I managed to get a record three hours of good sleep before I woke in a cold sweat, gasping for air like I’d been running from Dragon’s overly slobbery kisses.
I lay back down, willing my frantic heart to slow. My chest ached a little more than usual, but I imagined it had to do with the dream I’d had. Which had been…
I closed my eyes and tried to recall as much as I could. If the past week or so was anything to go by, my dreams were starting to take on prophetic powers of their own. Which, I realized, would kind of make sense. If Anatole was correct (and as full of himself as the guy was, I think he was correct) and a part of the Dark Prince had indeed been left inside me, that would explain a lot. It’d explain me seeing him in the crumbling castle, when he’d begged me not to give him hope. It might even explain why I’d seen visions of the Realm of the gods and heard the disembodied voice. Though the soothing, inhuman speaker there didn’t seem to match the gravelly, trying-way-too-hard-to-sound cool tone the Prince usually had.
I pushed myself up, arms trembling slightly, mind racing with new possibilities. That must have meant, if I had a part of the Prince, then the Prince certainly still had a part of me, like Anatole believed. We were connected, still, only this time in a much more horrible way than ever before.
I sat up fully now, stomach filling with anxiety. We were still connected, and that meant, if I wanted to ever heal, he’d have to be involved. Just the thought of seeing the Prince again gave me the feeling of cresting the top of a roller coaster, right before I plunged down. And not in the pleasant, adrenaline-rush kind of way. In the way that made me want to hurl.
And yet…
That hollow, aching void that’d taken the place of his presence the day Kasia had stolen him from me…He had to have a similar feeling, didn’t he? He had to have some part of him that felt, no matter how much he tried to deny it, that something important, something irreplaceable, was missing. And if he had that, I had an angle to work with. It still didn’t make the prospect of ever facing him again pleasant—if I ever could face him again while he was with Kasia—but any sliver of hope was one I’d take.
I realized then how stuffy the cave was. The lingering scents of Anatole’s candles stuck to my skin and made me smell like an aisle of Bed Bath & Beyond. I needed fresh air.
I breathed a sigh of relief when I stepped outside. It must have rained while I slept, because the wet stone of the ridge shone like mirrors under the moonlight.
“You too?”
Colson leaned against the gently rising and falling swell of Dragon’s chest, beneath the tarp-like overhang of one of Dragon’s leathery wings that had sheltered him from the rain.
I approached them, making sure to give a wide berth to Dragon’s loudly snoring nostrils. Colson gave a wry smile. “No matter how much trouble they can be, they’re always adorable when they’re asleep.”
“I think you’re confusing Dragon with a human child,” I said. “At least children won’t threaten to drop you from five thousand feet.”
“We were only at four thousand. Max.”
I couldn’t help smiling. Colson looked up at me, and the mirth that was there a moment before vanished. “I didn’t get to tell you earlier, but I thought you were very brave talking with Anatole.”
“Brave? I said.
He nodded to my arm. “Weakness is never an easy thing to show. As we both know all too well.”
I rubbed the back of my forearm as it throbbed. “This wasn’t bravery. It was cowardice. I promised Mia I’d tell her all the secrets I had and I lied about that.”
“You did it to protect her. Even acts of cowardice, if done for the good of others, well…” He shrugged his enormous shoulders. “I think that’s brave all the same.”
I smirked. “Do you, like, read books on wisdom as a hobby?”
The corner of Colson’s mouth twitched. “Fortune cookies, actually.”
I laughed at that, then quickly shut my mouth as Dragon snorted in his sleep, letting out a short spurt of flame.
“I wasn’t just talking about showing us the marks,” Colson said. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, making him look strangely vulnerable for someone his size. “I don’t mean this as an insult, but none of you have experienced the sort of hatred Supes like me face.”
“You mean…as a half-giant?”
“Yes. Since the boroughs have come together there has been peace. It’s a good thing, I’m not saying it isn’t. But there is still division, even if others don’t want to see it. I guess what I’m saying is…”
He took a deep breath. “I understand why Kasia is doing what she is. It’s not right, but for someone who has been hated her entire life, I understand why. I think it needs to be done. I think she needs to be stopped. I think you’re the one who has to do it, and you’re willing to do it.
“But I want you to understand that what she is, what those of us like her are…some are pushed to extremes. Some are so broken that they’re left no other choice. So when it comes time for you to do what you need to, please don’t hate her for what she’s become. I just wanted you to understand that.”
