The hunted, p.16
The Hunted, page 16
“And we succeeded,” Alejandro said with an easy smile and shrug. “So there’s that. I think we can all agree that serving a blow to the castle was satisfying in and of itself.”
Someone in the crowd hooted and hollered. I was fairly certain it was Jesco.
“I don’t want to speak on their behalf too much, but after hearing their story and seeing Selene shine through her power, I know that she is our best shot in taking back Aradia. The Universe has been guiding her, and now it’s leading us too. Our world is not going down without a fight. We need her, and she needs us.”
The crowd’s energy grew impassioned and vibrant, and I knew it was my turn to speak when Prairie stepped back.
I cleared my throat. “Hi, I’m Áine. I think you all have heard much of the story by now, but just in case you haven’t, I’ll give you my best shot at a long-story-short version.”
The crowd chuckled, and I could tell that I was safe here. Despite lingering questions and doubts, this group of people were overwhelmingly here to help. They were here to take back all that was stolen. I gave them the rundown of all that I’d learned, putting special emphasis on the nature of shadow magick and how it had been concentrated inside Lucius. They also had to understand the way it was given to his supporters and soldiers who did his bidding. There was an icy black web of destruction embedded in Aradia now, a virus that was polluting the land and her magick as well as all the witches under Lucius’s control.
“I’m not a military general,” I said. “And I don’t want to fight a war. As far as I know, any type of widespread violence would only make the false king stronger anyway. The witches who work for him, all who live in the cities and never belonged to any coven… from everything I saw in the Akashic, it would seem they’ve been indoctrinated into a system of lies about both Lucius and all of Aradia. They think covens are backwards, that the old ways of living and doing magick were just a means to oppress witches and restrict their power. They think that there are no gods, and all covens’ rituals and beliefs are just a way to control people. They think that Lucius freed Aradia from all that was holding witches back, and that the reason he’s so powerful is because he was blessed by unknown heavens and made into a deity himself. A king of the people,” I said, anger slipping into my tone.
“I don’t think everyone who works for him or accepts his rule are evil. The only one who is truly evil is Lucius. Everyone else is just lost. They need our help.” I took a breath. “But at the same time, violence on some scale seems inevitable, and no one will be free if he’s allowed to continue. Because what he’s doing will destroy us all, and possibly even other realms too.” I looked to Daelon. “While we learn from each other and begin planning for the future, I know it’s best we teach as many people as possible proper shielding and offensive techniques. We all need to be able to defend ourselves. I am told that you all have been training on your own, and you surely know a lot more than Daelon and me in many areas, but understanding the false king’s magick and strategies in particular are what we can help with. That’s where Daelon comes in. As Lucius’s former second-in-command, he knows exactly how his magick works. He knows how to train you for whatever the future holds.”
Jesco raised a hand. “If I was listening correctly, doesn’t your power contradict the false king’s? And it makes your own allies stronger as well?”
I nodded. “I haven’t been able to see it in action too much, but that’s how I understand it. It seems to find its way into the right people, sharing in all that was left behind by the covens who were lost. It makes you stronger, but it also strengthens me. Lucius’s power is strengthened by pain and alienation, and mine is strengthened by connection.”
“By love,” Wren said, and many in the crowd turned to look at him. “Love created the universe, and love will save it too.”
I shifted. I wasn’t sure why, but I was suddenly uncomfortable under the weight of everyone’s gazes. Everything felt very real. Our objective was no longer a set of small tasks, like learning about Lucius’s origins or escaping the castle. Now our mission was literally saving the world, and I was at the very center of it. I knew it wasn’t about me, as an individual, but my body didn’t seem capable of making that distinction. All I felt now was the steady pumping of adrenaline as my heart rate soared. The sun’s heat at my back was now uncomfortable, no longer a source of grounding.
