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PROLOGUE
Scrambling backwards from the opponent he could no longer see, Aeric flailed his sword with one hand while wiping the blood out of his eyes with the other. Panic clutched his throat. His aching body no longer trembled from exhaustion alone.
An unseen elf’s arrow found its mark through his
upraised arm. Aeric cried out. His sword clattered to his feet a moment before
his leather armour gave beneath the crushing, piercing blow from the sharp end
of a dwarf’s mighty war hammer. Aeric staggered, clutching the wound. The agony
from beneath his blood-bathed hands was so intense that he barely
registered the final two arrows when they pierced his thighs, leaving him
wondering for a moment why he was sinking to his knees.
The dwarf kicked Aeric’s sword out of reach. “You failed, Your Highness.” His lips curled into a sneer when he spoke Aeric’s title.
Aeric tried to sound brave, even as his breath rasped and black spots floated in his vision. “Finish it, beast. Kill me.” He dropped to a seated position.
“Already did.”
Aeric watched the filthy creature lift Phoenix Frenzy, the sword that had been passed down between crown princes for generations. Normally, seeing his prized weapon in the hands of the enemy would have sent him into a rage, but it felt dreamlike, as if he was observing from afar.
“My gratitude for the sword.” The dwarf’s laughter was mocking as he strolled away, a cocky bounce to his stride.
Aeric watched him tilt Frenzy from side to side, examining her craftsmanship in open admiration—the etching of flames along the rare otopardium shaft, the golden pommel shaped like a phoenix in flight. The dwarf’s lack of urgency spoke volumes; but for a handful of skirmishes, the battle was over, Aeric and his men defeated.
With Aeric’s strength dripping from him and the castle courtyard blurring, he tipped sideways then rolled to his back, his knees still bent. Gravity directed the flowing blood away from his eyes, cutting warm paths through the grime to patter on the ground at uneven intervals, like the first drops of rain on parched earth. So much for the protection potion Oracle Ebba forced him to drink every week.
He blinked several times to clear his vision, his blank stare barely registering the smoke that curled against the sky, taking the place of the absent clouds. The erupting celebratory din from the city below drowned out the few faint clashes of metal on metal and the cries of the wounded.
The dwarf was correct. Aeric had failed. The first test of his man-hood, one that should have been simple. The peasants hadn’t been brave enough to attempt an uprising in decades, yet somehow, less than one year after his father presented him with Phoenix Frenzy and tasked him with controlling Stakfleth, he had managed to lose both. Worse, Gloringar, the dwarf queen, had been rescued from imprisonment.
He had tried to warn his father about the rumours—approaching dwarves, an elven army’s silent advance—only to be rebuked. “To take my place on the throne,” his father had said, “you need to exhibit more intelligence than those you seek to rule. Light elves have not been seen in the kingdom for nearly two centuries. And dwarves? Has there been a slave revolt of which I’m unaware? Of which Oracle Ebba is un-aware?”
If only the king would blame Oracle Ebba for this failure rather than his own son.
Oblivious to the silence spreading across Castle on the Hill’s courtyard and the heat of the late morning sun, Aeric shivered from shock and, perhaps more so, from fear. Fear of his fate should he survive his wounds. To his estimation, surviving meant one of three possible outcomes: being beheaded by the enemy, being held prisoner with or without ransom, or being returned to his father who would publicly shame and punish him. Any of these possibilities would be cause for enemy celebration. A rallying point.
If he didn’t die here in the courtyard, he hoped for beheading, the only outcome that could save him from his father. Although the king was normally kind to his children, he did not tolerate failure, especially from his own flesh and blood. The only thing that infuriated him more was disobedience. Aeric had borne witness to his father’s extreme methods of discipline with his siblings and endured the brunt of them himself. Beheading by the enemy would be swift and relatively painless, the opposite of any punishment King Ulric would devise.
Imprisonment was the outcome he most dreaded, even more so than facing his father alive. Not only would he be trapped in the company of such filth as dwarves, peasants, and elves, King Ulric would inevitably regain possession of the city and of Aeric himself. Being held prisoner would only delay Aeric’s suffering at his father’s hand, and any amount of time spent anticipating it, imagining it, was too long.
With these thoughts, Aeric came to welcome death. Cowardly perhaps, yet he prayed for its swift arrival. The goddesses were more likely to show mercy than his father ever would. The faces of his sisters flashed in his mind. Not even the guilt over deserting them could provide him with the courage he needed to survive. Cowardly, and selfish.
