While his calmer state of consciousness allowed some curiosity to bloom, he had far more pressing questions.
“You said my vitale is the part of my body I still maintain control over. Does that mean…” His words snagged on a thorn of fear, but he quickly refocused on his breath, on the steady rise and fall of his lungs, on the steady beat of his heart. He tried again, and this time he managed to speak past the terror that threatened to overwhelm him. “Does that mean Morkai has control over the other parts of me?”
Emylia kept her tone steady. Gentle. “Morkai has control over your cereba. That is the spiritual aspect of your mind that allows your soul to animate your physical body. It controls movement. Speech.”
Ethera. Vitale. Cereba. These were all strange words he’d never heard before. Were these scientific terms? Or did they have more to do with magic?
“If we’re both souls, how are we talking?”
“Our etheras are beyond the restraints of the human body. We can communicate, even without forming words with our lips. However, the instinct to move our lips when we speak is deeply ingrained with the outer layer of our etheras.”
“Are you saying we could communicate with just our minds if we wanted to?”
She pursed her lips.Yes, we can. See?This time, he heard the words despite her lips remaining pressed tight.
A shudder tore through him. If he had a body, his hair would stand on end.
“I figured you’d prefer it if we continued speaking like this,” she said, moving her lips this time.
She was right. Speaking mind-to-mind was not something he was ready for.
Changing the subject, he asked, “How did this happen? You said Morkai tethered his ethera to the crystal. The last thing I remember from inside my body was looking at the light on the stone’s facets.”
“Eye contact with light from the crystal gave him temporary access to your cereba. He held you in place and drew your ethera into the crystal through that link.”
Teryn shuddered, wondering if that was what had happened to Cora when he’d found her in the tower room. She’d had the crystal in her hand, but…she’d probably been looking at it too. He’d only taken the precaution of not letting the stone touch his skin, but he’d let himself look. Let himself become entranced by its dazzling light. How foolish could he be?
“Don’t blame yourself,” Emylia said. “Morkai wove countless enchantments around the crystal over the years, ones that were meant to be triggered upon his death, should it come to pass. As a result, the crystal is easy to forget, evading one’s memory when it’s out of sight. It’s alluring, which makes one forget danger and want to look at it. And it’s unbreakable. These enchantments were too strong for even the princess to break with her efforts.”
“You know about Cora, then? I think she was stuck in here too, she—” His pulse racketed, surging out of his control. “Has he gained some hold over her ethera too?”
“No, you freed her before he could touch her ethera, and he…he didn’t intend to touch hers at all.”
That gave him some relief. Enough to steady his breaths again. “Does that mean when his shadowed form touched mine, he took control?”
“Yes. Touching your ethera with his own strengthened the link to your cereba. That allowed him to manipulate your body. A difficult task with such a temporary connection, but it was enough to force your hand to lift the crystal and hold it over your body’s sternum. That closed the circuit, creating a sustained link from Morkai’s ethera, to your cereba, to his heart-center.”
Teryn furrowed his brow. “Heart-center?”
“The spiritual aspect of the heart. His is stored inside the crystal. So long as the crystal is near your body, within at least sixteen inches of where your heart-center should be, the circuit remains closed, giving him primary control over your cereba.”
Primary control. Overhisbody.
Nothing good could come of that.
“Where is my body now? What is he doing with it?”
Emylia held his gaze, nibbling her bottom lip as if debating whether to answer. Then, with a sigh, she waved a hand. A ripple of shadow crossed his vision. As it settled, the bedroom grew somewhat sharper, the walls and furnishings more distinct. She stood and gestured toward the bed. Teryn rose too, feeling that strange buzzing resistance between his feet and the floor. Slowly, he turned toward the bed, dreading what he was about to see. He was right to feel dread. For there, upon the bed, lay himself. Asleep. His own body separate from the soul he was now.
“Is this real?” Teryn asked. “Is this truly my bedroom? Truly my body?”
She nodded. “I can utilize some of the magic in the crystal. With it, I can forge a likeness of any place I’ve seen. That is what I first showed you when you awoke. I muted the light of the crystal and showed you something familiar to set you at ease. But what you see now is real. In addition to casting illusions, I can create a window of sorts that allows me to project my ethera—and yours—outside the crystal.”
“So we’re free from the crystal now?” Even as he asked, he knew the hope was too good to be true.
“No, our etheras are tethered. Mine even more than yours, as I have no link to a living body. We can experience the crystal’s immediate surroundings, but that doesn’t make us free of our captivity.”
Teryn wondered if Morkai had been able to project his ethera in the same way. If so, Morkai could have been watching Cora the entire time she’d possessed the crystal. Rage burned through him at the thought.
