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Prophecy Girl (The Five Orders Book 1)

Page 14

by Holly Roberds


  “I’m not a virgin,” Travis said too quickly from behind me. “So, I’m definitely not the Propheros.”

  Gatsby smiled, though only the barest hint of humor reached his eyes. “Ah, I see. So you brought a complete stranger into the reading room. What do you think our Masters will think of their golden boy, now?”

  I didn’t know what to say. Every part of me demanded I come up with a lie as to why we were there but it wasn’t in my nature. Lying demanded a creativity I didn’t possess.

  “Gatsby,” I pleaded. “I am just trying to figure out how to save the Propheros. I believe there could be a different way to defeat the Stygian. A way where she won’t have to die.”

  Gatsby nodded his head solemnly as if he were listening to me.

  I continued. “Travis is only trying to help me find that way. If we could read the book, perhaps we could do more.”

  “You are an unexpected fool, Calan.” Gatsby sneered through a smile. “You know there is only one way, and the Order tells us what that way is. If the past five years have taught me anything, it’s that they know what is best for us.” Though his words were bold, something flickered behind his eyes as he said them. “What you choose to do about your soul is your choice, but I’m getting mine back.”

  With that, Gatsby leapt to the other side of the shelves like a spider monkey and slipped his body through a small opening as quietly and vanished as quickly as he appeared. I ran to the door but heard the dead bolt lock from the outside just as my hand curved around the handle.

  “No,” I slammed my fists against the door causing books along the upper shelves to rattle, some plummeting to the ground. Travis yelped as one smacked his head, but he quickly dodged the next two.

  “What a charmer,” Travis said, rubbing his head, though there was a nervous twinge to his voice, too. He knew he was here uninvited. “Guess there are worse guys than you out there. Though why you all look like ridiculously good-looking fitness models… the hell do they feed you guys?”

  I turned around, my back pressed against the door. “I’m sorry, Travis, I didn’t mean to implicate you into this. I was just trying to save Emma.”

  Looking up, I calculated the distance to the secret opening Gatsby had used. I quickly scaled a ladder, two of the rungs breaking under my weight. When I got to the opening, I saw a small, metal door had been shut behind Gatsby. I shook its hinges but apart from its loud screeching protest, it did not budge. Gingerly stepping back down the ladder, I had to leap the last several feet where three more rungs broke, effectively destroying the ladder for further use.

  Travis’s long fingers drummed against the book as he waited for me to find a way out. “Were you going to let me die?”

  I didn’t answer right away. I had to obey my Order in deliver the Propheros to the dark, but a part of me was ashamed I felt Travis would have been easier to sacrifice. “It isn’t up to me. I am merely a foot solider for the Light.”

  Travis gave me a strange look. He knew I wouldn’t have fought as hard if it were him. Tension rolled out into the room, a thick blanket of unsaid accusation. Discomfort stiffened the muscles between my shoulders but there was nothing to say. There may be nothing I could do for Emma, either. I could feel sorry, but guilt was a useless ruse that changed nothing. I couldn’t indulge, I could only correct what was before me.

  Finally, Travis put his nose back into the book while I waited by the door, listening for approaching footsteps.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  “Whoa,” Travis said after five minutes of reading from the book.

  “What?” I snapped, impatient and on edge at the door, waiting for them to come for us. Best case scenario, the Luxis would send me back to purgatory, life between lives, and I would stand no chance of regaining my soul. Worse case, they would deem me a dark one. They would torture me before banishing me into the Stygian using a portal. It was a punishment reserved for the most wicked. As my agitation grew, my fingers ached to pull my broadsword from its sheath on my back.

  “Your upbringing is super intense. Like child-star messed up. I didn’t know....” said Travis.

  “Oh,” I said, my shoulders sagging a bit. He must have read the part about me trying to regain my soul.

  “I mean, being snatched from your crib and trained into a thoughtless soldier of the Light would screw anyone up.”