The arrow wounds and the gash to his head weren’t fatal and the myriad of cuts and scrapes minor, but the wound in his side? His hand shook and he moaned as he probed the area. The dwarf’s mark was grievous enough to kill him without treatment, but it would be a slow, painful death, not the quick one he wanted. Only the most skilled of healers could save him, including elves with their powerful magic, and even then he would require days of care. Unfortunately, he’d heard whispers of such a witch here in Stakfleth. Not that he and his troops had been able to locate her. Another failure.
If the stories of the witch’s skills were true, he mustn’t fall into her hands.
But the dwarf knew where he’d fallen and could lead the enemy to him.
Then he mustn’t be recognized. He must appear to be somebody else. A nobody. And somebody must appear to be him.
Aeric frowned. He couldn’t do much about his face or hair other than hope the generous coating of grime and blood would serve as a mask, as with any exposed tattoos. Fortunately, his armour appeared identical to that of his men, its otopardium reinforcements hidden. This helped him blend in, not stand out as an obvious target.
What were his other identifying features? The dwarf had inad-vertently done him a favour by stealing his sword, although now, belatedly, the thought of Phoenix Frenzy in that sub-human’s hands made his stomach churn. Then there was his family ring and the medallion hanging around his neck. Normally, if the enemy got close enough to recognize the jewellery, they were close enough for him to kill. Not today, though. Today there had been too many.
Somehow, he needed to plant the jewellery on a decoy body. But how? He could barely move.
With great effort, he tilted his head from left to right. The archers were no longer on the parapets, the victors no longer in the courtyard. The cries of the wounded were fewer and weaker, while the sounds of battle had disappeared. It was officially over, and the enemy were either congregating in the city down the hill or on their way to do so.
The nearest of Aeric’s fallen troops was still well beyond arm’s reach, another victim of the elves’ marksmanship. When his gaze swept along the wound-riddled body to the bloodied face, an arrow protruding from the temple, he felt a pang that was quite separate from the agony of his injuries. Cadbian. A cousin who was more like a brother. His closest friend. It was no surprise he’d died nearby. They’d always been inseparable, even more so than Aeric had been with the actual brother he’d lost years ago.
When his vision blurred this time, it wasn’t from blood.
Going through with this would doom his best friend’s corpse to mutilation. Cadbian’s head would end up on a stake. But it had to be done. Aeric could not face his father. He needed to drag himself over to Cadbian, transfer the ring and the medallion, then drag himself as far away as possible. Other than a few well-placed arrows, their wounds didn’t match, but truly, how difficult could it be to outsmart a dwarf? The ruined state of Cadbian’s face worked in Aeric’s favour by masking the differences in their features, as did their nearly identical hair, and the cloud of death would soon hide the colour of Cadbian’s eyes. Besides, he only needed to fool the enemy long enough to die.
He set his jaw. “Forgive me, cousin.”
The arrows in Aeric’s limbs needed to come out before he could roll over or crawl. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and yanked. And again. And once more. He bit his tongue so hard trying to hold the howls at bay that he tasted the tang of fresh blood. Moaning, he tried to move but the unbearable pain overcame him and black spots congealed into darkness.
***
Sometime later, Aeric blinked several times, getting his bearings. He was halfway on his right side. And weak. So weak. He could hear water running nearby. The fountain. His throat burned with a sudden ferocious thirst. How long had he been unconscious? Not long enough for the enemy to have found him, but that outcome inched towards certainty with each passing moment, and he didn’t have the strength to reach Cadbian’s body. He was doomed.
Unless…
He hadn’t attempted this since he was a boy, when it had been nothing but a game to him. His fun little secret. Until the oracle had caught him in the act and informed his father, who had then directed his infamous wrath and cruelty towards Aeric for the first time. After Aeric had recovered, he wouldn’t so much as think about the game lest he found himself the target of such fury again. Could it now, in this desperate situation, help him escape a different form of punishment? In his weakened state, would he be able to manage?
He had to try.
Another groan escaped him when he let go of the wound in his side. Slick blood enabled him to slip off his ring with ease. He tossed it as close to Cadbian’s right hand as he could, but his aim lacked its usual pinpoint accuracy. The ring landed on Cadbian’s left shoulder, followed by Aeric’s royal medallion and the necklace he’d snapped.
