Page 82 of The Shadowed Oracle (The Bonded Worlds #1)

Chapter Forty-Four

The visions had been sharp cuts into Ingrid’s psyche up to that moment. The emotions and hopes and dreams and memories of others were forced upon her in unwanted surges, striking her like physical blows.

But this…

This vision was different, controlled, almost offering itself to her.

In the fraction of a second it took her to realize it was whirling toward her, she’d recognized it, welcomed it, then snatched it from the air.

And like slipping into a warm bath, Queen Enitha’s memories began to wash over her.

She saw a full moon in the sky, illuminating a young female sitting on a dock.

The girl seemed comfortable, spent most nights right there, alone but not lonely.

She did not get lonely, not in the traditional sense of the word.

She was obsessive, full of desire and passion, but she was not whole enough to experience true longing.

For something had broken in her, snapped and shattered to pieces in a time long ago, in a kingdom far away, before she’d even reached her fifth year.

That was when it all changed.

Ingrid’s visions took her across the beautiful world of Ealis, over rolling hills and lush forests and sparkling lakes, curiously ending up on yet another dock.

This one was larger and far more populated.

Even on this cold and late night, soldiers were scattered everywhere.

And in the middle of them, stood Enitha, so young and innocent that she was almost unrecognizable.

The vision pushed Ingrid closer. She saw Enitha’s small, pale hand stretch out, reaching toward someone for help. She saw Enitha cry and kick and scream as she was loaded onto a war vessel full of those armored guards.

And then Ingrid saw who Enitha was calling out to.

He was a dark-featured man with onyx, soulless eyes. His long grey hair fanned out over his cloak as he turned. With how pitiful Enitha’s cries were, even Ingrid thought he would glance back. Just one final look before his daughter was gone forever.

But the man didn’t so much as slow his pace as he travelled back down the long road to his castle. And back to his throne. His magic. His army. His power, in that legendary city carved into the mountains.

It was Makkar.

Enitha’s father… was Makkar. Estranged, but not forgotten.

The pain he’d caused her—it was what drove her to seek dominion of her own.

To prove to her father that she would not be a burden.

That her power would be an asset, and not a liability.

That after all, it was power, and not a curse.

Not a blemish on his name, or a blight that frightened his council members and his peers—back when Makkar was an inexperienced ruler himself, and still had to worry about such trivial things as appearances.

That curse. The reason she was sent away from her family and placed in a loveless home in the Isles. That burden she bore. She’d turned it into her greatest strength. It was how she’d single-handedly cut off the great kingdom of Maradenn’s trade routes to Iberium.

The Hydra. Enitha didn’t control it. She was the beast before them. Another form, another body. That was her true power, her gift and her curse. The one she’d been born with. So entwined with who she was, who she’d always been, that no poison or spell could rid her of it, even temporarily.

The monster before them—it was Enitha.

She was the last obstacle keeping them from freedom.

The visions slowly faded. Enitha’s past gave way to Ingrid’s present.

Her surroundings became clear again, but moving in extreme slow motion.

Dean, Raidinn, Lucilla and Tyla were running toward her, their arms outstretched, their hair frozen in mid-air, and their lips stretched so wide with screams it looked painful.

Time had changed for everyone and everything around her.

She’d had signs of this rift in space when her vision of Francesca surfaced, but she’d ignored them.

The ability to slow time itself never even occurred to her.

Dean hadn’t mentioned Karis possessing anything of the sort, and she hadn’t read anything like it in her books.

No, this was something else, some defense mechanism, protecting her when she was seized by her gift—not a branch of her abilities, but a symptom of her magic awakening.

Because it was awakening.

Before that vision she had welcomed in could leave, she’d reached out a mental hand and gripped the magic it rode in on, gently caressing it. Offering herself up to it, just like the vision had invited her. Not demanding or angrily grasping at it. Simply welcoming it, and hoping it would accept.

“ Get back! ”

“ Ingrid! ”

“ INGRID! ”

Time was catching up. Enitha—the Hydra drew closer to her, and the world around her rapidly gained pace. Those cautious words from her friends, meant to protect her, putting her safety above their own, were now audible.