I crouched beside him. “I understand. I’ve tried feeling for her, really I have. There’s part of me…”
I thought back to the few visions I’d had of Kasia, the few times I’d glimpsed what I could only describe as the true Kasia; not the crazy, murderous woman everyone else thought she was, but the woman who’d had a family and lost them in a terrible way I couldn’t begin to comprehend. She was someone who, like Colson, had experienced being ostracized by others, but who, unlike Colson, had never again found those who cared for her enough to show her that there was a different way to handle things than violence.
“I get it,” I finally said. “I don’t hate her. I just need to stop her.”
“I know. I wanted to make sure you understood. Whatever you decide, I’m behind you all the way.”
“Thank you. You don’t know how much it means to hear that.”
Colson reached out and gently squeezed my hand in a gesture I’d rarely seen him make with anyone else. “You’re my friend. A true friend, through it all. I’ll never forget that.”
I was going to cry, there was no doubt about it. I hurriedly wiped the tears already spilling down my face. “I won’t either. I won’t ever forget that either. And now I’m going to leave and pretend it’s because I want you to get some sleep and not because I’m about to start bawling like a baby in front of you.”
Colson smiled as I stood, continuing to wipe my tears. Just the thought of going back inside the cave and sniffling myself to sleep beside the scent of Christmas cookies made me veer away from the entrance. I planted myself on the other side of the cave, where the ridge overlooked the valley, and sloped suddenly downward to a worn footpath I could barely make out.
It took me a few minutes to overcome my sniffling, and when I did, I spied a lone, hunched figure hobbling up the footpath from the darkness. Anatole stopped when he reached the top and spotted me.
“Bit late for a walk, isn’t it?” I said. “Finally decided to turn us in?”
Chuckling, Anatole came to sit beside me. “I would have turned you in if I wished to risk exposing my location to some less-than-savory individuals. Plus, any reward there might be on you probably wouldn’t be that good anyway. Not that I need it. Do you know how expensive the rent is here?”
He held up two narrow fingers in the shape of a zero. “I am curious, though, how you found me. I thought my location was quite secure…”
“Our Headmaster, Lucien Dunadine, told us.”
“Ah, that explains it. A great man, Lucien. Met him years ago when he needed help during the Supernatural Boroughs consolidation. He wanted to see how it’d worked in the past. I told him it hadn’t worked, but he did it anyway.” He shrugged, as if to say “what can you do?” “I didn’t realize he still had my address.”
I glanced back at the cave. “It’s…kind of hard to forget.”
“Hm…” Anatole sat thinking, tapping another of his long fingers against the fuzz coating his chin.
“Did you…find out anything else about my mark?” I said.
“It is most unusual,” he said. “I believe I was correct with my original hypothesis that you and that god have each retained parts of each other, and that is why the mark continues to spread. That is also why you still remain tethered, no matter how weakly, to the Realm of the gods.” He thought some more. “This god you had, did you have him for a while?”
“Since I was a child. Kasia transferred him to me.”
“I see. That’s an unorthodox way, at best, to accept a being of great power. Most don’t survive the process.”
I squeezed my marked hand, thinking of how broken Nolan still was after losing his god, and the vision I’d had of Kasia putting the Dark Prince inside me. “I know.”
“I have also read of an interesting event regarding the Zukami. It does not happen with all Zukumi, but like what has happened to you the soul of the host can become intertwined with their god. This can be involuntary, but in some cases, the gods choose to willingly combine with their hosts.”
“Believe me, my god wanted nothing to do with me.”
“Oh, it’s possible. It requires a great deal of desire to want to stay with the host. To give up everything they are or ever were and combine with the being they serve.”
All the Dark Prince had ever wanted was a body of his own. My body, to be specific. Or, I guess, the easiest body he could get, which would still be mine. He certainly wouldn’t have wanted my soul along with it. Yet I had a piece of him, and he’d torn off a piece of me. We had been connected in a much deeper way than just host and parasite. That left two possibilities: the Dark Prince had unintentionally bonded with me, or he’d done it on purpose.
“I’ve been thinking of something else,” I said, dropping my voice lower. I didn’t really think that Colson, and especially not Asher and Mia, could hear me from way out here, but what I was about to ask felt like it needed hushed tones regardless. “It’s possible that I can sever more than just my connection to the Realm of the gods, isn’t it?”
Anatole was quiet for so long I thought maybe I’d hit upon something he’d never intended to tell us. “You are correct. Magic such as this is rarely as easy to use as your standard spell. There is much potential to go wrong. And many ways you can use it. So yes, the Sage you seek could give you the ability not only to sever your connection, but another’s as well.”
“And this magic…it’s a one-time thing, isn’t it?”
