“How?” I heard myself ask. “How could the Order have created spells powerful enough to freeze Vaeloran magic in its tracks?”
I drifted in and out of whatever explanation followed. No matter how hard I tried to focus, my mind kept playing the same four words over and over.
They died that night.
The magic I’d inadvertently summoned up from the Below, and its collision with Lorien’s power…
It had killed them.
Nothing else truly registered.
And this must have been obvious, because Orin finally shook his head and said, “We can discuss more details later. This conversation is one we should probably save for somewhere safer, anyway.”
“Is anywhere actuallysafe?”
His tired eyes looked troubled, but he nodded. “I have an associate waiting in the wings. We’ll move on as soon as I see the signal from him, telling us that the path is clear and our hiding place is ready. For now, let’s just lay low.” He scanned the wreckage, and I again got the feeling he was expecting members of the Void Order to ambush us at any moment.
While he ventured off to watch for signals from this ‘associate’ of his, I made my way to what had once been the eastern courtyard. I sat on a cracked bench in the darkest part of it, a tall hedge at my back and a relatively unobstructed view of the manor before me.
Thalia found me a short time later. She leaned against a cracked, moss-covered column, staring in the direction of the manor for a minute before she said, “So…it was all an unstable disaster just waiting to finish unfolding.”
I didn’t reply.
She shifted her weight from one foot to the other. I could tell she was struggling to find words of comfort; it was another testament to our growing friendship that she stayed and attempted to offer any commiseration at all.
“You know there was nothing you could have done to save this place, right? It wasn’t meant to be saved. Some things aren’t, in the end.”
I shrugged, reaching for one of several withered flowers scattered across the bench. Holding it flat in my palm, I focused on the decaying energy surrounding it, letting shadows twist from my wrist and latch onto that decay. As I pulled it out, theflower brightened, its edges perking up. It was an old trick I used to spend hours performing in these gardens; I could take the energy from dead and dying things, and, in doing so, I could make them look like they were alive again, if only for a moment.
But my magic never lasted very long in this realm.
“This wasn’t even my real home,” I told Thalia. “They weren’t even my real parents.” It sounded harsh, but I just wanted to detach myself even further from these crumbling surroundings and all they represented.
Thalia shook her head. “Real or not…absent or present…they still shaped you. And they’ll go on shaping you, even now.”
I crushed the flower in my fist, watching its brightness fade through the cracks between my fingers. “For so many years, I was obsessed with saving this place. It’s what led me to Noctaris to begin with. It was a purpose that kept me moving even when the weight of everything became crushing. And all this time, there was nothing truly here for me to save. It was all a lie. My entire life here was a lie.”
Her brows knitted together in thought. “Maybe not a lie, but more of a…detour. One that ultimately led you to the destination you were meant to arrive at. To the things you were truly meant to save.”
I exhaled a long, slow breath. “…Maybe.”
She started to reply, but we were interrupted by the sound of someone kicking aside debris and muttering to himself—Orin.
Even with the space between us, I felt the tension ripple through Thalia’s body at the sight of him.
“Maybe you should go speak to him?” I urged, softly.
She gave a dismissive snort, turning away. Orin carried on without paying us any mind at first, holding up what looked like a piece of a broken mirror, angling it to catch the dying light and twisting it in deliberate patterns; maybe part of the signals he had apparently planned for.
His daughter was quiet for a long time, just watching him, before she said, “It was easier when he was just a ghost that haunted my memories.”
I nodded, understanding.
She wrapped her arms tightly around herself, warding against the chill of the rapidly approaching evening. We quietly watched the sun sink more fully behind what was left of Rose Point. The brilliant display of reds and oranges made me think of fire—of the last vestiges of my old life going up in flames.
Let it burn,I thought.Let it all burn.
As shadows overtook the final rays of sunlight, Aleks and Zayn came into sight, walking close together and talking in hushed voices. They were too far away to properly hear, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t seem to access the mental bond Aleks and I had been sharing, either.
