mythean arcana 06 - master of fate (30 page)

Aurora felt like there was a great gaping hole where her heart had been. She had only seconds before she lost her will.

“Esha!” Aurora called, having no idea if her sister could hear her. “I love you!”

The Seer burst into the cell. Aurora squeezed her eyes shut and focused on the aether, willing herself to be absorbed by it, praying that the aether stone around her neck would aid her one-way trip and that this would be a loophole in the magic cell. 

It blocked aetherwalking, not entering the aether. After all, no one willingly flung themselves into the aether, never planning to exit. That wasn’t aetherwalking. That was suicide.

But to save Felix and her sister? Aurora would do it. Hopefully, she’d drag the Seer with her. If it had worked the first time, it would work again.

Icy blackness enveloped her. She opened her eyes, seeing nothing. Mouse was no longer bundled warmly against her chest. She gasped and reached out, clawing for anything.

Nothing.

Black, cold, nothing. She panicked, flailing in the dark. Trapped. She was trapped forever in hell. And she’d cut every link to the real world. Her link with Felix, her link with Mouse.

No one could find her now.

She grasped the aether stone at her neck.

She floated in the cold blackness of the aether, alone. Stupid. She’d been afraid of loving because eventually Felix would be torn away from her like her mother had been. She’d never guessed she’d be the one having to tear herself away from him.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Felix stumbled and fell to his knees in the snow. Around him, men continued to trudge up the steep mountain, giant canvas packs on their backs and sleds trailing behind them. He clambered to his feet, shaking his head. His brain felt foggy.

“They won’t let you up without your two thousand pounds, lad,” a grizzled man said to him as he passed. “Best go pack up afore you try to cross.”

What the hell? Where was he? Aurora needed him. He had to get to her. She was being dragged across time. He scrubbed a hand over his face. The men flowed by him, an endless stream climbing in single file up a snowy hill.

He searched his surroundings for Aurora, but couldn’t find her. As the seconds passed, the unnatural panic that clouded his mind faded away. What the hell had happened? It felt like he’d been under a spell. A good one.

But now it didn’t make sense that she’d be dragged across time. 

The Seer. She’d tricked him.

He closed his eyes, envisioned the Seer’s ice palace, and let the aether carry him across time and space.

It was empty.

A cry echoed from somewhere far off, deeper inside the caves. He headed toward it, sprinting across the ice. He raced for miles along a narrow blue passageway. It had to have been built by the Seer. The glacier hadn’t formed this.

Voices echoed as he ran along the passage. It opened abruptly into a larger room. Along one wall stood ten heavy wooden doors. Six were flung open. Mouse hurtled from one and threw herself at his chest. He caught her, instantly smelling Aurora.

Esha, Warren, and Malcolm spilled out of one of the rooms Mouse had exited.

“Have you seen Aurora?” Esha cried. Her eyes were frantic. “She’s gone! So is the Seer.”

He didn’t understand. “But Mouse is here.” 

“She’s gone. She’s gone.” Esha clutched at Warren’s arm, looking as if she would collapse. “She went back. She said she loved me and left. Forever. It was the only way.”

The sheer terror in Esha’s eyes made Felix stumble. “What? Tell me everything.”

“We were trapped,” Malcolm said. “Each of us in a cell that dampened our powers and prevented aetherwalking. I could hear the Seer.” The tale Malcolm told him made his heart threaten to break his ribs with its pounding. “Then the magic broke. We could use our powers to break out of the cells. We found Mouse alone in Aurora’s cell. Aurora and the Seer are gone.”

Felix reached out to steady himself against the cold wall.

“Felix, she went back to the aether,” Esha said. “She dragged the Seer with her because the Seer has part of her soul. It’s the only way the Seer’s magic could break.”

“She saved us.” Aurora was alone in the aether. He wanted to roar with pain. She’d be so cold. So afraid. “I have to get her. Get her out. I can timewalk to when she was trapped in the cell.”

