Page 22 of A Traitor Sister (Remnants of the Fallen Kingdom #2)

22

ZIVEN

I watch Marlak as we continue on our way to the tower island.

His worry about Astra subsided and he told me he thinks her danger is over, or else he was just overreacting.

Witnessing his pain was when I finally saw him as a real person; someone with feelings and a heart.

Still gruffy, though. And jealous of his unicorn. Jealous of Astra, too.

He thinks I already forgot he overheard her conversation like an insecure teenager. I could mock him all night for that, but I didn’t spend years striving to survive just to risk my neck for nothing. He’s got a temper and I don’t want to tempt it.

At least I’m relieved to know that he no longer senses Astra in danger. I have few friends, but I like to think she’s one of them, and my life’s already too lonely as it is.

Only the stars light our way as we walk on rocky hills with sparse vegetation. On our way, we encounter a few carcasses, looking like seagulls or other birds, some of them still emitting a putrid smell.

The sight gives me the creeps. “Who’s eating them? Ice Golems?”

Marlak turns to me and huffs. “Golems don’t eat food. They’re magical beings.”

“Then who’s eating the seagulls?”

He shrugs. “Bigger birds?”

“How big? We walked all the way here and I didn’t hear any birds. And these are fresh. If there’s a predator out there?—”

“We’re almost in the tower. We’ll be indoors soon.”

“You say it as if we’ll just stroll in.”

He raises an eyebrow. “ I’ll walk in. You can help me open the door, if necessary, then do whatever you want.”

“The ferocious giant bird could be on the island, Marlak. Have you considered that?”

“We’re bigger than birds. And you can’t expect to infiltrate a magical prison if this makes you afraid.” He points to the carcass.

“I’m just wondering.”

He keeps walking, and I follow despite my misgivings. I’m not just wondering, no. It’s a basic precaution. If there’s a dangerous creature out there, we need to be careful.

Regardless of his opinion, I decide to keep my ears perked and my senses alert to any danger that may come my way. Marlak and his inflated self-confidence can deal with whatever comes his way.

Then again, he’s so powerful that monsters might be no threat to him. I wish his abnormal magical prowess would make me more at ease, but everything about this place puts me on edge, and it’s not that I’m a coward, like Marlak’s suggesting.

We climb a rocky hill, and the air changes, becoming warmer and more humid, with more water dissolved in the air. So much water.

He pauses at the edge of a cliff. When I look down, I understand the reason for the humidity—and realize we reached our destination.

The cliff is a circle, surrounding a lake with hot water, white steam billowing from it. In the middle, a green island and a tower, strangely slim in the middle and wide on top, made of a dark stone. My entire body wants to turn around and run, while part of me is fascinated by it.

“It’s here,” he says. “Except that the island is invisible.”

I blink, wondering if I’m imagining things. “I can see the island and the tower, Marlak. Can’t you?”

He frowns. “No. All I see is a gigantic hot spring.”

I look down at the lake surrounding the island. “There’s magic in that water, keeping it boiling. It’s not just the fire of the earth.”

“I know. It’s why I can’t just freeze it and form a bridge.”

“There is a bridge.” I point, then realize he can’t see it. “It’s on the other side of the island. I’m not sure if it’s made of wood or metal, but it’s covered, perhaps to prevent travelers from getting hot water spilled on them.”

Marlak nods. “Let’s go.”

Uneasiness takes hold of me as I observe the rocky cliff. While I think I’m a good enough climber that I could descend it, I’m not so sure about doing it in the dark, in a magical place, and with whatever is killing those birds out there. Plus, I have a gut feeling telling me not to go, that it’s not safe at night.

“After the sun rises,” I say. “It’s too dangerous to go there now.”

He rolls his eyes. “Oh. I knew it. Scared of a little cliff.”

“Mock me all you want. You’re not going to make me step into that island at night. Strange magic surrounds it, and nighttime brings out the worst in curses and creatures. You’ve waited years; you can wait a few more hours.”

He huffs. “Truly? What’s your plan then? To sleep out here?”

“We have a tent, don’t we?”

“Ice golems roam this area, not to mention the evil, terrifying bird-killing monster.” His voice is deep and mocking, then goes back to normal. “Do you prefer to spend the night out here in the open, or indoors?”

Valid question, no doubt, and yet…

“Not in that tower.” My spine tingles just looking at it. “And I’m not descending this cliff now. I don’t know it well enough, and I don’t want to risk being attacked while hanging from it.”

He sighs. “I can make ice steps. A nice, cute staircase for you, if you’re so afraid of the cliff.”

“Ice stairs?” I chuckle. “Not slippery at all, I suppose.”

“I don’t care how you’re getting down there. We’re going to that tower tonight.”

“You’re free to go. I’ll wait until tomorrow.”