And so she answered.

“I found it.”

Reaching in those dormant quadrants of her being where her power had been hiding—compartments that were now open, in sight, and within her reach—she would earn back what was taken.

All of Ingrid’s anger, and her pain, and her longing, and her joy, and her brief moments of peace, and her sadness and loneliness and everything else in between, it washed away in a torrent as the very essence of her soul began to forge the magic within.

Her body went weightless. Not numb, but transcending the form she’d been stuck in on Earth for those long years.

She embodied pure and thoughtless bliss.

The only sensation in her entire body was a faint rumble, a small vibration of encouragement, as if all who’d come before her, all who had ever been called Oracle were there with her.

Those ancestors, blood kin or not, brothers and sisters of the sight, they were behind her now. Together.

They offered Ingrid their power, their assurances, their undying love, and a comforting hand on her shoulder. As if saying, “Let it in. Then become it.”

With the words, her father’s necklace began to shine.

The light formed in a circular shield around the ship, becoming so bright that the Hydra’s heads flinched back at the power inside.

It was an all-consuming white at first, then tinted with shades of pink and finally red.

The same red she’d been ridiculed for, stared at and hunted for.

Her eyes. Her real eyes. Tears filled them now as she raised her arms and touched the beaming light coming from the viseer stone.

The Hydra couldn’t penetrate it. The power of it was too strong.

Her father’s power, she thought, the last thing he'd given her before leaving. He was like her. A hunted wielder of the rarest kind. An Oracle. He must’ve been.

She could feel him. She could sense his energy among all those benevolent souls guiding her.

He was guiding her. Protecting her. Helping her in that last step to unlocking her own magic.

Bracing herself, palms down to Ealis, drawing from the Mother herself, she closed her eyes and filled the voids keeping her from complete control.

A wielder divided internally will never be whole enough to send their power into the external world.

That vague and frustrating excerpt she’d read in Maradenn, it was so clear now. It was the parts of her she’d tried to repress, forget, bury deep inside. That’s what was missing. She needed to acknowledge the past versions of herself, needed to grieve for them and all they’d been through.

And finally, forgive herself.

Forgive herself.

Forgive herself.

She pictured that baby girl born in a world that was not her own.

The toddler who’d been moved like stolen property for fear of who might find her, might recognize what she had inside her.

That six-year-old girl who’d been left to fend for herself, fighting off monsters and nightmares before she even knew what her own last name was.

And that ambitious girl, barely twenty, alone in a new city, looking for anything to numb the pain.

Any form of escape. Anything to forget who she was, what she’d been through, what was taken away, and what she’d always had to fight against.

“It’s okay,” she whispered to them—to herself. “It’s all going to be okay. We’re together now.”

And then she unleashed.

Pure thrumming power exploded in every direction.

In seconds, the Shades were gone, hissing and burning and squealing in the light before finally turning to dust. Once her greatest fear, vaporized with just a thought.

Ingrid looked to the Hydra, to Enitha, ready to unleash again, but Enitha snapped down with one of her mighty jaws toward the ship at that very moment. The viseer stone shuddered, bending at the blow. Ingrid recovered, dug into the well of her magic again to strike.

Another stream of magic flowed from her, and with it came another disembodied voice calling out in warning.

She needed to rest. Recharge. Not long, only a minute or so.

The red energy from the necklace still brimmed with power, buying her time.

Keeping her and her friends safe while she regained her strength.

A hand—far more real, and far more familiar rested again on Ingrid’s shoulder.

“It’s beautiful,” Dean said. He sighed, then laughed in an exhaustive, deep breath of relief. “You’re doing it, Ingrid! You’re… you’re doing it.” He laughed harder, freer, his voice cracking and raw as he spoke. “What do you need me to do!? Where?—”

“Stay behind me,” Ingrid ordered.

“Yes, ma’am! Anything else!?”

Ingrid kept her hands to the sky, waiting for the power tingling in her fingertips to build. She had a simple plan for when it returned to her, but stumbled when she realized Dean and the others didn’t know what they faced was Enitha, and not just another mindless killing machine.