21. Eldrion

TWENTY-ONE

Smoke and shadows swirl around my feet and drift up into the air. The entire room is full of them. They congeal in the air, press down upon me, cloud my vision.

But what does it matter?

There is nothing here that could help me.

“Show yourself again,” I shout into the void. “Now I know your secret, come here and explain what you did. Explain what it means.”

I wait for my mother’s voice, or her face, or her presence to appear. But nothing comes.

I am alone, clutching her diary, reading the words over and over.

And the weight of what I learned about Alana is almost unbearable.

At first, I felt enlightened. Knowing she was created to help fight the darkness was a relief. An answer to a question I have held for far too long. But then I realised that the truth brought only more questions.

It still doesn’t make sense to me; my mother created her to fight an evil she knew was coming. Why not stop it herself? Why not warn me of what she saw?

Why leave me to drive myself to madness from not knowing?

As I stand in the middle of my chamber, shadows swirling around me, a sudden wave of exhaustion washes over me like a tidal wave. The diary falls to the floor. I sink to my knees. Pain ricochets through my temples, and I know the vision is coming for me again.

It rarely comes in daylight, or in waking hours, but when it does, it is a pain like nothing I have ever known.

I scream and slam my fist into the flagstone floor so hard it splinters.

Darkness closes in.

I am standing on the roof of the citadel now. Luminael is sprawled out before me. But it is not the city I know. The streets are choked with smoke and ash. Buildings crumble and burn, and the sky above is a sickly swirling mass of red and black, an open wound growing angrier by the minute.

I reach for the shadows, but they are gone. They are no longer under my control. They do not work for me now, they work against me.

And they belong to something else.

The demons.

In all the visions I’ve had before, I have never seen them clearly. I have always known they were there. An otherworldly force of evil, closing in, bringing the destruction of everything light and dragging us all into darkness.

This time, they show themselves to me.

They are everywhere, swarming through the streets, clambering over the ruins of the buildings that have fallen. Their bodies are twisted, deformed, a nightmarish blend of fae and something else.

Something dark, and ancient, and primal.

Their eyes glow red, like the sky. They shriek and howl at a pitch that feels like broken glass inside my bones.

They are relentless.

Blood streams in rivers down the streets, mixing with ash and smoke. The air is thick with the stench of death. And above it all, a dark figure looms.

I cannot see its face, but it is the most venomous of them all.

It turns its shadow-laced face towards me. I see nothing but its eyes, fixing on mine.

I try to run, because my powers have deserted me, but then I feel a presence beside me. I turn and there she is... Alana.

Her face is streaked with tears and soot. There is fear in her eyes, but there is something else too; determination. A fire that burns so bright it is hard not to want to bathe in its glow.

“Eldrion...” she speaks my name as though it comforts her. “What do we do?”

Before I can answer her, the figure above us speaks. “You cannot stop this,” it hisses. “You are too late. The shadows are mine now, and the darkness has won.”

Alana reaches for my hand. When I look down, shadows swirl around our wrists, binding us together.

And then she is gone.

I am back in my quarters. Alone. The diary lying on the floor, darkness pressing up against the windows from outside.

A knock on the door pulls me out of my haze and makes me stand.

I expect to see Pria, but it is Garratt who greets me. He saunters in, and wrinkles his nose. “Haven’t seen you since you went to the caves,” he says. “I was starting to get worried.” He spots the diary, and I swoop down to pick it up before he can think of doing so himself.

“I have been otherwise engaged,” I snap, stalking over to the whisky and pouring us each a glass. “What do you want?”

Garratt sips his whisky and takes off his hat. “Just checking in,” he says. “And bringing some news.”

“News?”

“I might have a location for your fae girl.” He perches on the arm of the chair beside the window and takes another sip of his drink. “Just a rumour, mind. They’re using a shielding spell. Powerful one. But I thought if I had a rough location, you might be able to circumvent that somehow.”

My entire body feels like it is frozen in place. “Tell me,” I growl, slamming the drink down. “Tell me, now, Garratt.”

Nodding, Garratt reaches into his pocket and takes out a map of Luminael. He points to the forests on the eastern side of the city. “Somewhere here. By the lake.”

“Get out.” I snatch the map from him and gesture to the door. “Now. Leave.”

Garratt hesitates, then reaches past me and grabs the whisky bottle. With a nod of his cap, he leaves, closing the door behind him.

Immediately, I take the map to the hidden study behind the wall. I spread it out before me and close my eyes. Then I summon every morsel of magic in my body and send it pummelling into the fabric of the map.

This is all I needed; something to focus on. One specific spot on which to concentrate my power.

“Show me Alana,” I whisper in ancient fae tongue. “Show me Alana Leafborne.”

And then I see her.

There she is.

By the lake. She is wearing nothing but a robe, her bare legs visible as she walks.

She leaves delicate footprints along the shore as she approaches the water. She stops, looks behind her, then drops the robe from her shoulders.

I sigh and sink back against the wall, allowing the vision to swallow me.

Except, this time it is not a vision.

It is real.

I have found her.