What was there to tell him, anyway? That she’d produced a flicker of power for nothing more than a second before it had fizzled into nothing? And for all she knew, the device was totally broken, and she’d just been talking to herself this entire time. She knew Okwata had based the construction of the device on the use of radio waves but even if it wasn’t damaged, would it work across worlds? She’d no doubt he’d imbued it with some kind of magic too, but surely some distances were just too great. Fia shoved the device back into her pocket and leapt to her feet.
Sitting around asking herself an endless stream of rhetorical questions would get her nowhere. She resumed her stance, feet shoulder width apart and held her palms out facing each other. She focused on her breath as Erebus had taught her, back in the forests of Ashar. When he tricked you. Her temper flared with each inhale and exhale, and as she thought of all the lies he’d spun her, her palms began to crackle and spark. She thought of how many times he’d tried to get close to her, of how he always looked at her like she was a snack.
“Evina!” Lorn hissed from her cell, and a bright blue light sparked in front of Fia. But she was ready for it. As Evina appeared in the middle of her cell, Fia grabbed the woman’s arm and pulled it tight behind her back.
Evina made a pained sound but said nothing as Fia secured her other arm. “I don’t want to hurt you,” she said quietly against the navy hood covering Evina’s hair. “But I can’t stay here. We can’t stay here like this, and we need you to get us out.”
The woman didn’t struggle against Fia’s grip. She only nodded once in response.
“I’m going to turn you around, very slowly, so we can talk face to face, okay?”
Another nod. Fia hadn’t noticed before how small Evina was, how frail the woman’s wrists felt in her hands. As she spun Evina around, turquoise eyes met hers, a small face framed by white braided hair. But her sepia skin was smooth, youthful—if Fia had to place her age Evina was close to her own.
“No disappearing tricks, okay? I just want to talk,” Fia began. But as quickly as Evina had arrived, the lights in the cell fizzled out, and Fia was plunged into darkness.
Chapter Five
Fia
T he world spun. But it wasn’t the prison cell, it was somewhere darker, emptier. Evina’s dazzling eyes sparkled in the darkness.
“I’m sorry,” she said. Her accent rolled on her Rs. “I can’t speak out there,” she inclined her head behind them, as if it were back in the direction of the cell.
Out there. As if here was somewhere in between. A chill ran down Fia’s spine at the thought. “Can’t, or won’t?” She made to pull her hands away from Evina’s wrists, but Evina shook her head.
Evina’s brow scrunched, a few of her braids falling across her eyes. “I can’t. I’ve been looking for a way out since he brought us here. Don’t let go of my hands, the connection will be weaker.”
He brought us here. Fia searched Evina’s face in the darkness. She wished she was more trusting, but trusting Erebus was what had landed her in this mess. Clouds of darkness swarmed around them, jostling a few braids that had worked their way free from Evina’s hood. “You’re a prisoner too?”
“I am. My… our lands are at war. Erebus brought me here against my will. He can’t keep me contained in a cell, but I need to know where I’m evanescing to before I can do it. I can’t travel very far.”
“You mean the whole disappearing trick?” The same trick Erebus had likely used to get them all to his prison in the first place.
Evina nodded. “I’ve found a way out of the prison. I can take you both with me, but it will not be easy.”
“For us, or for you?” Fia wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer.
“This prison is like a fortress. It is many thousands of years old, but most of the wards that used to contain the ancient darkness within it are now broken.” Evina held her gaze, head high as if she were far more than a dinner lady wherever she’d come from. She hadn’t answered the question either. But if most of the wards were broken, that explained how Erebus had escaped.
Fia caught the glitter of fine silver chains looping from the tops of Evina’s ears to her lobes. “So you know what’s outside?”
“I’ve only ever seen it from a great distance—no one has been able to come near. Many dark things walk the lands for some hectares beyond the walls of the prison—to keep people out, I once thought, but now I realise it was part of the efforts to keep him here.”
“So, what are you saying, you can evanesce me and Lorn out of here? All three of us, together? Out there, to where all the dark things are?”
