Page 7 of Iridian

“And he wrestled with the idea for years and years. Wrestled with the morality of it, andthatis the real reason why he went out in the world, traveled far and wide, in search—not for Laetus, but forreasons.”

I’ll be damned…“Reasons for…what, exactly? Whynotto become so purely evil as to possess other people to make them do whatever he wanted?” I couldn’t help myself, though it might have been smarter to just let her get on with the story.

“Reasons why the people deserve their freedom,” Madeline said. “He searched for the good in people, sure that he’d find it, and the answer might surprise you—hedidn’t. The idea of agood manis only an illusion. People are bad to their core, manipulative, lying, cheating bastards, all of them. To trustanyoneat all would be foolish…” Her voice trailed off and she looked down at the book on her lap. “He concluded.”

So painfully obvious thatshebelieved that, too. And I wondered, was that the reason why Madeline was the way she was? Did she really believe that all people arebad?

I would imagine so.Shewas a liar and a manipulator, and she knewsheshouldn’t be trusted, I guessed. After all, it all begins with our own selves, doesn’t it? We see the world through our own eyes.

“Even if that was true, two wrongs still don’t make a right.”

“Regardless of what he consideredwrongorright,he decided to move forward with his plan, to gather an army and take over the world to ensure that the people prospered under his care.”

A bitter laughed burst out of me. “Hiscare,yes. Where he possessed some of the most powerful mages in the world and with them threatened the same people hecaredabout, sure. I see it,” I mocked, but Madeline might as well have been deaf to my voice just now.

“However, his methods were deemedinhumaneby the people, and so they opposed him. Fought him. Died in countless battles before they came together and defeated Titus. That’s the end of the story.”

This was definitely thelongestMadeline had ever spoken to me. I had never before in my life heard this many words coming out of her mouth within the same hour—or even the same year!

“Except the part where they practically banned the Laetus and called themMudand cast them out of society and took away their right to have magic.” I shook my head because an ache had already started to develop behind my eyes. “The story never really ended.”

Madeline was silent for a moment as she went through the pages of the book.

“That is the nature of fear, Rosabel,” she finally said. “That is what people who are afraid of what they cannot control or comprehend orbestdo.”

That I actually agreed with, and suddenly I had this urge to ask her more, curious to see how she thought, what she believedin, but I stopped myself. Not just because of who she was but because time was ticking and Taland wasn’t with me and I needed to find him and find my bracelet asap. Before things went even more to shit. Before this became…irreparable.

“What’s a Regah chamber?” I asked instead.

Madeline didn’t look up from the pages of the book at all, but more shockingly, she actually answered my question.

“It’s a concrete space linked directly to one’s soul, so to speak. To one’s magic. Think of it as a bridge that links your physical location to the one that you have connected your magic to,” she said.

“Two different places in one,” I whispered, as the image of the Regah chamber came to my mind again, that veil of magic that separated us in Silver Spring from the Devil’s cell at the Tomb penitentiary.

“Precisely. Forbidden magic for obvious reasons,” Madeline continued with a deep sigh like she was nostalgic all of a sudden. “But it enables you to be present in two places at once—onlytwo. The one where your physical body is, and the one you’ve tied your magic to. Even then, you are separated by the screen of magic that projects you to the place you are connected to, and projects the place you are connected to, to you. Basically, the entire thing is onlyprojectionbut not only of images. Of all senses and of magical energy, too.”

I nodded. “Oh, yes. I saw that. The Devil literally attacked us from his cell at the Tomb.” Shivers erupted down my back at the memory of how his magic had suspended me on air. How it had taken complete control of my body, how I’d been barely able to finish that spell… “He took us to the Blackrealm, too. I don’t suppose you’ll mind telling me whatthatis, too, would you?”

“It’s nothing but a Blackfire trick gone wrong,” Madeline said, and this time she did raise her head from the book to look at me. “They’ve created this vast space that they can connect tofor short periods of time, Goddess knows when. It has nothing but the color black, hence the name, I would imagine, but there’s a reason why accessing it is forbidden. There’s a reason why the strongest of Blackfires steer clear of it.”

“Which is?” I asked when it didn’t look like she planned to continue.

“You can lose yourself to the black, Rosabel. And if you do, there is no going back. One will forever be stuck in the black if one doesn’t know how to navigate through it—and believe you me, nobody really does, no matter what they think.” She lowered her eyes to the book again. “They used it as a punishment measure back when the IDD was first created. They would banish mages into the Blackrealm never to be seen or heard of again—which, if you ask me, is the cruelest fate of all. No in or out, virtually no senses, no time. I imagine one would want to lose their mind in such a situation—and what happens when you can’t even dothat?”

“That’s…awful.” Just to think about being in a timeless space surrounded by black, never seeing or hearing or feeling anything—fuck.

“That’signorance,” said Madeline. “It was done by people who thought they had control over the Blackrealm but quickly found how wrong they were.”

“But—”

“Isthiswhat you were talking about, Rosabel?”

Madeline didn’t let me speak when she suddenly turned the book toward me to show me illustrations of the Delaetus Army, the soldiers standing in perfect formation with their helmets on—and their bracelets.

I swallowed hard, thoughts of the Blackrealm momentarily forgotten. “Yes.”

“You stole this bracelet from the IDD Vault.”

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