Now for the hard part.
He closed his eyes, held out his arm, and recalled every detail of his ring, imagined energy pulsating from his fingertips, and willed it to move. He visualized it sliding across and off Cadbian to his cousin’s right hand. Sweat beaded on his bloodied brow. His arm trembled. The pounding in his head multiplied. Was it working? He opened his eyes.
Sure enough, the ring now rested on the far side of Cadbian’s torso. Another push and it would hit the ground. Amazement swelled in Aeric’s chest, even as he realized his efforts would be for naught if he couldn’t get the ring on Cadbian’s finger. Did he have enough strength and skill for such a precise manipulation? First, he needed to see where he’d be aiming.
He was able to prop himself on his elbow long enough to look across Cadbian’s body. His excitement drained and his gorge rose. His cousin’s fingers were severed. That nightmarish sight should have been enough to stop him from looking at Cadbian’s face again and the arrow protruding from his temple, but his gaze wandered there against his will. The fatal arrow seemed to point at him in accusation. Look what you and your ineptitude caused, it seemed to say.
Some sixth sense prickled, telling him people were approaching the courtyard. He was running out of time.
Again, he pictured the ring, ignored his shaking arm that wanted to wilt to the ground, and imagined an invisible push. The ring hit the ground on Cadbian’s far side with a soft thump. The fresh flow of adrenaline dulled his pain just enough for him to take another look across Cadbian’s body, and he managed to push the ring against a bloody stump before he collapsed onto his back again. Close enough. Maybe the enemy would think the ring had come off when the fingers were severed.
Now the medallion. This was easier. Aeric took as deep a breath as possible before making a few minor adjustments to its location and the position of the chain, his entire body now shaking. When he finished, it looked as if the chain might have snapped during battle.
Gasping, he rolled to his back and choked down agony’s scream, but not before motion in the distance caught his eye. Five figures stepped through the main gate across the courtyard. Two were elves, one tall and imposing, his shoulder-length hair tucked behind his ears, and the other dark-skinned with long, corded black hair. Two dwarves included the bald male who had defeated Aeric and stolen Phoenix Frenzy, and a female with white-blonde hair. Finally, there was a human woman, dressed in a long, brown skirt and a billowing white blouse, a multi-coloured bag over her shoulder. Each of them bore the marks of battle. Dirt, blood, wounds, torn clothing.
“Where did the boy-prince fall, Zigali?” A deep, resonant male voice.
“East of the fountain, I said. Your pointy ears not workin’?”
“Zigali,” a firm female voice said with a note of warning.
Aeric forced himself not to writhe, not to scream or cry. Instinct screamed at him to keep his eyes open, yet he forced them closed. It was torture of another kind to lie there listening to them cross the courtyard, doing nothing but waiting to be found in this shameful situation, unable to do anything to help himself or to hurt them.
Five sets of footsteps stopped beside Cadbian. Aeric’s lip curled at the thought of these creatures touching his cousin, even in death, but he kept still and silent.
“What shall we do with the prince’s body, my lord?”
Aeric berated himself for not recognizing Lord Taron, leader of the elves. Another item for his growing list of failures.
The elf lord didn’t reply.
“My lord?”
“That is not the prince.”
Aeric’s stomach clenched at Lord Taron’s words. Judging by the sound of footsteps heading back towards the fountain, one of the men was walking away. A lighter set of steps followed.
“It bloody well is,” Zigali called out. “I felled him myself, I told you.”
“He bears the royal jewellery, my lord.” There was hesitation in the other elf’s smooth voice, as if he didn’t want to offend Lord Taron.
Aeric opened his eyes but a crack and found the tall elf lord standing by the fountain, sunlight glinting off his hair as he stared at the dancing water. Weren’t elves supposed to be wise and all-knowing? Surely this one had seen the symbols of the five elements before: unicorn, bear, eagle, lion, and dolphin. The human woman stood by the elf’s side, but their voices were too soft for him to hear.
Aeric shifted his gaze to the dwarves and the remaining elf, all three of whom were watching the two at the fountain, their backs to Aeric. The male dwarf—Zigali, apparently—cursed, spat on the ground, and said, “Well, what are you waitin’ for? Behead him. Ah, I’ll do it myself.”