He turned to me, his eyes wide and luminous, as though beseeching me to truly understand what I was asking. “You are correct again. Magic with such enormous consequence often is.”
I let out a breath of air as I leaned back against the outer wall of the cave. “What should I do, then? I can either sever my connection, or Kasia’s.”
“That is a decision only you can make,” Anatole said. “As you’ve said before, you know her better than anyone. You know what she is capable of, and what it will take to stop her.”
He stood and dusted the dirt from the bottom of his clothes. “I imagine, when you’re faced with it, the decision will be an easy one. Goodnight, Skylar Rivest.”
I mumbled a goodnight, too enthralled within my own thoughts. I sat there for another half hour, mulling over each scenario as it came to me, going back and forth on each of my decisions and trying to find a way where I could get everything I wanted and still end up unscathed.
I had nothing.
Chest aching, brain hurting, I stood and walked back inside the cave. Before I lay back down I looked at Mia, curled into a ball, muttering softly in her sleep; then to Asher, his face calm, so sure that the Sage would be the one who would heal me, and that we would go on and be victorious against Kasia.
Anatole was wrong. It wasn’t an easy decision. Nothing like this ever would be.
“Are you finally going to tell us where to go?” Asher said.
He readjusted his grip around my waist, and I in turn held tighter to Dragon’s back spike as he danced in place, eager to take off. Anatole stood below us and at a safe distance.
Anatole nodded at Dragon. “I don’t need to tell you. Your beast already knows the way.”
I looked around Dragon’s back spike to Colson. “Is that true?”
“Why are you asking me?” Colson said. “Just because he likes me best doesn’t mean I know what he’s thinking.”
“Shame, then you could get the rest of us to like him,” Asher muttered.
“Remember what I said,” Anatole called up to us, but he was looking specifically at me. “Now, go to the Black Forest. You will find the Sage of the gods there.”
“Hold on, the Black—” Mia started, but no sooner had the words left Anatole’s mouth than Dragon bounded again, once, twice, and then he was spreading his wings and loping to the edge of the cliff.
“Thanks for stopping by!” Anatole called. “And thank you for not letting him eat me!”
“Colson!” I yelled. “What’s he—”
Dragon threw himself off the edge. We freefell for much longer than I would have liked before Dragon decided that flapping his wings when trying to fly was a good idea, and then we were hurtling up above the cloud layer as the ground rapidly vanished below us.
A couple hours and one rousing wake-up flight later, Dragon dipped below the clouds once again. The expansive green of the Black Forest was beneath us. Pockets of shadowy darkness filled the spaces between the canopies. I’d had the entire flight to think about what the Sage of the gods would be like and what I would say. I also had plenty of time to think about how the others would react once I made my choice.
I heard Colson yell something to Dragon and point down to an open meadow. I was ready this time and practically bear-hugged the back spike as Dragon lurched downward. We circled twice before he came to a skidding halt, kicking up grass and pollen as he clobbered flowers and beheaded reeds. Before Dragon had even finished his final landing procedures Asher and I were leaping off, rolling as we hit the soft ground. My legs shook with strain, and I stumbled twice before managing to gain a footing, but it felt so good to be off that I didn’t care if I looked like a baby penguin learning to walk on ice.
I caught Asher giving me a strange, almost sad, look as he straightened up from where he’d landed.
“What?” I said.
He continued looking at me a moment longer before nodding over my shoulder. “Watch it.”
I was distracted from his strange look by Colson as he managed to stop Dragon bouncing long enough for him and Mia to get off.
“Stay,” I heard him rumble. That order sounded like a lost cause to me. Dragon was about as likely to stay as he was to actually stop moving all together.
Mia brushed herself off and looked up. Her mouth dropped open. “No way.”
I turned. At once, all my assumptions about who we’d been sent to meet were confirmed. And I wasn’t sure if the knot of nervousness in my stomach was a good thing or not.
The meadow we stood in looked like any other meadow, with gently waving grasses and slightly soggy ground beneath our feet. But there was something more beneath the surface. A lot more, as if the colors and sounds and smells had been amplified a hundred times, awakening a sixth sense I didn’t know I possessed.
At the other end of the meadow sat a crumbling castle I’d only seen once before, the outer ramparts nothing but teetering piles of rock. The entire castle seemed to sag to one side, its towers pitching dangerously far over, as though they were one strong gust away from falling. Vines stretched their fingers through the stonework and rushes sprouted from the base of the walls.
Someone stood beneath the western gate, watching us. Not just any someone. A Fae.
“Welcome!” Radell said. “I had wondered when we’d meet again. Please, come inside. It seems we have much to talk about.”