He heard footsteps shuffling behind him. Thinking it to be Kazimir, appearing as usual in the worst moments, he spun. Instead, he saw a small, familiar boy with tawny brown hair, wind-swept and dirty.
"No, no, no, no, no."
“Welcome to Troborough!” the boy exclaimed, his features bright, life not yet turning him into a hateful prick.
“No way,” Whitney said. He rushed forward, placed the palm of his hand on Even-Younger-Whitney’s head, and shoved him to the side “Out of my way shog-for-brains.”
“Excuse me?” the boy said, his voice already far in the distance.
Whitney knew exactly what he needed to do. His map, which he could still feel in his pocket, was covered in marks and Xs, but there was one place he was saving for last. The one place Elsewhere seemed to refuse him access.
Wetzel’s shack stood at the base of a tiny hill. Whitney crossed a field of yellow daffodils, small bugs stirring with each step.
“Hey, mister!” Young Whitney shouted. “You don’t want to go there!”
“Yeah, I really do, kid,” Whitney called back over his shoulder.
“You don’t want to go there! You don’t want to go there! You don't want to go there!” The boy’s word echoed over and over again, and it just kept going as Whitney got closer to the hut.
Again, his body froze outside the shack, every muscle unable to press forward. He fought, but nothing happened. He remembered Kazimir’s warning, “You don't carve your own path here.”
But Kazimir was wrong. Kazimir had damned himself to this place, Whitney hadn’t. Besides, where was the upyr now?
Whitney did the only thing he could think of. He didn't have faith in gods or goddesses; he’d never needed them before. All he knew was all those many years ago he’d made a mistake, and his mistake hurt the only person who’d ever truly mattered to him.
“Sora!” Whitney shouted. “Sora!”
He summoned whatever strength he had in his body, and farming had made him sturdy as an ox. Still, it took every ounce of his energy to lift his left leg. But it moved. Ever so slightly, it moved.
That gave him hope again. He reached deep inside of himself, pushing away all thoughts of Iam or any other god. He thought only of reaching Sora again. His right foot lifted and he placed it down, one step closer.
“Ha!” Whitney shouted loud enough for Yarrington to hear—if there was a Yarrington in Elsewhere. “Suck shog, gods!”
Behind him, he could still hear the boy saying, “You don't want to go there!” on repeat. But Whitney did.
He focused and moved his other foot. He did it, again and again, until he stood right at the threshold of Wetzel’s shack. He considered knocking but didn’t care. It wasn't even real Wetzel. He’d seen that the barrier of this realm extended all the way across the sky. If there were any connection between Elsewhere and Pantego, it would be in that shack where Sora had grown up. It was the only place he hadn’t looked.
He reached down, turned the knob, and the door opened.
Inside, there was nothing at all.
No tables, no chairs, no stacks of strange tomes, no bed, no potions. Nothing at all.
Whitney’s chin hit his chest.
“Whitney?” came a voice from behind him.
As he turned, he saw the spectral form of a Panpingese woman, more beautiful and radiant than anything he’d ever seen before. Her long, dark hair fell just past her shoulders, her eyes practically glowed, amber like the sun.
“Sora?” he said. “Sora!”
Whitney tried to move again, but he was stuck. He pushed but still couldn’t budge.
“Sora!” he screamed again.
“You could have told me the truth,” Sora said, her voice distant, floating on air.
“What? What do you mean? Sora, I knew you didn’t forget about me! Oh, gods.” He squeezed his eyelids shut, worried he was seeing things. When he opened them again, she remained in front of him. “Sora, I know you didn’t mean to do this, but only you can get me out!”
“Did he know?” Sora said.
Whitney looked over his shoulder at Wetzel’s shack, not understanding. “Did who know?”
“At least he never lied.”
“You’re right, I’m sorry. I’ve lied to about so much. But I want you to know the truth. How I fee—”
“In time?” she interrupted.
“No,” Whitney said, “Now. Just get me out, and I’ll tell you everything. I’m so sorry.” He ran to her and went to embrace her, but his arms passed right through.
“Forgiveness?”