“Zigali.” Like a flash, the female dwarf’s arm shot out to grasp Zigali’s arm before he could raise Aeric’s own sword. To Aeric’s surprise, the thief lowered his arm and bent his head in deference. Just like that, Aeric recognized who she was: Gloringar, the so-called Queen of the Dwarves. That she would be there at his end was one final insult.
“Wait for Lord Taron,” the dreadlocked elf said to Zigali. “He is Seeing. And he is correct. This body does not bear the mark of your war hammer. It is a decoy.”
“Bah. You Loinnai and your nonsense.” But Zigali joined the others in staring towards the fountain.
Aeric’s eyelids began to flutter of their own accord as a wave of dizziness crashed over him. He was feeling weaker by the moment, and he prayed to succeed at this one thing: death.
“What is it you see, my lord?” the dreadlocked elf called out.
“Blood, Yendar.” It was the human woman who replied.
“I coulda told you that. ʼNuff blood’s been spilt today a blind man could see it.”
Gloringar and Yendar sighed, whereas the elf lord ignored Zigali. “On the lion. Solely the lion.” Without warning, Lord Taron spun on his heel, his keen eyes scouring the once pristine courtyard that had become a field of bodies. “The true prince shall not be far.”
The game was up. They were going to find him, and when they did, he didn’t want to look like a coward, playing dead. At least he could do that much right. So, he opened his eyes and waited, daring them to notice but lacking the strength to call out. He wasn’t even strong enough to guard his mind as his mother and Oracle Ebba had taught him, which was dangerous—he’d heard the stories and knew Lord Taron could pluck thoughts out of minds with the ease of a troll crushing an egg.
It took Taron mere seconds to find him. The elf’s eyebrows lifted and he smiled, much to Aeric’s ire. How Aeric longed to jump to his feet and attack, to rid the world of Lord Taron and his smile for good.
The others followed Lord Taron’s gaze. When the human woman saw Aeric, she said something to the elf lord, who nodded once. Aeric glowered at the lot of them, his breaths coming faster with each step the woman and the group took in his direction. Such was Lord Taron’s grace that he seemed to float on air as he strode to Aeric’s side. “This is the prince.”
Aeric glared into the magnetic blue eyes, striking in both their intensity and the kindness within. “Go ahead. Kill me,” he said through gritted teeth.
“That’d be him all right. Said the same thing to me. I say we grant his wish. Allow his sword to finish what Oxheart—”
Taron held up one large but graceful hand, then knelt beside Aeric’s shoulder. “You are gravely wounded. I regret your suffering.”
The elf’s voice was soothing, almost hypnotic, and Aeric couldn’t help but believe him. His planned insults died on his tongue, replaced by a pleading tone. “Let me die.”
Taron tilted his head and placed his warm hand on Aeric’s cheek. “I am certain such a fate appears preferable to your father’s fury.”
Aeric jerked his face away, his skin crawling. “Do not touch me.”
Taron didn’t appear angry or insulted. If anything, his features softened further. Until his brow furrowed. Until he looked at his now bloody fingers. Sniffed them. Touched his fingertips to his tongue, one eyebrow arched. Taron’s gaze went to the human woman, and it was she he looked at while addressing Aeric. “There is much magic in your blood, young prince.”
Magic? In him? If Aeric were able to laugh, he might have. Magic in a member of the royal family? “Impossible,” he said, his voice no louder than a breath, watching the elf’s face swim in and out of focus. He was tired. So tired.
The elf got to his feet. “Eethelyn. As discussed.”
“My lord?” The elf Yendar’s voice filled with wonder. “Is it truly the prophecy?”
Taron’s head tipped forward in a nod as he rolled up the sleeves of his blousy shirt.
Aeric’s fingernails scratched into the dirt as Eethelyn knelt beside him, her brown skirt brushing his hip. He’d have spit at her if he had any saliva. Her gaze bounced between him and Cadbian, a crease between her brows. At the sound of glass clinking in her handwoven bag, the icy dread of recognition chased away Aeric’s glare. This was the famed witch of Stakfleth, the one who had evaded him for almost a year.
Whatever adrenaline remained in his body emptied into what remained of his blood. He tried to push off with his heel and slide backwards away from her but only managed a few centimetres before collapsing in a shuddering, writhing heap, every nerve on fire, every muscle fibre throbbing with pain. He squeezed his eyes shut, trapping the tears inside, praying for his racing heart to drain the last of his lifeblood before she could begin.
