Chapter 21

Tristan and I paused in the doorway of the empty room.

Empty except for Tavion and Raz, hands bound behind their backs, kneeling in the center of the floor facing away from us.

They were so still I couldn't tell if they were still breathing, couldn't see their faces because they were staring out over the forest.

Some kind of Old God irony, I was sure, meant to convey some momentous message.

Overhead, my darklings slithered across the ceiling, no darker than the deepening shadows in the room, the billowing thunderclouds cutting off all traces of daylight as the storm swept in.

Her magic coated this room like Corvus's blight coated the forest, dripping from every wall and puddling on the floor. That same foul power wrapped tightly around Raz and Tav, and I was sure she made them hurt.

If I knew my males at all, they were fighting, locked inside their bodies, searching for a way out. In fact, if I listened closely, I could hear Tavion screaming in my head, warning me not to come any closer.

Soon enough, soon enough I'll have you both free, and then…

The Oracle appeared before the glass windows, her magic billowing around her like dark robes, watching me with a predatory gleam in her eyes, lips curled into a cruel smile as she raised her hand, summoning the tendrils of shadow to encircle her like a web.

"Clever girl, locking me inside my head." The Oracle's voice dripped with malice. "I must say, I never saw that coming, and it is not often I am surprised, least of all by mortals."

I stopped short of the glass room, raw magic crackling at my hands as I waited for her to make the first move. She was closer to Tavion and Raz than we were, close enough to snap their necks.

When we'd left this morning, I'd only taken what we'd needed.

A change of clothes for Tristan, and the bag to carry them in.

The keystone was upstairs in the top drawer of the bedside table. I didn't even know if its power would work against her, but I'd never reach it in time anyway.

I had two knives, Tristan had three. But this wouldn't come down to that kind of fighting, not from the bloodthirsty look on her face.

No, she'd use her magic and she'd make us suffer.

"I'm the one you want, Gelvira. Leave them out of this." My voice echoed off all the glass. "Let's you and I settle this between ourselves like sisters should."

The Oracle chuckled darkly, her eyes glowing with malevolent power. "You know that's not how this works. It has never truly been between the two of us." In one step she was beside Raziel, dragging her fingers through his hair.

With a flick of her wrist, the Oracle gripped a handful and yanked his head back, baring his throat, tendons and muscle stretched to their limit, and my heart lurched. Beside me, Tristan hissed a warning when I took a single, stumbling step into the room.

Dark energy crawled over me the moment I broke through her invisible barrier, probing for a way through my shield. Energy meant to rip and tear and sunder flesh, should my magic fail me.

"Take your fucking filthy hands off him." Violence ripped through me, the kind that would make me do something foolish. "Or I'll make you let them go."

She threw her head back and laughed, the sound ringing like a bell. "We've done this dance before, Anaria, so many times. You wouldn't remember, but such blustering threats never work in your favor."

In one swift motion, I cast a shield of shimmering light over the two of them, and the Oracle snatched her hand back as if she'd been burned, her shadows writhing, trying to cast off my starry power as her body torqued in pain.

Tavion and Raz shifted, enough for me to see their faces. Twisted with fury, but their eyes were clear enough to tell me she wasn't controlling their minds.

"I tried to warn you," I said mildly as she glared at me through narrowed eyes. "Now let them go so we can finish this."

Stars shattered the air as she threw off my power, Raz's eyes darting between me, the door, the windows. Outside, the storm blew hard, rain lashing the glass, the floor vibrating from the wind and the thundering waterfalls.

"I knew you were a fool from the moment you opened your eyes," she hissed. "But it was too late. The magic chose you, even if I did not. I would have slit your throat right then, before you drew your first breath, but Torin stopped me. I never should have listened."

She rounded the still-kneeling Tavion and Raz, dragging her shadows behind her. "You have made a mess of things, Princess. Both kings dead, the magic released, and for what?" She swept her hand across the windows to the blighted forest beyond.

"Trapping me only gave Corvus the chance he's been craving all these millennium. You ruined all the glorious life you created out of ignorance. You are not worthy of becoming one of us."

Well, she wasn't wrong.

"Why did you allow him to exist, knowing what he was capable of?"

The mocking smile slid off her face. "Because he is my brother. The only true family I have left. But this world only lasts forever if we consume its magic in small sips. Corvus doesn't know restraint. He would swallow this world whole. Now, I don't know if he can be stopped."

