“Tilly, stop!” he commanded. “Nothing returns from the Valari ’Kharun. What waits behind doesn’t belong in any living world.”
Horous stumbled back toward me. Fionn wasn't close enough to reach me, and he knew it. Besides, his choices were not mine.
“Blood for blood!” I screamed, adrenaline pumping through my trembling body. My fear was my strength.
The guards faltered just long enough for me to move forward. With all the strength I had left, I shoved him, harder this time. The Valari Kharun roared open, and bright light burst everywhere.
“No!” he bellowed, as the gate swallowed him whole.
For a brief second, everything stilled. The mark burned, not painfully, but with power. I stood, my hair whipping through the air, and spoke out to the Valari Kharun and Horous as he disappeared.
“You wanted to push my soul through the gate. Now, let the darkness you created for the marked judge you. Today, your justice is served.”
***
I had brought Horous down. His fate dragged him into the same darkness he had condemned the sacrificed souls to. For the briefest moment, I felt the damned, as though their vengeance had finally been answered.
I stood tall. The fear was still there, but it no longer controlled me.
"Well played, little spark,"Ignara’s voice a fading whisper in the depths of my mind. Her presence faded with one last warning:
“Little Spark, you didn't just close the door. You opened it.”
THIRTY FOUR
THE JOURNAL
The sky ominously darkened. Maybe it was my imagination, but the clouds seemed to move faster above the monoliths. With relief, I knew Horous was gone, at least for now. My body trembled as I moved away from the gate.
Fionn plunged the weapon deep into one of the four Gatemen’s necks, then into another, slicing his throat. Both men gave bloodcurdling screams and stumbled to the ground, dark brown blood spurting from their wounds. Muttering a string of curses, the two-remaining moved toward Fionn.
Fionn swung down from the horse, his boots striking the earth with a sharp sound that cut through the energy buzzing in my ears. I didn’t have to look to know what was in his eyes. I could feel it, cold and merciless, like the edge of the blade he held in his hand.
“Run, Tilly!” he shouted, casting me a quick glance before lunging for the men.
“Keep running and don’t stop for any reason!”
Gasping for breath, I rose to my feet on trembling legs and stumbled away. By now, an eerie mist rose from the sea and drifted across the land, enshrouding the abbey in a spectral veil.
***
I looked back for a split second, catching the way Fionn stood against the Gatemen. He looked like a fallen God in the way he brutally attacked, he was lethal, swinging his sword withterrifyingprecision. But I didn't let the heroism fool me. I knew he wasn’t fighting to save me; he was fighting to make sure the prophecy was completed.
To him, I wasn't a person to be rescued. I was amarkedsoul he refused to lose to a rival.
Suddenly,amysterious figure emerged from seemingly nowhere, his billowing cloak obscuring his face. I made a wide detour, determined not to risk capture again. My heart pumped hard against my ribs. I had survived a celestial ritual and being sacrificed to theGate; I wasn’t about to let a ghost in a cloak be the end of me.
He held out his hands and motionedforme to stop.
Terrified by the gnarled hands that reached toward me, I dodged the cloaked figure even as his fingers brushed againstmy skin. The bitter taste of fear rose in my throat. Feeling the adrenaline course like fire through my veins, I bolted toward the vortex, the biting chill of the windscouringmy face and fanning my hair like a tangled veil.
I didn’t dare look back, too afraid to see what might be following me, or what might have happened to Fionn. Through the eerily whistling wind, I heard the fleeting clink ofsteeland a distant cry.
Beyond the craggy edge of the cliff, the thundering surf crashed against the rocks with a relentless boom and hiss. I made my way toward the shoreline trail, almost twisting my ankle on the rocks littering the path. The only reason I was able to run at all was because Fionn had somehow found me and come to my rescue. But the Gatemen were ruthless monsters with the strength of demons. What would happen if they killed Fionn? What would happen to me then? Where was I running to? All that I could see was the vortex.
As I wound my way toward the shore, the cloaked figure appeared again from the mist shrouding the sea and walked toward me. I skidded to a stop and glanced over my shoulder. I had only just fled from him, but here he stood yet again, strolling through the sand as if he could vanish in and out of thin air.
The wind billowed through his cloak, this time revealing the face of a monk so weathered by time and the elements that it was impossible to determine his age. He extended his hands. The same hands I had barely escaped moments ago. Gasping for breath, I desperately scanned the bleak terrain. There were no roads, no buildings, nothing but desolate, wind-scoured moors and the stormy ocean.
