Runemaker, page 9
“No. And I believe you in that. But Aidan is powerful. He’s like a black hole, and you’re past the event horizon. Wherever he goes, you will follow. Not because you love him, but because he is the opposite of you, and you will always, always, try to help those who need it most. And Aidan needs that help more than any of us.”
“Says the man who left Aidan there to die.”
“He isn’t dead,” Jarrett muttered. “I know he isn’t. It wouldn’t be that easy.”
Tenn swallowed. “What about the twins. Are they alive? Did they—”
“They had nothing to do with this. Dreya would have killed me if she knew what I’d had planned. The only reason I got the sigil off Kianna was because I told her I thought you could find a way to reverse it on Aidan.”
“So you lied.”
Jarrett finally looked at him. His eyes were red, but they weren’t soft anymore.
“You’re one to talk.”
Tenn looked away.
“What do we do now, then? You know Aidan is important. And if he isn’t dead, that means he’s still out there. It means he still needs our help.”
“Aidan isn’t the mission. Saving Aidan will never fix the world or end the Howls. Your job is to end this. All of this. And so long as you think Aidan is the one you have to fix, rather than the world...you’re a risk. Either he convinces you to join him, or he kills you. Either way, we lose. We all lose.”
Tenn didn’t know how to take it. If he didn’t have this damn sigil against his chest, Water would be clawing at him, trying to drown him in sadness. But as it was, he just felt hollow. Numb.
“Why are there only two options?” Tenn asked flatly. “After everything I’ve done, why do you believe my only fates are to die or become evil? Why don’t you believe that I could save him and all of us?”
Jarrett stood.
“Because one person can’t save the world,” he said. “What you learned about the runes, the power you wield...that’s not enough to end things if you’re on your own, if you’re out chasing someone who could turn on you at any second. I have to keep you here. Keep you safe. Not just from Aidan, but from yourself. If you go out there...if you go after him...”
Jarrett sighed and shook his head.
“You looked at him with the same worry you once looked at me with. You think you can fix him. He knows you think that. And he will use that against you.”
“I saved you,” Tenn whispered.
“Some days,” Jarrett said, as if to himself. He paused, then headed toward the door. “Some days, I’m not so certain.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
DREYA
Dreya stared in awe at the battlefield.
Awe, and fear. Two sensations she was not quite used to feeling.
She looked to her brother. He stared at the carnage with wide eyes, the flames of destruction flickering pink against his pale blue irises. She knew in the deepest part of her soul his Sphere burned inside him with recognition—so much power. So much anger. More than the world had ever seen. Pulled from a place the world had never seen.
And she knew her brother felt drawn to it.
Neither of them spoke. Neither of them needed to. He felt her uncertainty just as she felt his struggle.
Aidan had done this. Aidan had done all of this. He had ended the battle before it ever truly began. And then, he had vanished.
Flames licked across the countryside for miles on end, a heat that brought sweat to her brow even here, even with her flickering shield. She pulled through Air and sent her senses soaring, spreading her awareness wide.
Hoping to find someone—anyone—alive.
Even though she knew that hope was futile.
Hope did not change the nature of things.
As far as her powers could go, so too did the destruction, until she reached the very edge of her awareness and sensed even more flames lingering beyond. How had he done it?
That was no ordinary magic, Devon thought.
Dreya nodded. The Witches had taught them everything they knew of magic, and the nature of the world. There were more than the five elements all humans contained, more than Earth and Air and Fire and Water. More even than Maya. There was a balance to it all, and on that fulcrum rested a shadow. A dark to the light.
There were the powers that came from this world, and the powers born only to destroy it.
It should not have been possible, but Aidan had drawn from that darker wellspring. He had drawn the runes that allowed him to do what even the Dark Lady could not.
The Dark Lady had opened the door for evil. Aidan had blown apart the wall.
Once more, she thought of Tenn. Brought his tracking rune to mind. He was far, so far. And when she focused on Jarrett’s own rune, she found him to be in a similar locale. Betrayal twisted her heart, but until she knew for certain, she would not entertain the notion. Where had they gone? And why had they done so without telling her?
The questions were troubling. The only consolation she found was that Tenn was still alive. She had to believe Jarrett had brought him far away to keep him safe.
If that’s the case, Devon thought her way, then why were we not brought with?
And that was the true question. Why had Jarrett not trusted them with their location? Or was this something else? Had the two of them been captured?
She had no way of knowing, not yet. And she had long ago learned not to fill her mind with worry about things she could not explain. It would not be productive. It would spell her death.
Movement nearby.
She’d been so distracted scanning outside her shield that she’d barely cared to keep an eye on what was occurring within.
She snapped her senses back to the stairwell and felt a small wave of relief wash through her. Devon grunted to himself.
“Kianna,” Dreya said the moment the woman stepped out onto the balustrade.
Kianna jogged the last few steps, and slowed as she surveyed the fire-swept field around them. She shook her head absently. Dreya found she could watch Kianna’s movements all day and not get tired. There was a strength in each gesture that Kianna seemed absolutely unaware of, and yet made her who she was. Like a lioness. Unknowing of her grace, but confident in her strength.
