge of power brought on by his crippling grief. She grips both of his shoulders, nails digging into skin. “You are, Jaemes. You are the leader of your tribe.”
“Your people need you,” Erline adds, effectively ending the discussion with the blatant and hard order. She tips her gaze to me like she’s just now noticing me. “Aiden,” she calls. “Tell me you have information to avenge the deaths you see before you.”
All attention moves to me, even Eliza’s, and I bristle under the weight of it. Their stares are like needles down my spine as mixtures of emotions pummel my stomach.
“I -” I begin, hesitating. I scratch the edge of my jaw. “I’m not sure this information should be heard by many.”
“No,” she says, curtly. “No more secrets. We tell everyone, or more will die. We can’t keep hiding the knowledge we have.”
“That’s a change,” Kat mumbles spitefully.
With a swing of my arm, I drop my hand back to my side. I don’t think it’s a good idea for everyone to know, but far be it from me to ignore the wishes of the only original fee left on our side of this mess. “Kheelan is weak. He lost many lives tied to him, and he’s running on pure reserves. It is possible Eliza is the only thing keeping him alive.” I look to her while she continues the practiced act of wrapping a deep wound to protect it from mud. Instead of a traditional, pristinely white hospital gauze, the material is more like moss.
“That’s how they knew where we were,” Tember begins. “Which village we sought refuge in . . . They followed the scent of his mate. Any magic she would have displayed would have told him right away where she was.”
I nod, thinking back to our surprise prenumbra attack before we were taken hostage. “Staying here is not an option. Not if we want this village to be safe.”
“The Angels Ground was a trap,” Erline murmurs, and Jaemes’s jaw squares to it.
“Yes,” I say. “And I don’t find it surprising.” They should have anticipated this. Corbin planned her death, and we were too blind with our own selfish desires to see the attack before it came. They toyed with our weaknesses, every single one of us.
Jaemes lifts his head and pins me with a glare. “You knew?” he asks. “You knew they’d kill Erma while you were frolicking with your kin? And you did nothing?”
CHAPTER FIVE
AIDEN VANDER
GUARDIAN REALM
“I couldn’t leave.”
He huffs. “Because your allegiances are on both sides?”
“No,” I growl, curling my fingers into fists at my sides. “Because I was held captive and tortured for information. But don’t worry,” I spit. “I refused to give any.”
A feral rumble claws its way up his throat, and every muscle in his bare arms quivers. I’ve never seen the elf so enraged, so full of emotions beyond the jokes and immaturity. As if noticing my change for the first time, he studies every inch of my body, sweeping me from head to toe.
Embers sparkle along my skin, and the voices in my head go silent. “Don’t you ever question my allegiances again. My only job is to keep her alive.” I point to Eliza. “Whichever line she falls under, I will protect her until my very last breath. My alliances are with her and her alone.”
“What about Corbin?” Kat asks when the room’s hostility becomes uncomfortable. “Did you see him?”
“Yes.” I turn my body to include her, Dyson, and the Sandman into the fold.
“And Sureen?” the Sandman asks.
“And Sureen,” I confirm, curtly nodding my head. I clasp my hands behind my back, my biceps rippling to the stretch. Carefully, I quench the embers. “They can dive into the minds of all of us.”
“Oleum?” Erline spits in disbelief. “That’s a myth. It’s only to feed the demons and nothing more.”
“Says who?” I challenge her with a raised eyebrow, flicking the expression across my shoulder. She shuffles under my scrutiny, unsure of herself.
“Oleum?” Dyson asks, trying the word on his own tongue. “How does this Oleum work?”
“It is said that with a simple touch and one desire, a creature of fee blood can listen to the thoughts of others using a pool of black substance, similar to oil,” Erline says, frowning. “But that substance was only meant for the demons’ consumption. It could never be pooled without being absorbed into something.”
“Well, he must have managed it somehow because Kheelan has some, too,” Eliza murmurs, ignoring the attention shifting to her.
