Page 90 of Morning's Light

CHAPTER 20

It is done.

“No!” Astix screeched. She reached out to catch Karsia a second before the girl’s body hit the ground.

Darkness laughed and disappeared into the prone body, leaving them in silence with the TelosAmyet standing sentinel.

“No, no, what have you done?” Astix stroked her younger sister’s hair and blew tendrils of smoke away from the body. “What have you done, you stupid girl?”

Aisanna fell to her knees. “I didn’t know she was awake. Come on, come on.” She tried to summon her magic and found it returning slowly. Healing light flowed from her fingertips into Karsia’s torso.

“Oh my God, there’s steam rising. There’s a hole in her chest!” The last few words ended in a hysterical screech.

“You have to do something.” Aisanna glanced away, gripping the hair at her temples to the point of pain. “This isn’t working. Why isn’t it working?” She tried to summon acorns, symbols of the gods she’d once used to bring Astix back from the edge. Magic came in fits and spurts, sputtering out before she had a chance to lasso her sister’s soul.

“I don’t know what to do.” Astix shook and she looked around. “I need to think. I-I-I’m not good with the healing stuff. I’ve never done it.”

“We don’t have time to think. My powers aren’t working and she’s out of time. She’s not waking up!”

“Fine, let me just—” Her breath exploded out and Astix did the only thing she knew: She conjured. Her senses flared and reached out, finding something to use. Some small thing to tether her sister to their plane of existence.

Her magic brightened and she drew the stones she needed to her.

Aisanna clutched Karsia against her, petals falling around them. “You can’t leave us,” she whispered. “You should have stayed home tonight. Why didn’t I make you stay home? Why would you do something like this?”

Aisanna kept a strong hold, pushing against the friction in her mind. She shook her head bitterly and steamrolled over the last wall. At last, she cracked through the blockage. She took hold of the magic there. A warm recognition of all she was. They’d need it if they wanted to cheat death a second time.

“Roll her over. She needs to face me.” Astix’s voice shook.

When Aisanna blinked, Astix held two small gems in her hand, both glowing from within. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know. But I’m not letting her become the fucking veil. You have my word.”

“Try. Please. Just try.”

Astix took a deep breath, steeling herself, desperately keeping her mind away from what may happen if she failed. Instead, she spoke aloud, although they both knew it was little comfort. “Amber is a protector in general. Thought to ward off negativity and align the physical body with the aura.” She closed her eyes and the glow deepened within the gemstones. “Emerald keeps away evil spirits and voids the power of magicians. Together they should be enough. They have to be enough. Darkness is a physical manifestation of power beyond our control, so I don’t know if this will—”

“Do it,” Aisanna demanded.

Astix slammed her hands together in a shower of sparks. When she opened her palms, the two gemstones had fused together into an amorphous shape. Aisanna placed her palm over Astix’s and together the sisters plunged the makeshift heart through the hole in the younger woman’s chest.

Golden light grew around them. They combined their power, an energy harness to keep Karsia with them.

“You’ll live, damn you,” Aisanna ordered.

Astix gave a final push of the heart, light blinding and heat scorching. They waited for a breath, two, three.

And Karsia inhaled sharply.

Smoke continued to curl from the large crevice where the bolt hit her. Skin and sinew knit together before their eyes and the glow of the gemstones winked out of existence.

“Thank God.” Aisanna hugged Karsia close and felt the erratic beat of the other woman’s heart. “We thought we’d lost you.”

Astix sat back on her heels. “That was a horrible thing to do. A terrible, horrible thing. How could you?”

“I’m alive.” Karsia forced out the words, sounding like two boulders rubbing together. She coughed dryly. “I think.”

“You are alive.” Aisanna drew away to stare at her baby sister. She ran her hands along every piece of exposed skin, looking for wounds, ignoring the shooting pain in her own arm.

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