Page 64 of The Illuminated
“Fine,” he grunted, and as our hands met, we both began to channel. The image of those angelic white birds and Lucius’s demonic wolf creatures flooded our joined consciousness, and we anchored our travel spell to their energetic imprint as we transported through space.
I quickly retracted my hand as the new world took its shape. It was a field of tall grass, and as I rose to my feet, I realized it resembled some kind of battleground. Sickly looking zombie-like creatures on one side, and an army of the living on the other. Lucius and I were caught in the middle. Birds dive-bombed, and humanoid creatures fought with a combination of stone-age battle axes and swords and modern weapons. A bomb exploded near us, sending burning wreckage flying in every direction.
“What is this?” I asked in horror as demonic shadow creatures bolted toward us like they were rabid. Tall men with golden skin and ice white eyes shot them down with golden arrows.
“Who knows? It’s the astrals. As bizarre and meaningless as a dream.”
I shook my head, taking in the carnage. I could feel my own energy—the power of defeated covens and the will of the Universe—reflected in one side. Lucius’s unnatural shadow magick found its home in the other. It was like a dreamlike mirror of the conflict of the witch realm.
“It’s an echo,” I said, mostly to myself. “From Aradia.” As above, so below.
“Who cares what it is,” Lucius muttered. He craned his head, looking away from the battle and toward looming rolling hills of tall, golden grass. “Don’t you hear it? The whispers of Aradia? Listen. It calls to us.”
A broken clock really was right twice a day, because I did hear it. Like a beckoning call, the realm of the living yearned for our return, and it came to us in a cacophony of voices, laughter, cries, and shouts.
We followed, each fighting off stragglers from the astral war as we went. A phantom-like being of white light took a stab at Lucius, bursting into a plume of black smoke at Lucius’s chant. Something I could only describe as a zombie hyena scampered to me with knife-teeth, blown into a million tiny flesh pieces as it met the force of my own magick.
“Disgusting,” Lucius said in response, quirking a brow.
Even the sky above was warring, a mix of bright colors ranging from orange to violet to even colors unseen on Earth or Aradia, to hues of black and indescribable voids that sought to eat the vibrancy away.
Over the hills lay a desolate, barren flatland of blackened grass that looked like it might extend out into eternity. I jumped at the sound of a loud crash, a strike of lightning touching the ground directly in front of us.
You want power, false King? We can give you power.
I knew the voice rang in both of our minds because Lucius’s eyes darted all around in fear. It sounded like the voice of a god—something ancient and powerful, and very, very ticked off.
“Where the hell is this portal?” Lucius screeched, dodging bolts of lightning from above.
The voices from the dimension below grew louder, and soon a haziness appeared on the horizon like that of a hot summer’s day.
Lucius cursed, a bolt finally hitting its mark. He stood for a moment in a kind of vertical seizure until he was released from the electricity with a hiss. He glared at me as if it wasmydoing. I just lifted my hands in the air and shrugged. It wasn’t my fault the whole universe hated Lucius.
If you want your friends in the castle to live, you must escape only with Daelon. Refuse all help from your allies, for you will need them most when you return,the celestial voice said, and I knew this time it was only to me.
He was also right—it was time to escape and follow the map to the ancient coven of Iciera, and anyone who helped us would be killed by Lucius. As much as it was going to hurt, I needed to leave them for now. Until we’d found more allies on the outside to help us storm the castle and the dungeons. And, of course, take down Lucius.
Lucius eyed me, his aura blood red with anger and paranoia. “What are you smirking about?”
“How one day you’ll think back on this moment and know that it was the beginning of the end.”
He looked like he wanted to kill me all over again, no doubt questioning the utility of our truce. I reached the nearly imperceptible shift in astral reality, like a translucent shimmer in the middle of this stretch of nothingness. I waved my hand through it, feeling a strange sucking sensation against my skin like an invisible vacuum.
“I know you’re feeling cocky now, little witch. But I’d still be careful. There are fates far worse than death. For you, and for Daelon. Oh, and Taryn too.”
I bristled. The voice told me to take just Daelon, but I couldn’t leave Taryn behind, not when Lucius had seen her colluding with Daelon. He knew she stood with us, so she also had to come.
“You will be my Queen, but you have to choose it. And the longer this drags on, the worse it will get. For everyone,” he warned, too close now for comfort. His eyes darkened as he took in a long breath. “As adorable as your newfound arrogance is, it will only hurt you in the end. Because you will give in to me, one way or another. And by the end, you’ll bebegging for it.”
I spit in his face.
He grabbed my chin roughly, his eyes wild and animalistic. Then he donned a terrifying grin, and he plunged his hand through the tear in the astrals, stretching it wide enough for us to jump through.
“Enough foreplay,” he whispered into my ear as an inescapable pull of suction sent us tumbling through the portal.
At first, I couldn’t rid myself of his touch, the imprint of his fingers on my face like a permanent branding and the feel of his breath against my ear like an eternal source of heat. I could’ve sworn he evenbit mein the commotion, my earlobe searing with a sting.
The voices of the realm were overwhelming, and all I could see was the flashing of lights as I was pulled down a dark tunnel of formlessness. A crack split open at the bottom of the channel, offering me back the gift of life. And as painful, heavy, and confusing as I knew this gift was, I would’ve chosen it again and again.