“Where did he go?” Kianna asked.
There was no point asking who. Kianna didn’t care about Tenn or Jarrett. And that, too, was another reason Dreya admired her—Kianna was focused on only one thing. Even if that often led to frustration.
“I do not know,” Dreya said. She reached out and put a tentative hand on Kianna’s arm. Kianna wore only a T-shirt despite the cold, and her skin was hot to the touch.
Stop flirting, Devon thought gruffly. Dreya glared daggers at him.
Kianna didn’t shake off her hand. She just leaned against the railing and stared out at the flames.
“I can sense you now,” Dreya whispered. “How?”
“Blondie. Said Tenn needed to study it or something. Hell if I know.”
Jarrett took the sigil? But why? Another question she had no answer for, and another she filed away for a future worry. She had to focus on now.
“What did you do, Aidan?” Kianna whispered.
Dreya swallowed down the words she knew Kianna would not want to hear. Your friend has taken on the words of the Dark Lady. He has harnessed powers no man should wield.
Kianna looked to her.
“An hour ago, he was close to death. And just now he blasted onto the battlefield like a goddamned comet and destroyed everything. Everything. How is that even possible?”
The scene replayed in Dreya’s mind. Just as Kianna had said, Aidan had burst from the Guild in a ball of flame and landed in the midst of the battle, sending wave after wave of fire around him. Nothing stood a chance against him. No man or woman, no Howl. Not even the nameless Kin that led the charge. Aidan had burned it all down in a matter of seconds. Dreya had sensed him, out there. She had sensed him kill the Kin with his bare hands. Just as she sensed that he hadn’t been alone.
But it was more than sensing. Air was the element of thought and sound, and she had heard voices amidst the screams and cinders. Aidan’s voice. And another’s.
Aidan, speaking to someone, saying he would destroy the rest of the Kin. And then, he would bring the Dark Lady back. She had heard them. And Devon had heard them.
It chilled her to the core, those words. The Dark Lady was dead and gone. But so many things that should have been dead and gone had been reviving lately, and though she was not one for flights of fancy, she would never discard a statement like that without absolute proof it was impossible.
Right now, nothing seemed impossible.
Especially because she had heard those very same whispers through her brother’s attachment to Fire. The promise that the Dark Lady still lived. The promise that eternity still existed in her ever-burning heart.
Dreya gently tightened her hold on Kianna’s arm.
“She has him, now,” she whispered. “The Dark Lady. He has discovered her words, has found runes to grant himself new power. I believe...he intends to kill the rest of the Kin as an offering to her. And then, he intends to bring her back.”
Silence between them as her words burrowed deep in Kianna’s heart. Silence, save for the cinders. Silence—not even screams of the dying. Aidan’s wrath had been that absolute.
We have to kill him, Devon thought.
We have to save him, Dreya hissed back. They are both necessary to end this.
“Then we have to end this,” Kianna said, her grip on the railing tightening. “And if it comes to it, I will be the one to end him.”
She didn’t brush off Dreya’s hand.
Not once.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
AIDAN
“Do you wish to do the honors,” Tomás asked, “or shall I?”
They stood above a man. A Howl. A Kin. Outside, the sun shone on a pale sand beach and clouds skittered across the blue sky. There were seagulls. Swaying palm trees. It was paradise.
But in here, the scene was far from pastoral. Blood splattered against the walls, and the fine silk sheets the Kin lay on were stained with his blood.
It hadn’t taken much to surprise and subdue him. The moment Tomás appeared in the palatial house, Aidan at his side, the Kin clearly knew the fight was over.
Desmond was his name. Desmond, a bloodling who ruled the entire continent of Africa from the comfort of his seaside condo. Desmond, who seemed less like a Kin and more like a posh tourist.
Desmond, who was moments away from being ripped out of history.
“Let me,” Aidan said. He knelt down and stared the man in the eyes. Hazel eyes. Hazel, and oh so very afraid.
He placed his hand on Desmond’s stomach. Felt the Kin’s inverted Sphere of Water sizzle and hiss against Aidan’s Fire.
“Any last words?” Aidan asked.
Desmond opened his mouth.
Aidan opened to Fire, and one of the most powerful creatures in history was no more.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
DREYA
“We should never have let him go,” Devon growled.
Dreya stared up at her brother, who paced at the foot of her narrow bed. Morning had come and the remaining troop had assembled back within the Guild’s walls.
There weren’t many of the remaining troop. Everyone outside the main perimeter had been destroyed.
Kianna had gone to sleep or to pace, Dreya wasn’t certain which. Amiina had been killed. And while the rest of small Guild tried to rally and decide on new leadership, she and her brother had retired to the dormitories to figure out what to do next.
