AUTUMNAL EQUINOX, FADING TWILIGHT
The island rocked beneath my feet. I felt shaky and weirdly disoriented. Beside me, Calvin stared at the fire.
Fear washed over me like an icy breeze. It woke me up, like a slap to my cheek.
How long had we been standing there?
The sun was a blood-red ball grazing the water, and we still had to put all the torches in place and set the fuse. It couldn’t have been long, I told myself.
But we’d had no time to lose. How could this happen?
Starting to shake, I grabbed Calvin’s arm and shook him too. “Calvin! We need to go!”
He blinked, understanding hitting with the setting sun. Together we scrambled down the cliff, our feet touching the sandy rock at the base just as Molly popped into sight around the corner.
“Skye!” Molly’s cry burst with relief.
“Where’s Davey?” I asked.
“With Dominic. They’re coming, with Paulo and Kenji.”
“Anyone else?”
Molly shook her head.
“We heard the danger blasts and the SOS. Who’s in trouble?” Fear swelled in my heart; I fought it even as I stared at Molly, dreading her words.
“You.” Molly’s eyes were sad. “And Hafthor. He’s gone, isn’t he?”
I nodded.
Molly squeezed her eyes shut, breathing shallowly. “I tried to warn you, but—” She broke off, shaking her head. “I tried.” Tears leaked from her eyes. I wanted to comfort her, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t hug her, or comfort her, or tell her it was okay, because right now, this entire place was definitely not okay, and the pain pumping through my heart would give her a nasty vision of the future—or at least an extraordinarily painful one.
Mine.
I pictured myself walking into death’s arms, torch in hand, taking Nil with me. Molly didn’t need to see it too. At least I saw myself winning. That visual gave me strength. It gave me the courage to give up what I wanted most: a future with Rives.
But life wasn’t always fair, or easy.
Or long, I thought.
And deep down, I secretly couldn’t wait to give up the pain of this world. It was too much.
Molly coughed, and her eyes flew open as she sniffed. “Is that smoke?”
“Yes.” I focused, because I had to; I fought to think around my pain and fatigue. “We need to lay the fuse and set as many torches as we can. We can’t wait.”
“About that.” Molly turned red. “We lost quite a few when the earthquake hit.”
“How many?” Calvin asked.
“All but two,” she said, cringing. “But Paulo and Kenji have a good dozen.” She turned. “Here they come.”
A few seconds later the boys came into sight and we got to work as the last rays of sunlight faded. The wind picked up as darkness fell; it spat sand into my face and grabbed hold of my hair and whipped it around like an invisible bully.
Calvin and Paulo set the fuse line, with Paulo gently feeding it inside the cave. We backtracked, unwinding the line and setting torches to guide Calvin later, but we didn’t light them, not yet. We worked quickly, but when we climbed back up, I was shocked at how much the fire had grown.
Flames of orange and yellow tipped with red leaped into the black Nil sky, snarling and hot. Invisible bursts of heat punched us like fists; the entire meadow raged with fire, cracking and roiling and feeding off the wind. Dry grasses, new grasses—all burned with a vengeance.
Rives and Thad’s team were still missing, lost in the dark. To the dark.
I spun toward Molly. “Can you see them? Rives and Thad?” My voice was pleading, like my heart. “Please tell me they’re not trapped in the fire.”
Molly’s brows pinched together. “I can’t see them; all I see is darkness. Which means nothing. This gift is so useless!” she groaned, grabbing her head.
The wind picked up. It howled, streaking past as loud as a scream. Behind us the water crashed and roared with a frightening intensity, the waves churned by the wind and fueled by the crescent moon.
“I hear her again!” Kenji yelled. “I’m going back.”
“Back?” I snapped my head toward him.
“I’ll come with you!” Paulo shouted.
“No!” Molly cried. “It’s no one!”
“We have to be sure!” Paulo was already moving. “If there’s even a chance, we have to save her! Be right back!”
“Who are they talking about?” I asked Molly as Kenji and Paulo dashed back down to the rocky beach. I moved slightly north, trying to see where the boys were headed.
“A girl. Kenji heard her all day.” Walking beside me, Molly watched the darkness where Kenji and Paulo had vanished. “It’s why we were so late. She’s behind us. Kenji says she sounds scared. But each time we backtrack, we can’t find her, and I’ve never seen her, not even a glimpse.” Molly turned back to the sea, to the dark open water. “I don’t think she’s real. I think Hafthor was right about his hidden people, at least about something here that we can’t see—that I can’t see—something that likes to play games.” She didn’t move. “It’s the island, isn’t it?” she said quietly. “It’s toying with all of us.”
Like prey, snared in its island web. I thought back to the day we’d arrived, when Nil had shown each of us a different face in the gate. And in that moment I knew we’d underestimated Nil. The island toyed with each of us, pulling from the past to steal our future, messing with our minds with a power we couldn’t fathom.
“Yes,” I said. “But not for long.”
It ends tonight, I thought, my resolve mixing with relief and anger. By my hand.
Molly nodded at me, her eyes bright with tears, her smile sad. Then she coughed. The meadow’s heat pressing thickly against our faces, like the smoke. She peered at the cliff’s edge.