Daelon’s hand found mine as he introduced himself and gave a layout of what he hoped to teach them. I heard bits and pieces about mental shields, hand-to-hand combat, harnessing frequencies on the fly, and about using my magickal power boost to their advantage when blocking and counteracting shadow spells. But I couldn’t pay attention any longer.
Daelon faltered when I slipped out of his grasp.
Keep talking. I need a minute, I whispered in his mind. He pulled their attention back on him as I strode to an open glass door in the center of all the windows. I slipped outside, quickly taking the deepest breath that I could suck into my lungs.
Everything was quiet, just the faint chirping of birds and the whistling of wind. There were all kinds of training areas set up out here, and I found myself dropping down to sit on the grass in front of some kind of combat range, perhaps for throwing weapons or shooting bows and arrows. It only made my stomach lurch and churn, imagining my friends wielding blades and going head-to-head with Lucius’s army. I was torn between the fire in my blood that yearned for the destruction of all that Lucius had built and the bitter taste of grief for future lives lost.
I jumped in surprise when someone touched my shoulder, relieved to see it was Wren, with Jesco at his side. Wren’s healing energy instantly put me at ease, and Jesco was wearing that trademark mischievous smirk that distracted me from everything heavy.
They plopped down in front of me.
“You all right?” Jesco asked.
I shrugged. “Just wondering as I always do why the hell the Universe chose me to solve all of these monumental, earth-shattering problems. Especially when I have absolutely no idea how we’re going to accomplish such abstract goals as restoring the whole world with love.”
Wren sighed. “What makes you think it’s your responsibility to come up with all the answers?”
“The whole being ordained with Goddess-given power was my first clue,” I said, and I immediately regretted my tone. I didn’t know why I was acting this way. Like everyone loved to remind me, I was supposed to be eternally grateful I had these special powers.
“You are an important piece of the puzzle,” Wren said. “But you are not the only one. We still don’t know your ultimate role, or what the future holds. You’ve been led to death and back, and what you’ve already accomplished has sent shockwaves through the land. Now that the truth is free to be told, not only about Lucius but also about your own resurrection, I sense we are not the only group plotting to be a part of this revolution.”
I weighed his words, and I found that they resonated deep within my intuition. I knew I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t the only one with a responsibility to restore Aradia, even if it sometimes felt that way.
“What you have inside you has gotten you this far,” Jesco said. He sat with his hands clasped around one of his raised knees. “You must hold faith that things will continue to fall into place. Not just for you, but for all witches, everywhere. Not a single person in that crowd expected a twenty-two-year-old witch to be ready with detailed war plans that would put an end to all suffering, forevermore.”
“You are not the only one with a sacred purpose,” Wren said. “Others will have their own roles in this fight. People you haven’t met yet might have already discovered how to contribute their own ideas and skills. We just don’t know.”
I stared at the two men. I was grateful to be surrounded by so many witches older and wiser than I was. I wasn’t used to having this many people around who were looking out for me, and it nearly brought tears to my eyes.
“I guess it might be a little egotistical of me to believe it’s all up to me, huh?” I said sheepishly.
Jesco laughed. “Perhaps. Or it’s mighty noble. But it’s a good thing the world doesn’t revolve around you. That it doesn’t revolve around any single person.”
“Especially Jesco, though,” Wren jabbed.
“Don’t test me, old man. The kids have riled me up into a fightin’ mood,” Jesco said, raising a fist half-heartedly.
“Old man?” Wren scoffed. “Coming from you? Well I think I’ve decided who my sparring partner will be today.”
“You two are going to fight?” I asked, and they both turned their heads to me.
“Hey now, are you agreeing with him that I’m old? Only Jesco’s allowed to call me old,” Wren accused.
“Oh no, I didn’t mean that,” I said quickly. “I just meant because you’re a healer and a High Priest. I don’t know…”
They both laughed at my embarrassment.
“Healers can have a hard time committing violence, that’s for certain. Because we feel the pain we inflict,” Wren started, and I picked up on his use of we. “But sometimes we must fight all the same, when there’s greater suffering if we choose not to.”
