Page 28

For a moment, I had found it hard to imagine that Baldur, this whirlwind of a Berserker with no end and no beginning might be able to bring out the best in Astra. And yet, despite Brandon’s killer frown and Hammer’s threatening growls, the Father pressed his fingers against the half-Daughter’s temples and hummed softly, while she focused on opening a shimmering portal.

She had done it before, even though she’d gotten the destination wrong.

The first hint I got that something big was coming was when her skin lit up pink. Astra glowed intensely from the inside, her Daughter nature taking over. Nurtured by Purgatory’s energies, it flared brighter than ever before. Baldur’s influence was playing its part. “That’s it,” he said, laughing as he opened his eyes. The blue fires had turned pink, and I sucked in a breath, realizing that Astra was using the Father as some kind of conduit.

“Holy smokes,” Jericho breathed, eyebrows raised in astonishment.

“You can say that again,” Dafne replied. They had their arms wrapped around one another, waiting with childlike anticipation for Astra to come through and take us where we needed to go.

“Stay with that feeling,” Brandon whispered in Astra’s ear. He’d coached her before. I knew she would respond. Baldur cried out in what sounded like pain, his skin turning paler as a shimmering portal tore its way between him and Astra. Before its upper tip could reach their heads, Baldur grunted and pushed Astra back, breaking the physical contact.

The shimmering portal grew and widened, the pink glow now concentrated exclusively in Astra’s hands as she tried to maneuver the damned thing. White light poured from inside it, an ocean of diamonds waiting to be crossed.

“There it is,” Baldur laughed, clearly pleased with himself.

Brandon took Astra’s hand in his with a determination I hadn’t seen before. I welcomed it, after the earlier uncertainties. The Berserker had proven his intentions to be pure, and Astra surely benefited from his presence, from his attention and affection. It felt good to see them like this. She needed him, and I had a feeling he needed her, too, in his own way. “Come on, we need to go,” he told her.

Hammer padded closer, giving him a faint whimper. It brought a tear to Astra’s eyes. “Turns out he’s choosing to come with you, after all.”

Brandon had not made any effort to convince the Aesir to follow him, confident that Hammer would be able to choose freely once faced with the options. This had been his moment, and the dire wolf had chosen to leave Purgatory in Brandon’s company. We had no idea what that meant for his future, but if his Berserker had gone rogue, Hammer would follow.

“You honor me,” Brandon told the Aesir, who huffed in return and licked the back of his hand. It was a wholesome moment, a much-needed breath of hope. I imagined a future for them together—Astra, Brandon, and Hammer. I had no idea where the thought had come from, but due to the warm smile on her face, it felt right.

“Are you ready?” Myst asked, and I turned my head to find her gazing at me. She leaned forward, and for a moment, I anticipated something I knew I wanted. But it never came, as Brandon pulled Astra through the shimmering portal, Baldur jumped in after them, and Edda grabbed both Myst and me and took us with her.

“That was fun!” Jericho exclaimed as he and Dafne followed us through the passageway, swiftly joined by the Time Master and Aphis.

The enhanced team was complete, and we’d safely made it… “Hold on,” I mumbled. “We’re not in The Shade.”

“Oh, come on, seriously?” Time snapped, his chin jutting angrily. “Ah… now I see it. Well played.”

We weren’t in The Shade, per se. We’d made it to a small patch of dry land just outside The Shade, separated by less than a mile of water. The ocean spread all around us in its precious shades of blue, glimmering under the moonlight. “But we’re home,” I said. “Or home-adjacent, at least.”

“Okay… I’m considering this an improvement,” Astra replied, her breathing labored as the shimmering portal closed behind us.

“It is an improvement,” Baldur said. His humor vanished as he turned his attention to The Shade. “But I don’t think that’s supposed to be there.”

There was something wrong. Awfully wrong. “What did she do?” I heard Edda ask, though nobody had an answer, just a pile of questions, each stranger than the other.

The usual spell that cloaked our island had changed into something… different. A dome of black smoke now covered my beloved home. Reds and greens burst through it. Blues and yellows. Every other color on the cosmic palette joined them, occasionally interrupted by white lightning.

An electric charge filled the air. The kind of heavy humidity that I could smell. It told us a storm was coming, and we had landed smack in the middle of it. The ocean rumbled, its waters choppy as they attempted to swallow our little piece of dry land. It had been calm earlier, but it was changing. The Time Master made use of some of the swamp witch magic knowledge he’d acquired over the years to elevate it above the water. His lips moved, and I dared assume he was reaching out to Death, too. We needed help.

“I don’t understand,” Myst said, stunned by the sight before us. The dome crackled and moaned, swelling and growing, ever so slowly. It was obvious, though. It could not be denied. Whatever the spell cast upon our island was, it was spreading. “What sort of magic is this? It doesn’t look like Purgatory magic.”

“It’s much worse,” Edda concluded, covering her mouth.