He pauses, then narrows his eyes. “Ziven, let me make one thing clear. You said you had nowhere to go, right?”

“Yes. And if you say you’ll never harbor me again and you’ll forbid all your allies from helping me, I’m still not going to that island tonight. I don’t care. I’m not going, Marlak. If you’re so desperate to go, I’m not stopping you.”

He clenches his fists, then takes a deep breath. “Please.” His tone is different, I suppose because he realized he can’t mock me or threaten me to do what he wants. “I need to see my sister. One night is an eternity. I’m also anxious to return home to my wife. Astra still worries me, even if I don’t sense any danger right now. Please. You wanted to help me; help me.”

“Tomorrow.”

He looks down. “Just show me the location of the bridge. You don’t need to cross it.”

“I think it needs to be opened, and there’s no guarantee I can unlock it more than once, that it will work if I don’t go through. I’m going tomorrow. You can either wait or try to do it yourself.”

Marlak sighs, rolls his eyes, then says, “Fine then. Have fun with the bird killer.”

He steps into the cliff and soon disappears as he descends it. For a second, I consider trying to convince him not to go, telling him it’s dangerous, but I know he won’t listen.

That island feels wrong, eerie. While I should walk away and find a safer spot to sleep, I prefer to stand still, as I doubt his stubbornness will help him find an entrance he can’t see.

Sometimes I wonder how Astra tolerates that royal assholeness. Hearts make no sense.

I sit on a rock and wait, hoping no monsters find me. Despite Marlak’s grumpiness, I hope they don’t find him either.

LIDIANE

F ar, far ahead, I can sense a faint trace of wards. It could be one hour, and then it could be three, four hours away. Perhaps I should tell the others that there’s a chance we’ll never make it, but I’m clinging to the sliver of hope that we might—somehow—defy death.

Beside me, Azur runs, but I can sense his uneasiness, even his fear. Earlier, I felt his lack of magic, and there’s no point pondering what any of that means when we might die at any moment.

We have to survive first, and then later I can decide what to do, perhaps even decide how I feel. For now, I’m terrified of what we might face.

We’ve come across two groups of wild rats, and my sound glamour scared them away. I’d rather not encounter any more of them, as I’m not sure what my sound will attract—or awaken. A chill covers my skin, and it has nothing to do with the cooling dusk.

Shades of orange, red, and pink paint the sky as the sun slowly disappears on the horizon. Less than an hour of daylight—and no sign of the keep.

My brother will be furious if I die here. I wonder if anyone will know where we are, or if we’ll be an open question forever haunting our loved ones.

Beside me, Azur mutters, “We’ll make it.”

His face is slick with sweat, his blond hair messy around his face, and yet he knows I need some cheering, some hope. When I look at him, I have no doubt that we can cross the Shadow Lands at night, that we can defeat any monster, that we’ll fight together to the end.

Now, if everything goes wrong, that will be a worthy way to die, but I’d rather live and see what future awaits me when the sun rises.

Purple has taken over the sky, while the sunlight gets dimmer and dimmer. Stars already peer at us from between angry, red clouds.

My legs are weak, but I keep pushing them. Just a little more, just a little. Considering the wards are likely far ahead, in reality I’ll have to keep going a lot more, and yet I need to tell my legs that it’s right ahead, or else they’ll falter.

My breath catches when the last hint of daylight disappears.

“How far?” Azur mutters.

I can sense wards up ahead, not too far. “One hour or two.”

“What?” Tarlia asks.

“We’ll hurry,” I say softly. “Silence now. Let’s avoid calling attention to ourselves.”

Our feet against the earth and our ragged breaths are already noisy enough. From what I’ve heard, the monsters from the Shadow Lands don’t all attack together, meaning that only one type might find us.

Soulsuckers are the worst. It’s hard to fight something that attacks our minds. Sand Sprites can be tricky because they are hard to kill. My hope is that earth ghouls find us. They’re humanoids, but made of some energy of the earth, not really alive, not really dead, and easy to kill.

In truth, I hope nothing finds us. If I ever needed luck, it was today.

“We’ll make it,” Azur says again, and for some silly reason, his confidence makes me smile.

Am I falling for him? Have I already fallen?

In one day. I need to be less gullible and more careful.

Azur stops running, his eyes brilliant against the darkness surrounding us. “Lidiane, I love you. I’m sure I do. Can you feel our bond?”

What I feel are my heartbeats accelerating, my legs weakening, by hands trembling. What else do I feel, other than a mix of excitement and terror?

He pulls my hand to his chest, where his heart is beating so, so fast, its rhythm matching mine. Our eyes meet, and it’s as if time stopped—nothing else in this moment but him and I.

His blue eyes draw me in, pull me, his brilliant eyes promising more than I dare hope—until their spark suddenly fades. Or is it the world fading around me? Something sticky covers my hand. His blood. It can’t be. This can’t be real, can’t be.

