Page 66

66

The Honors

JEDIDIAH

T he inside of the mountain was infested with shadows. Sentient, yearning shadows. Oddly, they weren’t that aggressive. They hissed when they sensed me but never lashed out. They took no real form; besides a few spiders I’d seen scuttle up the walls. Most of them were just writhing masses, like tentacles or vines.

They were searching for him.

Fucking creepy. But also somehow sad.

The sorrowful shadows reminded me of what I’d seen when I fell into the darkness. I desperately wanted to block it out. But the memories stabbed the backs of my eyes, forcing me. Forcing me to admit the truth.

The face under that gold mask…

Young Solaris, forced to choose. Forced to watch .

A violent tremor ran through me.

“Focus,” I told myself. I searched every hall, every room. The skeletal remains of San Gabriel Academy offered nothing much. Though, I was surprised to find that on one of the lower levels, there was a room left mostly untouched. A medieval-looking kitchen. With a cast iron stove and counters lining the walls. I stared into the dark room for a minute before moving on.

From down a set of dark stairs, I could hear a faint whirring sound. Like…water?

“What?” I muttered to myself. I cast fire over my palm to light the way as I gingerly descended. Down the curving stairs about three stories. At the bottom, the air was hot and moist. It smelled damp. I stepped into the dim, cavernous space, walking down a narrow corridor, the cave opened up to reveal a small body of crystal blue water. It knocked me back a step, but curiosity got me. I moved toward it, my flaming hand held out. Glowing crystals clustered under the surface as a source of natural light. A small waterfall ran down the far side of the cave, feeding the pool with fresh water. I crouched down and dared to dip a finger in. The water was warm.

A hot spring.

“Wow,” I muttered. It had to be a natural hot spring, but there were additions. A smooth, polished stone floor wrapped around the pool, as well as a ledge under the perimeter of the water which served as a seat.

I wanted to strip and jump in, but I didn’t deserve the reprieve. I cataloged this discovery and moved on, back up the stairs.

I couldn’t shake the idea that I was still missing something, though. It made no sense; it was just a feeling. He had left something important behind in the obliteration of San Gabriel.

Back on the higher level, I found the room that Solaris had been in last time. I searched every inch, but it was utterly bare.

I was kidding myself. There was nothing to find.

I sighed in defeat and went back to Nyx. She sat on the floor between the fireplace and Solaris. Her knees tucked into her chest with her hands folded over them, her cheek resting on her knuckles.

She stared into the flames. When she sensed me standing in the doorway, she turned slowly. The emotion painted on her face fucking gutted me. A sorrow so deep, looking into it felt like being washed out to sea. There was a flicker of something else, though. A curiosity.

My eyes scanned the room. “What happened? Who was here?”

Nyx blinked. “The dragon.”

My shoulders slumped in relief. “Oh. Good. Good.”

She stood. Lava spread through my veins as I eyed her. Her tight, high braid. Dragon leathers, skin coated in blood and ash, battle weighing heavy in her eyes. Yet all her wounds had healed, even the ones that had been tainted with venom. Her flesh wasn’t marred with bite wounds or stab wounds. Besides the grime of battle, she was completely intact.

Looking at her now, I couldn’t believe she was real. A dainty but fearsome creature who had just attempted to take on an entire army alone. For—us.

We didn’t deserve her.

“Did you find anything?” she asked me.

“Kinda.” I dared to move into the room, keeping my eyes fastened upward, focusing on Nyx and not the body at her feet. “I found the bones of a kitchen. It’s empty but there’s a stove and counters and stuff. Also, a hot spring, way down on a lower level. And…the place is infested with shadows. It’s weird, though. They’re relatively docile.”

She quirked a brow. “Docile shadows?”

“Yeah.”

“Well.” She mulled that one over. “It could be worse.”

We stood, only a few feet apart. The air grew tight and full between us. She bit her lip and looked away.

“Nyx…” Where the fuck could I even start? “Everything that went down before—the way that all came to a head, I—”

“Don’t,” she muttered, waving me off. “It’s fine.”

“No. It is not fucking fine.”

“It is,” she snapped. “It has to be. I’m not going to sit around and fucking dwell on all the secrets you kept from me. Drugs, vampire hunting, secret evil siblings. You don’t trust me, Jedidiah. And I don’t blame you. So don’t worry about it. You don’t owe me anything. I always chose to be open with you but that’s on me. You don’t owe me the same back.”