Evina nodded, and hope fluttered in Fia’s chest.
“Then what are we standing around here for?” she asked.
“It will not be pleasant for you. Don’t let go.”
Fia didn’t get a chance to reply. They appeared in Lorn’s cell, the Makya’s hands already alight, ready to attack.
“Don’t—” Fia began as she fought her rising nausea from the evanescing, but Lorn had already released a fireball towards Evina. Evina didn’t move, and the fireball hit an invisible wall, inches from her chest, fizzling into sparks at her feet. She rolled her eyes. What else could she do? The evanescing, the shield—Fia didn’t doubt for a second that there was more power contained within Evina’s tiny frame.
“Relax, Lorn, she’s here to help.” Fia went to reach for Lorn’s arm but thought better of it. “She can’t speak. Lorn, Evina. Evina, this is Lorn. I’m Fia by the way.”
Evina reached her hands out, one towards each of them.
Lorn had folded her arms across her chest, her chin held high. She looked a mess. Alexander had wounded her, she’d said. Her clothes were in tatters. She’d ripped off a sleeve of her leather coat and rolled the other up past the elbow, her bodysuit had holes and tears here and there, and yet she stood tall, chin held high, ember eyes blazing and her flame-red hair sleeked to perfection, shorter than the last time Fia had seen it.
Fia wanted nothing more than to leave her behind, but she knew the Makya would be useful. “Do you want to be his plaything? Because I certainly don’t. Take her hand, she’s going to get us out of here.”
Evina looked to Fia and nodded her head as if in thanks.
“Oh, and whatever you do, don’t let go. She said it’s not going to be pleasant,” Fia added.
“I thought you said she couldn’t talk?” Lorn extended a hand, and before Fia had a chance to reply, Evina grabbed it, and the darkness descended once more.
The cell fell away from underneath Fia, the world spiralling into one. The blue light from the orbs around Lorn’s cell warped into the white of Evina’s hair and the red of Lorn’s, swirling together like paint pouring down a drain.
They reappeared in a stone corridor, the blue orbs lining the walls. Lorn threw up the moment their feet touched the ground, stepping back as her vomit splattered the rock.
“Where are we?” she said, wiping her free hand across her mouth.
Evina inclined her head. Behind them were two identical wooden doors, the doors to their cells no doubt. She dropped their hands and motioned for them to follow.
“Are you alright?” Fia asked as Lorn spat on the floor behind them.
Lorn simply scowled and stormed off after Evina.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” Fia glanced around to get her bearings. More cold rock. And not a sound; they were alone in Erebus’s prison.
Evina led them to the end of the narrow corridor, through to a large chamber lit up with more of the orblights. The walls were marked, scarred even, as if large nails had scraped into the stone, over and over. The creatures who built it, perhaps. Or the creature who tried to escape. A chill ran down Fia’s spine, and she shoved aside any thoughts of Erebus alone here for thousands of years, trying to find a way out.
She didn’t know what he had done to be trapped here. All she knew was what the witches had told her; Erebus was like his father, and so they had im
prisoned him after Ahriman’s death. Was he cruel before his imprisonment, or only in the days and years that followed? Erebus had told her the opposite when he was pretending to be Dante. He’d said he wasn’t like Ahriman, not in the beginning—that he shared his father’s gifts, but little else. Both versions of the story could have been a lie, for all Fia knew.
You’ve been lied to by more than one. Her friend’s words tugged at her. The witches could have lied to her too. Not Noor, but her coven leader, Kharsee, maybe. Erebus could have been telling the truth.
The chamber was barren, save for the orblights. Evina turned to them as if to check they were following. Her navy hooded dress brushed the floor, disguising her feet. Around her waist she wore a silver belt of woven strands, so fine they looked like liquid as she moved. Similar strands of silver wrapped over her biceps and a few poked out from the long sleeves of her dress, wrapping around her hand and over her fingers, attaching to silver rings. Something glistened from the high neckline of her dress, as if she wore more of that same silver but had tucked it away for discretion. She motioned for them to keep following.
