Kill your darlings, p.4
Kill Your Darlings, page 4
“That’s hardly a comfort. In fact, it puts us all in mortal danger,” says Valen, fixing me with a glacial look. “Kyla Starblade is the only person in our army who could defeat Lord Zalor. Our strategy for reclaiming Shadow-occupied territory hinges on her lightmagic. If he finds out she’s gone, there would be little to stop him from laying siege to the imperial city and claiming the Eldrian throne.”
“I don’t need the mansplaining, thanks. I literally wrote the book on this.” My characters frown at the Earth reference. Valen’s disapproving scowl suggests he wants to lecture me some more. Before he can, I scrape together my composure and add, “I’ve put you in a bad spot, but I’m going to fix it.”
“How?” says Cendrion.
How, indeed? I can’t win the Shadow War. My presence in Kyla’s body has extinguished her magic.
I inhale, and strong scents ground me: the lingering stench of the mugwort poultice, the deep aroma of muddy earth, the subtle tang of magic. If this were a book, the answer would be straightforward, simple. I’d have my characters traipse off on an epic quest to save the world.
Slow warmth seeps from my heart, leaking through my body. Why can’t it be that simple? I’ll be the first to admit I suck at problem-solving on Earth, but here… here I have fantastical, otherworldly tools at my fingertips. Knowledge. Magic. Friends.
My lungs fill with anticipation and my stomach contracts with nervous excitement. With a stout nod, I sit up straight. “I’ll bring Kyla back.”
“Again,” Cendrion presses, “how?”
A hurricane of half-baked ideas swirls through me. Planning isn’t my strong suit, but that won’t stop me here. Throwing aside my blankets, I jump to my feet. “I need to talk to the dragons. If anyone can offer answers, it’s them.”
For the first time since I revealed my identity, no one argues with me. I send a silent prayer of thanks to the mother-goddess Ohra.
My spirits rise once more as our ragtag troupe marches to the southern end of the camp. Solera lives and breathes around me. Solid, tangible, real.
The jury’s still out on that last one, I’ll admit. But if it looks real, sounds real, smells real, it may as well be real. What is reality but the sum of our perceptions? So long as this perception of reality lasts, I’ll commit to it.
“Stand aside, please,” I call to a group of guards, puffing out my chest as I strut toward the changemagic portal that shimmers behind them. “We must return to Midgard.”
Kyla doesn’t actually have commanding power in the army. She’s classified as a special ops force and serves directly under the highest officer of the Mortal Alliance: Valen. Hello, conflict of interest.
The guards glance at Valen for confirmation. At his curt nod, they stand aside, allowing us access to the portable gateway that leads to Eldria’s imperial city.
“Captain Ithryn,” says Valen, addressing the lead guard. His voice is clipped and tense. “Send a message to General Praxus; he has command of the division while I’m on leave. Zalor’s forces have withdrawn, but we must reinforce the airmagic shields around Westport and double the patrols on watch.”
Ithryn bows and raises her left hand, where a silvery communication ring glints on her littlest finger. She murmurs to it as our group passes by, magically relaying Valen’s orders.
I refrain from telling them that Zalor’s busy with other things at this point in the tale, already plotting his next attack. Our division will be safe while we’re away.
The Midgard Portal is a wispy aberration, a rip in the fabric of spacetime that has no width or mass. It stretches between two mobile, metallic boundary poles. Within the portal’s foggy depths, a sparkling metropolis fades into view. I step from Westport to the imperial city, moving seven hundred miles in a single stride, reveling in the soft tingle of arcane magic as it warps around me.
There’s a bounce in my step as I arrive in the Imperial Palace courtyard. I squint upwards, admiring the grandeur. White marble walls gleam in the afternoon sun. Cylindrical towers rise to spear fluffy, low-hanging clouds. Sculpted gargoyles crouch on high ramparts, spouting trails of water that thin to mist before ever touching the ground.
Magnificent though it is, I veer away from the palace, crossing the tiered flagstone square toward golden gates that lead to the city proper. The Midgardian Mountains rise in the far distance, blurred with summer haze.