“You’re doomed now, Your Highness,” Zigali said, his tone mocking again. “My Oxheart is nothin’ compared to what she can do.”
Seeing Aeric’s rising panic, Eethelyn said to the dwarf as much as to him, “Hush.” Her gentle smile crinkled the skin around her chestnut eyes. She was older than he first thought. In fact, the witch didn’t look anything like he had imagined. No tattered robes. No greasy, salt-and-pepper hair. The colour of milk and honey, her silky locks swirled around straight, not hunched, shoulders. “My name is Eethelyn, and I wish you no harm.” Her voice was like melted butter. “Gloringar,” she said as she held three empty vials in the air. “Please fill these at the fountain.”
There was still time, Aeric thought. He might still die before she could finish her preparations.
It was a nasty surprise when, without warning, Lord Taron was the one to lay hands on him, so much so that Aeric jolted as a tingling warmth spread through him. He tried to pull away from the elf’s touch. He didn’t want Lord Taron’s magic to find the remaining embers of his life, to prevent them from extinguishing altogether. Unfortunately, he could already feel his pain dimming under the elf’s ministrations.
“Ah, we’re holding him prisoner? Ransom?”
Gloringar returned and handed the vials of water to Eethelyn.
“Nor is imprisonment his fate.” It was Eethelyn who spoke as she selected bottles and potions and other items from her bag.
The dwarf sputtered. “He’s bloody evil, he is. Just like his father, and his father’s father before him.”
Eethelyn lifted her gaze from whatever she was brewing and gave Aeric a gentle, apologetic smile.
“Enough, Zigali.” Taron cupped Aeric’s face, his gaze penetrating and locking onto Aeric’s. “Evil has not yet overtaken this cub.”
“Look around.” Zigali held his arms out to the side. “Your eyes can see a flea on a stag from miles away but you can’t see what’s right before you? He did this. Him and his father.”
“Oh, I see. Yet I also See beyond.” Lord Taron resumed his work. “Prince Aeric has a vital role to play in the events of prophecy.”
Which prophecy, Aeric wondered, and how could any prophecy involve him?
“Forgive me, Eethelyn,” Gloringar said. “I am familiar with the workings of a healer, yet I fail to recognize much of the magic you are using. Do you not plan to heal him? Or you, Lord Taron?”
Eethelyn shook a stoppered vial. “We have delayed his death. There are more important uses for our powers in the time we have.”
With wary eyes focused on the smoking, bubbling turquoise contents of the vial, Aeric found the strength to speak, albeit far more quietly than he would have liked. “What is your meaning?”
Zigali snorted. “He said somethin’ other than ‘Kill me’ or ‘Let me die.’ Must be magic.”
The witch rolled her eyes. “Fear not, Zigali, for that is the true meaning behind his words.” She addressed Yendar and Gloringar. “Bring the decoy body closer.”
Aeric looked away as the elf and the dwarf carried Cadbian’s ruined body to his side and cringed when his cousin’s still-warm flesh grazed his arm. His shallow breathing quickened. He could taste bile.
The witch stroked the waves of Aeric’s blood-soaked hair. “I regret your sorrow. I know you loved him.”
He was surprised to see tears in her eyes. “Do not pretend to care.” His voice felt like brittle leaves rustling across cracked earth, and the spinning in his head was the wind blowing them.
“So much hatred forced upon you. So many lies.”
When he opened his mouth to retort, she touched a finger to his dry lips then ran her hands along his face, sweeping his eyelids down. “You’ll understand ’ere long. Now rest.”
The drowsiness flowing through him was different from the weak-ness and fatigue. Pleasant even. He felt separate from his body. The pain faded. He didn’t even care when she removed the armour that was worth more money than she would ever see, tore his shirt open, and bared his torso.
Drifting, he listened to the clink of glass, the grinding of mortar and pestle, the witch’s murmuring. Her tone intensified as she poured a pungent, pine-scented liquid over him—he vaguely registered a stinging burn wherever his skin had been broken—followed by a peculiarly warm, somewhat tingling liquid that numbed his wounds and staunched any remaining blood flow. “That shall do for now,” Eethelyn said. She and the elf lord removed their hands from his body.
Aeric could hear their voices, but he no longer cared what they said. He just wanted to float there forever, even as someone took his hand, wrapped it around what felt like Cadbian’s dead one, and held it in place.