  I perked up at that. “What? What do you mean?”

  Travis held his hands out as if they could do the talking where his mouth struggled. “I don’t know. Like it’s pretty messed up how they snatch babies and force you to obey their every whim.”

  “It is for my own good. It is so I can redeem myself and regain my soul.”

  Travis’s face scrunched in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

  “It must mention in there how I had committed untold atrocities in a past life and must serve the Light until I can regain my soul. They used magic to find me and offered me a chance at redemption. It is what the Chevalier are, creatures of darkness, serving the Light.”

  Travis’s eyes turned back down to the sacred text. “No,” he said slowly, “it only says that whenever the Chevalier ranks have been whittled down, they go out into the world and snatch some babies. Doesn’t say anything about how they choose. It doesn’t say anything about Chevalier missing their souls, it just says,” he leaned into the book and read off the page, “Chevalier must be trained to facilitate complete and utter obedience, no matter the means. It is done so that they will unerringly follow the Light.”

  My body went numb as he read. They lied to me? Emma was right, they lied to me so I would obey their every command. I wasn’t missing a soul. There was no reason why I could not love, or read, or enjoy the earthly pleasures like anyone else. I had nothing to prove.

  “I’m sorry, man,” I distantly heard Travis say. “I’ve heard of brainwashing cults and all, but dayum.”

  “They lied to me.” I said the words out loud as if it would make the idea easier to swallow, but it went down like razor blades soaked in lemon juice.

  Footsteps approached the door, and I knew they’d arrived. I pulled the broadsword from my back and squeezed the handle with a rage never known before. Unable to digest the lie of my entire existence, my vision turned red.

  When the door creaked open, I swung my sword high, ready to bring it down on whoever was on the other side.

  “Calan, no,” Travis cried out just as my sword swung down. His cries met my ears just as I recognized the liquid brown eyes of Emma widen in fear as she watched my steel slice through the air toward her face.

  It was too late to pull back on the momentum I’d created but I moved the axis of my swing and it swiped down past Emma’s face and away from her body. A few of her hairs floated to the ground from where they had been cleanly sliced away from her head.

  I forced out a breath. I had almost killed her. I fell to one knee and held myself against the storm of emotions erupting from the close call.

  What was wrong with me? I wasn’t a killer. I’d never slayed anything other than demons and malevolent spirits. I couldn’t let the Luxis further manipulate me away from what I was. They’d made me soulless enough already.

  Emma molded her body over my hunched over one. “It’s okay, you didn’t hurt me. It’s okay now, Calan.”

  I never wanted her to move away. Feeling like a raw, pulsating nerve, she acted as a skin, protecting and soothing me.

  “I think I peed a little,” Travis squeaked.

  When I turned to look at him, his pants appeared dry but his face was drawn and pale. I gathered my senses and stood up, allowing Emma to wrap her body around mine for a moment, enjoying the warmth and comfort of her embrace. I laid my head atop of hers. Emma was the only one I could trust anymore.

  “How did you know to come find us?” Travis asked, after a couple of uncomfortable throat clearings.

  Emma pulled her head back and looked up into my eyes to respond. “Some guy came to me. His
name was Gatsby.” Her lips pulled into a frown. “He said he was a Chevalier and he had to come see what all the fuss was about.” Her eyes flattened as if recalling something distasteful or annoying. “He looked me up and down, then said he ‘got it.’ Then he mentioned something about how funny it was Calan’s end would come from a girl who was only five foot five.” Then she said matter of fact. “So I slugged him.”

  I sputtered, pulling away from her. “You did what?”

  She shrugged and cocked her head. “What? I knocked him right to the ground just like I did Travis.”

  “Great,” Travis said grimly, rubbing the part of his face she had connected a fist to not all that long ago.

  I looked down to see Emma rubbing at her now bright red knuckles. I couldn’t help the grin from forming on my face. Gatsby had a tenuous position as it was. When word spread he was bested in one shot, he would never hear the end of it.

