I was slower than he was, especially hefting the increasingly heavy weapon over my shoulder, but the hedge would stop him—the custovitan hedge would be my saving grace. I reached the stairs of the main entrance just in time to see him stretch out his hands and blast the doors open with an explosion of power that reverberated through the entire citadel, even sending me stumbling backward.
“Zuhra—don’t! He’ll kill you!”
Loukas’s shout did little to deter me, but my grandfather was suddenly there by my side, as Loukas rushed past us.
“Zuhra—Raidyn needs you. Right now,” he said, soft but insistent. Grief darkened his eyes and turned my blood to ice, scraping through my veins. “Your sister … she’s not—”
“He healed her. He was going to heal her,” I insisted, but my grandfather just shook his head mutely.
The metal ball crashed to the ground where I dropped it.
“Go to her. I will stop him. I will stop the one who hurt my Ederra,” he vowed, stooping to grab up the weapon I’d abandoned.
His words glanced off me as I turned, running as fast as I could back the way I’d come. Raidyn couldn’t have failed—he couldn’t have. Inara had to be alive. She had to be.
Every step felt like a hundred; every breath burned like fire in my lungs, like the Paladin power I’d never been able to find within myself. If I’d had any, I would have given it to her—I would have given it all to her, if it meant she would live.
I sprinted down the hallway, toward the doors of the Hall of Miracles that gaped open, like a dark wound torn through the heart of the citadel. More Paladin rushed past me but I barely even acknowledged their presence in my world—what it meant, what it would mean. All that mattered was Inara.
I burst into the room to see all four of them gathered around her body—my mother, my father, Halvor, and Raidyn. And Inara, lying on the ground, unmoving.
They all turned to look at me, all except Raidyn, who had one hand on her chest and one on her throat, his head bent toward her and his eyes closed. His whole body was shaking, and yet she was completely still.
I dropped to the ground beside him, almost blinded by tears.
“He’s trying.” My father’s voice shook, his words heavy with sorrow. “Because you asked him to, he’s trying … but I told you … this is not something he can heal, Zuhra. And if he doesn’t stop soon, he will lose himself.”
I just shook my head, my tears spilling out onto my cheeks. “No,” I whispered thickly. “Inara, no…”
“You have to tell him to stop, Zuhra. Hurry, or we’ll lose him, too.”
I looked at Raidyn, at the beautiful face that I’d come to know so well, his eyes squeezed shut, all the veins in his body glowing brightly as he bent every ounce of power he had to do what I’d asked—to do the impossible. Even as I watched, his power flickered and my heart lurched into my throat.
I couldn’t lose him, too.
If Inara was beyond our reach … if I was never to see my sister again … I couldn’t lose Raidyn at the same moment.
I swallowed, looking at my sister’s lovely face one last time—at the brush of her lashes against her cheeks, her lips slightly parted, and I wished I’d seen her eyes open—that I’d seen her burning blue irises one last time. I bent over and pressed a kiss to her cold cheek and brokenly whispered, “I love you, Inara. I love you and … and I’m … I’m sorry…”
I felt my father’s hand on my back, a warm, reassuring pressure as I forced myself to sit back up and then turned to Raidyn. “You can stop,” I choked out. “Raid, you can stop.”
But he was beyond hearing.
I reached out and put my hand on top of his, opening my mouth to repeat myself—but before I could speak, something ignited in my veins, my hand clamped onto his, and then heat exploded out into my body. It was just like when I’d grabbed Inara’s hand on the door handle, when I’d felt her power surging through me, burning through my veins, before the rakasa had burst through the gateway and knocked us both free.
Raidyn’s power surged into me, through me, turning my veins to fire and binding me to him. Instead of pulling him free, somehow I’d been sucked into the abyss with him. Dimly, I heard voices calling to me, but they quickly faded, further and further, until it was just me and Raidyn … and Inara.
I could hear the slow, steady beat of his heart in my ears. I could feel his presence beside me—within me—within her. I recognized the touch of his soul against mine from when he’d healed me. I felt him recognize me, almost as if his power—his soul—sighed in relief. Deeper, more intimate than any caress of his fingers against the skin of my hip, this most sacred, innermost part of who he was intertwined with my soul, with the fire burning through my veins, soothing it, calling to it, wrapping it up in his power. Images flashed through my mind: a woman and a man, hugging one another while he watched; the man putting him in the saddle of a gryphon, one I’d never seen before; the woman ladling something into a bowl while Raidyn sat at a table watching the man sneak up behind her, to surprise her with a kiss on her neck; the woman sitting on his bed, singing softly to him, his room softened by the settling darkness of falling dusk; my grandmother putting her arm around him and the crushing sadness that felt as though it were suffocating him; Sharmaine laughing, running her hands through his hair; coming around a corner and finding Loukas and Sharmaine half-hidden by my grandmother’s flowers, kissing; flying high above Soluselis, nothing but the wind on his face and the sun above and Naiki below; flying again, but this time, with me in his arms, and wanting so badly to kiss me—
It was so fast, over in one beat of his heart, but every one of the memories imprinted onto my mind, as if I’d experienced them myself. And then, somehow, I felt him guiding both of us toward her—toward Inara. I felt the moment we reached her soul, together. The same thing happened again, but this time it was flashes of Inara we saw, together. The roar, the pain, but also the joy—moments with me in her garden, moments with Sami in the kitchen, reading a book together in her bed, a kiss with Halvor, even a conversation with our mother. In another beat of his heart, it was over, and he and I were pushing onward, further into the core of who she was, where she was.
