Chapter One

Cor Oscurimenta

“WATCH OUT ELIJAH!” a voice called, and a moment later, I tumbled head over heels, like Alice down the rabbit hole. My head throbbed, and my stomach threatened to release its contents at any moment. I was surrounded by darkness. Occasionally, monsters circled me, claws out, eyes red, desperate to pull me into the shadows.

I landed on my rump on a springy surface, bounced to my feet, lost my balance, and fell on my stomach. I lifted my head. I was in a ravine surrounded by jagged stone cliffs on three sides. In front of me stretched a long, flat plain punctured by twisted, blackened tree stumps, plumes of smoke circling to the heavy, black clouds overhead. Tongues of flame dotted the horizon. Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled.

“I think I’m in the puxhàredo Gloom!” I grumbled, rolled to my side, and struggled to my feet. My balance faltered. I almost fainted.

“Bona Venra Adda Oscuriment,” a voice boomed from the shadow of the caves gaping like angry mouths to my left.

“So, I am in the Gloom,” I said, clutching my head and breathing in the smell of phosphorus. Crow-like birds circled overhead, screeching, “Oscuriment!”

“Velsonavets enta ispirina?”

I squinted into the cave, trying to decipher the body talking to me in hushed tones.

“I could use an aspirin,” I said. “Who are you?”

The air, thick with smoke, rippled around me. A figure approached the edge of the cave. I squinted to make out the shape of the figure. Red eyes with yellow pupils shone among the darkness.

I stepped back reflexively.

“Who are you?”

“Ent Amans Antico, Elijah mala deo Oscurimenta.”

“Old friend?” I muttered, and my mind raced. “Haddo?”

Puxhàredo. I hoped he wasn’t back from the grave me and Barn sent him to. Without my magic and Barn and Austin, I was in terrible danger.

“Adcunma ent picant plus emportanted, iunio,” the voice said. The figure shuffled closer to the edge of the cave. Áucúitus flew overhead shrieking and crying out. God, I fricking hoped I was dreaming. I had been hit by a massive rock that knocked me out. I was in a coma probably. I was hallucinating. Yes. That was it. How did I wake myself? I pinched myself.

“Ouch!” I cursed. Burning embers floated down from the clouds streaked with red and orange and black.

“Nunta sogno Iunio,” the voice assured me I wasn’t dreaming.

“What do you want?”

“Sulla prove ijustavets.”

“Only to help me?” I asked skeptically.

“Morosa adve passare sents et aquent podet ijust.”

“How do you know what happened to me and how to help? Who are you?”

“Ent amico.”

“A friend, huh?” I folded my arms across my chest skeptically. “Okay, so what happened to me?”

“Tragica plus horribilibis.”

“My magic,” I whispered.

“Podavets retroclaummenavets Macicens tuae sic enduravets gralle.”

“If I push myself very hard, my magic will come back.”

The shadow nodded. ”Tu sentavets aquela podavets lom complenet.”

“Push myself how?”

“Pro demonstrare aquelve est pro patris rente.”

“To show I’m…not my father?”

“Macicants non relaxicare edve mes?”

“Right, Magicals don’t give up. And I’m a Magical!”

“Bona, iunio.”

“Puxhàredo!” I complained, “So how do I get out of here?”

“Tu deccia sicme dere alcuns,” the voice called out ,and a creature stepped out of the cave. “You can leave once you’ve given me something.” The creature had the lower body of a goat and the upper body of a man—well defined abs and pecs and arms—sorta hot actually—and the head of a stag with long horns curling up to the sky. Its red and yellow eyes glowed among the ash and embers falling around us.

“Zid’dra!” I screamed, and innately something forced my feet into motion. I was running as fast as I could away from the King of the Gloom, the scourge of the Shimmering, the antithesis to the Áuqala.

“No, no, no,” I said. “I am not giving you anything. Not my soul or whatever.”

“Sic tu non ralcipricare morta desi tua!” Zid’dra’s voice followed me as I sprinted as far away from the caves as I could.

“I am not reciprocating, so kill me.”

“Ergo podum tua enbellissare!”

“I don’t want you to make me great. I want nothing to do with you.”

“Tu non podere fugired deme, iunio!” Zid’dra’s voice echoed around me as I ran through the ravine as fast as I could.

“I am going to get away from you!” I shouted, turning back and spotting Zid’dra transform into a magnificent black stallion, eyes red and yellow with flames shooting from its nostrils.

“Oh, fuck,” I said, turning around and trying to run faster. “I am going to die!” My foot connected with a flaming, fallen tree. My body flew over the flames, and I tumbled several times until I lay on my back, short of breath, ash and embers falling onto my face softly.

The horse appeared among the smoke and cinders.

“Tu devents sapens aquela matterna conjurunta mäu Licuria cuna sangro deve?”

I huddled under the stallion staring up at its red eyes and the flames shooting from its nostrils.”

“What do you mean my mom summoned Devlina with my blood?”

“Hexa utilunt matterna deve proa mäu Licuria conjuret cuna sangro deve aquel sorprens comvinet dus.”

“Mom used my blood in a spell to conjure Devlina?”

The stallion whinnied and blew smoke out its nostrils; its eyes flashed yellow.

“So, what does that mean?”

“Battarant-no et pro diminuir potencia dega tuxa tu!”