“How many years was he down here?” Fia asked, her gaze once again falling on the scrapes and scratches in the rock as they followed Evina to the far side of the chamber. The air was cold and damp, the scent in the air reminding Fia of standing beside a waterfall.
Lorn grumbled something incoherent before mumbling, “Long enough for him to figure out how to whisper to us.”
Us. Fia paled at the memory. Not everyone had heard Erebus’s whispers when he had been imprisoned here. But she had. Lorn too. Another likeness they shared that Fia wished she could erase.
The chamber narrowed, more of those gouge marks carving a way through the rock. Evina led them into a smaller room where a trickle of water ran into a bowl carved right out of the rock. Water dripped over the edge of the overflowing bowl into a channel in the floor, which ran along the length of the room before disappearing through a hole out of sight. Orblights cast their shimmering blue gaze on the water, and Fia stepped forwards to look into the bowl, but Evina tugged at her sleeve.
The young woman shook her head. No. The expression was clear and firm across her face. It was just a bowl of fresh water as far as Fia could tell. But she heeded Evina’s warning and stepped back to follow her once more. Evina didn’t remove her arm from Fia’s, and all but dragged her towards another doorway carved into the rock at the other side of the room.
Fia’s thoughts drifted to Erebus again, trapped here alone for thousands of years, separated from Terah. Such imprisonment would twist and torment even the kindest of souls, surely. Do not feel sorry for him. He tormented others for years. Even Lorn might not have launched her attacks across Ohinyan if Erebus had not been whispering to her.
They carried on down another corridor in the rock. “So, what was your plan, to run us round this place in circles until Erebus comes back?” Lorn rolled her eyes as she followed Evina.
Fia shot her a glare. “Still better than sitting in our cells doing nothing, isn’t it?”
“Not if he comes back before we can get out, it isn’t.”
Evina ignored them but quickened her pace. Can’t or won’t? Fia’s question replayed over in her head. It shouldn’t have mattered. Whether Evina didn’t speak because she chose not to, or for other reasons, was none of Fia’s business. But the way she’d shaken her head when Fia had asked; Evina’s eyes had darkened for a moment.
A breeze stroked Fia’s cheek, snapping her from her thoughts. Icy cold, the scent of fresh snow the only indication of what waited for them outside the prison. Evina darted ahead into another chamber, smaller than the last, gesturing to a space on the wall. As Fia came closer the breeze increased, and finally, she could see its source.
A stack of rocks piled against the wall—big, heavy rocks, and above them, an opening. So high Fia would have missed it had it not been for Evina standing beneath it. But she couldn’t have moved the rocks by herself. Most looked far too big for her to have moved them alone with her bare hands. Perhaps she truly did have more magic than they’d already witnessed.
Evina gestured to the rock pile, and Fia clambered up it, reaching on her toes to the opening in the wall. The icy breeze blasted her face and puffs of soft snow blew towards her. She shielded her eyes and blinked out into the beyond. Snow-capped mountains, as far she could see in the grey. Shit. She climbed back down to Evina and Lorn. “You can take us out there?”
“What’s out there?” Lorn asked, already pushing past Fia and climbing up the rock pile to look. “A bit of snow,” she scoffed. “You forget I can provide warmth,” she said over her shoulder.
“That isn’t all I’m worried about,” Fia said, reaching for the cuff that wasn’t there. Instead, she twirled Sophie’s bracelet between her fingertips. “Dark things walk the lands out there, Evina said.”
Lorn huffed a laugh. “Then they’d better start running,” she said with a wicked grin. “Let’s get out of here.” She reached out a hand to Evina.
Evina nodded, her lips a firm line as she took both their hands in her own. The world blurred again—spiralled and spiralled for so long Fia felt for certain she would be violently sick. Just as she thought she could take no more, her face met with ice-cold snow.
She managed to lift herself onto her side before heaving, the snow staining in the twilight. A blizzard whipped at her face, the snow biting into her skin and clinging to her hair in clumps. Her whole body shook. Move. Get up. She forced herself to her feet, fingers sinking into the snow as she tried and fell, then tried again. Her eyes were streaming, and she couldn’t stop her teeth from chattering. She couldn’t see Lorn or Evina. Couldn’t see anything past the blizzard lashing against her face.