Whitney spun back to her. Her face grew angry and then suddenly, her form disappeared and in its place was just a charred patch of grass. Whitney was suddenly free to move again and fell to his knees, clawing at the ground, tears flowing more freely than he’d ever remembered.
“Why!” he sobbed, staring down. “Sora, come back to me. Sora!” He looked up to the bloodstained sky. “What kind of sick game is this!” he screamed.
He heard the shuffling of feet, expected to see Kazimir, and then Younger Whitney appeared before him. All this bedlam he’d been causing was bound to bring Kazimir around and beg him to stay calm so he can remain on his vacation, but it was clear to Whitney now. That conversation they’d had, and that deal—the upyr only made it because his time in Elsewhere was over. He was gone... free.
The thought of Kazimir getting to leave despite all the awful things he’d done made Whitney even angrier. Sure, they’d moved on from being enemies, he was the only thing he had here, his only connection to the real world. Big Whitney gritted his teeth and began to rise, his head lifting first. He was done playing Elsewhere’s games.
“You bring her bac—”
Whitney’s words were cut short as he saw the boy, no longer the boy. His face looked as if it were melting like wax under a hot flame. Beneath the pink flesh that had been, there was dark, blood red, scaly hide. Blood poured down his face from two holes in his forehead where horns were growing. He showed his teeth, sharp, long, needle thin.
Whitney fell back on his hands and crab crawled backward until his head slammed against the door of Wetzel’s shack.
“Whitney, you stupid man,” his deformed doppelgänger said, voice now so deep Whitney could feel it in his bones.
“What… what are you?” he asked as if he didn’t already know. Churches of Iam and cults depicted enough demon spirits of Elsewhere for him to take a guess at what one might look like.
“That does not matter anymore. You’ve been so concerned about what the barrier was keeping in,” the demon said, approaching him, “that you’ve failed to wonder what it might be keeping out. Heragi, God of Misfortune had his fun with you in this realm of mischief, but the will of fire has broken the barrier, and I’ve had my eyes on you since you fled Troborough. A heartless thief like you deserves torture far worse than this.”
Wetzel's shack suddenly exploded from within throwing Whitney into the river. Wood splintered like arrows, some piercing his flesh. A deafening sound so horrific it belonged in nightmares filled the sky, making all other sounds nonexistent. Whitney couldn’t even hear himself breath. He rose to his feet, knees shaking.
Demons, hundreds of them, all unique but equally terrifying, poured out of the rupture beneath the shack. They gathered behind the demon that was Young Whitney. One had more eyes than Whitney could count, blinking all at once. A sharp, hooked beak protruded from another’s face. And yet another appeared like a goat with ears and tusks like a mammoth.
A blinding light flashed somewhere beyond the town square. Whitney chanced looking away from the horde to see something bright white and in the shape of an Eye of Iam. Dozens of figures moved around within the light, but Whitney couldn't make any of them out.
He tried to speak, but nothing came out. He looked back to the demons.
The one who was Young Whitney smiled, each needle-like tooth digging into its own flesh and producing pinpricks of blood. “Run.”
XXXIII
THE MYSTIC
In so many ways, Wetzel hadn’t done his job to prepare Sora for the world at large. Sure, she knew there were beasts and evil—but never could she have imagined the kind of evil she’d faced with Whitney and Torsten these last few months. Sora had never been in trouble with the law before Whitney. She hadn’t even been in deep trouble with Wetzel other than the time she’d set one of his bookshelves ablaze while practicing blood magic.
Presently, she stood outside a dark room that resembled the one Lord Aran Bokeo had taken her to beneath his bookstore. The mystics had their servants carry her from the Well of Wisdom to the highest floor of the tower, where it tapered to fit only a single, circular room. She was too exhausted to protest, both in mind and body. Summoning enough fire to rupture her bar guai, seeing into the past—it was a struggle just to stay upright, let alone fight.
The servants placed Sora on her feet just within the threshold and dared not go further. She caught Kai’s eye as he turned to leave. The gravity of his expression was enough for her to know she was in trouble. He nodded to her as if offering good luck, but said nothing as he and the others left.
