Endless Magic (3 page)

I paced the room anxiously, unconcerned with propriety and forgetful of the migraine and the still dripping wound to the back of my head. There was nothing I could do, nothing to save Lilly's mother from whatever cruel fate Lucan intended for her. I was weak without magic, and helpless to make any difference. Even ideas for diversions were lost in my muddled brain. There was nothing I could do for her.

And whatever happened would be my fault.

I came to this castle to protect those that I loved. I offered myself in place of everyone else, and yet here I stood, a powerless witness to more bloodshed at my expense.

“You can't do this! You can't hurt someone else just because of me!” I cried out, accusing Lucan in my very tone of his tyrannical blood-lust.

“Dearest child, I can do whatever I want,” he chided me gently, his voice sickly sweet and churning my stomach. “Lest you have forgotten, I am the king!” He jumped up, shouting at me with more aggressive force, spit sprayed from his lips and his eyes turned wild with hatred and evil.

“Kiran,” I turned to him, pleading with him to intervene. “Please, you have to do something; you have to reason with your father.”

He held my eyes for a moment, his face oppressed with grief and I knew that he tried to warn me. I felt his admonitions and his daily pleading like a knife in my heart. He broke his gaze, looking away ashamed and emotional.

“My son has done enough, hiding you away in his bedroom, lying to me, manipulating me. So, let this be a warning to you both,” Lucan began lecturing once Lilly's mother was dragged into the throne room. “You will learn to obey, child. When I give a command, you will follow it. When I tell you to do something, you will honor it without hesitation. I am your king and you will treat me as such. And if you cannot follow these very simple directions then there will be consequences. It is your disobedience that has cost this woman her life, and if you are not in full possession of your magic by tomorrow morning at dawn, then I will execute every other prisoner held here, one by one, while you watch helpless and mortal. Is that clear?”

Tears started to stream down my face at the gravity of his words. And as much as I wanted to blame him for his cruelty, he was right, this was my fault. “It's impossible, I've tried to get it back,” I whimpered, pathetically, looking at Lilly's mother who had just started to understand what was about to happen to her.

She was a beautiful woman, with more auburn hair than Lilly's fiery red, and it fell in delicate waves down her back. Her green eyes sparkled with magic, after the suffocating prisons that deteriorated one's power. Her skin was as porcelain as Lilly's and she radiated the self-sacrifice any mother would gladly give for the freedom of her child.

“Obviously, you have not tried hard enough,” Lucan snapped. “You have until tomorrow morning at dawn, Eden, or this Shape-shifter will not be the only victim of your insubordination.”

Lucan stood from his royal seat and walked slowly over to a Titan Guard, reaching for his decorative sword and pulling it from its placeholder at his side. I screamed something even I didn't understand and went blind with a fight that I didn't think I still had in me. Strong hands, forceful against my arms, held me back, and pulled me to the corner of the room. I struggled desperately against them, fighting with everything I held on to, to save the innocent.

Lucan turned on Lilly's mother, as she stood tall and still, held by two Guards that were not necessary. She was ready for death, determined to be martyred with dignity and grace. Lucan tilted his head and sighed with pity before plunging the sword forcibly through her heart.

The room fell silent; even I gasped with horror and then found no sounds to express my outraged sorrow. The Titans that held her, let go so that she could slump to the ground, impaled by the ornamental sword. She held on to the hilt, agony constricting her face, and her magic floating from her body in a visible energy field of soft lavender. She was dying slowly, too slowly not to feel the pain as her violet magic drifted out of her.

“Tomorrow at dawn, Eden, or you will relive this moment one hundred times,” Lucan vowed, staring me down with arrogant resolve.

I believed him.

He left the room, his robes sweeping out behind him and his Titan Guard was close at his heels. Analisa sat in stunned silence for a few more minutes, her face paling with the horror of Lucan's punishment. She eventually stood and left the room in silence, her own Guard trailing after her.

Left alone with just the dying woman, Talbott, Sebastian and Kiran, Sebastian and Talbott let go of me and I too sunk to the floor, weeping in heartache for the unnecessary murder of another guiltless victim. I let my head fall into my hands and my weeping turned into deep moaning as I felt the weight of this war more severely than ever before.

I had been naive, too innocent to understand what I fought against. I had interacted with Lucan and seen what he did to Avalon, but I justified the cruelty to his pursuit for immortality. I witnessed the murder of my grandfather, but I credited an ancient rivalry to the hatred between the two men. This was something different; truly my imagination could never have conjured up this kind of cruelty, the senseless killing of innocent Immortals. I believed too much in the goodness of others to ever anticipate these kinds of repercussions. And now, not just one woman would suffer at my fate, but Lucan promised a hundred. A hundred prisoners, as innocent as Lilly's mother, would die because of my stupidity and stubbornness.

I heard the sword pulled from her chest, and the morbid sound itself, the sharp blade slicing against hot flesh, sent me into a deeper hysteria. I wailed, rocking back and forth, unwilling to look at the woman whose blood now stained my hands.

“Eden, look!” Sebastian demanded but I refused, burying my face further into my arms “Seriously, Eden, look!”

Something like hope in Sebastian's voice tugged at my resolve and I lifted my eyes, carefully finding Lilly's mother and bracing myself against the rising nausea. But instead of a purple energy field moving toward the heavens, the room filled with blue smoke.

The blue smoke, moved in wisps and soft movements, surrounding the woman and wrapping her up in its billowy folds. She gasped, as if being revived from the hold of death and the lavender electricity slowly returned to her. Her chest stopped hemorrhaging and her skin returned from the ghostly white of death to the pale pink of life.