“Wait.” Malcolm held out his hand. “If Aurora escapes, so will the Seer.”

Felix rounded on his brother, blood surging in his head and his fists clenched. “I’m going back!”

“You can’t change history like that. It’s huge. The timewalker elders will hunt you down and kill you.”

“Do you think I give a fuck?” Felix roared. “I’m getting her back!”

“I don’t mean you shouldn’t go after her,” Malcolm said quickly. “But we should think of a way that won’t end with your death. And we need to be able to capture and kill the Seer as soon as she’s released. Otherwise, we’re fucked. We couldn’t take her even with cloaking charms, which is saying something. I haven’t been defeated in centuries.”

The idea of waiting, of leaving Aurora in the aether, made him ache. His head pounded and he struggled to rein himself in. They had to do this right the first time, or risk greater tragedy. The Seer was unimaginably strong as long as she had her souls. “The soulceress knife was destroyed. One of the souls took it.”

“What about the demon blade she used on you?” Warren asked. 

“Maybe. We’d have to find it.” Felix sank into a crouch and pinched the bridge of his nose. Mouse paced by his heels. His mind raced with ideas. How to find her in the aether? How to get her out? How to kill the Seer once she’d escaped?

He had no answers.

He surged back up to his feet. “Esha and Warren—can you search this place for the demon blade? I’ll join you in a moment.”

“On it.” Esha spun, her cat at her heels, and set off down the corridor.

Warren’s gaze met his. “We’ll fix this.”

Felix nodded, desperate to believe they could. Warren followed Esha down the corridor and Felix prayed they’d find the blade. He turned to his brother. “Tell me you have some genius warlock plan for getting a blade if they doona find the Seer’s. I might have a way to get Aurora out without timewalking, but I’ve got no idea how to defeat the Seer without a blade that will strip her stolen souls.”

“I’ll see what I can do. I’ll meet you at Aurora’s tower afterward.”

Felix nodded and Malcolm disappeared. When he was alone with Mouse, he walked into the cell from which Aurora had disappeared. It was freezing cold and tiny. Scraps of her jacket were frozen into the ice.

His fists clenched. She hated the cold.

Yet she’d thrown herself into the aether. It was immensely clever. Selfless.

He cursed himself for falling under the Seer’s spell. He should have known it was false. He’d timewalked enough that he’d come close to risking his sanity. His mind still felt a bit fuzzy from it. But that wasn’t the worst. No. He’d spent valuable time running through history when he could have been trying to save Aurora.

But he could save her now, possibly without risking his own life at the hands of the timewalker elders. He stood in the middle of the room and closed his eyes, reaching inside himself for the link between their souls. She’d bound their souls. He had to be able to find her this way.

He found nothing.

“
Fuck
.” Of course she’d cut the link between their souls. She wouldn’t have wanted to risk dragging him in with her. He’d hoped she’d have left that link so that he could find her—like a trail of breadcrumbs.

But she hadn’t even wanted to do that. She wouldn’t have risked him.

Any hope he’d felt crashed around his feet, leaving him empty.

Mouse meowed. His gaze darted up to her. She sat in the corner, some of her otherworldly familiar glow gone. She was Aurora’s familiar. Could she track Aurora and find her in the aether?

His throat tightened at the idea of the sacrifice she’d made.

For him.

But Mouse could lead him to her; he just had to ask Esha how to do it. It took him more than an hour to find Esha and Warren in the rabbit maze of the Seer’s ice palace. They were searching what appeared to be a bedroom.

“Can Mouse be used to track Aurora? Their souls are linked because Mouse is her familiar. She should be able to find her.”

Esha’s dark gaze met his. “Theoretically, yes. But I think Aurora cut the link between their souls. It’s the only reason Mouse is here and not in the aether with Aurora. She wouldn’t have wanted to drag Mouse to the aether with her. She loved Mouse too much.”