“What would you have had me do?” Dreya asked. “We could not keep Tenn here. It was too dangerous. If Aidan had turned on him. If the Kin had gotten through—”
“And now he is back in America. What good is he to us there? Aidan is gone, Dreya. Perhaps he has gone after Tenn? Perhaps even now Tenn burns for our mistake. If we had kept him here, we could have protected him. Now, he is so far away we cannot even warn him of the danger that Aidan has become.”
“I have to believe that Aidan has not gone after him,” Dreya said. “He has gone after the rest of the Kin.”
“Why? Because your girlfriend believes so?”
It was like a slap to the face.
Never once had she or her brother had a lover. Never once had they even had an interest in romance. There was only death for them. Only duty.
And yet, something about Kianna had kindled a spark deep within her, a knowing as much as a yearning. For her brother to use that against her, when for so many years they’d had only each other, felt like the worst sort of betrayal.
“I believe so because that is what I heard.” She kept her voice even, pulled through Air to clear the lesser emotions from her head. She had to think logically and rationally. For the both of them. It was the only way they could possibly make it through. “Aidan has gone after the rest of the Kin. And then...”
“And then he plans on doing what no one else could do.” He slumped against the wall, arms across his chest, and faced her. “We have failed.”
Those three words. They were a spear to her heart.
The three words she had tried desperately to keep from ricocheting through her mind and tearing through the little hope she still had. And now that he had said them, she felt the weight of their truth settling on her shoulders.
“We have,” she said quietly.
Sadness fell heavy atop her. A sadness she hadn’t felt since watching her entire Clan die at her own hands. A sadness she had tried so desperately to replace with logic and reason and purpose.
She remembered it clear as yesterday. Clearer still. The scent of her people dying and burning, the sound of their screams as they echoed up the canyon walls. She glanced to her brother. To the burgundy scarf draped loose about his neck.
The scarf that had once been their mother’s.
The scarf he had pulled from her burnt corpse.
A reminder to them both of their failure. A reminder that every breath he took was because someone else had died. Because many people had died.
Now, it seemed to settle on his shoulders like a noose.
“I’d ask if I’m interrupting,” Kianna said from the doorway. “But I can never tell if you two are talking or just brooding.”
Dreya jolted at the sound of her voice. She had let herself be taken unawares. Had let her guard down. Even Devon looked shocked. The stress of everything must be getting to her. That must be it. Must be.
“Kianna,” Dreya said.
“Yup.” She had changed since they last saw her. Out of her ash-covered clothes and into fresh jeans and a long pink sweater. Dreya looked down at her own soot-stained fabric. She must do the same. Death debased her.
Kianna stepped into the room and plopped down on the bed beside Dreya. Inches apart, but still close enough to feel her warmth. Devon’s eyes flickered between the two of them.
Should I go? he thought toward Dreya.
Dreya shook her head, almost imperceptibly.
“What are you two discussing?” Kianna asked.
“What there is to do,” Dreya replied. “If there is anything we can do.”
Kianna nodded to herself.
“Been asking myself the same thing. And it all boils back down to one goal. We have to find Aidan. Before the idiot can do something we’ll all regret.”
“But how? We have no idea where he might be. And even if we could find him, we have no way of getting there.”
“You guys made your way to us just fine,” Kianna said.
“Yes. We had runes for travel. But to use them, we would need an Earth mage.” She paused. Looked Kianna in the eye before flicking her gaze away. She could feel Devon rolling his eyes. “And in order for us all to travel, you would need to be attuned, as well.”
Kianna jutted her jaw. She didn’t say anything.
Dreya looked to her brother.
What do you want me to do? he asked.
Dreya had no idea.
“Figured as much,” Kianna finally said. “Magic seems to be part of everything anymore.”
She readjusted herself on the mattress, leaned back against the headrest and put her long legs on the bed, nudged right against Dreya’s side. Her boots, Dreya noted, had been cleaned. But still.
“You know,” Kianna said. “I’ve spent the last four years doing everything I could to prove that you didn’t need magic to survive in this new world, and I’d say I’ve done a damn good job of it. All it does is fuck everything up. I mean, look around. Would any of this have happened if humans hadn’t discovered magic?”
Dreya could feel Devon’s agitation raise, and his tenuous grasp to keep Fire in check. Humans would have found a way to ruin things, she heard him say. It felt like a slight against the two of them. After all, they had spent most of their lives learning magic. Learning to protect and revere it. Not everyone used it as a weapon.
Even though she and her brother had begun to.
“But.” Kianna sighed and flopped her head back against the wall. “But.”
She went silent for a moment. Then closed her eyes.
“But it’s becoming increasingly clear that Aidan is so far up shit’s creek that the only way to get him back is to swim. And by swim, I mean use magic.” She opened her eyes and tilted her head forward, looked Dreya dead-on. “You say I gotta be attuned to get to the wee bastard? Fine. Attune me. But don’t you dare tell him about it.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
AIDAN
“Where are we?” Aidan asked.
Snow swept around them, blanketing everything in pale blue and white. The sun was rising—or was it setting? he couldn’t tell—and blanketing the horizon in pink. Aidan knew he should have been freezing. Knew the snow whipping around them should have cut him to the core.
