Chapter 37

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

A terra’s brow creased, his confusion evident as he pulled harder on Luc’s magic to get the power boost he’d plotted for. With every moment that passed, he tried to dig deeper into the magic. His confusion was understandable. Rose had seen how easily the power flowed when the process worked, as the Compass Points had tested between Arie and Carter.

Aterra had done everything right. As he said—he had the artifact, he was in a place of great magic, and he’d stolen the will and blood from Luc.

The problem was—Luc was no longer Suden Point.

Rose used Aterra’s momentary confusion to ready the Compass Points’ magic. She dove into her lake of power. The connections to Carter and Juliette were easy to find. The tree trunk tunnel that mirrored the passage on Vesten property, and the windswept doorway that mirrored the entrance to the portal at Osten house.

What would this new connection look like?

She stood on the shore of her lake and looked for something new. Luc was still connected to her through her lakebed. That onyx presence wasn’t going anywhere—it was a part of her now. Even in his crumpled state, as he fought off the magic of the Suden ring, his power was sure and steady beneath the waters.

This connection point would be like Carter’s and Juliette’s, outside of the water, on the shore. Only now, searching for a new one, did she realize how intimate it was that even Luc’s initial connection, the tunnel, was in her water—the very heart of her magic.

She should have known from the beginning that their connection was something different. Maybe she did.

“We were always something different. Something the continent wasn’t ready for—but what it needed nonetheless.” She smiled as Luc’s voice pierced her thoughts. He must be waking.

The earth shook beneath her feet. When she looked up, a hole appeared past the southern shoreline.

Rose ran to it. It was deep, and she couldn’t see a bottom. She hoped this harkened back to Darren’s feelings about the hole in Loch, and wasn’t a way to tear through the heart of her magic. She smiled to herself—her connection point with Darren, would start with his perception of Luc. She peered into the hole and sent her magic gently into it, requesting whatever he was willing to offer.

Darren’s magic shook the ground in acceptance. They were ready.

Rose released the breath she’d been holding as she left the heart of her magic, and Luc returned to himself. The slight curl of his lip into her favorite smirk was its own kind of reward. He pushed himself up.

“He’s all yours, love,” Luc said.

Aterra shook his head as he noted the tilt of Luc’s head, a signal he was mentally communicating with Rose. He clenched his teeth together as he finally realized something hadn’t gone his way.

“What did you do?” He glared at Rose like this was all her fault. She shrugged, unbothered, though unwilling to waste Aterra’s momentary confusion.

Rose ignited the connections to the Compass Points. She reached into the heart of her power and pulled their magic together. Water, wind, fire, and earth magic rushed through her, meeting in a central stream of magic directly pointed at the Suden god.

They’d done this in the cavern below Mount Bury. They’d held a god but had nowhere to put him. Luc had made a decision for them by taking Aterra here—beyond the veil. Rose respected his decision. It was the best they had at the time. But Cassandra was right. The veil wasn’t a dumping ground for the continent. The realms were connected, as Carter had argued. Both realms needed to be balanced for everyone to thrive on the continent and in their afterlife.

That worked for Rose. They had a new plan for Aterra. He wanted to strengthen his own power. He tried to rule whatever land he occupied. They would give him no land to occupy, making it impossible for him to plot. They would put him in a space where no one resided.

The idea had come to Rose slowly. Although her and Carter’s journey proved the space between realms was vaster than it appeared, the shared memory of Luc’s journey gave her the initial spark. The space between the continent and beyond the veil wasn’t easily traveled by any party.

Rose thought again of Zrak’s words about her and Luc’s relationship being the key to his choices. It was, in more ways than she could truly understand. Luc had thrown himself into the void without knowing how to cross beyond the veil. He didn’t have the innate skill that Carter’s veil cat did in understanding the paths between realms. No, it was Luc’s connection to Rose that drove him forward. He knew where his bound partner was, and though she knew what it cost him from the memory he shared, he knew to cross; he had to walk away from her.

He had to walk through the emptiness.

He had to cross the expanse of nothing.

Rose was glad he did because it was the perfect place to store a god who strove to be all-powerful. He could be all-powerful over the nothing between realms.

Rose glanced at Carter as the combined power of the Compass Points poured forth, pushing against the deflection Aterra attempted.

“What did you do?” Aterra roared. His magic pushed against theirs, but Rose understood it better this time. She also understood that this place wasn’t helping him like the wild magic at the Lake of the Gods had. “Why didn’t the power transfer work?” Aterra growled, his head swiveling from side to side as he assessed the threat of the Compass Points.

He moved again, reaching for Luc with the ring but finding himself held in place. His power flared, and the dungeon quaked with his rage. Stones crumbled, and loose rocks scattered, but this was far from the power he’d displayed beneath the Lake of the Gods. Aterra’s power had limits here. It would have limits where he was being taken as well. The space between worlds had no earth to manipulate. His element would be meaningless there.

Rose pushed the stream of magic within her even harder as Aterra reached for Luc again. Even if it was pointless, she couldn’t stand the thought of this father who’d abandoned him trying to further abuse his connection.

“Are you going to tell him? Or should I?” Rose asked through the bond.

“Consider it one of the first gifts I’ll give you,” he said. “The first in a long line of ways I’ll make this up to you.” She smiled as he teased her. As much as she had enjoyed him on his knees, crawling to her in the heart of her magic, there was no ledger between them.

“One doesn’t preclude the other,” he said, hearing her thoughts and winking at her across the room.

