Page 27

27

GAIDA

We hurry through the damaged corridor, the aftermath of my outburst leaving a trail of destruction behind us. Broken glass crunches under our feet as we pass the shattered light fixtures. Students press themselves against the walls to avoid us, their whispers following in our wake.

Luke leads the way, his normally calm attitude replaced by urgent purpose. Dante stays close beside me, his hand never leaving mine.

“Luke’s suppression is already wearing off,” I mutter. “I can feel her pushing against it.”

The Blood Queen’s presence lingers at the edges of my consciousness, patient yet insistent. Not attacking, but waiting. I feel her watching, calculating, like water pressing against a weakening dam.

We reach Luke’s office to find Felix sitting cross-legged on the floor, surrounded by open books and scattered parchments. His eyes are closed, his fingers tracing invisible patterns in the air. He doesn’t acknowledge our entrance.

“Felix?” Luke calls.

Felix’s eyes snap open. “About time. I found it.”

He stands in one fluid motion, a reminder of his new vampire reflexes. The transition suits him in strange ways, sharpening his academic intensity into something more predatory.

“Found what exactly?” I ask.

“The entrance to the hidden chamber.” He gestures in the air behind him. “It’s been there all along, concealed by layers of misdirection spells. Quite brilliant, actually. The door exists in multiple places simultaneously.”

“An interdimensional doorway,” Luke murmurs.

“And the walker of two worlds, gets it in one,” Felix says with a beam, which shows his fangs.

Then… he launches himself at me.

“Whoa!” Dante says, stepping in between us.

“No, it’s fine—” I start, but get cut off when a flood of power wallops both Felix and Dante across the room. Luke is barely managing to stay on his feet in the magickal gale that has suddenly cropped up from out of nowhere and is coming directly from me,

“No!” I cry, panic rising as I see them both slam against the far wall. The power surges through me, wild and uncontrollable. The office walls warp, reality bends around us. Books zoom off shelves, papers snap in the cyclone of energy.

It’s like standing in the eye of a storm as the windows shatter outward, glass exploding into the courtyard below, slicing up students as it goes. Their screams of pain and panic barely register.

The foundations of MistHallow shake as reality fractures. Through the cracks in the air, I see the other worlds with their strange landscapes, impossible architectures, and beings that defy description.

“The entrance,” Felix gasps, struggling to his feet. “We need to get her through now, before she tears the academy apart!”

“Too late!” Luke shouts and dives for cover under the desk. “Duck!”

An explosion that brings down half of the academy around us, rocks the building, and I’m thrown off my feet. I burst through Luke’s office door to slam into the wall in the hallway. Rock and stone crash down around me, cutting me off from the guys.

“Fuck!” I screech as my clothes tear with the force of the wind. I push myself to my knees, blood dripping from a gash on my forehead that heals almost instantly. The hallway is unrecognisable.

And then I hear the growls.

“The ferals,” I mutter. “Shit! Shit!” They’re coming to me.

The power inside me rages like a beast, eager for release. I clench my fists, fighting to contain it.

You’re only hurting yourself by resisting . Let go. Let us finish what was begun.

“Shut up,” I hiss through gritted teeth as I take in the growing destruction. I’m blocked off completely from the guys now. The office has collapsed, and I let out a whimper.

I did this. I’m still doing this.

A loud crash to the left signifies the collapse of the north tower

I watch in horror as it crumbles into the courtyard, dust billowing upward in a massive cloud. Screams echo from every direction as students and staff flee the collapsed building.

I’m the epicentre of this destruction. Every second I remain here puts more lives at risk.

The growling grows louder. Through the settling dust, I see the ferals emerging from the shadows, eyes wild and hungry. Their movements are less chaotic than before, more purposeful. They’re coming for me, drawn to the power rampaging through me.

The first feral lunges. Without thinking, I throw my hand up. Power erupts from my palm, not the wild, uncontrolled force from before, but something precise. The feral disintegrates mid-air, turned to ash in an instant.

“Ah!” I scream in horror, dropping my hand, chilled at what I’ve done.

The Blood Queen’s laughter echoes in my mind.

See how easily it comes when you stop fighting?

The remaining ferals hesitate, sensing the change. I use their moment of uncertainty to run, pushing through the rubble to the outside. I need to get into the forest, away from everyone. Every step I take causes tremors beneath my feet and more destruction to follow. Chasms open up in the ground, giant maws spewing out fire, lava, and creatures I can’t even look at without wanting to cry in fear.

The lava-filled chasms snap shut behind me only to reopen elsewhere, as I lunge forward. Students scatter in terror as I pass, some frozen like they’re caught in pockets of slowed time.