  It was then I noticed Emma had somehow found a change of clothing from the thin white dress the order had supplied. She now wore a forest green tank top, dark brown cargo pants, and combat boots that fit just a little too big on her. She had probably stolen them from Vico’s quarters. He was the shortest and most compact of the Chevalier. With her short, messy hair, and look of defiance recounting her meeting with Gatsby, she looked fierce and dangerous.

  Something primal flared in me, urging me to test this side of her. There was still a softness about her cheeks and in her eyes, but something more daring seemed to emerge from her with every trial we encountered.

  She was changing. With each hardship, she was evolving, hardening into something different in order to survive. Part of me crowed with pride in her ability to adapt, but the larger part of me wanted her to remain the carefree girl I met, with her nose stuck in a book.

  “He didn’t see it coming.” Emma continued to explain her run-in with Gatsby. “And I didn’t like the way he was talking about you, so I figured you’d gotten into trouble somehow and came looking for you.”

  Travis moved from around the podium, tucking the grand volume of sacred text awkwardly under his arm. “Yeah, well if you thought that, it won’t take long for someone else to think of it.”

  “Yes,” I agreed, also realizing we were wasting precious time. “We must go.”

  Pressing Emma out in front of me, I followed her with Travis trailing behind. Before I could turn to tell him, Travis’s arm holding the book smacked into some kind of invisible force so hard it knocked Travis flat on his back.

  When his mouth opened, a dry raspy sound emerged. Reaching over I grabbed the book and threw it on the ground and yanked Travis to his feet like the day I first met him. “You can’t take the book from the room. It’s bound here.”

  Still unable to catch his breath, Travis settled for glaring at me as we hurried down the halls.

  “Are you going to portal us out of here?” Emma asked.

  I tried to summon energy to my hands and was met with what I expected. Nothing.

  “No. My powers have failed me again.” The words came out fiercely as I thought of Master Violetta informing me I had broken the faith.

  “I don’t get it, man.” Travis said, “Do we need to like get you to some kind of magical gas station to fuel you up or what?”

  “My powers are rooted in faith. I have no faith left in me.”

  My head bowed in grief as I lead them down a back passage. Emma and Travis’s footsteps echoed down the stone hall, while mine were silent. How could I believe we would be able to escape? Travis was right, the only way out of this was a portal and I couldn’t even manage a spark.

  “So what do you believe now?” Emma asked, trying to study my face even as I hurried us along.

  After a beat, I told her the truth. The words strangled my throat. “Nothing. I don’t know what there is to believe in, anymore.”

  I led us down a flight of stairs that opened to the dining hall. The long oak tables were empty, and no sounds emanated from the attached kitchen. It was empty, as most members of the Order would be paying their devotions across the Temple in the prayer room at this time. I paused, needing to think.

  Emma eyed the considerable length of the tables. “Wow for as many card-carrying members your Order has, I sure haven’t seen many running around.”

  When Travis caught his breath, he asked, “Wait a minute, should we be running, here? I mean, I know they lied to you, man, and I’m sorry for you but this coming darkness thing is a big deal.” His eyes drifted over to Emma.

  She looked at me uncertainly. “He knows?”

  I nodded.

  “Wait,” Travis blinked then held his hands up. “You knew?” He asked Emma.

  She licked her lips nervously but didn’t respond.

  He spoke louder this time, demanding an answer. “You knew I was going to have to die to save the freakin’ world and you didn’t tell me? Answer me, Emma.”

  She swallowed and nodded her head. “I knew.”

  Betrayal strained his features. “And you didn’t tell me? You helped him bring me here? I get why the brainwashed Terminator had to drag me here, he can’t even wipe his ass without his Masters’ permission.”

  Anger flashed in my chest like a whip, quick and hot. Never had I been so quick to enmity. I wanted to march over and punch him out like Emma had done, but instead I clenched my fists and kept them at my sides.