“This is hybrid magic,” Baldur said what the Mother couldn’t, as the shock had rendered her speechless. “Like I told you, darkness and light, life and death. Hrista found a way. I’m willing to bet that the box of Kedra, the black witch, played a fundamental part.”

Astra nodded once. “Okay, so what do we do?”

“I imagine Hrista will answer that question any moment now,” the Time Master replied, drawing his scythe as he looked ahead. Before he could use his death magic, however, a bright white pulse smacked him in the forehead, and he nearly fell into the water. Aphis caught him and held him up, while the rest of us turned to see Hrista coming.

A jetty made of ice extended from beneath the hybrid magic dome. With each step that Hrista took, the frost expanded beneath her, creating a walkway for her to approach us. My blood ran cold as I saw the woman behind her. She had cuffs on, and she seemed… different. “Unending?” I mumbled, mostly to myself.

By the time Hrista reached us, Baldur and Edda had already assumed their combat positions. The rogue Valkyrie didn’t seem frightened, however. Maybe amused, but certainly not impressed. Unending’s hands were bound with threads of black mist, and her nostrils flared furiously.

“You’ve been a very bad girl,” Baldur said and manifested his long-handled axe. Edda drew her shining trident, and they both lunged at her with everything they had. They glided across the water like birds, the moonlight dancing on their blades.

But Hrista disappeared and reappeared behind Unending with a sly grin, while the Mother and Father came to a screeching halt. Unending looked so downtrodden, it nearly broke my heart. “Don’t bother,” the Reaper said. “She’s not really here.”

“What?” Baldur needed a moment to get his thoughts back in order.

Edda held on to his shoulder for support, equally puzzled. “She’s not really here?”

“In layman’s terms, I’m projecting,” Hrista replied, then looked at the Time Master. “I shot my disabling spell at you all the way from back there. I’m a sniper, do not mess with me.”

She seemed like she was having fun. Unending, on the other hand, looked close to broken, and I couldn’t understand why. “How… what happened to you?” I asked the Reaper.

It was Time who answered, instantly recognizing her new condition. “She has a living body. I don’t know how, and I don’t know why, but Unending, my dear sister, is stuck inside that meat suit.”

“And something tells me this ray of twisted sunshine had something to do with it,” Brandon concluded. He would’ve liked nothing more than to tear Hrista’s head off, but there was no point. If we were dealing with a projection, it meant that she was well protected. She had come prepared.

Unending took a step forward on the ice, her foot slipping. She re-balanced herself carefully—having her hands bound made it more difficult, but she pulled through. “I’m a prisoner, and so is Tristan,” the Reaper said. “For a particularly personal reason, I had myself fitted into a body, and now… I can no longer leave it. If I do, it will be through death only, and then I shall be automatically reaped and sent into the afterlife. Not even Death can change that. I will never be a Reaper again.” Her voice broke, tears glazing her eyes—no longer galaxies but human-like pools of darkness and raw emotion. “I am here as proof that Hrista has a sure hold on me and my husband, as well as the entire island.”

“There… See? It wasn’t that hard,” Hrista replied, enjoying every second. “Now, my turn.” She looked to Astra first. “I knew you’d come, eventually. But I am generally well prepared, so this conversation already has an auspicious conclusion. You made it close enough, but you can never set foot inside The Shade. Ever again. I have locked all of you out. Every single Shadian, except for Tristan and his poor little wifey here, because there’s nothing I like better than leverage.”

Edda shook her head, making sure her disappointment was clear. “I don’t understand what it is you’re hoping to accomplish with this, Hrista. You don’t belong here.”

“I belong wherever I damn well please!” she retorted, immediately furious. I wasn’t the only one who noticed, either. Unending was also intently focused on the Valkyrie. “And like I said, The Shade is mine, now. Try all you want, you are never coming back to it. I’m making it into something better, far superior and beautifully evolved.”

“What the hell did you do?” I asked, horror unfurling in my throat.

“She took creation magic, and she perverted it,” Baldur said. “My biggest concern is that she may be untouchable.”

The projection claimed as much. Hrista had been able to fire a spell at the Time Master. She’d forced Unending out here to relay her message as a hostage. And she’d gotten her claws so deep into our island, I wasn’t sure how we’d free it before it was too late. Myst looked worried, but there was anger in her eyes, too. It flared white and unforgiving, then dwindled into something soft and uncertain when she glanced at me. Hope, I realized. When Myst looked at me, she had hope.

“Say what you will, do whatever you want,” Astra said, her hands still glowing pink—a shade I hadn’t seen before. It was furiously intense and infinitely brighter, a mirror of her emotions, I figured. It was hard to even look at them as I waited for my eyes to become accustomed to that light. “I will get you out of there. One way or another, I’m going to come in there and drag your ass back to Purgatory where you belong.”

Her bravery and determination made me feel like there was a light at the end of this peculiar tunnel. Sure, we’d stumbled plenty along the way. We’d won a few battles, lost some. Even so, we’d made it this far. The Shade was my home. It had welcomed me as a child, and now it needed me to protect it. It needed each of us who’d grown in its redwood embrace to come through for it.