I sprint across the courtyard, dodging panicked students and staff. The ground ripples beneath my feet like water now, Massive trees uproot themselves, floating impossibly in mid-air before crashing down, causing more chaos. The sky above MistHallow fragments, showing glimpses of alien stars and unfamiliar suns.

Can’t stop.

I’m a weapon of mass destruction, and the only way to protect everyone is to get as far away as possible.

The forest looms ahead, dark and ancient. Maybe there, I can contain this or at least minimise the damage. I push myself faster, my vampire speed taking me to the tree line in seconds, and I burst through the wards like they weren’t even there.

As I enter the forest, the trees respond to my presence. Branches reach for me, not threatening but almost reverent, recognising something primal within me. The ground beneath my feet stabilises slightly, the tremors lessening.

“The old magick recognises its own,” the Blood Queen whispers outside my head, all around me. “Nature bends to our will.”

I stumble to a halt in a small clearing, dropping to my knees. “Get out!”

“I am you, and you are me. There is no separation.”

The clearing around me shifts, reality thins. The stone circle materialises around me, the same one from my vision. Ancient, weathered monoliths rising from the forest floor.

“Do you understand now, Gaida? Do you understand what we are?”

The Blood Queen’s consciousness presses against my awareness with sudden urgency.

“You are?—”

“We,” she interrupts. “We are.”

I blink as the realisation hits me like a boulder to the head.

“Now you’re getting it. This is where they divided me. Where they stole what was rightfully mine.”

“You were the worlds. They split you. How is that possible? How are you a living thing?”

“Not a living thing, child. Something far greater.” The Blood Queen’s voice resonates through the clearing. “Before the worlds, before time itself, I was consciousness given form, energy with purpose.”

Each monolith in the stone circle glows with symbols that shift and change as I watch them. The forest around us recedes, replaced by swirling cosmic energy, stars being born and dying in rapid succession.

“The Primordial,” she continues. “The first thought that echoed through nothingness and created everything. I was the weaver of reality, the architect of existence.”

“Fuck,” I croak as visions crash through my mind of a singular consciousness expanding outward, creating galaxies, planets, life itself. Beauty and horror intertwined, creation and destruction in perfect balance. “We’ve got it all wrong.”

“Everyone does, all the time. I’m made out to be this monster.”

“You are a monster! You just killed that vampire!”

“He would’ve killed you. They worshipped my opposite, the bearer of the Blood Rights. The one who was supposed to keep the worlds separate.”

“Luke.”

“Hmm,” she mutters. “It seems he took what was yours, but that is only good. At no other time in history have the Blood Rights lived alongside us.”

“So what happened? Did you create the vampires to guard the veils like you said before?”

“I created others like myself, lesser beings, but powerful still to watch over the veils, to ensure that one day we could bind them back together, so that I could be whole again.”

“Are you split across the worlds?”

“In a manner of speaking, all vampires come from me.”

The stone circle trembles. The ground beneath me heaves. I dig my fingers into the earth, trying to anchor myself against the onslaught of revelations.

“Mashtar was the only one who remained loyal,” she whispers. “The only one who remembered our true purpose.”

“And what was that purpose?” I ask, trying to sort through the overwhelming stream of images and feelings flowing through me.

“To be whole again.” Her voice carries a longing so profound it makes my chest ache. “To end the suffering of separation.”

The cosmic visions swirling around us shift to show countless worlds, each vibrating at different frequencies, each containing versions of the same beings living different lives, making different choices.

“Every world is incomplete,” she continues. “Every reality is a fragment. Can you not feel how wrong this is? How the separation tears at the very fabric of existence?”

I can feel it now. A dissonance, like music played slightly out of tune. The worlds weren’t meant to be apart. Yet something doesn’t add up.

“If reuniting the worlds would be so wonderful, why did they stop you?”

“Because they feared the transition,” she says dismissively. “They couldn’t see beyond the momentary chaos to the harmony that would follow.”

“Momentary?” I challenge, watching worlds burn. “This looks pretty damn permanent.”

“Sacrifices must be made for the greater good.”

“And who decides what’s good? You?”

The Blood Queen’s presence grows colder. “I am the Primordial. Creation itself. Who better to decide?”

Something clicks into place. “That’s why I feel your power growing stronger near the academy. MistHallow sits at the convergence point of multiple worlds, doesn’t it? That’s why it was built here.”

“Yes,” she admits, a hint of admiration in her voice. “The founders knew what they were doing, though they sought to contain rather than release.”

The stone circle pulses with energy, each monolith representing a different world, a different reality. I can feel the connections between them, the invisible threads that bind them despite their separation.

“If I let you reunite the worlds, billions will die,” I say, my voice steadier than I feel. “I’ve seen the chaos-bringers you mentioned. They’re waiting in the spaces between worlds, aren’t they? Not trapped, but hungry. Patient.”