“As for me, I just wanna fuck some colonizers up,” Jesco said with a wide grin. “You’ll see me on the front lines. If it ever comes to that.” He paused. “Which I obviously hope it doesn’t.”
Wren shook his head at him. “Regardless, we all need to be able to defend ourselves. Especially when we have what the Shadow King wants most.”
Chapter 15
I let Daelon completely take over training. He knew as much about how my power worked as I did, and I was resigned to the fact that he would be far more capable of explaining to regular witches how to fight than I would. Not everyone had access to an ocean of natural magick at their fingertips and the guidance of thousands of dead witches in their ear.
Also, I was still on edge even after Jesco and Wren’s helpful guidance. I just couldn’t shake Wren’s last words from my mind.
Especially when we have what the Shadow King wants most.
The words pressed up against my chest like a heavy weight, circulating through my body like an unshakeable omen. Daelon and I finally had everything we ever wanted and needed in Iciera. Friends and allies, wisdom and guidance… freedom.
And yet my presence here put everyone in imminent danger, just as Ruth said the first day I arrived.
Ruth found me talking to Jesco and Wren, and she decided to take me on a walk to the magickal greenhouses located just past the training and recreation park. The way she smiled and chatted with coven folk as we walked did much to ease everyone’s tension. Prairie and the others were right. It took her a minute to come around, but once she got to know me, she’d only grown more friendly to Daelon and me. We just had to prove that we weren’t going to do anything behind her back.
We walked down a dirt path tunneled in between giant, gorgeous oak trees. Like everything else in Iciera, even the trees had auras that complimented the surrounding land. The air here was medicine.
“Do you think the reason witches struggled to fight the Order was because this realm has only ever known peace?” I asked. “Was everyone just not used to wielding magick as shields and weapons?”
Ruth threw her brown shawl over her shoulder and peered over at me incredulously. “Who in the hell told you this realm has only ever known peace?”
I paused to consider her question. Wasn’t that what Daelon and Amos had always told me? Or had it only been Daelon? And who knew what kind of truth was told in the castle about the realm’s history…
Ruth continued. “We had been an overwhelmingly peaceful world for a very, very long time. To a human perhaps it would seem like forever. But history wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. The realm has seen battles, long before the Order. Witches have gotten vengeful. They’ve coveted and gotten greedy. Aradia has had to fight for its epoch of peace.”
We reached the end of the tree tunnel, and the land opened up to a series of clear glass greenhouses with rounded ceilings and interconnected tunnels. It was breathtaking, like a palace of glass showcasing entire rainbows of plants in the ground, potted on shelves, and hanging from the ceiling.
Ruth smiled when she looked over at me, watching my reaction.
I cleared my throat. “I found a copy of The Lost Witches of Aradia in the castle that hadn’t been burned. So many of its stories seemed to be parables against violence and in favor of reciprocity and connectivity between covens. Is that why? Because it wasn’t always peaceful?”
Ruth nodded. “The natural state of existence is peace. Mortals are prone to forgetting that, so we have to write stories to remind us. To put us in our rightful place in our tiny slice of the cosmos. Stories teach us how to live, and that’s why the king burned them all. A culture without stories is a culture lost, a people primed for conquest and brainwashing.” Ruth’s energy turned hot. “Most covens were caught off-guard and unprepared when the Order struck, yes. We still have some warrior in our blood and in our magick, but it’s been forgotten. So for these past two decades we’ve been doin’ a lot of remembering. And I have a feeling we aren’t the only ones.”
I thought of Cyrus and his mystery coven on the tropical island. Were they training and planning just as we were? He was certain our paths would cross, and now I wondered about their role in this unwritten map to Aradia’s restoration. Maybe I did have more help than I even knew about.
We entered the greenhouse palace through an open doorway, and the smell of fresh herbs tickled my nostrils. As soon as we stepped inside, the temperature shifted, and I felt the energetic field of magickal influence all around us. An older woman dressed in flowy purple pants and a matching top was tending to a patch of lavender in one of the center rows. Her hair was white and in loose waves down her back. She looked up at us, her light eyes narrowing in on me.