“Wait, hold on.” I squirmed to move away from the stallion. “What do you mean you need a part of me to weaken Devlina?”

“Est deo mannerad relquicitarunt, placiddo Iunio.”

“Look, maybe Mom used me in a spell, but surely you and Devlina will patch things up. She calls you pookie, for crying out loud!”

“Proaccivare sum prove nullificare!”

“Okay, you want to be proactive,” I said, “but there’s no need to jump to conclusions. Maybe Mom linked me to Devlina—” My mind spun back in time to Tynenium when I was engaged in hand-to-hand combat with Devlina. Every time my sword sliced a wound into her arm, my own arm burned with pain. We were inextricably linked. Devlina had been coming around me, wanting me to join her. Now I understood. She needed me to help her destroy Zid’dra. But no. My magic was gone—no, diminished. Surely, I was no use to her. I couldn’t be. I hoped I wasn’t.

The stallion reared back on its back hooves, lifted its front hooves into the air and head up and shot two long tongues of flames into the air.

That doesn’t seem like a good thing, I thought to myself.

The stallion returned to face me, “Bombba adda conversacibo enra-no, tuxa deve desi mim!”

“Let’s be reasonable,” I said. “Just because you’re tired of talking doesn’t mean you need to kill me. Think about it. Devlina loves you. She does. Maybe just apologize to her. Cut a few wives loose. Tell her she’s a great cook!”

Suddenly, the stallion was over me, flames licking at its nostrils.

“Zid’dra non relens iamais!”

“There’s always a first time to apologize, Zid’dra!”

The stallion dug its hooves into the sand in front of it, reared up on its back legs and unleashed two streams of flames at me. I winced, bracing myself for the heat and the inevitable…and a second later, the temperature plunged suddenly. I shivered as the flames were extinguished by a dazzling white light. I was momentarily blinded.

Something cool and soft fell against my face. The smell of phosphorus and smoke retreated. I opened my eyes. Snow fell around me.

The stallion stood motionless, its eyes dark and its body covered with ice.

Hundreds of pinpoints of light floated above the stallion, at least fifty feet high.

“Elijah,” a soft voice called to me from above, “you must hurry now. My magic won’t last long down here far away from where I belong among the stars in the heavens.”

“You’re the Áuqala!” I said as the pinpoints of light came to resemble a tall woman with long flowing hair falling past her shoulders, wearing a long dress, holding a sword in one hand and a shield in the other.

“I am Evangeline, your great-great-grandmother.”

“Holy cannoli!” I exclaimed. “Did you come to save me?”

“Of course, my love.” The pinpoints of light twinkled each time she spoke. ”Now I need you to stand quickly, my love.”

I hurried to my feet.

“Place your feet together, hands at your sides, and close your eyes.”

I did as instructed.

“Reach deep inside you and touch the magic within, love.”

“There is no magic.”

“There is. You know it is.”

“I can’t use it.”

“You can.”

“Not like before.”

“Those bastards at the Còngréhassa…”

“Grandma Evangeline!”

“I can use bad words on occasion.”

I laughed.

“Feel the light inside you,” she said.

Among the shadows and darkness within me, buried under layers of self-loathing and hatred of brands and plans and especially of Mom’s failure to succeed in love and my vile father who despised boys who liked to kiss other boys, there was a slight sensation of…. What was that….hope?

“Yes, Elijah, reach for the hope.”

“The hope?” I asked.

“Yes, Elijah, inside you is an eqaulibreo, a balance. Between hope and anguish. You’ve moved too far into anguish.”

“The darkness.”

“Yes, Elijah.”

“What can I do with hope?”

“Hope is the absence of fear. You will release yourself from the Gloom and then you will return to Burbank and find your mom and she will help you. And you will seek out Máurso, the God of War, and you will learn how to use magic in a different way. And you will struggle along the way and suffer, but you will turn to the light. And in the end, you will be stronger than before.”

“Do I have to do the suffering and struggling part?” I asked. “Or is that maybe negotiable?”

“Elijah,” Evangeline said firmly. Just like Mom when she was ending a conversation simply with the tone of her voice.

“Okay.”

“Elijah, you will be great again, I promise.”

“Ugh,” I said, “I don’t feel great. And I really messed things up. My boyfriend—”

“He’s still there.”

“And Barn, my brother. Well, he hates me.”

“He loves you.”

“And I love him. And Austin.”

“They will help you.”

“You think?”

“I know, my cherished one.”

“So…” I stammered, “I mean, me and my mom haven’t been doing too well.”

“Yes,” Evangeline said in a regal tone, “but you two will help each other.”

“You think so?”

“You are my blood.”

“Well, looks like you’re made of stars.”

“Elijah.” Evangeline’s voice wavered. “Stop stalling. You are a stubborn boy, aren’t you?”

I hung my head. “Okay, yeah. I hear you. Mom and me.”

The earth trembled violently underfoot. The snow turned to mist. Áucúitus howled in the distance. The stallion’s eyes flickered red.

“You must go now, Elijah! Reach for that sparkle of hope within you. Go to the light, my dearest one!”

I closed my eyes and dwelled on the strange flicker of hope deep within me. Austin’s face flashed before my eyes. His hand reached for mine. I grasped for him. Suddenly, my body became light as a feather, my feet lifted off the ground, and in a split second, I was hurtling up and up and up.