Page 50 of Swords of Soul and Shadow (Gate Chronicles #3)

His face visibly relaxed. “I saw you head up this way, but I wasn’t sure if you still needed time…I’m sorry. I just—I just—”

Hallie shook her head. While she might’ve begun her quest into the city earlier to find and talk with him about that, this wasn’t the time or the place.

Not when sudden cold filled her entire being and grew with each step she took into the Gate chamber.

The quaking was gone, but the fury still radiated from the Gate.

THUMP-THUMP.

Hallie screamed as pain drenched her body. The Gate—the heartbeat was coming from the Gate . She fell backward against the wall, her pack cushioning her.

“Hallie!” Niels bent down to her level, catching her by her shoulders. “What hurts?”

Why hadn’t her power stopped it that time? Why did it hurt so badly?

Niels didn’t look as if he was hit with anything. He just looked worried…and a little sweaty. How had he found her so quickly? Why hadn’t he caught up with her earlier?

She shook her head. “I…I think that’s the sword. Kainadr’s Shadow.”

Not one scholar believed the old Yalven folk tales were true…but the Cerl King did. And sure enough, a sword waited in the Gate.

Whether or not that was the sword wasn’t clear. But at this point, it would seem odder to Hallie if it wasn’t.

She knew from her last experience with the Gate that it would take in Yalvs and somehow transform them into swords.

She wasn’t sure why, and it was one thing she’d like to research further in the library, though she hadn’t been able to find anything in the week after Zeke died.

She and Kase had gone to research and read every single day and had found nothing.

But having a sword would only help her position. She knew nothing about sword fighting, but having any weapon was better than having none at all. Maybe she’d get lucky, and any opponent they came across also wouldn’t have a clue.

When she got back to Kyvena, she would ask Saldr about it.

She walked a little closer. The sword was dark as night with a nondescript cross guard.

A vivid red gem sat in the pommel—a ruby.

At the moment, Hallie couldn’t remember what gemstone Rodr’s had.

She didn’t think this was the same sword.

For one, Rodr’s sword had been made of Zuprium.

This one looked like it’d been forged from ink.

It hung in the middle of the archway. Her ears rang as she stared at it. She could have sworn it was singing her name.

She thought back to the legend of Kainadr and Xera, of the statues in the ruined valley temple. Could it really be? The stories never described the swords themselves, only that Xera and Kainadr gave themselves over to become swords to help Toro defeat Jagamot.

No scholar knew what happened to the swords afterward. It was the main reason many scholars put it down to a nice myth.

But this sword beckoned to her, like it was a part of her.

Without waiting to second-guess herself, she reached for the sword.

Her hand went through the odd golden water that didn’t feel like water, just like Ben had done back in the late autumn, just like her satchel with her copy of The Odyssey and sketchbook full of notes from her first journey to Tasava.

A torrent of invisible fire raced up her arm from where she stuck her hand into the Gate, grasping for the sword—but no matter how hard she pushed, she just couldn’t reach it.

The ground shook once more, but she gripped the bricks on one side of the Gate and refused to let her hand move.

She screamed at the anguish eating away at her flesh as her power responded and flooded the archway in a great whoosh.

Her fingers found the sword grip. She pulled. The sword came loose from whatever held it captive, and she stumbled backward. Niels caught her. She stiffened and tugged out of his hold as quickly as she could.

“Thanks,” she muttered as she inspected the weapon in her hand. The pain fell away like summer rain off the inn’s roof, and soon it was gone completely.

“What is that?”

The sword seemed to drink in the light from the Gate instead of reflecting it. It wasn’t too heavy. It felt just right in her hands.

“A myth,” Hallie whispered.

“I don’t understand.”

Hallie didn’t respond. The sword was cold, and her power responded only in the places where her skin touched the metal.

She observed the Gate. The sense of wrong was still there.

Her palm began to ache from where she held the sword.

She switched it to the other hand. The first grew cold; the one holding the weapon, hot.

She held it out to Niels. “Tell me what you feel.”

He hesitated, his mouth opening as if to say something, but he closed it sharply and took the weapon.

He held it awkwardly as if afraid it would attack.

He shrugged. “Just feels like a sword, not that I ever held one before.” He handed it back.