  Perhaps I was so quick to anger because some of his vile observations contained seeds of truth. I was just a tool, a means to an end, and obedient dog begging for his whipping.

  “But you, Emma?” Travis asked. “You helped him get me here and you knew it was to kill me? That is sick, man.” His mouth curled in disgust.

  Going on the defensive, Emma shot back, “Well, what the hell does it matter, Travis? Turns out, you aren’t the doomed virgin. It’s me, okay? I’m the doomed virgin. Are you happy now?”

  Their fighting caused pain to lance through my head, but I knew it wasn’t wise to jump in to try and stop a dog fight. You’d get your hand ripped off if you tried.

  “No Emma, I’m not freakin’ happy. You were willing to throw me into the volcano to save the world, but now that we’ve learned it’s actually you, you’re going to run?”

  Emma sighed, her shoulders slumping. “Now that we’re here, it doesn’t feel right.

  I don’t want to throw my life away on the word of some mysterious, shady Order. I can honestly say I would do the same for you.”

  “We need to go now.” I urged. There truly wasn’t time for this. Gatsby would be up and about soon, motioning the entire Temple to track us down. There were two hundred people in this Temple, willing to die if it meant they could bring us to the Light.

  Travis took a step back from us. “No.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  “No?” I asked, not comprehending his rebelliousness.

  Travis took another step away from us. His eyes became glassy, and his shoulders shook as if under extreme stress. Red seeped up his neck then his face, making it look puffy. “No. I wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for you. You dragged me all the way here and I have nothing to do with your creepy underground war. I wish I’d never met you.” He ran a hand over his face then squared his shoulders as if getting a hold of himself. “But you know what? You shouldn’t leave either,” he said to Emma this time. “Sure, they lied to Calan about his soul…”

  “I knew it,” Emma shouted. Her head whipped around to grin at me in victory.

  But I couldn’t share her mirth. Later, I would untangle the lies and find out what was left of me. The smile on her face died when she saw my expression.

  Travis went on, “But their book didn’t. And the book also said the dark lord, whatever that is, is coming. It says if you don’t make the sacrifice, the dark that comes will stay.”

  Emma held out her in hands, pleading. “Travis, we can’t be sure they’re right. These people have already shown corruption.”

  Travis yelled over he
r, causing Emma to snap her jaw shut. “And what if they are right?”

  For the first time, I was tempted to respect him. All belief had fled me, but Travis stood with conviction and in that moment, I envied him the ability to clearly see to what was right and wrong, what must be done. But all I knew in that moment was I had to keep Emma safe and that Travis wasn’t coming with us.

  “We have to go,” I said quietly to Emma, encircling her arm with my hand.

  “Travis.” she said, her face contorted in pain as though he had punched her in the gut. She didn’t fight when I pulled her along, but could only slowly shuffle alongside me. I took us out the side door that led to the west wing.

  As soon as we were out of sight, Travis screamed his head off. “They’re here. This way. Help, they’re getting away.”

  Emma finally broke into a full out run with me. Part of me understood Travis doing what he thought he had to do. The other part of me wanted to shake him until his face turned purple then his head fell off.

  I led us to a parlor and went to the far wall. I splayed my hand on a particular spot then pushed. Stone scraped against stone as a secret door opened. I pulled Emma into the pitch black as the door closed behind us on its own.

  Emma sniffled behind me, but I didn’t have time to stop and dry her tears. Instead, I gently cautioned, “We are going down a stairwell. Watch your step. We have to be very careful. It curves down and around in a spiral.” I kept my voice low, but my words still bounced around the stone walls.

  She didn’t answer. Distantly, a gong began to ring. They were raising the alarm to all the members of the Order to find us.

  “Are you with me?” I asked, reaching in the black, trying to find her hand. When I found it, her fingers wrapped around mine.

  “Yes, sorry. I nodded. Forgot you can’t see me.” Her voice sounded thick, like she had something caught in her throat.

 

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