And all we found was the barest flicker of life, huddled in a corner of so much darkness, bringing back the light felt insurmountable. Somehow I recognized that she was almost gone, that this tiny flame was all that was left of my sister before she left us—forever.
He stretched toward her, but she was out of reach, he couldn’t stretch that far.
So I did.
I wound myself through him, with him, combining our will and might into one, and together we pressed toward her, toward that last flickering ember that was Inara’s life force in this dark, cavernous space, where I realized her power had once resided. It hurt, oh, how it hurt, ripping, tearing, burning—but I refused to give up, refused to let her go, and then—
We reached her.
Raidyn and I, together, wrapped our essence, our very souls around hers and slowly, gently coaxed it forward. I felt him doing something, as if he were stitching her back together, filling this terrible void with something else, patching it almost, so it wasn’t entirely empty.
And, for some unfathomable reason, every stitch felt like someone stabbing me.
But I knew, somehow, that this was the only way to bring her back—to save my sister. And so I grasped onto him and I grasped onto her and he continued his work, reeling us backward out of this dark, terrible, empty place, stitch by stabbing stitch.
Until finally, finally, when I felt as though I would soon lose the ability to hold on to either of them any longer, he pulled even further back, fast, fast, fast, unspooling from her, withdrawing into his own body, so it was just me and him once more, and then with the strangest sensation, as though he’d run a finger over my cheek, except soul to soul, he unraveled himself from me, as well, and with a gasp of pain that flared like an explosion of fire through my body, I was slammed back into myself.
Trying to peel my eyes open took an inordinate amount of effort. When I finally managed to do it, I realized I was lying on my back, staring up at a sea of faces surrounding me.
“She’s awake,” my father breathed, and my mother reached out to brush my face with her fingers, her own face wet with tears. My mother was … crying?
“Zuhra?”
I gasped and tried to sit up, but my head swam, forcing me back to the ground.
“Go slow,” my father warned. “That was … quite the feat.”
And then she was there, kneeling at my side, well and whole and alert and lucid and alive. But her eyes … her eyes were a plain, dull blue.
No spark of Paladin power left.
“Inara,” I whispered.
And then I began to sob.
She bent over to pull me into her arms.
“I … I…”
“You saved me, Zuzu.” She squeezed me even tighter and I finally was able to force the strength into my arms to squeeze her back. “Just like you always have.”
“I don’t … I’m not sure…”
She released me enough to pull back. Halvor hovered behind her, his hand outstretched toward her, though not touching her, as though he still couldn’t believe it. Inara glanced to her left and I followed her gaze. Raidyn knelt a few feet away, his hands on his knees. He was pale and trembling, his hairline damp, and his eyes were dulled, only the faintest glow left as he watched me gravely.
“Thank you,” I choked out. “Thank you for healing her.”
Raidyn’s gaze never flickered. “I am not to thank. You are.”
I shook my head, halting and unsure. “I don’t understand…”
“Go ahead, Raidyn. Tell her what you told us,” my father prompted.
I looked back to him. When our eyes met, I remembered suddenly what I’d experienced—what I’d felt … what I’d seen. My entire body ached, but my heart most of all. The connection from when he’d healed me—the sanaulus—I think I understood, at last.
“Zuhra … what you just did…” His expression was unreadable when he said, “I wasn’t able to heal Inara by myself—it wasn’t until you touched my hand, until you joined your power with mine that we succeeded.”
“My … what?” A pulse went through me—a stab of want so strong, I could barely breathe.
“Zuhra, you’re an enhancer.” The way he said it, breathing the word as if he could barely believe it, sent a thrill down my spine.
“Apparently it’s incredibly rare,” Inara added, “and it’s the only way Raidyn could have saved me—because your power enhanced his, allowing him to bring me back. I told you—you saved me. Again.”
An enhancer. Grandfather had been right after all. I did have power within me, I just hadn’t found it yet.
Grandfather.
