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Chapter 1

Aliya

THERE WAS ONLY ONEthing worse than realizing you were alone in this world, and that was knowing that fact would never change. I was the last of my line. The final princess of my kingdom.

But was it really a kingdom without people? Without staff, without villagers?

I got up from my plush seat in the library and wandered over to the window that looked out over our once vibrant town. If I closed my eyes and focused really hard, I could still see my people out there in the streets. Mothers carrying their babies as they walked along the cobblestone streets. Market stall vendors bartering their wares.

They’d all died when the plague came. First, the old and sick had left us. But then the healthy and young too. Then my parents. My strong, healthy, beloved king and queen.

I’d waited for my own death to arrive as everyone I loved crumpled around me.

They’d all died of that terrible sickness.

Everyone but me.

The brush of a fluffy tail against my leg had me looking down, happiness filling my heart. “Everyone except you, my dear one.”

I picked up my closest friend, my only companion. Willow, my cat. She cuddled into my arms, nestling in and purring loudly.

“But you’ll leave me too one day, won’t you?” I asked aloud, scratching her head and pressing my cheek to hers. The idea of losing Willow also made my heart fill with dread.

Then the thought struck me...Did she really have to die also?

My jaw dropped open in shock as the question resonated inside my head.Well, did she?

None of my parents’ money nor their power had saved them. I’d been told we’d been Wielders, once upon a time. Magic users that could tap into the ether and channel it into the world. But once we had succeeded in vanquishing our enemies of the past—the black wolves—my forefathers had let their magic fall into obscurity.

By the time my parents were born, magic was a thing of the past. No one had practiced or taught the knowledge of the Wielders for a hundred years. I had no skills, no powers. Though my father had always said that my intuition skills were strong, and I’d always been taught to follow the nudge of what my mother called “the spirits”. My guides.

My gaze slid to the top of the bookshelves, where dust gathered on the ancient leather spines untouched for so long. I wasn’t even sure they were written in a language I’d be able to understand.

I couldn’t study magic, could I? Learn those things that had been left behind by my ancestors? If I could extend Willow’s life, or change my future in some way, wouldn’t it be worth the effort and trouble?

And if I didn’t succeed and failed miserably, what had I lost? Nothing but time. The only thing I had in abundance.

The words were out of my mouth before I’d decided to say them. “What else have I got to do?”

I kissed the top of my cat’s head and put her down on the red carpet beneath our feet. She stretched, arching her back, then jumped up onto the seat I’d just vacated, circled the area and curled up onto a pillow.

I put a hand on my hip and mock-glared at her. “Don’t suppose you want to climb to the top shelf and grab those books for me?”

The cat closed her eyes and made a contented snuff as she fell asleep.

“Great. Okay. No help there. Okay... I can do this.”

I walked across to the ladder that extended to the top of the twenty-foot-tall bookshelf and tugged it across the railings until it was lined up with the stack of books my intuition was pulling me toward.

I grabbed hold of the ladder railing and shook my head, calling myself all types of a fool. If I fell, there was no one around to help me. I’d lie crippled on the floor and die even slower than the plague would’ve taken me.

“You won’t fall. Just get up there.” I shook myself and started climbing.

When I was younger, I would have scaled this ladder in moments, then ridden it down like a slide. But my fears had increased with each passing day that I’d been alone. And there were too many to count now.

“Who are you kidding?” I told myself, having a two-way conversation with my thoughts. Another silly habit I’d picked up. “You know exactly how many days it’s been. Four hundred and twenty-two.”

I lifted my legs slowly, climbing higher and higher. My heart banged in my chest as an unreasonable amount of fear pulsed through me.