My heart cracked. “It’s not like that. It was never like that. It wasn’t about you, Nyx. It was me—I felt so—fuck.” I swallowed hard, attempting to gather the words to relay my inner turmoil. “Everything has just been so out of control. Ever since he showed up.” I gestured to Solaris without looking at him. “Since the twins died. Ever since my father pushed me off the mountain. It’s like I haven’t stopped falling and everything is just so out of my fucking control, I can’t stand it. I wanted to be strong for you. I never wanted you to see me that way.”

Her shoulders rose and fell, her face twisted. She searched between my eyes.

Hers fell to the floor and she nodded. “I get it.”

No, she didn’t.

Blood leaked from the split through my heart, pooling in my body like hot lead.

“You’re brothers,” she breathed. So quietly, as if she were speaking to herself. “I cannot unsee it now. Twin daggers, one forged in earth and flame; the other in water and darkness. So different, yet somehow, the same.”

My fists clenched at my sides. I forced myself to breathe deeply and not snap. She was going through a lot. Bound to be uncouth and delusional here and there. “We are not the same.”

She glanced up at me. “No?”

“No.”

She stared at me and I had to look away. Into the flames roaring under the mantle.

She changed the subject carefully, drawing my eyes back to hers. “I feel something. Not a kitchen or a hot spring. Something else. Something he left untouched.”

I nodded. “Yeah. I thought the same. But I looked everywhere and there was nothing but shadows and stone.”

She was thoughtful for a moment. “Solaris likes to hide things. Take me to the room you found him in last time.”

I did. We walked silently through the dark halls. She peered at the shadow creatures writhing along the corners and cracks, but she said nothing.

We stared into the dark chamber Solaris had led me to with his pain. It remained untouched, utterly frozen in time. There was a glass door to a snowy terrace. A few unlit lanterns on the walls. And then, nothing.

She ventured inside, her gaze sweeping over every inch.

“Something is in here,” she muttered. “I’m sure of it.”

Nyx flicked her wrist and cast all the lanterns aglow. The pulsing orange light gave us just enough to see all four corners of the long, barren room. She moved to a wall, her fingers brushing along the stone.

I watched her pensively.

“Help me,” she said. “Feel around. See if you find a groove or something. Look for a door. Big or small.”

“A door?” My lips twisted with incredulity.

“Yes.”

We searched every inch of the stone walls for a ridiculous amount of time. I grew extremely doubtful quickly but kept looking for her sake. The only thing we stumbled upon was a single wingback chair in the back corner, a pile of black jackets and cloaks hanging over it. It intrigued me enough to put my all into a thorough search. Once half a clock spin tolled by and without any other discoveries, though, I gave up. “There’s nothing, Nyx.”

She remained as stubborn as ever. “There is.”

“Okay.” I bit my tongue. Stopped to watch her. Those dark brows were permanently narrowed over her hyper-focused eyes. With all that hair tied up high and out of her face, her narrow features were even more elvan and otherworldly. Thin fingers brushed along the stone in the farthest corner, determination etched into her very being.

“I’m close,” she insisted. “There’s something—ah! Jed, come here! Feel this!”

I curiously obliged. Let her grab my hand and guide my fingers to a spot on the wall. I felt it right away—the thin groove. We shared a questioning look.

She sucked in a sharp breath and held out her hand, fingers splayed. Gold flames flickered behind her dark gaze as she summoned the opening to reveal itself with her kinetic power. Groaning of stone on stone before a heavy door jarred open.

Holy fuck. She was right.

“Yes!” she hissed excitedly, darting through the opening without a second thought.

I lunged in after her, a cry of protest leaving my lips. Crazy, reckless woman. We were met with heavy darkness. Chills whispered across my forearms.

Nyx summoned fire over her fist like a torch.

The cool light emitting from her extended hand revealed a room that had been left intact after all. My breath caught, my jaw going slack as I straightened my spine and gawked around. A smaller space, with a long, elaborate table in the middle. A high table with tall chairs. An unlit fireplace under a giant, ornate mantle. Maps upon maps were pinned chaotically to a board on the wall. Shelves and shelves of books. A writing desk. Eight gold globes were placed randomly around the room, each caged in rings. A window, surprisingly. Dusty, unlit candles clustered on all surfaces.

Nyx banished her flame, casting the candles and the fireplace alive instead. She prowled forward like a jungle cat through tall grass. Slowly, taking in the entirety of her surroundings with obsessive calculation.

“A war room.” I stated the obvious.

“San Gabriel had a fucking war room.” Nyx’s tone dripped with dark incredulity. “Of course he kept this.”

I stayed close to the door.

“Oh, my Goddess,” she said as she rounded the table. “I’ve seen this before.”

My face warped. “What? How?”

“Come here.”