I’m hyped. So hyped. Is it wrong to be this excited? Childlike delight bubbles within me. This rush of serotonin is better than any drug I’ve ever tried—and I’ve tried a lot of them.
I wasn’t an addict, not really. I was just looking for something that could… well, something that could give me this. Happiness, pure and undiluted. Nothing worked (though tequila came close), so I never tried the same drug twice.
“How many dragons are in residence in the mountains?” I attempt to sound calm and professional, but my voice comes out high-pitched with eager anticipation.
“You mean your omniscient creator brain doesn’t know?” Rexa sneers.
The true-to-character reaction warms me, and my lips quirk. “No, this isn’t part of the story I wrote. This world started changing as soon as I possessed Kyla.”
Ugh. That makes me sound like some gross poltergeist. This isn’t a possession. I don’t know what it is, but I know it’s not as simple as that.
Rexa’s eyes flash gold in the afternoon light. “So you admit you stole her body.”
“I told you a million times, I didn’t steal anything. This wasn’t intentional.”
Although if I had been able to do it intentionally—transport my soul from Earth to Solera, inhabit the body of my heroic protagonist—I’d have done so in a heartbeat.
“Enough arguing, Rexa,” says Asher. As the army’s ambassador, it’s his duty to be a mediator within our forces. If a conflict arises, Asher’s the one who sorts it out.
“I can’t believe you’re buying into her bullshit,” Rexa says as the gates swing open on magical automated hinges, revealing the cityscape. “You’re parading this parasite through our capital like it’s nothing. What if she’s an enemy shapeshifter trying to infiltrate our army?”
“How would an enemy know as much as she knows about us?”
“Wow, great question. I guess it would only make sense if Zalor had mind-controlled demons who could turn to shadow and spy on private conversations. Oh wait—”
“If I wanted to infiltrate your army,” I interrupt, “confessing I’m from a different world has got to be the stupidest way to try it. Besides, you know why I can’t be a shapeshifter.”
As soon as the words are out, I realize I’ve crossed a line with Rexa. Her body fills with tension, a coiled spring ready to snap. We’ve left the palace proper, and I shudder to think how a brawl between two army officers would look to the city’s civilians.
Rexa’s a fighter in every sense of the word, just like Lindsay—but I haven’t had a fight with Lindsay in years. She moved to Chile to reconnect with her birth family. After finding her birth mother and sister, she decided to stay abroad and pursue a career in teaching. With her so far away, she and I drifted apart.
Now Rexa leans close, and a surge of memories return to me. The way her eyes narrow, the way her cheeks color with emotion… it’s like looking at my cousin. When was the last time I bothered to FaceTime with Lindsay? I can’t remember.
“What do you know about the shapeshifters?” Rexa whispers in a venomous undertone.
I swallow, clenching fists that have become clammy. “I—I know you’re the last one.”
A snarl curls Rexa’s lips. “I can’t begin to guess why you’re playing this twisted game, but you’re going to slip up eventually, and when you do…” She draws a claw across her neck.
Asher steps between us. “I don’t take chances when it comes to public safety.”
From his wyvernhide utility belt—something he created himself, with enough hidden features to make Batman envious—he withdraws a tiny glass vial. Acid-green liquid glints within it. “You know what this is?”
“Soulbane,” I say without missing a beat. “Not lethal, but toxic. It knocks you out when it enters your bloodstream and prevents you from wielding until it cycles out of your system.”
He nods. “I won’t hesitate to use this if I think you’re a danger to yourself or anyone around you, but so far you haven’t given me reason to distrust you.”
Rexa scoffs, but thankfully, doesn’t comment.
“I’m sure we all want things to go back to normal, including…”
Asher hesitates, giving me an odd look. “We never got your real name.”
“For sake of ease, it’s best if you keep calling me Kyla.”
He frowns. “That feels weird.”
“She’s right,” says Cendrion, plodding along behind us. “This is a matter of national security. Zalor cannot discover that Kyla is compromised.”
I glance over my shoulder and flash him a smile. He doesn’t return it.
