Page 32 of When Death Called Life Home (When Deities Awaken #1)

Chapter 32

Taken

ASCIAN

A silence settled over the forest and the Scholars Academy as Ascian moved through the space to get breakfast. Alora would be meditating, or almost finished by now, and he wanted to get their food ready before she headed to her energy training with Riven.

She’d grown so focused the last few days. After letting herself risk forgetting him, and the memories staying, she’d taken to finding different spots around the Academy to try and limit her boredom. Emptying her mind hadn’t been practical for her. Alora needed to organise it, and that was easier, supposedly, when she had background noise to focus on. That background noise couldn’t involve Ascian’s voice, though. She’d made that perfectly clear when he’d moved to join her the second day.

Ascian didn’t register the silence at first, his mind too narrowed in on finding where Alora decided to meditate today. He tried the library first, as he always did. Zillah, once again, glared at him when the smell of his food wafted into her space. She at least confirmed she hadn’t seen Alora enter the library before she promptly kicked him out.

He tried her and Riven’s training room next. Perhaps she’d already started, finished her meditation early, but it was empty of both Riven and her. No new scorch marks charred the walls to signal they were ever there in the last few hours. Ascian frowned. His gaze shifted to the window and the fallen tree trunk where Alora liked to go when the weather remained nice. Empty. Even with the sun beaming down over it.

The plates of food were forgotten in the training room as Ascian headed back to the library and stopped before Zillah. “You definitely haven’t seen Alora this morning?”

She lifted her eyes to meet his, wide and surprised. He didn’t question what her surprise was at, didn’t have the room in his brain to. “No. I didn’t realise I was meant to be keeping an eye on her.”

Ascian narrowed his eyes into a glare. “You notice more than you let people know, Zillah. You haven’t seen her at all today?”

“Alora?” Riven’s deep voice asked as he rounded the corner and headed towards them. “She was headed to the forest this morning to meditate. Said to give her an extra hour.”

Weight dropped on Ascian’s chest, his lungs struggling to pull in oxygen. “She’s not there.”

Riven paused as he assessed Ascian. His jaw worked, fingers flexing around the book he held before he set it on the desk next to Zillah. “Zillah, go get Maelo.” Zillah shot up and around the desk, disappearing within a second. “Ascian, she’ll be fine. She has access to her energy now, and I hear she’s been doing well in physical combat.”

“That won’t matter if she’s caught unawares,” he snapped back. “Every novice here wants us dead. Word has spread about my abandoning the Elders, and about us searching for a way to be rid of them.”

“And she’s the weaker target.”

“No,” Ascian grunted. “She’s the more powerful target because if you get her, you get me. I knew I should have kept my distance. ”

He cursed beneath his breath, dragging his hands over his face and through his hair.

“There’s no saying that would have prevented this, Az. Most people know of the affection and protectiveness you hold for her. If anything, you getting close to her again may have delayed this from happening. She has a better chance of surviving because of the training she underwent during that time.”

Ascian didn’t care. All he saw was Alora being shoved through a damned portal, again. Alone in a world not meant for her, surrounded by people who could care less whether she’s happy and thriving. He’ll kill whoever took her. If he was Death’s descendent, meant to inherit his power, then for Alora he’d embrace the fear that came with it. He wouldn’t lose her again, he’d make everyone bow before him to get to her.

“You weren’t kidding when you said he was in a state,” Maelo murmured as she approached him. She crossed her arms and popped out her hip as she stated, “Are you going into a murderous rage state?”

“I might be,” Ascian growled back.

Maelo hummed, nodding slowly. “How about, before we do that, we go look for clues where she was meditating? ”

Ascian gritted his teeth against rejecting the idea. He wanted to. It’d be so easy to slip into killing whoever stepped in his way, but he wanted to find Alora before it was too late. There was still time. There had to be. How long could it have been since she was taken? How far could they have travelled?

“Come on.” Maelo motioned to the door and waited for Ascian to move towards it first.

As he approached it, he heard Zillah whisper to Maelo behind him, “You’re magic.”

There was nothing special about the spot Alora liked to meditate in when the weather was good. Not to Ascian, at least. Not when Alora wasn’t there. Just a fallen tree and some bushes. Right on the edge of the forest. A forest where anyone could be hiding … Ascian drew in a long breath and let it out through parted lips. Alora was smart, and feisty.

Maybe she went to try and find Basilius. Ascian pulled up short before the exact spot and spun towards Maelo. “Have you checked on the guardians today?”

Maelo frowned and shook her head. “I normally do that when Alora is training with Riven. It calms him to feel her energy, if only for a few minutes.”

“We need to let them out. If she’s still close by, he’ll find her easily.”

“Ascian,” Maelo warned. Her gaze drifted past his shoulder, to the edge of the forest.