Her silence confirms my suspicion.

“They didn’t separate the worlds to protect them from the chaos-bringers,” I continue, the truth dawning on me. “The worlds were separated to protect them from you.”

“LIES!” she screeches, the forest around us warping with her rage. “They feared what they couldn’t understand! I would have created perfection!”

“At what cost?” I demand, standing my ground even when I realise that these aren’t visions I’m seeing but reality. The merging has started, and I am responsible for it. “How many lives is your ‘perfection’ worth?”

The Blood Queen’s form materialises fully before me now, her rage giving her substance. She looks like me, but twisted, her beauty sharp and cruel, her eyes burning with cosmic fire.

“All of them,” she hisses. “What are individual lives compared to the whole? The suffering of separation is greater than any momentary pain of reunification.”

“You’re wrong,” I say, standing to face her. “Each life matters. Each choice, each moment, that’s what makes existence beautiful.”

She laughs, the sound distorting reality around us. “Such human sentiment from one who is so much more. You disappoint me, Gaida.”

The boundaries between worlds thin. Through the spaces between the monoliths, I glimpse other versions of MistHallow. One is engulfed in flames, another submerged beneath an alien ocean, and a third is an obsidian structure shrouded in darkness that makes me shudder.

“I won’t let you do this,” I state firmly.

“You cannot stop what has already begun.” She extends her hand, power crackling between her fingers. “The process is irreversible now. The worlds will merge, with or without your cooperation.”

“Then why do you need me at all?” I challenge.

Her expression flickers, revealing something beneath the confidence.

Desperation.

“Because you’re not as powerful as you claim,” I taunt. “You need a vessel. A conduit.”

“I AM POWER!” she roars, the force of her voice flattening the trees around us.

But I see the truth behind her manipulations. “You’re trapped. Split between worlds, not here, not there…” I gesture to the creepy version of MistHallow. “You need me to channel enough power to complete the merger.”

Her eyes narrow. “Very clever. But it changes nothing. The process has begun, and you are the conduit whether you cooperate or not.”

“I’ll fight you,” I promise, clenching my fists. “Every step of the way.”

“Your resistance only makes the process more violent,” she warns, gesturing to the chaos spiralling outward from our circle. “Accept what you are, what we are, and the transition will be smoother. Fewer lives lost.”

“Don’t pretend you care about lives,” I spit. “I’ve seen what you truly want.”

A distant explosion draws my attention. Through the thinning veil, I can see MistHallow collapsing, towers crumbling as reality fractures around it. Students flee across the grounds, some disappearing as they cross boundaries between worlds that shouldn’t exist. I can’t tell if it is this MistHallow or another one.

My heart twists with guilt and fear. Luke, Dante, Felix—are they still alive? Are they searching for me?

My momentary distraction costs me.

The Blood Queen slams into my body and then simply merges with me, like a ghost possessing a body.

The scream that rips from my throat makes it bleed as the world twists and turns violently around me.

“Gaida!” Dante’s voice reaches me a second before he does, but an invisible barrier repels him.

Luke moves into view, battered, bloodied, but not broken. All three of them are here, alive. Luke gathers his magickal energy, gathering around his hands. “Release her.”

“I am not separate from her,” the Blood Queen replies through me. “I am her.”

Dante approaches the barrier cautiously. “Gaida, I know you can hear me. Fight her.”

“She cannot expel what is becoming part of her essence,” the Blood Queen taunts. “Soon there will be no separation between us.”

“You’re wrong,” Dante says firmly. “I know Gaida. She’s stronger than you ever could hope to be.”

Inside my mind, I struggle against the overwhelming force of the Blood Queen’s consciousness. Her memories flood through me, her certainty that the worlds must be reunited, her conviction that only she understands the true nature of reality.

Pushing back against her control with everything I have, for a brief moment, I reclaim my voice. “Dante!”

The Blood Queen reasserts control immediately, and Dante’s expression turns grim.

“We’ll find a way,” he promises. “Hold on, Gaida.”

The reality breaches widen, cold winds from alien worlds howl through the openings.

“Luke!” he shouts. “Can you contain her?”

“I’m trying,” he grunts, his magick sweeping around me but not getting near me.

Felix moves in beside him, clamping his hand around Luke’s wrist.

The magick wavers and then doubles up, cascading towards me and knocking me off my feet.

“Fools!” the Blood Queen cries as I hit the ground hard, my limbs tangled in a net of magick so fierce it burns my skin.

The worlds will be one again. As they were always meant to be.

Shut the fuck up, you hopeless bitch! My guys will destroy you even if they have to stake me to do it. You won’t live to see this happen!

I know my thoughts are true. I know they will do the right thing.