His reaction, coupled with Rexa’s unrelenting death glare, sours my mood. I should have lied and pretended to be Kyla. It wouldn’t have been hard. If only I’d come up with a better explanation, one that didn’t turn my darlings against me.
We tromp west for a solid hour. The city has lost some of its vibrancy due to the ongoing war, but there are still plenty of people bustling about. Glittering skyscrapers, constructed through a combination of magic and mathematics, tower on either side of the packed thoroughfare as patrons browse street stands for food, clothes, and art.
Finally, we reach the city walls. Midgard perches on towering limestone cliffs surrounded by a moat. The ring of mountains beyond the river offers further natural protection.
Of course, without Kyla’s teleporting abilities, I have no idea how we’re going to reach the dragons’ mountain enclave in a timely fashion. Midgard’s fleet of enchanted airships is divided amongst the battlefronts, and it would take hours to cross the footbridge and climb the far slopes.
I stop once we’re clear of the gates, but Valen strides ahead and does an about-face, pinning me with his icy gaze.
“So, I didn’t think this one through,” I admit. “I can’t teleport us to the dragons.”
“No, but you can summon them.”
Ah. This is another test. He wants to see how much I know.
Cracking my neck and hiding a smirk, I sidestep Valen and continue toward the cliff. “It won’t have the same effect without magic, but I can try.”
I relish the sweet breeze that rises from the river, stirring my garments and lifting my loose hair in a cloud. The sun is sinking behind the western ridge of the mountains. Colorful, sparkling shapes traverse the skies: dragons high above, scouring the moat and slopes for an evening meal.
My worries melt away. Pure, unburdened joy renders me feather-light and giddy. This is all I’ve ever wanted—this beauty, this view, this feeling. I know the stakes, I know I’m insane, but for all that… I’m happy.
A lifetime has passed since I was last happy.
“Drachryi, kemraté a’eos!” Caught in the thrill of playing pretend, I thrust Kyla’s hand in the air, pointing at a flying formation of six dragons. “Vecerey rheenra aves te’oi!”
The timbre of raw magical power that should be present when Kyla speaks Draconic is absent from my voice. Still, my inflection and pronunciation are spot-on. I roll my Rs and manage to capture the songlike flow of the language.
Asher’s eyes go wide. While he’s suitably impressed, Rexa is the perfect picture of haughty disdain: lizard arms crossed, fuzzy hip jutted, clawed foot tapping.
Luck’s on my side. A twilight-scaled beauty swoops low, fixing me with a keen eye. Since I paid special attention to every dragon in my books, I recognize her as Temereth. Possessed of uncanny intelligence, even for the hyper-intelligent dragons, she’s one of the few who’s taken it upon herself to learn the Eldrian language.
A convenient happenstance to move this new subplot along. Suspiciously convenient, almost.
“Temereth, tenerey qaersas arem evos arcanos,” I yell.
Dragons don’t deign to interact with mortals—who they view as crude and brutish—but they’ll make an exception for Kyla Starblade. She wields their power, and they honor that magical connection.
Sure enough, Temereth banks and backwings, slowing her approach. I retreat, giving her room to land. She alights before me, hooking pearly talons into crevices in the rocky ground. Her massive, membranous wings create miniature tornadoes of dust, and her dark scales glint sapphire when they catch the light of the sun. The scent of charcoal and minerals clings to her. It’s accented with an indescribable aroma of magic, charged and vibrant.
I press my right fist to my heart and bow. I’m not sucking up—not consciously, at any rate. It’s the appropriate reaction. Here’s a creature four times my size who could rend me to pieces if she chose. If she doesn’t deserve my respect, no one does.
“Lux’abria,” she greets me, using the Draconic term for Lightbringer. “Quoras endrat inquios teos?”
“Do you mind if we speak Eldrian so my friends can join the conversation?” I gesture behind me, commending myself on my quick thinking. My Draconic is conversational at best. I invented a language for my books, but I had a handy-dandy cheat sheet I referenced whenever I was writing.
Temereth surveys my companions, passing judgment.