Somebody knelt beside his head again. He recognized Taron’s clean scent, like clothing dried by the mountain air. The elf’s breath tickled his ear. “It is time for your metamorphosis to begin.”
The witch’s murmuring transformed into chanting. Strange scents assaulted him. Some pleasant, some not. One, he recognized. Blood. He surfaced enough to find Eethelyn using it like ink on his forehead, his face, his chest, belly, and limbs. Despite his stupor, his pulse raced anew.
Eethelyn placed her hand over his heart. Its pounding slowed and the warmth flowed through him again. “Hush now,” she said. “It will end anon.” Then, louder, “Lord Taron, Yendar, Gloringar, I need you at his side. The contact cannot be broken. Their hands must remain joined.”
“What about me? What might I do?” Zigali asked.
“Try not to faint.” Eethelyn pressed her lips to Aeric’s forehead and said, “My regrets.”
Pain such as Aeric could have never imagined burned through his body like a million lightning bolts. The trance lifted, broken. The elves held him down but his legs still thrashed. He tried to pull his hand away from Cadbian’s, but Gloringar squeezed tighter. He pressed out from within, desperate for the agony to end and for the taint of the non-human flesh to leave him. Their contact with him did indeed lift for the briefest moment, but not long enough for him to break free, and the strength of their grips returned tenfold.
The witch gasped. “He should not have been capable of breaking the Resting spell much less move you. The prophecy. It is true.”
Upon hearing that word again, Aeric opened his eyes wide and a roar tore from his throat. He could lift his head enough to see what did indeed look like lightning flashing through his skin all over his body, down his arm, and into Cadbian’s, and then from Cadbian into him. Only Cadbian didn’t look like Cadbian anymore. Cadbian looked like him. Exactly like him.
Aeric screamed.
“You’re bloody maniacs, the lot of you. I—I…” Zigali hit the ground with a resounding thud.
The blood-painted symbols made a hissing sound when they disappeared off Aeric’s body, leaving behind tiny puffs of smoke. Moments later, the pain eased and the pressure on his arms dis-appeared. Panting, he glared up into the witch’s pale, sweaty, tear-streaked face. “I hate you. I want you dead. All of you.”
Yendar frowned. “You are certain? He is The Other?”
Eethelyn’s smile was tremulous. “Without a doubt.” She cradled Aeric’s head in her lap, stroked her shaking hands over his eyes and down his face again. He tried to resist the spell, but the familiar drowsiness spread through him and sweet liquid rained down his throat. “Your journey now begins.”
“We shall meet again,” Taron said.
And blackness overtook him.
***
Three weeks earlier
June 8, 2004
***
CHAPTER ONE
Lexi wiped her sweaty palms on her thighs and tried to convince her heart to slow down, her chest to loosen, and her stomach to stop churning. Rain wasn’t forecast until later in the day. The plane was above the scattered clouds. There was no turbulence. The early morning sunlight danced across the plane’s polished wings, casting a small shadow on the Alps below. Everything was fine, she told herself. She was a logical person. A science major. She knew the statistics, knew flying was the safest form of travel, but when it came to her own personal safety, those statistics meant nothing. She’d always felt deep inside that she’d be in a plane crash one day. It was only a matter of when.
“Breathe, Lexi.” Her mother, seated beside her, her red hair pulled back in a ponytail, looked up from her paperback. “Just think, soon we’ll be in Belgium for the shopping trip of your life.”
“Right. Horses. Think horses.” Lexi took a deep breath, held it, then let it leak out, forcing her brain to recall the details of the horses her trainer had arranged for her to try out.
The second leg of her family’s European vacation was dedicated to finding a horse who could jump the height and compete at the level Lexi’s current horses could not, as much as she loved them. In fact, if it weren’t for the horse shopping she might have stayed home where she felt safe, leaving her parents and brother to spend the entire vacation in Italy, her father and brother playing tourist while her mother searched for art for a wealthy gallery client.
Her father took a break from his binoculars to look over his shoulder. “You hanging in there, kiddo?”
Lee, next to him, took a break from flashing his dimples at the blushing flight attendant to toss an M&M at Lexi. He was always eating junk food, not that you could tell by looking at him. “Chill out, Flecksy,” he said. “It’s not like the pilots are as bad at flying as you are at driving.”
