Revenge had led me nowhere, and distance had hardened my heart.
I did not want to fight and kill my way out of this if I could simply disappear.
We approached a stream which wound idyllically through groves of impossibly colorful and lush flowers. Blooms swayed in the breeze, untouched by autumn frost. The water was clear and swirled in eddies as it lapped at the sandy banks.
Harkin drew Equinox into a slow walk as he regarded the stream. He leaned forward to whisper in my ear, “Watch carefully.”
I shivered at his breath, hot on the cold shell of my ear.
With a splash, a small figure burst from beneath the tranquil surface. A single droplet landed on my nose, and I scrunched it with wary interest. It was a Tünécris, real and solid as it drifted up from the water to meet me.
The water sprite was no larger than the length of my palm—pale blue skin freckled with specks of navy and violet. Her hair was the silver of a moonlit lake, and it drifted about her, unconcerned with the certainty of gravity, because for her, it seemed not to exist.
She approached me with curiosity and a lightness that was surprising. I had heard plenty of stories of the Tünécris, fickle sprites born of water, earth, air, and fire. They were said to be just as likely to bless or curse humans that stumbled upon their homes.
This particular sprite appeared to favor the former, but I sat very still regardless. Harkin’s hand closed over my elbow. In support or warning, I did not know. This time, I did not shake him off.
“Stay very still,” he cautioned me. I could not tell if it was excitement or fear in the tremor of his voice.
Tiny, blue fingers reached for me as the sprite grew closer. When we were eye level, the sprite’s tiny hand pressed against my cheek. The pressure was a mere whisper, but I could feel the mágik passing between us. As our eyes locked—mine gray and brown, and the sprite’s deep violet—I was pulled into a vision.
Ocean waves crashed, echoing through me, the taste of salt and sea thick on my tongue. The tide rushed and sucked at the beach. High, rocky cliffs rose at my back. I floated atop the waves, my bare feet resting on the undulating surface which rose and swelled in a heartbeat of a rhythm. My body hung, weightless, in the place where the sea and the sky became one.
Unbound hair whipped against my chin, veiling my vision as the wind pulled it every which way. I turned so the wind buffeted my front, and dark hair streamed out behind me.
The moon hung low and large on the horizon, its massive silver-white body limning me in a luminescent glow that felt like mágik incarnate. The sea rippled with moonlight, washing over the world with a feeling of cleansing peace.
“Lunanya?” I whispered, calling to the Moon Goddess with every hope in my fickle heart.
The wave I stood upon crested, unnaturally tall, and I found myself far above the mortal world. I gazed upon the lands below. Kis Temare, the blink of a village where I had been raised, the swell of the larger town of Tarmarnél, and the rising capital city of Ordelés Proper.
To the east, the vastness of the Varázis Erva swallowed the horizon. Trees stretched almost infinitely, but there, in the distance, I could just make out the Kingdom of Acsilla.
I knew it should have been impossible to see so far, to stand atop the rush of water beneath me, to be able to reach out and place my hands upon the moon, but I was lost in the world as I saw it now.
The desire to linger here and remain in this feeling of gentle power filled me, but I heard a voice, a whisper in the wind. It came from behind me, its tones deep and smooth and concerned.
Pressure squeezed at my elbow, but when I looked down, there was nothing there.
My thoughts grew foggy. I couldn’t remember how I had gotten here, to this reality defying place. I shook my heavy head, trying to clear the blurring in my vision. Trying to see the moon one last time.
“Don’t leave me,” I begged, but the wave beneath me tripped and fell, sending me sprawling through the unforgiving expanse of the twilit sky.
My eyes closed and reopened on a gasp. I reeled backwards. Harkin was there to catch me as I came back to myself, holding me steady on Quin’s back. I sagged against him for a moment before remembering myself. I sat up straight once more, breathing unevenly. The sprite still floated before me, a grin twisting her pale lips.
“What did you do to her?” Harkin demanded. Displeasure sang in his voice.
The sprite giggled, pressing her little fingertips to her mouth in glee. With a wave and a twirl, she zipped away, skating along the surface of the water just as I had done in the vision. She flashed a final smile and sank into the current.
“Are you alright? Did she hurt you?” I almost thought I heard genuine concern in his tone but promptly dismissed the thought.
“I’m fine.” I pushed venom into my voice, but my brow furrowed as I contemplated the image the sprite had shown me. Was it a vision of what was to come? An omen? Or merely a trick to be played on the unsuspecting?
I struggled to marry the two versions of myself which warred in my mind. The child in me remembered the stories and wanted to revel in the mágik I had been granted, but the hardened adult in me—the one who had loved and lost far too much—wanted to burn it away.
Opening my heart will only lead me to more pain, I reminded myself. I pushed down the lingering hum of mágik that blanketed me. I shoved away the vision that claimed me. I let the memories of my brother flood in, instead.
Hurt. Broken. Dying.
