Page 27 of Voices in the Stars (The Lost Witch #1)

I ran from her. I tried to hide my shaking hands as I marched toward the set of doors next to the stairs. Her cries didn’t start until I opened the doors. My eyes closed as I felt my heart give a painful squeeze. Taking a deep breath, I made my way into Ezryn’s room.

The doors slammed shut behind me. I leaned against the wood, running my hands up my face, grabbing at the base of my horns.

I’d been deceived. It shouldn’t have been a shocking revelation at this point.

If there was one thing my father was good at, it was being a terrible creature.

Her very existence proved that. The last of the witches, due to the power-hungry slaughter Eris commenced.

He wanted no one to be able to defy him.

“You look like shit,” Ezryn commented

I opened my eyes to glare at the Elf. He sat at the desk that took up most of the center of the room.

Bookshelves lined the back wall of the room.

They were filled with maps from across Alryne.

I’d spent several days pouring over these maps myself on restless nights, trying to find more people to join my fight.

Ezryn was looking for someone, as well. It was why he had a map spread out across his desk now.

The two islands shown made up Feycrest with its large river that we were traveling through now.

There were red marks crossed through the ports he had already traveled through.

A large circle around the port outside of the city Kilrest. Where I was taking Cece.

Where my father waited for us. My stomach twisted at that thought.

“If I asked you to go back to the last port, would you?” I asked, making my way to one of the beds that were shoved against the other two walls.

His head shot up from where he was looking over the drawn-out map. His eyes narrowed even as his silver hair draped across his face. The tips of his ears twitched as he looked over me.

“No” was all he said before turning his head back down.

I laid back against the bed, crossing my arms under my head, staring up at the wooden beams. Certain things about her story made no sense.

I squeezed my eyes shut. There was no guessing what he wanted her for.

He needed her to call the gods so he could absorb their power and strip power from the rest of Alryne, like he’d done with Feycrest.

She spoke of a family, though. It made no sense. There should have been no one left. I was a small child, but I remembered the destruction in the temple of Kilrest as he killed all of them. Only two survived. A father and his baby.

The father’s body was found many nights after.

No one ever knew what happened to the child.

I assumed, like everyone else, she died somewhere along their escape.

Until I was sent to bring her back to her home in Kilrest. She’d been in hiding for over twenty years.

The question was where. There were only a few places where it would be possible, but her lack of knowledge of anything narrowed it down to one.

“Do you remember anything about Donnaway?” I asked Ezryn, tilting my head back to look at him.

He laughed along with the rustling of paper as he rolled it back up. His answer didn’t come until it had been nestled back onto the shelves.

“Yes, I imagine I’ve heard the same as you. Whispered rumors with no truth to back them up.”

“Do you think it exists?” I continued.

“Do I think it’s possible for a bunch of magicless humans to be hiding somewhere?” The boards creaked as he walked across to the other side of the room, sitting on the bed, hands on his knees as he stared at me. “Did you knock a horn loose while out there?”

I chuckled before sitting up, leaning against the wall. “Amuse me.”

“No.” His earrings jingled as he shook his head. “With your father, I think he would’ve found them no matter where they were hiding.”

I glanced toward the door. What he was saying made sense.

The humans were a weak race that Eris wanted nowhere near even the existence of magic.

He felt their presence drained the power from everyone else, making them dangerous.

Another excuse for him to kill. Another reason why he had to be stopped.

“You’ve looked through many maps in your years,” I commented, fuzzy memories of seeing crudely drawn maps piecing together as I spoke. It’d been so many years, the chances I was remembering them correctly were slim.

“You know why.” His voice was curt.

I nodded, not wanting to fight over him chasing after a ghost right now. “Then certainly you remember what was on them.”

“I remember a misprint outside the town of Lachlan,” he commented.

That was Klyn’s town. The same place we found her wandering through the forest. I tried to keep my hope tampered down as he confirmed what I was thinking. There used to be another town there. What that meant for her, I wasn’t sure. It certainly meant I was a piece of shit.

“I see where your mind is going, Atlas,” he said with a sigh. “I’ve been around much longer than you. Those forests were heavily searched. No one found anything.”

I wanted to agree with him, but I remembered Klyn’s words. He found the city disguised at the warlock that led the coven. That couldn’t be a coincidence. I refused to believe it.

“What if...” I started explaining instead, looking back to Ezryn, fully prepared to be laughed at. “What if I told you the proof of their existence was on your ship?”

Ezryn almost doubled over as he laughed at me. The sound bounced around the room as I gritted my teeth.

“You have got to be kidding me,” he finally choked out. “You’d rather believe in tales than realize she’s a lost cause working for your father?”