The words hit him in the chest. So he’d be timewalking to get her. If they were lucky, they’d have a few days before the elders found him. “I’m going to Aurora’s flat to meet Malcolm. Keep searching.”

Esha and Warren nodded in tandem. He was grateful, because as much as he wanted to kill the damn Seer, he could focus only on getting Aurora back.

“Come on, Mouse,” he said. 

She was at his side in an instant, leaning against his legs. He absorbed the warmth of her fur, grasping at any connection with Aurora, and aetherwalked them back to her flat. 

Mouse raced around the room, searching for Aurora. When she’d completed her circle of the space, she gave a plaintive cry. It twisted his heart even more.

He couldn’t get the thought of her in the aether out of his mind. Memories of her reacting after her nightmares made him ill. Now she was living it. Terrible thoughts raced through his mind as he paced Aurora’s living room. Everything reminded him of her.

After what felt like hours, Malcolm appeared in the living room. Fortunately, Aurora had reconfigured her protection charm to make an exception for the members of their team. In his hand, he held a black blade. His hair was singed and he smelled strongly of brimstone.

“You found one,” Felix said. “How?”

“Don’t ask. But we can’t lose that blade.” Malcolm set it on the coffee table and muttered, “Or she’ll kill me.”

Felix ignored it. His brother clearly didn’t want to share, but was also distracted by whatever he’d just done.

Malcolm met his gaze. “Have you found a better way to reach her?”

“Nay. My ideas were worthless. I’m going to go back in time and kill the Seer.”

Malcolm’s lips flattened. “The elders will kill you for changing history like this.”

“I doona have a choice. I’d take my own death a thousand times over rather than leave her in the aether. If I can kill the Seer before she captures Aurora, she’ll never have to make the choice to go into the aether.”

His brother gave him a hard look, then nodded. He handed him the knife. “Don’t hesitate.”

“No’ a chance in hell.” Felix closed his eyes and focused on an image of the Seer’s ice prison. He reached out to the aether to timewalk. Something pushed him back. A great force shoved him into the wall.

“What the hell?” Malcolm said.

Felix straightened and got his bearings. Aurora’s flat. “It’s blocked,” he said, despair filling his chest like black oil. “Before she was sucked into the aether, the Seer must have blocked her ice palace with her magic. I canna enter.”

“Go back farther. To a time when she’s not in her prison.”

That would change everything. He’d have to go back to a time and place he knew she would be. If he couldn’t get into her ice prison, the only other time would have been when she was torturing him. But if he did that, she’d never have a chance to build the portal that would bring Aurora to him. He’d lose all the time they’d spent together over the last week. And he’d never meet her again—the elders would kill him before he had a chance.

But he could save her life. Determination replaced the bitter agony in his chest. It was worth it. No matter how painful.

“I have to go back pretty far,” he told Malcolm, his chest aching with the knowledge of what was coming. “If I succeed, the elders will eventually find me. Take care of Aurora once I’m gone.”

His brother’s expression showed how much he didn’t like the plan.

“I have to do this, Malcolm.”

“I think you’re panicking. There’s got to be another way.”

“Of course I’m panicking. The woman I love is in hell. I have to get her out. This is the best way.”

“I will make sure she is all right.”

“Thank you.” He clasped his brother in a quick hug, then stepped back. His stomach churned as he focused on the Seer’s prison in the Alps. He’d vowed never to return.

How easily that changed.

He closed his eyes and timewalked. Once again, he was thrown back into the wall.

“What the hell?” he said.

Understanding and relief lit Malcolm’s eyes. “Of course. She didn’t block her ice palace from being accessible to timewalkers—she blocked herself. She knew what she was dealing with when she tortured you. These are her precautions. You can’t get to her in the past. Not by timewalking. No walker can.”

No. It had to work. It
had
to. This couldn’t be the end. Not like this. Not with Aurora suffering for eternity in the aether, enduring her greatest nightmare.

He closed his eyes and tried again. The force slammed him into the wall. He tried again. And again.