Page 163 of At the Mercy of Midnight
Darkness entered her mind, and sweet oblivion took her.
The next thing she knew, Amelia stood at the edges of a lake, the world around unreal and shimmering, like partial thoughts and fragments of memory.
The ground beneath her feet was spongy and soft, the water of the lake black and still, reflecting the trees and the twinkle of stars above.
At the centre of the lake, Lyana stood, waiting.
She looked the same as always, her red hair tumbling around her in an ethereal way, her skin pale, white gown glowing. It was her eyes that were different, however. They had always been filled with a timeless sadness, but this time, they held something different. Something like resignation, or perhaps…anticipation.
“You came to me,” Lyana said softly, taking two small steps across the still surface of the lake.
Amelia swallowed the weight of grief stuck in her throat. “I…I didn’t know I was going to. I just ended up here.” Lyana tilted her head, and her lips twitched into a semblance of a smile,making Amelia frown. Didn’t she know that it had failed? That the Midnight Realm had won? “Lyana…I’m so sorry, we…failed.” The last word came out as a hushed whisper, a word Amelia hadn’t said aloud yet.
Her face didn’t change.
“Silas was brave,” Lyana remarked, as though they were not discussing his death. “Foolish, but brave.”
Her teeth clenched together. “You…you said if the ritual was done as Bane described, that things would become balanced, that the Rift would disappear!” Amelia felt her hands curl into fists, accusation lacing her tone as anger replaced where sadness had sat. “You said if he became the sacrifice it would work!”
That small smile grew by a fraction, and the anger in Amelia withered just slightly, replaced by something akin to fear.
“I said a lot of things,” Lyana murmured, stepping closer still. “What you needed to hear, to make the choices I wanted to you make.”
Amelia’s chest tightened as a cold, cruel wind stirred at the trees beyond the lake, and the stars about them flickered, like a candle about to sputter out.
She swallowed, meeting Lyana’s eyes. “…You lied.”
“To a degree,” she said ominously. “Truths and lies were mixed.”
“Why?” Amelia breathed.
Lyana’s face lost all expression, eyes turning dull. Even her red hair seemed to darken. “I won’t let him get what he wants. Not any longer.”
Amelia looked at the woman with disbelief. “What are you talking about?”
Lyana tilted her chin as she hid her smile. “You almost ruined it all, you, and Silas. I watched as you tried to rewrite it…you came so close. It might have actually worked.” Her laugh tinkled around the still spaces. “But of course,hewould never have let it happen. Foolish, but predictable. He didn’t even hear the subtle changes I made to the ritual.”
Amelia shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
Lyana sighed. “I’ve been here hundreds of years, Amelia. I’ve absorbed everything about this Realm and how to control it. Unfortunately for you, it means I’ve learned how to control people like you.”
Something clicked in her mind. “Hundreds?” she asked, voice small. “You…you aren’t one of the last pair, are you?”
A small laugh. “No.”
Amelia felt her chest rise on a sharp inhale, and she looked around, pleading silently for an exit, a way to leave. Her feet wouldn’t move and there was nowhere to go. She looked back at her. “Who are you, then?”
“I wasn’t the last,” she said. “I was the very first.”
The truth rippled outwards, like a stone thrown in the middle of the lake. Around them, the forest shifted, the trees seeming to wither and shrivel before her eyes, the stars above bleeding until the sky was nothing but darkness. When Amelia looked back at Lyana, the red of her hair faded, turning inky black, features morphing, a face of sharp angles and dark eyes staring back at her.
“I don’t…” Amelia shook her, disbelieving.
“I was there when the Monolith’s first arrived, tearing the world apart,” Lyana explained, black hair flowing around her. “We were the first chosen, the first tofail.” Something relentlessly dark, something angry and bitter, shadowed her face. “I was sent here, cursed to be alone for eternity.”
Amelia felt her breaths turn harsh. “I…why would you lie to me…why would you want us to fail? For Silas to be forced to join you!”
“I have my reasons,” Lyana said faintly, her smile widening. “Which you should be grateful for…you get to live! That’s more than all the others have gotten. They are all here…suffering with me. You’re the first to get to go back.”