I stood up, slowly, noticing that the gash on the back of my head had stopped throbbing. I stumbled toward Lilly's mom in unbelieving awe. She sat up, rubbing at her healed chest and eying me with intense curiosity.

The room was still filled with smoke, and I took careful steps through it. Now that the smoke had finished healing, it spread across the stone floor in playful movements, swirling in and out of my legs as I walked. I breathed again, a thankful sigh of relief and my heart swelled with the impossibility of the miracle. I had banished the magic and with it I assumed the smoke, but here it stayed, released from some secret part of me, capable of healing and unwilling to leave me.

“Kiran, I don't know.” I replied with more force. “This doesn't make sense to me either. But you could tell your father about it, just in case it's enough to convince him I'm at least trying to get my magic back....” I mumbled, finishing halfheartedly. The room stayed silent, nobody offering to tell Lucan anything.

Lilly's mother, stayed still on the ground, unsure what to do or if she should move.

“I'm Eden,” I introduced myself to her, offering my hand and helping her stand. “I'm a friend of your daughter’s.”

“Yes, I know who you are.” She smiled at me, a thankful, genuine smile, her eyes brimming with tears and I felt loved. “I'm Rosalind.”

“I'm so sorry for all of this,” I apologized, humbled by the horrifying event of her almost death.

“No, please, I should be thanking you!” She reached out for my hand again, holding it between hers; the look of gratitude displayed on her face was identical to one I had seen on Lilly's numerous times.

“We're going to need to meet. Tonight. And tell him that Avalon must come. I will not let Eden destroy a hundred plus lives tomorrow morning because of her stubborn unwillingness to help,” Kiran commanded.

I looked at him, truly hurt by his words, but he responded with only a glance of mild disgust. Then he turned to Talbott and gave quiet instructions about what to do with Rosalind.

I fell silent, reluctant to argue with Kiran and not ready to admit to myself the truth of what would happen tomorrow morning. There was hope in meeting Avalon tonight, and in being reunited with him, but unless I could get the magic back, hope meant nothing at the cost of so many lives.

Talbott led Rosalind away, and Sebastian took my arm, guiding me back to Kiran's room. I leaned on him, exhausted from the day already. How could I have let things get so bad?

“Did you call Titus?” I whispered.

We were walking up the stairs to Kiran's room. Sebastian put his arm around me, holding me tightly to him. Kiran followed silently after us. Even without my own magic, I could feel his angry electricity swirling around the stairwell. I was too afraid of him to even turn around, so I snuggled closer to Sebastian, letting his friendly presence shield me from more royal wrath.

“Yes, they will meet us tonight,” he whispered back, his tone thick and serious. “Eden, you have to get your magic back. No more messing around, all right?”

“All right,” I agreed, although I no longer needed convincing. “I'm sorry for all of this,” I apologized to Sebastian because he was the only one who could hear me right now. He kissed the top of my head and deposited me into Kiran's room, staying outside to speak quietly with Kiran.

I sat down on the edge of Kiran's bed and felt myself crumble from the weight of my role. Lives were at stake, a hundred lives, with a countdown clock ticking away the precious last minutes of their existence. I put my hope in Avalon, and seeing him. Surely our twin connection would make the process smooth and quick. He was able to get his magic back from me. I would be able to do the same. And I would return in the morning to offer my magic again for the safety of my people. Only this time, I would be offering more than my magic. I was offering my obedience, my loyalty, to a king that would use me for his monstrous intentions. I would not be martyred. I would not be given an easy way out. Whatever Lucan manipulated me into doing for him, I would have to live with the consequences for the rest of my life.

A knock at the door roused me from a deep sleep. I was curled up underneath Kiran's thick comforters. I tried for several hours this afternoon to get a head start on the magic, but nothing happened except exhausting myself.

I opened my eyes and met Kiran's gaze from across the room. He was sitting in one of his leather chairs watching me. His face partially masked by the darkness of the room, his fingers pressed together in a sign of silent concentration.

The knock at the door sounded again, but neither of us moved to answer it. He did not remove his eyes from mine and I could not have looked away if I wanted to.

I was afraid of him, and his penetrating gaze sent shivers down my spine. I wasn't afraid that he would hurt me, and I could hardly even believe he would go through with our upcoming wedding. But something about his change of demeanor frightened me.

Slowly, over the course of the last few months he changed. He was more concerned about the well-being of others and his kingdom than anything else. He stayed consistently somber and serious, never smiling and seldom softening his eyes. He cast me aside, as if he might a small child that he was forced to take care of and couldn't bother to pay attention to.

Until now. With the full power of his stare holding me captive, I couldn't even begin to guess what he was thinking. But I knew that I did not want to know, I did not want to hear more cruel words or more anger directed at me, even if it was from somebody I didn't care about either. I was fragile since my magic was gone. Or maybe I had always been fragile; at this point it was hard to tell.

The door opened; the knocker impatient for one of us to answer. Kiran released his piercing hold, greeting Sebastian as he walked through the door. “Are you ready?” he asked, his voice hoarse and rough.

“Yes, everything is in motion. Talbott is waiting for us,” Sebastian explained somberly.

I stretched underneath the covers, frustrated with how slow and tired no magic left me. But that would change tonight. It
had
to change tonight.

I walked to my closet and pulled a pair of black yoga pants and a black t-shirt and then took them to the bathroom. I rested against the door for a minute, finding the courage to face the night. So much rested on my ability to recall my magic; the weight of the task felt too impossible to carry. But I remembered Kiran's instructions to have Avalon there, wherever there was, and that gave me courage. I was going to get to see my brother tonight. We would be in the same room and that alone was enough reason to get dressed and find motivation.