“Azur,” I call him, as if my weak voice could undo his wounds, bring back his life.

Across his chest, three prongs protrude. A trident.

I tremble from head to toe.

The Sea Court has found me.

Azur falls, his eyes looking at nothing, while tridents surround me. Meanwhile, a fae holds a man with a fish tail; my brother. I didn’t know his body looked like that.

The sea court is about to kill him. I know they are.

“No!” I scream and scream and scream. “No!” As if my screams could do anything.

“Lidiane!” a girl calls. “Lidiane!” The yell is desperate, but it sounds so distant, so… “Azur! Renel!”

I know those names, I know that voice.

“You want to sleep now ?” Her voice cracks with anger. “I’m also tired, but really? What’s wrong with you?”

Someone touches my shoulder. “Lidiane!”

My eyes snap open, and I see Tarlia beside me, a dirty dagger in her hand, her clothes all spattered with mud—or blood.

“What’s happening?”

She exhales. “You all decided to take a nap. A fucking nap!”

Only then do I notice I’m lying down—right in the middle of the Shadow Lands. I get up and see some kind of giant slug cut in half. And then I realize what happened. “A soulsucker. Did you kill it?”

“I cut it in half. Let’s hope it’s enough.”

“Should be—for now. Wake Renel, and I’ll wake Azur.”

She crouches by Renel, showing him her rich vocabulary of expletives. I can’t believe we survived this.

Azur is lying down, his face peaceful.

I touch his shoulder. “Azur. It’s an illusion. Everything’s fine.”

He sits, his eyes wide, glances at me, then darts his gaze.

“A soulsucker,” I explain. “Somehow, Tar killed it.”

He blinks as he gets up, still looking away. “Unbelievable.”

Renel gets up slowly, his entire body trembling.

“Shall we run?” Tarlia asks everyone. “Or do you want to wait for giant rats? More sleepy slugs?”

“Let’s go.” I take a deep breath, hoping it will give me the strength to continue.

I still can’t believe she was able to kill the soulsucker. Either the creature couldn’t affect us all at once, or else it underestimated her and was feeding on her real fear of being in this place alone, with her companions asleep.

At least some luck graced us.

As I run, I consider my bizarre vision.

I love you . The words warm and chill my heart at the same time, even if I know they are fake words from a vision meant to draw my fear.

Falling in love is terrifying, so I can understand the soulsucker strategy. It was just an illusion. A strange illusion.

At least the cool night wind and the fear of facing any other creatures give me renowned strength. I can’t believe I’ve run so much. The magic of the wards feels stronger now, almost within reach.

Then I hear it; the sound of wind moving sand.

“Sand sprite!” I yell. “Let’s bundle together!”

I pull Tarlia in front of me, and then Renel and Azur flank us. Sand sprites prefer smaller targets, and might hesitate to attack a group of people together.

They can be incorporeal like sand carried by wind, or solid like a boulder. The issue is that they can hit us, and if they’re solid, they can do a lot of damage. For now, it’s just circling us. I make the roaring sound, hoping it will scare the creature, but it makes no difference.

Unsure what to do, I create an illusion of myself running away from the group.

The sprite becomes solid and attacks the illusion. I use glamour to make us unnoticeable, then create another illusion running in another direction. The sand sprite attacks it but then returns, as if sensing us.

I recall then some old tales about tubular bells in windows, and create that sound. The sand sprite stops moving.

I don’t know how long I can keep that sound going, but I whisper, “Let’s walk slowly.”

We move forward cautiously, while the creature is solid but motionless. We pass it, then I create two illusions of groups of people going in other directions, and mutter, “Run!”

Tarlia runs in front of me, and I create sounds of steps going in other directions while muffling ours.

I can’t be sure we lost it, but I can’t keep the sound so far back anymore. Then I hear a growl—and another.

Ghouls.

Renel’s sword reflects the moonlight as he decapitates one creature, then another. They’re uglier and more terrifying than I imagined. Even if they look like they’re made of earth, they have eerily realistic faces with no hair but with eyes, pointy or round ears, noses, mouth, and even teeth. The strange teeth are the issue, as they can bite fast and eventually kill. One or two ghouls is not a problem, but we’re not dealing with a couple of them, but many, many more.

I turn and see another one behind me, which Azur stabs. Tarlia crouches and tries to evade one ghoul, but without much success, until Renel decapitates it. He’s mostly fighting on his own, with some help from Azur.

I create the roaring sound, but it has no effect. Tubular bells don’t affect them either, and neither does any illusion. I’m not good with light illusions, but I try one, just to see how many surround us. Too many. Hundreds, coming from all directions.

Where did they come from?

There’s no way, no way we can defeat them all. No way we can escape. No way we can reach the keep.

In a matter of seconds—or perhaps minutes, depending on our fighting skills—we’ll be dead.