Their mother frowned at him. “Don’t tease your sister. You know her phobia can’t be reasoned with any more than your fear of spiders.”
“Tell him to lose the nickname too.” Lexi glared at Lee’s flawless skin. She was generally confident about herself, from her coppery skin tone that fell somewhere between her father’s espresso and her mother’s ivory, to her muscular legs from hours in the saddle, and her big, curly hair. All except for her freckles, the bane of her existence.
“Just trying to distract her. Sorry, twerp.”
“Lee.” Their dad attempted to sound stern.
In any other situation, Lexi might have had a flippant remark ready, but she was too busy focusing on her breathing and chewing her bottom lip.
“Why not try the relaxation music on your iPod?” Her mother placed her book facedown on her leg. “That’s one of the reasons we bought you the newfangled contraption. You did remember to charge it, didn’t you?”
“Shoot, I forgot,” Lexi lied. The fully charged iPod was stuffed inside her carry-on backpack along with her cell phone, her favourite hoodie, a light jacket, a fantasy novel and a whodunit, a few magazines, her makeup bag, and some other odds and ends. The truth was, there wasn’t any music soothing enough for her in this situation, and besides, then she wouldn’t be able to listen for any signs of trouble.
“Look how clearly we can see the Transit from up here.” Her father offered her his binoculars with their safety solar filtering. She didn’t really want to take them, but declining would hurt his feelings. “See the black dot against the sun’s photosphere?”
“Mm-hm.”
“That’s Venus passing between us and the sun.”
She handed the binoculars back to him. “It’s great, Dad.” She returned to chewing her lip while playing with her earrings, her knee bouncing.
He didn’t seem to notice her lack of enthusiasm. “This is the perfect vantagepoint for watching the Transit. Shame we’ll be landing before it ends.”
Lexi could picture him in professor mode, regaling his students with the tale. What was boring to her would be as fascinating to the physics majors at the University of Guelph as it was to her father. His passion for astrophysics in particular was infectious among them, making him one of the university’s most popular professors, as she had been told by fellow students many times. “Are you related to Professor Guinel?” they would ask. “He’s so great!” And he was, as a dad and a teacher. He wasn’t even disappointed when she enrolled in Biomedical Science. He knew physics wasn’t her thing.
“It’ll take less than seven hours for Venus to pass between us and the sun,” he went on, “and eight years from now it’ll happen again, then not again for over a hundred years. How lucky are we to witness the Transit of Venus not once but twice in our lifetime?”
She appreciated her father’s attempt to distract her and it might have helped, even a little, if she didn’t already have the facts memorized thanks to how often he repeated them.
Lee peeked between the seats, catching her when she checked her seat-belt for what felt like the thousandth time. “Look on the bright side. At least none of us plays rugby,” he said, referring to her most-feared movie in the world, the one where rugby players crashed in some mountains and resorted to cannibalism to survive. That it was based on a true story made it all the more horrifying.
“At least your big strong muscles would feed us until we’re fou—” The plane jolted and lurched. The left wing dropped, the plane tipped sideways, and Lexi knew. Just like how she’d think of a movie out of the blue and the next day it would be on TV, or how she’d dream about somebody she hadn’t seen in years and run into them within a day or so. She knew. “Mommy.” She reached for her mother’s hand.
“It’s okay, honey. I’m sure the pilot—” Her mother’s words were cut off when the bucking plane flipped to its right side and the oxygen masks dropped.
Lee, who was afraid of nothing but spiders and bad fashion, screamed, and he wasn’t alone. Shouts and commotion surrounded them, other pas-sengers crying out in fear and confusion.
Her dad jumped up—or was it sideways?—to push past Lee. Trying to stumble in the direction of the cockpit, he shouted, “What’s going on?”
“Sir, return to your seat.” The flight attendant’s formerly flaming cheeks were now pasty.
The intercom crackled. “This is your co-pilot speaking. Please buckle your seatbelts and remain seated as we attempt to turn around.”
Attempt to? Lexi tried to memorize her family’s faces, certain she’d never see them again.
The plane’s nose dropped, throwing her father against the front of the cabin with a crash. His blood splashed on the wall.
“Dad!” Lee tried to unbuckle, but he was shaking too hard.
Blood poured down their father’s dark, handsome face, and his arm hung at a funny angle. “Lee, stay in your seat!”