Behind me, Tristan held back, tense and ready. Tavion's eyes slid between us, waiting for the Oracle's magic to fail and give him an opening. When it did, he'd go for his sword, or his knife, or shift into his wolf.

And end up bleeding on this floor.

Lightning crackled outside and thunder boomed. The Oracle's head swiveled toward the rain-coated windows, the forest beyond blurred to a dark smear.

I met Raz's and Tavion's eyes, then flicked my gaze to those same windows. Again. A third time. Tavion's mouth tightened and he managed to shake his head. No.

Stubborn wolf. You stubborn, stubborn wolf.

"If killing Corvus was the only way to stop this, is that what you'd want?" I clenched my hands, my fingers swollen from clinging to Tristan's back, arms shaking from holding my magic on such a short leash, from the creeping cold of my darklings suspended on the ceiling overhead.

Waiting patiently as her gaze narrowed, malice turning to speculation.

"Is that what you are offering, Princess, in exchange for their lives? To kill my brother?"

I swallowed down all the insults I wanted to unleash on this vile creature. "He is destroying this world. Soon enough, there will be nothing left for any of us."

"Even from the bare bones of this world, I could still wring enough magic to survive." Her smile returned, though its brightness had dimmed. "But your kind…you cannot live without green, growing things, can you?"

"No. We cannot."

"Then you have far more to lose than I, and killing my brother benefits you more than it does me. Which leaves us at a crossroads, Princess. One more realm remains to be freed. One more ward must fall for the magic to fully return."

"There is no magic in Varitus." I shook my head out of habit more than anything else. "What little is left is nothing but parlor tricks and games." Oh, but how that pale imitation had beguiled me when I was young.

"You were clever enough to unlock the magic in Solarys. I have no doubt you will do the same in Varitus and unite the three realms once more."

"Why should I, when your brother will only devour that magic too?"

"Because if you do not, I will take these males you are so fiercely bonded to and feed them to my brother. You have seen how he twists fragile, growing things. Think of what he can do to flesh and blood. One more realm, Princess. That is my price for their lives."

"The world is dying," I snapped. "And all you can think about is your own power?"

"Their lives for Varitus. Then…you can go wherever you wish."

I snorted. "Just like that? You'd let us walk away?" I fed more power into my stardust shield, wrapping it tighter around Raz and Tavion, Tristan still staying well outside the Oracle's magic.

She gave me a one-shoulder shrug. "I am content to claim this realm for myself. There are others across the sea where you might find a home."

"How very magnanimous of you."

A trap…but why? Why did she want the magic in Varitus when there was barely any?

"I do wonder…if like before you are only motivated to succeed if I keep your males as my guests." The Oracle"s power cracked the air like lightning, a bolt of power heading straight for Raz and Tavion, powerful enough to shred them apart.

But I was quicker, blasting through her onslaught with ribbons of pure power.

Aimed not at the Oracle…but at the bay of windows.

The glass blew outward, the wind roaring through the room in a raging torrent, our magics colliding in a dazzling eruption of light and shadow before being sucked outside. Hair whipping wildly, I slid across the floor, pulled by the strength of the storm and the air being sucked out of this room.

"Now," I screamed to Tristan as I flung everything I had at the Oracle. "Do it now."

Then the room was a nightmare of scales and talons and that deadly, thrashing tail, spikes whipping back and forth, shredding the walls before he grasped Tavion in one taloned paw and leapt through the broken-out windows.

"Go," I screamed at Raz. "That's an order, in case you were thinking of refusing."

Raziel's jaw worked, his eyes blazing before he vanished, leaving a swirl of rain and fog in his place.

Relief flooded through me. The Oracle had lost her means of hurting me. Of controlling me.

Being alone made me strong.

She knew it as she turned away from the windows, soaking wet hair whipping around her face. One thought and my darklings dropped from the ceiling, tangling around her in a squeezing mass of shadows, pinning her arms to her sides.

They could only hold her for a few seconds, but that was all I needed.

"Now." I pulled out my thread of power like separating one strand of silver from a skein of cotton.

"Let's see what you really had planned for us."

Bexley had given me the idea with his talk of what witch magic could do. We didn't have the skulls, but we had something even better. Peering inside her head would give me the answers we needed.

So I wrapped that thin thread around her head like a wildflower crown, and Gelvira's eyes went dull as I peered inside her memories.