I frown at the woman I love but continue the conversation. “Have you ever daydreamed but couldn’t remember what you were thinking about when you’re pulled back to reality?”
Erline looks away and firms her lips. “So, this is true then. Corbin can do the impossible.”
“Yes,” I grumble. “He can do many things that should be impossible. And he’s been using it. Mostly on Katriane.”
She scoffs with her displeasure then snarls. An air of light magic clogs the atmosphere.
“Kheelan used it to hear other’s thoughts,” Eliza confesses, walking to the next angel and preparing the moss. “He drank it. How do we stop it? What can we use to counteract it?”
“We can’t,” I state. “There’s no way to stop it. None that I know of. The only thing we can do is destroy it, and I don’t see any one of us doing that any time soon. If we step foot onto that realm, we’re dead before we can blink.” A thought pings into my head, but instead of voicing it, I pocket the idea for a later time. “The only thing we can do is stick together and hope we outsmart them in the end.”
“The element of surprise is taken from us,” Tember says, ruffling her feathers. “How are we supposed to plan for the next battle if they can pluck it from our minds?”
“It’s crucial to make the next move,” Jaemes adds, his words still tinged with rage. “Before they do.”
I shift uncomfortably. “That brings me to my next point.”
“There’s more?” Dyson asks, incredulous.
“Corbin has been pulling souls from the void.”
All heads snap to me, and complete silence fills the room. Even the wounded turned shocked expressions toward me. It’s no surprise that he can – I was pulled from it. But I don’t think the group thought he’d be able to pull it off again.
We all know what this means.
A great growl comes from the small woman behind me. “I knew it!” Kat yells. Her shout breaks the silence, and at once, everyone begins speaking rapidly, chucking questions and shouting accusations faster than I can understand them. I stiffen under the weight of it all.
“Myla,” Erline says, her eyes wide.
Slowly, I shift my body fully to hers, preparing myself as I relive the memory of my last moments in the Demon Realm. “With the seed of three, they resurrected the firstborn.”
A void fills the now slack-faced company, noiseless, stunned, and soured.
“No…” Kat whispers, and I fli
nch to the pain lashing inside that one word.
“They,” Jaemes begins, blinking rapidly. “They resurrected the firstborn?”
I don’t nod to him. By the swipe of his lips as the facts settle somewhere in the empty pit of his grief, I know I don’t need to.
Dyson sighs, drawing the attention back to him. “Three fee wouldn’t gather unless there was something in it for each of them. Sureen wanted to test her new creatures’ capabilities; that much is obvious. Kheelan did it for the simple fact that he could. But Corbin, according to Fate, had different ideas in mind. Some sort of twisting to his already laid out strategies.”
I raise my eyebrows. “He had told his allies this was all in the name of war, for the ability to create life, for the devastation, and finally, a promise to rule. But what the other two don’t realize is how much he’s weakening them by what he’s asking them to bring to the table.” I cross my arms. “It makes sense. But who is Fate?”
Tember, Kat, and Dyson share a single look, one I can’t read. Eliza, scrunching the moss in her hand, stares blankly, if not guiltily, at the skin wall. Awareness hums along my skin.
“Everyone stays except for the five,” Erline blurts before any can utter a word. Each and every warrior bristle, but Mother Nature herself strides from the teepee, pointedly looking at me to follow as she passes. Kat, Dyson, Tember, and Eliza shuffle after. We duck into the neighboring teepee, Erline holding the flap open until Tember, the last to enter, ducks inside.
The five echoes with the voices in my head. I had blinked to it, tried to place it, to find the meaning behind it. “The Five? Is that what we’re being called now?” I ask each of those standing in the circle where Erline is now at the center.
Huffing, Erline gracefully bends and picks up a charred stick from the barren fire pit. She begins drawing along the fur, parting the strands to perfect lines. I echo her huff, impatient.