Two huge doors slammed shut behind her and startled Sora forward. A bridge led her to a circular dais in the center surrounded by rushing water. Floating, blue torches lit alongside it as she went. When she reached the platform, the bridge disappeared.
Statues of those same creatures Lord Bokeo had called wianu jutted out from the red walls, spitting water from a slit of a mouth. Their two giant eyes, all fashioned from gems more precious than Sora had ever seen, although unmoving, sparkled with the pride of life. She hadn’t noticed in the other chamber, likely because the waters didn’t rage like this, but tendril-like appendages thrust up from the surface, creating white foam breaks.
Aihara Na, leader of the Secret Council of Mystics, and the most frightening woman Sora had ever met—Queen Bliss included—sat on her throne. Seven others dotted the perimeter of the dais, each with its own yellow-robed mystic seated atop except one. They no longer shrouded their faces with hoods. She recognized Madam Jaya and Master Huyshi, and the others whose names she didn’t know. They all looked different, yet had a sameness—an ageless quality, even though some looked no younger or older than Sora and yet others, gray and withered.
Maybe it was their eyes, holding all the wisdom of every mystic come and gone, both calming and terrifying at the same time.
Scary as the Council might’ve been, Sora refused to cow before them. They’d held back far too much and lied about far more. Even now, she could feel defiance growing once again. She wished she had Aquira with her, wished she could command her little wyvern friend to shoot forth and burn them all to a crisp, but she hadn’t seen Aquira since fainting of exhaustion outside the Well of Wisdom.
Aihara Na steepled her fingers, elbows pressed firmly into the fabric of her armrests. Those ageless eyes looked over her overlong fingertips, calculating.
Sora took a deep breath to steady herself for the verbal onslaught she knew was coming.
“Sora of Troborough,” Aihara began, “you are brought here before—”
“Why don’t you call me by my real name?” she interrupted. She couldn’t help herself. Seeing the mystics again now that she’d had time to collect her thoughts caused the words to cascade off her tongue like a waterfall pounding against the rocks with unbridled fury. She was too weary to be coy. “Is it Nothhelm? Sumati?”
“Silence!” Madam Aihara Na bellowed as she stood from her throne and took two steps forward. Each footfall which was previously silent, now sounded like a thunderclap, resonating through Sora's very soul. “You stand here, guilty of willful rebellion against the Secret Council—”
“Rebellion? I don’t remember swearing allegiance to anyone.”
“If you open your mouth out of turn one more time, I will seal it shut permanently, is that understood? No, don’t respond. Just stay silent.” Madam Aihara returned to her throne, and this time Sora listened. The Mystic fell into her grand seat and waited a few long, calculating seconds before speaking again. “Your open rebellion, disregard for rules, and disrespect of our most sacred ritual place you before us for judgment. How do you plead?”
“Plead?” Sora asked. “I plead taken advantage of. Used by the mystics and lied to for reasons I do not understand.”
“You were never lied to,” Madam Jaya spoke up. “You simply weren’t ready to know.”
“It’s all the same.” Sora almost felt sorry for snapping at the mystic who’d she’d spent so much time training with, but she didn’t let it stop her. “I spent my entire life wondering who I was, who my parents were. I... how long were you going to wait to tell me? Until I was over a century old?”
“Half a year ago, who were you?” Aihara continued. “No one. You were little more than some heathen blood mage holed up beneath some backwoods town’s crazy healer’s shack.”
“You know nothing of Wetzel or Troborough.”
“Final warning,” Aihara said, drawing her fingers across her lips like a zipper.
“The Well of Wisdom is not some trinket to trifle with, yet you treated it as such,” Aihara said. “You have opened your mind to the deepest depths, a veritable chasm of knowledge, and you’ve tainted the waters with your uneducated thoughts and frivolous human attachments like that to this… Whitney Blisslayer who fills your mind.”
Sora felt the air flee her lungs. Now, words didn’t come to her. She still hadn’t told any of them about Whitney.
Madam Aihara paused, her lips tightening to a thin line, yet the corners pulled just barely. “You act surprised?”
“It’s just… I…”
“Did you not think Madam Jaya would tell her superior of your dealings with the upyr?”