My joy and relief dissipated. “Where is Grandfather—where is Barloc?”
Before anyone could answer me, a blast of light exploded out from the gateway. With a cry, I ducked—but the room had fallen silent. Nothing else happened.
When I uncovered my head and glanced up, the gateway had gone dark.
I immediately turned to Raidyn. He stared, slack-jawed.
The gateway was shut.
He was trapped here.
And he looked genuinely horrified.
Could Loukas have been wrong?
Loukas … he was here, too. Trapped here.
And Grandfather.
“Where is my father—Zuhra, where did he go?”
I snapped back to attention to find both of my parents on their feet, staring at me.
“He—he went after Barloc. He said something about making him pay for hurting Ederra—”
I barely finished the sentence before my father took off at a dead run, my mother right on his heels. Inara rushed after them, Halvor at her side, clutching her hand, leaving me and Raidyn. I scrambled to my feet, even though I still felt humiliatingly weak.
“Zuhra, wait—take it slow. You just drained yourself to heal your sister.” He lifted a hand, took a step toward me, but then paused … stopped … let his hand fall.
My heart fell with it.
“I’m all right,” I insisted. “I can’t just sit here. That’s my family out there.”
He winced, and too late, I wished I could recall my words. The memories I’d seen—the pieces of his life the sanaulus had given to me, flashed through my mind. I flushed and turned away, unable to run but hurrying as fast as I could after the others, not wanting him to read my emotions on my face—or sense them from my proximity. How much stronger would the connection be between us now that … that had happened? I’d seen so much, felt so much of who he’d been—who he was. His parents … that’s who the man and woman had been. They’d loved him so much—and each other—it had been so evident in every memory. His heartbreak when he’d been told about them being trapped here … And Raidyn catching Sharmaine and Loukas kissing … Loukas had left that little detail out of the story he’d told me.
When I heard him following after me, I clamped down on the memories—his memories. Did he know what I’d seen? How did it work if he was the healer whose power mine had latched onto and enhanced?
My power. I still couldn’t believe it.
I hurried through the hallways, managing a strange half-jog, half-speed-walking pace with my legs that still felt like they’d been physically beaten, Raidyn on my heels. He, too, had pushed himself to the brink, nearly losing himself trying to save my sister. We had so much to talk about—but we both remained silent as we rushed through the citadel. I sensed his awe—his curiosity—but also his fear, his panic. A riotous mixture of emotions that collided with my own.
What would we find when we finally reached the courtyard? Surely the hedge wouldn’t have let Barloc through, but then again … how had he gotten inside the citadel to begin with? And now with the power he possessed—and the Paladin’s fear of attacking him … What had happened? My dread grew stronger with every not-fast-enough step. Especially when I could hear no sound of battle … or any sound at all, for that matter, other than the slap of our boots on the stone floors.
“This is where you lived your whole life?” Raidyn finally spoke as we reached the top of the staircase, where my grandfather had taken the strange metal ball weapon from me. The double doors were missing—I vaguely remembered Barloc exploding them open—but there wasn’t anyone in the small sliver of courtyard visible from where we stood. The only thing we could see through the windows was the hedge, as massive as I remembered. “Just you, your sister, and your mother?”
“And Sami.” Where was Sami? There was no time to wonder, as I grabbed the banister for support to hop-run down the stairs, my legs nearly giving out more than once. Curse this blasted weakness! I needed my strength back. It was a small price to pay for saving Inara, but I’d never felt so helpless.
When I reached the bottom and got a better view of the courtyard, I slammed to a halt, my hand going to my mouth.
My father, mother, sister, and Loukas all knelt around a body on the ground near a huge, gaping hole ripped through the hedge—or blasted through it. Tendrils of smoke still wafted up from the blackened, wounded leaves that had been impermeable my entire life.
“Alkimos,” Raidyn breathed beside me, and then rushed forward, somehow finding the strength to run.
That’s when it hit me—the body on the ground. There was a large spiked metal ball next to it. And blood. Lots of blood.
“Grandfather!”
I took off after Raidyn. Loukas heard us coming and when his eyes met mine, the bleakness in his turned my body to ice.
No, no, no.
When I reached my family, I realized my father was holding Grandfather’s hand in both of his, tears streaking down his cheeks. A large gash had been torn through his chest and abdomen. He lay on the ground, the light stolen from his eyes, staring unseeing up at the stormy sky.
He’d tried to avenge Ederra, and instead Barloc had killed him.
He’d killed my grandfather—one of the most powerful Paladin in Visimperum.
“H-he … he said Ederra was hurt…” I could barely force the words out, my gaze moving to Loukas once more.
“She’s alive,” Loukas said, but the bleakness hadn’t left his face. “But … she is gravely injured. They’ll need your help healing her, I’m sure,” he said to Raidyn.