RENEL

S o. Many. Ghouls.

Too many, and they aren’t susceptible to glamours, so Lidiane’s magic is useless. All we have is my sword and Tar’s daggers, hardly enough against this horde.

Two creatures jump at me at once. I kick one and stab the other. Dark blood pours from his wound. Beside me, Tar is overwhelmed, trying to keep three of them at bay. I push one, decapitate two, then turn and elbow a ghoul coming for me.

Behind me, Azur grunts, and two ghouls push him to the ground. He’s barely keeping himself alive with that silly dagger. I jump in his direction, pull the creatures away from him, then throw them across more attackers.

My movement left the girls exposed, and five ghouls encircle them. I move to their side and keep the creatures at bay with broad swings, then turn back to do the same, as Azur can’t really block them without a proper weapon.

I turn again, block, kill a couple of ghouls, turn—and I don’t know how long I’ll last.

As long as it takes.

There are four lives on the line here. I don’t feel my arms, my body, my legs. All I focus is on pushing the creatures away, trying to keep us alive for one more second, then one more, then another one.

This second is all that matters.

And yet the creatures are getting closer and closer, pushed by the ones behind them, so they can’t even step back when I hit them.

I let instinct take over, that fighting instinct after years of practice, so that I don’t even know what my arms are doing anymore, just that it’s keeping the ghouls from reaching us.

As much as I tell myself I can keep resisting, I know that death is watching us, ready to take us the moment I make the smallest mistake, or maybe when no amount of fighting will be enough. I don’t want to die now, and for once, it’s not only my pettiness talking. This would be a stupid ending in the middle of nowhere, after a meaningless life. So empty, and yet I cling to it with all my might.

I strike and strike, unwilling to yield, too stubborn to accept defeat, fighting against all odds. Still standing, despite everything. I could use some luck now. A lot of luck. I can’t do this.

“Giants! Help!” Can anyone even hear me amidst the growls?

My screams disappear into the night.

“Somebody! Anybody! Help!”

One last strike, and one more. I don’t want Azur to die. Don’t want those girls to die either. But I can’t hold back the ghouls.

Too many. Too fast.

Four ghouls are coming at me, while I see that they’re overwhelming Tar. I want to help her, but they’re also pushing Azur, who has Lidiane behind him. I… I can’t defend them all.

Can’t even defend myself.

I swing my sword and yell, “Aaaaah!”

The ghouls pause, then turn around and run.

Fuck. I’m strangely proud and embarrassed at the same time. I scared the creatures, but if I had known a yell was all it took, I could have saved so much anguish, so much effort.

A relief chuckle comes to me. “Did you see that?”

Azur is checking if Lidiane is all right and doesn’t even have the courtesy to acknowledge me. Me, who saved them, not to mention the fact he’s supposed to protect me.

Tar at least stares at me, eyes wide, lips parted. At least one person is impressed.

Wait. She’s looking behind me. I turn quickly, ready to face another threat, but there’s nothing threatening about the creature approaching us.

Nothing at all.

At once, I’m overcome with memories of a different time, memories of my brother, my father, the family I once had, the happiness I once had.

It’s the dark unicorn.

And yet he has a name, a name that had almost faded from my memory: Cherry Cake.

I thought he had disappeared or even died. Sometimes I wondered if he was just a figment of my imagination, if the time when I flew on him with my brother was nothing but a dream. In retrospect—it was a dream. A childish illusion.

No. He’s real. He’s here. This time, he has no saddle like he did so many years ago, and it doesn’t matter. He saved me. Saved us.

I told Azur that I could take his horn to get his magic, but my stomach churns at the idea of anyone hurting him. I would never bring myself to do it, and I don’t even think it’s possible. He’s more powerful than a horde of ghouls. Who am I to try to defeat him?

He approaches slowly, then gets close enough and touches my forehead with his nose, just like he used to do years ago. I reach out to caress him.

“Don’t!” Azur yells.

Cherry Cake steps back, and I turn to my guardian. “I’m not an idiot.” I point to the unicorn. “He’s my friend. Or maybe was, a long time ago.”

I caress the unicorn’s flank. “Thank you. Thank you for still being a friend.”

He neighs, then turns around and trots away, going south.

“We have to follow him,” I yell at the others.

Lidiane gets up, and we get moving. Cherry Cake’s pace might be a slow trot for him, but for us, it means more running. I’m positive that my legs are disappointed that they didn’t get their deserved eternal rest back there.

But at least it isn’t far. The issue is whether the keep will be safe. It could be overrun with giants, for instance, who might not want us there.

Stupid giants. Imagine the deal they could have gotten if they had shown up when I thought I was about to die. A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I yelled, but did they listen? Nope.

Now, if the keep is accessible, I hope the wards are still standing—or else we’ll have no place to spend the night.