Ascian folded his arms and ignored her. “Our guardians will help prevent hers from killing any of the novices or scholars.”

“Ascian,” Maelo repeated louder, clearing her throat.

“No, Maelo, it’ll be fine,” Ascian grunted, heading back towards the academy. Maelo caught his arm as he moved past her, though, stopping him and yanking him back.

“Ascian!” She snapped, shoving her finger towards the trees aggressively. “Fucking notice anything alarming ?”

He frowned, turning back to the tree line and scanning each individual one until he spotted what Maelo was getting at; two large sets of claw marks gouging the trunks. Claw marks that resembled a particular bear guardian a little bit too much for Ascian’s taste.

The warmth in his body drained and left behind a cold sharpness identical to that of Alora’s ice daggers. Osiris took her. He’d hidden in the surrounding forest and taken her when she finally felt safe enough to let down her guard. Ascian would kill him.

He spun and strode back towards the academy, Maelo hot on his heels.

“What are you going to do, Ascian? You need a plan.”

“No, I need Osiris' throat in my hands,” he growled back.

“He’s not going to kill her,” Maelo muttered, not at all convincingly.

Ascian sent a glare her way. “You don’t know that.”

“Az,” Maelo said carefully. “He was more of a brother to her, before Raine died, than Kallias was.”

Ascian stopped and faced her, fuming. “And that was before Raine died. He changed, Maelo. Every time he saw Alora after that day he would go into a rage. There’s nothing to say he wouldn’t kill her.”

Maelo swallowed as the words barrelled into her. Ascian would find a way to carve them into her brain if he needed to. Osiris wasn’t the same as he had been those years ago. She needed to accept that and let go of whatever version of him stained her mind.

“He won’t kill her,” she said firmly. Ascian took a step towards her, but she added quickly, “Not when he wants you, too. ”

He froze, feet too heavy to lift as the realisation dawned on him.

“He’ll use her to trap you, Ascian, so you’re there to witness what the Elders decide. Until then, though, she’s safe.” Maelo slowly closed the small gap between them to get her brother's gaze focused on her and only her. “He won’t kill her until it’ll break you.”

“I need a plan.”

Maelo nodded. “You need a plan.”

“If he wants me, he wouldn’t take her to the Elders,” Ascian mused, jaw clenching at just the thought of them getting their hands on Alora. “He’d take her somewhere he knew well, somewhere he was comfortable. Somewhere he could control who interacted with her.”

“Would the Grotto be too obvious?” Maelo asked, a frown marring her face.

Ascian shook his head, rolling his shoulders back. “No. It’d be perfect. Verena, Sohan, and Izel are still there. As far as I’m aware, they still trust me as their commander. If they heard Alora screaming for me, they’d try and get a message to me. Somehow.”

“What if she doesn’t scream?”

The question hung suspended in the air between them, Maelo’s voice echoing in his mind at the very thought. If she didn’t scream, Osiris would try to make her.

“She won’t scream,” Maelo whispered the words in a horrified voice. Her eyes widened as they fell to the ground between them. “She wouldn’t do anything to put us in danger.”

Ascian cursed under his breath as he nodded in confirmation. “Not when she’s finally remembered us, and what we meant to her.”

“So, the plan?” Maelo asked. She shook some of the tension in her body loose and started towards the Academy, Ascian at her side.

“We need to get a message to Verena. See if she can determine whether Osiris does have Alora there, and once we have that confirmation, we find out how to get her out.”

“You say that as though you won’t be with us to do it.”

Ascian ground his teeth before answering. “Someone has to distract Osiris while Alora gets out.”

“And you’re planning to, what? Take her place? Like she’d let you do that if she hasn’t already given in to his demands.”

“I’m not losing her, again,” Ascian snapped. The weight on his shoulders grew heavier with each step he took towards the Academy.

“So you’d rather she experience that loss? A little tit for tat?” Maelo snarled, rounding on him. “You’d rather she go through losing you after whatever she’s being put through right now?”

“Yes,” Ascian growled back. “Because at least then she’d be alive. Feeling pain means she’s here and she’s breathing, even if she has to wait till her next life to be with me.”

“There’s no guarantee your next life will be any safer than this one, Ascian, and you’re kidding yourself if you believe that.”

Ascian opened his mouth to disagree but Maelo already stormed off and through the doors of the Academy, leaving him in the biting wind with his thoughts. He couldn’t deny her claim. There were never guarantees in life, but would it be possible to get Alora out without putting someone else in her place? Osiris would want no-one other than Ascian. Of that, he was sure.

Unless…

He shook his head. The idea was ridiculous, and the chance of it actually working was below ten percent. Still, he mulled over it before finally moving his feet again in search of his sister.