Hrista was impressed. She wouldn’t say it, but it was written all over her face, even in that projection form. Unending picked up on it, too. “Well, congratulations, Astra. You managed to open a portal. Whoop-dee-doo. You still have the entire population of The Shade to bring over. I assume you’ll want your Reaper friends involved, too,” she added, sneering at the Time Master.

Aphis was eager to rip her throat out, but the Reaper held him back. “You’ll get your chance, just not now.”

“Maybe never,” Hrista retorted, pointing a finger at Unending. “It’s why she’s here. Death is busy at the moment. I made sure of that. But you and the rest of your cohort might end up being a thorn in my side, so I figured Unending here would help even the playing field. If you so much as breathe in my direction, I’ll lop her head off and throw it at you across the water.” She looked at me next. I felt her hate coursing through me. Or maybe it was just mine, as powerful as hers. “And the same will happen to Tristan. Make sure you tell Esme that. I’ll have her clone eviscerate him.”

“Why are you doing this?” Myst asked the sister she’d once held in such high regard. I could only imagine how she felt in this moment. There wasn’t much I could do, unfortunately, other than make sure that Astra would keep her promise.

“Because I can. Because I am better, and because I am tired of seeing the universe punish excellence and reward mediocrity. What happened to the Spirit Bender must never happen again. I will upend the balance, and I will rearrange the entire world,” Hrista said. “And then, my dear sister… you’ll be welcome to join me. Or, should you choose to be stupid, I’ll be more than happy to reduce you and anyone else who dares interrupt my work into mere shadows of your former selves.”

Myst had deliberately chosen to keep her Aesir out of this. So had Edda and Baldur, as well as Regine before them. The only one who was practically vulnerable in this current formula was Brandon. His Hammer was close, a potential target for Hrista’s wrath. The dire wolf had chosen to come with him, though, and Brandon would never lose sight of him again. Yet the mad Valkyrie’s statement stood out, basically implying that even with the Aesirs safely tucked away in Purgatory, she still had a way to get to them. Valkyries and Berserkers couldn’t be killed or destroyed—but their Aesirs were not indestructible. And that was what Hrista was banking on.

“Time to head back, sweetie,” Hrista told Unending, then flashed us a broad smile. “It doesn’t matter what you do from now on. I already got what I wanted. I got your Shade.”

She retreated, cautiously walking in front of Unending. The Reaper gave us one last look.

“The World Crusher is free,” Unending said. “Death is probably with her.”

“I thought I told you no talking without my permission,” Hrista hissed.

In an instant, her projection vanished into thin air, and the ice jetty collapsed. Unending cried out and nearly fell into the water, but an invisible force held her up just above the surface, the waves splashing at the soles of her feet. She was dragged back, swallowed by the black dome with its ripples of colors and lightning before any of us could even react. Her words had troubled the Time Master.

“What was she talking about?” I asked him.

“I’m not sure myself. Death will know. I’ll have to ask,” he replied.

“Crap,” Jericho remarked, finding his voice again. “What do we do?”

“You two are kind of useless,” Dafne said to Baldur and Edda. They both scoffed, clearly insulted and in no mood for any of this.

“We just need a better approach,” the Mother of Valkyries replied.

The Father seemed a bit more doubtful. “And a hell of a lot more firepower. Hrista has really grown a lot since I last saw her.”

“We’ll get her out of there,” Astra declared, her gaze fixed on the captive island. “We’ll figure it out. One step at a time. One problem at a time. Sooner or later, in one form or another, using one or all the forms of magic known and unknown to us, we will…” her voice faltered, but she recovered quickly. “We will prevail. We will defeat Hrista. We will get our home back.”

We certainly had our work cut out for us. The Shade was temporarily off limits, but we now had the ability to bring everybody else back from the fake one. The Time Master’s death magic had been temporarily numbed, but he was still in touch with Death, though we’d yet to learn her response to this insanity. The whole World Crusher bit was an unexpected enigma, too. I wondered if it bore any relation to our problem here—it sounded like another Reaper, one of the old ones, though I only remembered ten. The First Tenners. Plus, her name was ominous... I shook my head, throwing the thoughts away and going back to my resolve. All was not lost. And we still had Edda and Baldur, who’d been unable to showcase their prowess because Hrista had come to us as a projection.

Which said a lot about her, I realized. Hrista was a coward. She had tricks up her sleeve, much like the Spirit Bender, and a sea of deadly venom in her heart, but in the end, she was a coward. I looked forward to telling Mom and Dad that.

“She will not win this,” Myst assured me, and I felt the vibrations in her voice. She meant every word. Brandon’s stern look spoke volumes, too. Even the dragons were with us, though a little weary.

There was a lot we didn’t know yet, but even so, we weren’t out of options. The universe hadn’t abandoned us. Our fates were still our own to make and bend as we chose. And Hrista would soon come to learn what it meant to piss off not one but all the Shadians.