“It won’t work,” she shouted at Aterra. A smile grew as she said the words that would bring his plan crumbling to the ground. “He’s no longer the Suden Point.”

“What do you mean? Of course, he’s the Suden Point! He’s the most powerful Suden on the continent! I made sure of it!” Aterra roared. The ground shook beneath him as his magic struggled against Rose’s hold.

“But I’m no longer on the continent,” Luc said with his wicked smile. “And I felt it was a dereliction of duty not to have a Suden Point in my absence. I wanted to ensure we had a leader incorruptible by your plans, a leader who would do what needed to be done for the Suden people and the continent.” Luc gestured to Darren, who held his gaze briefly, accepting his words with his own nod—his own acknowledgement of what he would do.

“Ready Carter?” Rose asked. Aterra may be weaker here, but sweat still dripped down her brow as she channeled the magic of the Compass Points to hold him.

He stalked closer to Aterra but didn’t shift. Rose would lose his power through the connection as soon as he did. They needed Aterra to be immobile, and they would only have seconds to make this work.

Luc seemed to realize what she needed. While the Compass Points’ hold leashed Aterra, he yanked the ring off his father’s finger. “I’ll be taking this back.” He didn’t hesitate, repeating the motions from under Mount Bury. With the ring on his finger, he stabbed Aterra with the already outstretched point. The same point Aterra had tried to use against him.

Aterra froze momentarily.

Carter growled as he fell to all fours in his veil cat form.

The magic around them changed as Cassandra allowed Carter the freedom to move within the castle walls.

Carter wrapped his mouth around Aterra’s leg, and Luc grabbed Carter’s scruff. For a brief moment, Carter’s yellow-green eyes searched the room as if looking for the best path to cross. He stared at the cave wall next to the cell. His gaze pierced the stone. Then he jumped, the passage to the continent opening before them as it had above the river and out on the plains. The veil cat didn’t hesitate, pulling the Suden god and demigod along with him.

The hole didn’t close, but they were running out of time. Luc’s move to stun Aterra would only buy them so long.

Seconds that felt like hours later, Carter returned—alone. Luc was placed in the Osten caves, and Cassandra was here. Together, they would close off this passageway between realms, sealing Aterra’s fate. Rose remembered Cassandra’s words: “ You must know I can’t do it alone, ” she’d told Carter. The Vesten Point seemed ready to do whatever he’d bargained for as he stalked to Cassandra’s side in his animal form.

The Lady of the Veil’s hand went to his scruff. Instead of jumping into the passage, Rose felt a pull of magic.

Cassandra had said she couldn’t do it alone. Carter had said he was at her service. As the magic flowed in the castle dungeon, Rose knew he offered himself to bolster whatever magic Cassandra needed. Power flowed between them. Rose had only ever seen this much power exchanged when the Compass Points merged their magic. She swallowed and hoped Carter knew what he was doing.

She was familiar enough with Carter’s magic that she felt it heating the room as Cassandra pulled so hard his element took over. The cyclical nature of flame and shift had never been more evident to Rose than in this moment. Carter’s power flared hot like his element and cooled like a spirit falling into the icy river surrounding these lands. His magic twisted with whatever Cassandra’s power was, and it seemed to both burn and freeze the hole between realms as it started to seal.

Aterra roared as he awoke from the ring’s strike in the darkness. She heard his yells but didn’t feel his earth magic at all—there was nothing to use against them where he was. The pathway through the wall Carter had opened continued to seal with the combination of his and Cassandra’s magic.

“I’ve closed it here. He won’t be able to get through,” Luc said through the bond.

“He’s done it,” Rose said, alerting Cassandra and Carter.

Cassandra’s fingers dug impossibly further into Carter’s scruff as she requested more magic. The veil cat growled, setting off a chorus of noise from the pack of veil cats standing guard around the Lady. With this final pull on the connection between Cassandra and Carter, the pathway sealed.

They had done it.

Carter shifted back into his fae form. He looked as if he would reach for Cassandra momentarily—his hand outstretched—but it gently fell to his side as he looked at the mark on the wall their magic had created.

Even though it had only been the two of them, and Luc on the other side, the symbol on the wall looked strangely like a compass. It was a circle with locks over the four cardinal direction points.

Rose wanted to believe it would hold. More than anything, she wanted to see what Luc had done on the other side.

“I’ll be back,” Carter told Cassandra, realizing the group needed him to leave.

“Take care of your people first,” she said, looking resigned. “I still have time, and if things aren’t settled on the continent, we won’t settle them here.”

He turned to her and nodded. Rose might be over-reading, but she would say a lot was communicated in a single nod. Carter wouldn’t spare more words to try to convince her of his intention. He would prove it to her by returning.

A cool mask once again slid over Cassandra’s face. “You should go back the standard way, head to the fields outside the city,” she said. She sounded tired and a little wistful as she let them go. The Lady of the Veil had dug deep into Carter’s magic. Rose wondered what she had found.

“We should get back,” he said to Rose, Juliette, and Darren.

“Let’s see what damage the Suden Point did to my caves,” Juliette said.

“Not really the Suden Point anymore,” Darren pointed out.

Juliette laughed. It sounded good on her. Juliette had carried more weight than the rest of them through this ordeal. Her connection with Zrak was something she had to work to sustain. Rose couldn’t imagine what Juliette would feel to truly be free of the ritual. “You’ve got me there,” she said as they left the castle.