“It’s closed,” was all Raidyn said back, and Loukas’s eyes widened, the blood draining from his face.
“How hurt is she?” My father still clutched Grandfather’s hand when he turned to Loukas. “How hurt is she?” he yelled when Loukas didn’t immediately reply.
I flinched—I’d never heard him yell before.
“It’s bad, sir.” Loukas’s eyes dropped to the ground. “Shar threw up a shield, but it was too much power—Ederra took the brunt of the jakla’s blast when he realized he was surrounded by hundreds of Paladin.”
My father curled in on himself, lifting his father’s hand and pressing it to his forehead. He began to rock back and forth, a low, keening noise coming from his throat. My mother hesitantly reached out and put a trembling hand on his shoulder. I’d never seen her attempt to comfort anyone before—and the sight of her and my father together, with my grandfather lying dead on the ground beside them, was almost more than I could bear.
Nearly blinded by the tears in my own eyes, I turned away from them—away from the hole in the hedge—and stared at the citadel, rising toward the blackening clouds above. I crossed my arms over my body, trying to hold myself together.
I felt him step toward me, felt his uncertainty, his pain, his longing. “Zuhra … I’m so sorry.” The low murmur of Raidyn’s voice thrummed through my body.
I needed him—I needed his strength, I needed him to want me for me, not as a means to an end. I needed to be able to trust him. Who did I believe—what did I believe?
When I didn’t respond, he stepped even closer and gently eased an arm around me, pulling me into the strength of his embrace. I let him hold me, folding my body into the planes of his. He gently reached up to stroke my hair, and my eyes squeezed shut as I listened to the beat of his heart against my ear where it was pressed against his chest. His warmth leeched into me, pushing away the chill that had seized me, sinking past my skin, deep into my bones.
I wasn’t sure how much time passed before my father spoke again.
“Where did he go? Where are the others?”
As loathe as I was to do it, I pulled back slightly, enough to turn and look at the small group still gathered around my grandfather’s body. Halvor had shrugged out of his jacket and draped it over my grandfather’s torso, hiding the damage, and his eyes had been pressed shut. Loukas pointed at the hole in the hedge.
“The jakla escaped through that, and the others followed him. I stayed back to try and help him … but it was too late.”
“What does that mean—jakla?” Halvor asked hesitantly, as though he were afraid to speak at all and remind us of his presence.
“It means ‘cursed’ in our language. It is the name for someone who performs the ritual to steal another Paladin’s power, as he has done,” my father answered. “Something that is normally fatal if not stopped before all of the Paladin’s power is ripped out of them.” His gaze flickered to where Raidyn and I stood, his eyes going to where Raidyn’s arms were still encircling me, and then back up to our faces. “At least we aren’t facing two deaths here today,” he said at last, his voice hoarse as he turned to Inara, who stared down at Grandfather, her expression unreadable.
With everything else that had happened, I hadn’t even had a chance for it to sink in.
My sister was alive. And she was standing right there.
As if he could sense the turn in my thoughts, Raidyn quickly dropped his arms, and I ran—on my still trembling legs—to grab her into the tightest, longest hug we’d ever shared.
“You’re alive. You’re alive.” I couldn’t stop repeating myself, sudden sobs surging up and consuming me, making my whole body shake.
But she was crying too when she said, “I was so afraid … that you … I thought…”
“We’re both alive,” I amended with a tiny laugh, a sound that held no amusement, only soul-deep relief—and gratitude.
When we finally broke apart, it was to find our parents standing there, arms around each other, their faces streaked with tears.
“Inara,” my mother’s voice trembled, “I want you to officially meet your father.”
Inara wiped at her face and exhaled slowly. I took her hand and squeezed it encouragingly. “He didn’t leave us on purpose,” I told her. “When you were born, a power surge went through the entire citadel, and the gateway sucked him through to Visimperum—and though he fought to be allowed to return, the council never agreed to open it for him.”
She still just stared at him, and thanks to the sanaulus, I could sense her trepidation—the war between the anger our mother had instilled in us toward him and the longing she’d always felt to meet him—the man who had given her the power that made her so different.
My father’s face was haggard with grief and pain, but his burning eyes were full of love when he lifted one hand to her—an invitation, allowing her to choose.
And after a moment, Inara stumbled forward a step, then two, and then she rushed into his open arms. I followed after her, wrapping my arms around both of them. And my mother’s arms came around me—something I couldn’t remember ever experiencing before.
We stood there, the four of us finally a family, and held each other, and cried.
Until there was a low thud behind us and Raidyn cried out, “Loukas!”
We broke apart and I whirled around to see Loukas lying on the ground, unconscious, his stomach covered in blood.