“It’s taking the boys too long,” she murmured, worried.
Everything was taking too long; time was slipping away, and taking our careful plan with it. The noise, the heat, the darkness and flames—the platform felt so far away, our plan crumbling like ashes in the dark.
Where are all the teams?
Where is Rives? my heart cried.
My name was a dying shout on the wind.
“Did you hear that?” I asked Molly, hope flaring. I leaned closer to the heat. “Someone called my name.” Maybe I’m hearing things now, my rational side informed me snidely.
Then I heard it again.
“There it is!” I spun toward Molly. “Did you hear that?”
She shook her head sadly.
Dominic stepped up beside me. “I heard it. Your name.” He smiled. “I do not think we both are imagining that voice.”
“Stay here,” I said. “I’m going to go to the platform and see if anyone’s there.”
Molly grabbed my arm, her eyes wide as she jerked back. “No!”
“Why?”
“Oh no,” she whispered. She wrapped her arms around her chest, her hands in fists, breathing rapidly, looking between the mountain and the meadow and somewhere I couldn’t see.
“Bloody hell,” Davey said from behind me. One hand rested on Molly’s back, steadying them both. “Do you see that?” He pointed to the middle of the field, where flames spun in a surreal circle.
“A twister. We’re about to have a bloody firenado!”
“Run,” Molly whispered.
Leaving the cliff’s edge, we sprinted across the meadow’s south border. The wind whipped mercilessly, screaming and churning; a funnel cloud of fire rose into the night, twisting and clawing as if spawned by hell itself. Fire raged; a rhino cut our way. Dominic shifted cleanly out of its path, and one second later, the wind snatched Dominic off his feet. He flew up into the sky and disappeared.
“Dominic!” I screamed.
The wind howled; the air burned. My skin felt as though it were melting.
“Get to the platform!” Molly yelled. “Go!”
Up the steps we raced, curving around the mountain until we piled onto the black rock. Cooler night air, dark rock. Smoke dulled the crispness of the sky. I could still see the crescent moon winking at me.
The abrupt change was surreal.
Cocooned in stillness and peace, the platform stood in stark contrast to the devastation below.
Hafthor, gone. Dominic, gone.
Rives, missing. Like Thad and Paulo.
My head and heart couldn’t accept the terrible reality unfolding in the Nil dark.
Molly stood stone still in shock, Davey’s arm wrapped around her shoulder. Soot coated her face, her eyes bright and blinking, against the smoke or visions, I didn’t know. I didn’t ask.
It was a nightmare.
Walking alone, I went over to the platform’s carving and bent down. The diamond eye winked at me, the rings begging to be touched. Gleaming at me was a small bracelet, rough twine holding a raw diamond, a gift from my past. Happy birthday, Rives had told me as he’d slipped it on my wrist, his expression radiating love.
I love you, I thought, grieving for what I’d already lost, what I had to give up. I love you with all that I am, with every last part of me.
I picked up the bracelet and slid it on. Nil’s memories had shown me exactly where to find it; I’d watched it fall as if I’d been standing there myself.
I stood there, alone, until footsteps and shouts made me turn.
Kenji skidded onto the platform, breathing hard. “We couldn’t find the girl before a tiger made us turn back. Paulo stayed with Calvin to help light the last torches to guide his run. Paulo says we don’t have long. And there was a fire funnel cloud in the meadow, totally crazy. Rives and Thad are coming up now. Zane and Lana too.”
Rives.
Relief turned my legs to jelly. Rives was okay. Right now, that was enough.
I leaned against the far wall, resting my shoulder against the same spot where Paulo had waited on the day we’d arrived. He’d asked to be last tonight, but the job was mine. Our destiny, his aunt had told my uncle, it wraps the island from beginning to end; I feel it. He’d been last before. Now it was my turn. Paulo’s ancestors had been with Nil at the beginning, and I’d be with Nil at the end. I’d make sure tonight was Nil’s end.
And yours, the night whispered.
Yes, I thought. We’ll go down together. I breathed deeply, aware I couldn’t block Nil out. But I could keep myself in, as in intact, until the very end: Nil’s, and mine.
Rives appeared on the platform with Thad and Zane, his chest and arms streaked with black and red like war paint. My breath hitched until I realized it wasn’t his blood; it was Zane’s. His temple bloody, Zane’s teeth were gritted in pain, his left knee bent, his foot twisted the wrong way, his ankle bloody as he leaned on Rives.
His pain hit me like a wall of heat. Burning, scalding. Choking.
Real.
The crushing, visceral pain tipped my hand; it erased the last selfish shard of doubt that had lingered in my heart. Zane’s pain was a grain of Nil sand compared to the unthinkable suffering of our entire world should Nil survive this night. Because only one of us could win: me, or Nil. And I refused to lose, even though it would cost me everything.
I would be last. It was the only way.
I locked eyes with Rives, a boy covered in soot and sweat and the blood of our friend, a boy I loved more than my own life, and I made my unequivocal choice: I would win.
For Rives, and for his children to come.