“Listen, Hal, I know this isn’t the best of times, but we gotta talk about what happened. ”

Hallie’s power responded to the sword once it was back in her hands. It wasn’t painful, only uncomfortable.

Niels waited. If she made eye contact, they’d have to have the conversation.

She didn’t want to. Not yet. Not when she had a mystery in her grasp and the world to save.

Maybe it was cowardly of her, but she only had so much bravery.

Even though she knew she had to break his heart.

It was only fair. Fair to him, her, Kase. Everyone. If only he hadn’t kissed her.

“Not now, Niels,” she pled.

“You know I only want you to be happy.”

Hallie closed her eyes for a moment, the outline of the sword painted on the back of her eyelids. She gripped it tightly to keep herself grounded.

Niels didn’t pick up on the hint. “Can we please just talk about it?”

Hallie didn’t loosen her grip on the sword, but she looked up at last. His eyes, ones she knew better than her own, were soft and pleading.

Regret flooded her veins. No matter what had happened three years ago, she was the one who had left.

She was the one who had made them near-strangers.

That part wasn’t his fault. She worried her lip a second before she whispered, “I’m sorry. ”

He took a step forward, his hand finding her upper arm. He held it lightly and bent to look in her eyes. She didn’t move out of his grip, but she avoided his gaze.

“Look…I tried, all right? I thought I was able to move on, but after these last few months of horror I’ve been through…and then you show up and get kidnapped by the Cerls, and I thought…I can’t help it, Hal. I will always love you.”

Hallie swallowed, taking a small step back.

Niels’ hand fell back to his side. She shook her head and finally looked him back in the eyes once more.

He had lines around his eyes that hadn’t been there when she’d left three years ago.

A few scars peppered his brow; another snaked out from the corner of his lip.

That one had been courtesy of Jack. All three of them had been throwing snowballs, and a rock got balled up in one of them.

Jack had felt terrible. Hallie had ripped a bit of cloth from her skirt to help stop the bleeding.

Hallie’s mother hadn’t been impressed with the added mending to her already full basket.

The ones on his brow could’ve been from the mines, or maybe they were from the years she hadn’t been home. She would never know, and that was okay. She had survived a few scrapes of her own since that she might never tell him about.

Stars, she’d gone on a whole death-defying mission in the fall that had gifted her a whole litany of new scars she’d rather not dwell on. There was only one person who could understand who she was now, who she’d become.

That man was not Niels Metzinger, no matter how much he wanted it to be.

Her thumb traced the sword pommel. A flush crept up her neck and onto her cheeks. “I…I can’t do this. Not now.”

“You keep saying that.”

“Niels, we’ve grown up. I’m not the Hallie you knew. I’ll never be her again.”

There. She’d said something, at least.

“Kase doesn’t know you like I do.” Niels rubbed the heel of his palm against the side of his head, almost as if he had a headache. He found her eyes once again. “He couldn’t protect you, but I can. I would’ve never let the Cerls kidnap you.”

Hallie’s mouth fell open, heat pounding against the wall. Niels had no idea. Absolutely no idea. He didn’t even realize how clueless he was. “I don’t need protecting.”

“Correa tortured you, forced those powers upon you. I wouldn’t have let it happen.”

“He would’ve killed you.”

Niels stepped closer, his face too close to hers. She couldn’t go back any further. “And I would’ve happily died if that meant you were safe.”

If this were a romance novel, Hallie knew the heroine would’ve grabbed him by the shirt and kissed him senseless. But this wasn’t some fantasy romance. This was reality. This was gritty and real and nothing like a book.

Hallie had something real, and it wasn’t anything bought with cheap flowers and over-the-top confessions of love.

She slid sideways away from him. “Kase nearly did.” Despite her best effort, her words came out choked, but that didn’t stop her.

“He’s my match in every way, and he sees me for my strengths, for my flaws, for everything I am.

He challenges me. Encourages me. Drives me to be better than I am instead of wishing I’d go back to being the same old Hallie. ”

“I never said that! I just…you’ve never even given me the chance to show you…” Niels took in a breath. “I’d been saving money. Enough to go to Kyvena. To find you.”

Shock radiated through her. She turned, her mouth dropping open slightly. “What?”

“Took me a few years, but I finally had enough. And then the attack happened.”

Her heart fluctuated between shock, fear, and anger. The latter won out. “And why do you think showing up in the capital would’ve changed anything?”