“Cendrion,” she rumbles, staring down her snout at the smaller male. “It has been a month of moons since I saw you last.”
His scaly lips curl in the faintest of snarls. “The dragons made it clear I was no longer welcome among them after the incident with Zalor.”
I’m sure I’m the only one who catches the subtle hitch in his voice when he mentions that so-called incident. Incident doesn’t capture the magnitude of the thing—it was downright cataclysmic when I wrote it.
The inner translucent membranes that protect Temereth’s violet eyes rise and lower. A constellation of reflected light winks across her hide as she tilts her head toward me. “You claimed to have a question involving arcane magic.”
“I do, and I ask that you keep an open mind when I tell you what happened.” With that, I launch into my tale, explaining my identity and my relationship to the world of Solera. Temereth listens without a single interruption, standing at attention with the preternatural stillness of her kind.
“I had a bad week, and I wanted it to be over. So I went to sleep on Earth—I guess. I actually can’t remember what I was doing, but I must have been sleeping, because next thing I knew, I woke up here, in Kyla’s body, thinking it was just another dream.”
I pause, reflecting on Earth. My memory’s glitching. I recall languishing in my apartment for days on end, trying to force myself to do my damn rewrites. After that, it’s a blank. The trail goes cold.
Some things remain crisp in my mind: Eric and Lindsay, my publishing team, my books. While the cornerstones of my identity are solid, the architectural details have blurred. I remember New York City, but not my favorite stores. I live near the 2 Train, but have no specific recollection of ever riding the subway.
I rub my temples, trying to massage away the beginnings of a stress headache. “Way I see it, there are two possibilities. The first is that I’ve suffered a massive psychotic break. This is a hallucination, and you’re all projections of my subconscious.”
Cendrion flattens his ears to his skull. “I’m not a figment of some human’s imagination.”
“Ah, but that’s exactly what you’d say if you were a figment of my imagination.”
I’m met with silence and unamused glares. No one appreciates my joke.
Clearing my throat, I hurry on. “The second possibility is that this is real. Everything in your universe, from the sun and the stars to the dirt beneath my feet, exists independently of me. But somehow I became connected to Kyla Starblade, and…”
I scowl, realizing the paradox as I stumble upon it. I’m connected to Kyla because she’s the main character in my bestselling Young Adult novel series. I fabricated her life and personality from scraps of thought in my head. The connection only makes sense if this isn’t real.
Temereth hums in thought. I can tell from the lowering of her rounded brow ridges that she, too, is analyzing the situation from every angle.
“There are many parallel universes that exist beyond our own,” she says. “While these universes never physically coincide, it is possible through quantum-magical entanglement that they may interact. Since souls consist of molecules that adhere to the fundamental laws of energy, your Earthling soul and Kyla’s Soleran soul could have become entangled.”
“I’m sorry, are we taking this lunatic story seriously?” says Rexa. “You think it’s more likely a transdimensional spirit possessed Kyla than that this is a disguised enemy?”
“Yes,” says Temereth, in a voice that invites no room for argument.
Valen tries arguing anyway. “You also think it more likely than the possibility that this is still Kyla? The sustained traumas of war can lead to PTSD, psychotic breaks, and worse.”
I hear the subtle edge of pleading in his voice. He’s grasping at straws, hoping this is the answer. For a moment, I find myself hoping it is, too. What if I’m really her, the legendary, lightmagic-wielding hero? What if the twisted, fragmented memories rattling around in my skull are the dream, and this is my reality?
Surreptitiously, I glance down at my hands and poke my left palm again. My right pointer finger connects with solid flesh.
Real, my heart whispers, yearning for it to be so.
“Every soul has a unique energy signature, an infrared aura of magicthreads,” Temereth continues in the background. “It is a mix of the elemental magic one wields, one’s genetic composition, and electrical impulses in the brain and body. As a lightmagic wielder, I can see those auras, and I can definitively say that this is not Kyla Starblade. Her aura is alien, unlike that of any soul on the planet of Solera. Jagged, where yours are soft. Dull, where yours are bright.”