“I didn’t think anything,” Sora said, “but I made no mention of anyone but him.” She looked to Madam Jaya, her instructor, whose expression betrayed her disappointment.
“Our vision pierces time and flesh,” Madam Jaya said. “We’ve known all along what tethers you, what keeps you from dedicating yourself to this order. You must understand, Sora. Whitney is dead. Forever gone. Nothing you can do will bring him back.”
“You’re wrong,” Sora said, despite the previous two warnings.
“Insolent girl.” Aihara raised her hand, swiping it hard in one direction. Even from so great a distance, several meters away, Sora felt the slap against her face. Her cheeks grew hot as burning embers.
“Death is the nature of Elsewhere,” Aihara said. “It is the other side which every living being in this world fights to stay away from until the fight leaves them. It is why only death can bridge the realms.”
Sora pushed off the cold stone and returned to her feet. “I don’t believe you."
“You dare question the Ancient One?” a mystic she hadn’t met snapped.
“No, no. Ghing, let her speak. Perhaps she, in her short time on this world uncovered some great truth we’ve missed all these centuries.”
“You said sacrifice was necessary to open Elsewhere, but I’ve done it without loss,” Sora said.
“I’ve already told you, that was the upyr’s doing, not your own, child,” Madam Jaya said.
“I didn’t tell you the whole truth.”
“Tell me then, Sora, what do you think happened?” Madam Jaya said. She didn’t even look disappointed anymore. Sora saw pity on the woman's face.
Sora recounted the story aboard Kazimir’s ship, how she’d sent both Whitney and Kazimir to Elsewhere before the upyr could kill him.
“You do not call that a sacrifice?” Aihara said. “Come, now, Sora. You’ve been grasping to willow branches in the middle of the Boiling Waters.”
“At least I’m being honest!” Sora yelled. “I didn’t kill anyone. Both Kazimir and Whitney still live within that place, I just… I know it.”
“It was because of the upyr, Sora,” Madam Jaya said.
“You saw them?”
Madam Aihara said, ignoring Jaya.
Sora nodded.
“Then they have passed into that gods-forsaken realm,” Aihara Na said. “They are gone, Sora, and it is high time you come to terms with it.” She steepled her fingers again. “And even if they do live, what makes you so certain the gods would let them return if even they themselves cannot?”
A response died on the tip of Sora’s tongue. She hadn’t thought much about how to remove them once she’d opened the portal to Elsewhere. Call it blind faith, but she was sure things would come together once the deed was done.
“Many of us have sacrificed deeply for you, Sora Sumati,” Aihara Na said. “Even your friend Aquira clings to life in your room after you forced her to nearly drain her body of flame. Without Madam Jaya’s healing, she surely would have died.”
Sora looked at Madam Jaya. Her teacher hung her head.
“I know what you saw in the Well,” Aihara Na said. “How can you not understand how dangerous it is to resist Elsewhere now that you know?”
The news about Aquira caught her off guard, but Sora closed her eyes and tried to focus. She couldn’t back down now. “It’s different. I was still here, not in Elsewhere.”
“Our entire Order crumbled because you were born when Elsewhere should have claimed you!” Aihara’s voice made the room quake. “Your mother gave her life in your stead. She opened herself to Elsewhere and in doing so roused a fallen Goddess, inspiring the one called Redstar to cause so much death in the West. Even Liam, the man responsible for our ruin, died for you. An Order of hundreds, and now only seven. We’ve gone to great stakes to hide you away because my master—your mother—begged us to protect you. You think Wetzel was a stranger to us?”
She’d figured out by now that they knew him, but she had no idea how. “He was a mystic?” Sora asked, hopeful.
“Gods, no.” Aihara looked aghast. “He was a student who outgrew the tower. He was headstrong, broke rules, and tried to take a shortcut with blood magic. We exiled him. Then, after your birth signaled our destruction, we needed someone we could trust. Someone right under Liam’s nose where he would never think to look if he decided to end his curse by killing you, and where we wouldn’t be tempted to bring you here before you were ready.”
The Redstar Rising Trilogy Page 113