“Lorn,” she called out, her voice hoarse from emptying her stomach. “Evina.” Shit. How would they find her if she couldn’t call out to them?
A fire burst into life a few metres to her right, and for the first time, Fia felt relief to be near the Makya woman. “Lorn,” she called out again. “I can’t see Evina.”
“She’s over here,” Lorn called back, the wind twisting her words and carrying them away. Fia stumbled towards Lorn’s light—she was further away than she’d realised—the cold eating at her bones and begging her to lie down, to rest just for a moment. But she kept going. Stumbling and pushing her hands into the ice-cold snow each time, exhaustion aching through every inch of her. She barely managed to crawl the last few feet to them. To Evina, lying still on the snow, and to the Makya stood beside her, her body ethereal, engulfed in flames.
“Is she—” Fia asked, as Lorn was at her side, her flames diminished, pulling Fia to her feet, towards Evina.
“She’s breathing, barely. We need to get out of this blizzard. We’re going to have to carry her. Can you walk?”
Fia didn’t even know if she could stand without Lorn’s arm on her own. The warmth from the Makya’s hand seeped through to her bones in that one spot it touched, and Fia willed it to spread through the rest of her body, but the blizzard was harsh and unrelenting.
She reached for Evina, rolled her onto her back and checked her pulse, her hands screaming at the chill that had settled into them. Evina’s pulse was slow. Too slow. They had to move, they had to get her to shelter, fast.
Chapter Six
Alexander
I t had been a while since Fia’s last message. Alexander leaned against the gunwale as the ship approached Djira, illuminated by the Makya and Okwata’s mirrors. Sea spray carried the scent of brine muddled with spices from the harbour as Osara and a few other Nords flew overhead. He’d tried to send a message back, again, but he knew it was no use. Fia hadn’t responded to any of them; her messages had been random, her thoughts and fears alone in the dark. Well, almost alone. Alexander had nearly lost his footing when he’d heard Fia’s message explaining that Lorn was in the cell beside hers. Don’t worry, she’d said with a quiet laugh. There’s a solid wall between us. I
t did little to calm his fears.
And it was different, this time. If he’d thought leaving her in London was hard, this—this was like a thundering roar that stretched beneath his skin and threatened to crush the air from his lungs. If Erebus hurt Fia, if Lorn hurt her… if she died… He gripped the railing to stop his hands from shaking.
She came back for you, Noor had told him. He breathed in the salty air, the azarna spice cutting through everything. The Asharians doused it liberally on all their food—it was the topic of many jokes elsewhere across Ohinyan. She came back for you. He’d been a fool to take her back to Earth. He dragged a hand through his hair. He couldn’t lose her. And taking her back to Earth had been the only way he knew how to keep her safe.
His chest tightened at the thought. She was in even more danger now, and he might never see her again. Never rest his head against hers, never breathe her in or feel the warmth of her body pressed against his. Never get to see how her face lit up when she discovered something new.
“Sire.” Malachai stepped up beside him as the ship docked, a large mirror casting a warm golden glow across their path. Nords climbed down rope ladders, a large wooden plank passed down to them as others tied ropes to heavy metal rings on the dock, brown and rusted with age. The light bounced off Malachai’s blond hair, off the golden cuff around his wrist, and he followed Alexander’s gaze. “We’ll find her, sire.”
Alexander pressed his wings tightly behind him to hide the way his back stiffened. “I’m throwing out the title, Mal. It’s just Alexander now.”
His friend raised an eyebrow. Brown eyes met his. “Can you do such a thing?” A broad grin spread across Malachai’s face, and he elbowed Alexander lightly in the ribs. Malachai had always known how to break the ice. Ever since they were boys. Ever since the first time they met, and Malachai had found him hiding from his father and another day of training.
The First Dawn (Daughter of the Phoenix Book Three) Page 4