“What are you up to, Winnie?” Ruth drawled.
Winnie. Prairie and Emerson’s grandmother. The believer in faerie kidnapping plots.
“Collecting ingredients,” she said. “I’ve got some cleaning and warding to do.”
Ruth grunted an mmm-hmm response. She sounded skeptical, and now I wondered what Ruth actually thought Winnie was doing with her satchel of herbs.
“There are other realms that need our help,” Winnie said as she snipped at a bushel of lavender. She looked at me adamantly. “You have to remember that. Go out into the forest and listen. You can hear ones above and below, too. Like whispers. Or a hum. Iciera is liminal, Aradia is liminal, and so it’s a hotspot for listening—for the collision of intersecting worlds. Emerson knew, and Charlie knows it too. That’s why you wanted to show them, Áine. It’s all connected. Remember that.”
She stared at me so insistently, her aura glowing such a bright purple, that I had to nod. She looked relieved when I did.
That’s why you wanted to show them. Though I knew what the others had said about her, and I knew that her rapid, disorganized speech didn’t necessarily stoke confidence, those words stuck in my mind like a flashing neon sign.
They were similar to what I told Daelon when we were in Paris, when I revealed my power with glowing orbs of golden light to the humans around the Eiffel Tower. I’d said I wanted to show them my magick, to help them feel whole. After the power high wore off, my actions made less sense. I still didn’t understand why I’d done it.
“Charlie will show you. When it all starts colliding. I know you’ll keep her safe,” Winnie finished, turning back to the bush.
“You have a good day now, Winnie. I’ll see you tomorrow for our tea,” Ruth said. I could see the wariness hidden under her smile.
“Yeah, yeah,” Winnie said, blocking us out as her energy recoiled back into herself.
Ruth let out a long sigh as we continued through the greenhouse. We passed through one of the glass tunnels, and now we were in a huge field of fruits and vegetables.
“Is she a seer?” I asked.
“Occasionally,” Ruth answered with a smile. “She has a great many tricks up her sleeve. As soon as you underestimate her, Winnie shows you just how much she knows about magick and the great mysteries. But just like me, she’s prone to getting stuck. And sometimes what she gets stuck on is far above our concerns here in Aradia.”
The way Ruth spoke about Winnie brought a grin to my lips. She refused to say a single negative remark, nor did she contradict any of Winnie’s beliefs or thoughts. I saw very clearly now why my friends had wanted us to believe that Ruth was a truly good leader. Her tenderness, her respect, and her admiration for a witch that others might write off altogether was refreshing. It might’ve been the bare minimum here in Iciera, but as someone who’d only ever lived on Earth or inside Lucius’s demented castle, it was heartwarming.
“I don’t suppose you know what she was trying to tell me…” I trailed off.
Ruth chuckled. “Was it not clear?” She raised a brow.
I rolled my eyes and continued forward.
I rummaged through Winnie’s words, trying to piece it together. I supposed she was talking about listening for whatever realm she thought Emerson was kidnapped into, the realm of the faeries. Perhaps that was the realm above, and Earth was the realm below, and she was warning me just as Hecate did that all these worlds were connected, all thrust into imbalance by Lucius. The confusing part was the fact that a five-year-old was supposedly at the center of all of this esoteric wisdom.
Maybe I was thinking about it just a little too hard. I shook my head, focusing back on the sarcastic High Priestess.
“I’ve been doing some reading about your coven, in old journals and collected correspondences. There’s a lot written about them for a coven so small,” Ruth said. She bent down in front of a tomato plant, her palm glowing slightly as she mended a wilted, drooping stem. “It’s far from customary, but I wouldn’t mind lending you and Daelon what I’ve found. We don’t live in ordinary times, and it might prove useful for when you’re ready to rebuild.”