“You have no room to speak of tales,” I hissed back. “You’re searching all of Alryne for a ghost.”

Ezryn jumped up at my words, marching over to where I sat. My eyes trained on his every movement. From the twitch of his ears down to where his hand moved closer to the sword that dangled from his hip. I’d liked to think the friendship we had wouldn’t end in violence.

“Keep your fanged mouth shut about her.” He bent down, inches from my face. I grimaced as the scent of fish wafted from him. “I’m looking for an innocent woman. You’re letting pussy lead you to our demise.”

I grabbed his throat before pushing him to the ground as I stood, baring my teeth at him as he laid sprawled out of the floor.

His green eyes were wide as he stared up at me.

I could smell the fear pulsing from him with his heartbeat.

It sang to me as I stared at the pulsing points in his neck.

I could feel the draw of the power. My ancestors begging me to follow in their footsteps.

All that kept it at bay was the stench of death coming from his blood.

My nose crinkled at it. I closed my eyes, taking a few deep breaths before standing.

“Gods help us,” he called from where he stayed down, hands now thrown over his face. “You’re going to let her kill us all.”

I rolled my eyes at his theatrics now. “Gonna make me explain this to you while you’re on the ground?”

“Depends on if you’re going to attack me again.”

I shrugged, sitting back on the bed, watching him roll on the ground. “I might.”

He just stared up at me before standing, crossing his arms as he looked down at me, quickly giving me a gesture to continue.

“She has no idea who she is.” I got straight to the point before recounting parts of the journey here.

Her lack of control over any of the many powers she wields.

How little she knew about the world around us.

Ending with the conversation we had just a few minutes prior when she begged me to take her back to a family that shouldn’t exist.

Ezryn just stared at me. His eyes getting increasingly wider the more I talked. His hands dropped to his sides. He leaned back against the desk, crumbling some of the papers he still had sitting out underneath him.

“You have to kill her,” he whispered.

“Are you insane?” I jumped up, one hand on my dagger while the other gestured to where I was certain she was still sitting outside.

“What happened to the talk about innocent women? She is one, as well. What do you except from me? Go out there and shove her into the Saliss? Watch her drown or get eaten?”

“Yes.” He nodded, eyes solemn as he looked back up to me. “Her not knowing is worse than her being aware of what’s going on.”

“How?” I asked, confused. He had spent so much of his life trying to fix one mistake. How could he tell me to discard her over something that wasn’t her fault? “I can take her back to Donnaway. Or, at least, close enough that she can find her way back.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” Ezryn snapped back at me. “Eris already knows you have her. He would never let you get that far.”

“What do you recommend, then?” I asked before quickly holding a hand up to him. “Besides killing her.”

“Listen, Atlas, I’m being completely serious,” Ezryn started before pacing in front of the desk.

“If she knew what was happening, then there would be a way to reason with her. Get her to join our side instead and help against your father. She doesn’t even know what she is capable of.

She is going to get manipulated and used.

It’s going to end with Eris getting the power of the gods on his side.

He will obliterate everything in Alryne with her help. ”

“You don’t know that.” Even I could tell my argument was weak as I shook my head. He was simply saying what I had thought just days before.

Ezryn walked up to me, placing both hands on my shoulders.

“Killing her would be a mercy. You know what he is capable of. What he will do to her. Especially once he learns how moldable she would be.”

“I’ll think about it.” The lie twisted in my stomach as the words left my lips. They seemed to satisfy Ezryn as he let go of me.

“Sleep on it, then. You’ll see that I’m right,” he commented, laying back down in his bed.

I sat back down as our conversation ran through my mind.

The gentle swaying of the ship was doing nothing do relax me.

I couldn’t kill her. I knew myself well enough.

Even when I thought of her as a cold-blooded murderer, I couldn’t do it.

No matter what murderous tendencies I had deep within my soul, I wouldn’t be able to do this.

Movement caught my eye out of the window next to me.

Cece was staring at the open water; the wind whipped her hair around her face.

She was turned just enough that I could see the sunlight brightening her face.

Her green eyes shone like the precious gemstones that men spent their entire lives looking for.

Staring at her now, I could see why they’d want to.

Something about her called out to me and I was getting tired of running from it.

My eyes shut as I laid back on the bed. I didn’t deserve to stare at her now after everything I’d done.

There had been true fear in her eyes this entire time.

It felt like someone plunged a knife into my chest as I thought about it.

All this time, I believed I was doing what was right.

To protect everyone. Instead, I had just been tormenting a woman who had no idea what was happening to her.

No more. I’d protect her from now on. From my father. Hell, even from myself if I needed to.