I did. I stood beside her, taking in the severe details of the table. Black, live edged wood. Carved into the top of it, was a map of the city. Certain sites were lit up with magic. And on the outskirts of it all…my father’s island.

“What the fuck?” I muttered, shaking my head.

Nyx fluttered over to the bookshelf, running her fingers along the wood. She read some titles aloud. “ The Art of War. Paradise Lost. Mein Kampf .” She made a face, glancing back at me quickly. “Jesus… Oh, speaking of Him. The Holy Bible .” I watched her, both of us noticing the carved wooden creatures placed among the books. She grabbed one, a dragon. Angled it around, her expression introspective. She put it back and continued to peruse, snagging when she came upon a thick red leather-bound book.

It seemed to wind her.

“What is it?” I asked, moving closer.

“This is the book Solaris took from the Secret Library.”

My fists clenched at my sides, trying not to think too hard about how he’d brought her halfway across the world to the most dangerous Sacred Site on the planet.

She looked up at me, and her expression unleashed a flurry of blind moths desperately trying to escape the pit of my stomach.

“Jed.”

I swallowed. “Yeah?”

The fire under the mantle crackled and spat. She stared at me, as if searching for the words. “What did you see in the shadows?”

My mouth opened. I shut it, though. Looked away from her, into the flames.

What did I see? How could I explain it? How could I ever say those fucking words out loud? Describe the imagery, the feeling…

“The boy in the white room?” she probed, her voice a raspy little whisper.

My eyes burned. My throat felt like it had a stick lodged in it. I put the heels of my hands over my eyes, rubbing until I saw whirling psychedelic patterns.

“Jed?” Her voice had gone up an octave.

“I don’t know. I don’t know. I can’t—I don’t know.”

“Okay,” she said. “Hey. It’s okay. You don’t have to tell me.”

And then her warm body was against mine. I released a ragged breath that was almost a sob, my arms instantly around her. I held her there, her cheek pressed against my chest. She clung to me. We embraced and said nothing. I kept swallowing, blinking away the burning in my eyes.

Her spine steeled abruptly, her chin perking up and to the side as if she’d heard a sound. In the same instant, a stone dropped into my chest cavity. A change in the air—a sudden urgency I couldn’t explain.

“Something’s happening to him.” She spoke matter-of-factly before turning to dart out of the hidden room.

We ran to find Solaris’s body—engulfed in shadows.

As if every one of them that had been dwelling inside the mountain was drawn to him. Their hisses and cries filled the air like dark mist. Writhing black figures trying to spool their way inside of him. Through his eyes, his mouth. His nose. His mutilated wrists, even.

“No!” Nyx shrieked, summoning her bright flames over both hands.

The shadows reared back and cried out. In protest.

They wanted back into him and were growing weak and desperate. But with his connection to magic cut off, the link was impossible. All the shadows were doing was infecting him.

“This is not the way,” Nyx declared to the living darkness. “You’re hurting him. There will be no vessel left for you if you continue this invasion!”

The shadows shrieked, furious and disobedient. They stayed unaggressive, despite their anger, spindling through the room like rivers. Lurking above Solaris’s body, despairingly trying to enter and find solace in a container once more.

“LEAVE!” Nyx commanded “Before I exile you to the void!”

The shadows merged into one hostile entity before rippling like a giant sound wave. The shadows filled the air with a low hum and electric charge.

Now this came off as aggressive.

I growled and summoned my fire. Swiped my hand to conjure it like a blade through the room, severing and burning the mass of the dark body threatening her. It screamed as it split in half. Its edges burned inward, forcing it to disperse into a hundred different little creatures that immediately retreated into the corners. Hissing ruefully as they slithered back into the cracks of our world.

Nyx shot me a flat glare. “I was trying to spare them.”

“I don’t mind doing the honors.”

“They’re just sad and lost. That was mean.”

My face crumpled. I didn’t know how to respond to that. It didn’t matter, though, because Nyx was worlds away. She stared down at Solaris, her eyes unfocused. Then she stepped closer to him. Stood right over him, no words on her lips or expression in her eyes.

Dazed, she waved her hands above him. “He needs fire.”

“What—”

Solaris combusted.

Some intelligible yell tore out of me.

Nyx remained unfazed. Watching, transfixed.

At first, his body didn’t burn. He stayed perfectly unharmed for several minutes as the fire rose high and danced all over him. Then a loud pop happened. After that, he burned. His skin blistered and melted off the bone. A gruesome process to behold but I didn’t take my eyes off him as it happened. Not even when he was a pile of thick dark ash.

“I shall remake him once more.”