The wind whistled past the windows, shrieking along with the pas-sengers. Pressure built in Lexi’s head, her chest. The blue of the sky turned to the green of trees. There was a flash of light, then everything went black.
***
The first thing Lexi registered was the cold, followed by the pungent odour of evergreens mixed with the harshness of smoke. Then the pain. Her entire body felt bruised. Raw. Her head felt like it was going to explode off her neck. She moaned and opened her eyes. Well, eye. The other was too swollen.
She was still strapped in her seat, but her seat was on a bed of pine needles instead of inside the airplane. Trees towered over her. The mountain grew in front of her, jagged peaks looking ready to take another bite from her world. Smoke drifted over her and moans and cries surrounded her and it all came flooding back.
“Mom! Dad! Lee!” Sobbing, a flood of adrenaline dulling her pain, she struggled to unfasten her seatbelt, staggered to her feet, and clutched the sides of her swirling head.
Logically, her mother and Lee should have been near her on the ground, but she’d somehow been thrown outside the crash radius that was littered with bodies, many still strapped in their seats. She counted two other survivors from her vantage point but could hear more. Their moans, cries, and screams. A bald man wandered aimlessly, blood smeared on his face, and a young brunette woman was draped over the body of another woman, sobbing.
Lexi staggered towards the charred, broken wreckage, tripping more than once on luggage and pieces of the plane. With each step, she shook harder, terrified of what she’d find.
She spotted Lee first, slumped in his seat. He was covered in blood, some still dripping from a gash in his scalp, his leg impossibly twisted. He wasn’t moving. His position was so unnatural, he couldn’t be alive.
She bent over and vomited, her sobs becoming wails, even as she caught sight of her mother’s bright red hair not far from Lee’s side. She half stumbled, half ran to her. Like many others, her mother was still in her seat. Unlike most others, she was breathing. Barely. Lexi sank to her knees and took her mother’s hands. They were ice cold. She was even more pale than usual under the blood and soot. “Mom. Mommy. Please wake up.” She gave her mother’s delicate artist’s hands a squeeze and tucked her hair behind her ear. “Mommy, please.”
Nothing.
Crouched there, with shock and grief squeezing her lungs and clawing at her heart, Lexi scanned the crash site, trying to figure out where her father might be. The last time she’d seen him he’d been near the cockpit. With a jolt, she realized he still was. Most of him. “No! Oh god Daddy, no.” She jerked her gaze back to her mother, but not quickly enough to prevent the horrifying image from being forever imprinted in her brain, impossible to scrub away. Her guttural wails morphed into screams for help. Her poor mother. She looked so uncomfortable in that seat. Lexi wanted to move her, but if she had a spinal injury, moving her would do even more damage, and that was important to prevent because her mother was going to survive, Lexi told herself. Promised herself. She had to survive. She couldn’t leave Lexi alone.
A sudden crack of thunder made Lexi jump and yelp. A glance at the sky revealed massive, churning black clouds, like boiling oil. She checked her watch in surprise. Rain hadn’t been forecast until the evening and it was only midmorning. The last thing her mother needed was to get soaked by the oncoming storm, and that meant Lexi had to find a way to cover her. She scanned the nearby debris and broken luggage for blankets or jackets, taking care to avoid even the slightest glimpse of her dad or Lee.
The bald man stopped his pacing to watch her rummage through people’s belongings and fill her arms with warm clothing, and she felt his eyes on her as she dropped what she’d collected beside her mom. Just as she spotted a University of Guelph sticker stuck to a familiar gold suitcase that was poking out from under an empty seat—her father’s carry-on—the bald man called out, “What are you doing, girl?”
Despite the man’s thick accent, she understood him well enough as he stomped towards her, scowling, his eyes narrowed. “My mom,” she said, only now realizing her own teeth were chattering. Cold? Shock? Fear? All the above? “She’s cold.”
“Those are not yours. You are a thief.”
Lexi tried to pretend the man wasn’t there as she opened her father’s suitcase, shaking so hard she could barely manage the zipper, and when a whiff of her father’s aftershave lifted off the sweatshirt she removed from his bag, her entire body began to shake with sobs. She clutched his hoodie to her chest, rocking in place, barely registering a new arrival.
“You leave her alone.” It was the young brunette woman.
“She is stealing. From dead people.”
“Then they don’t need it anymore, do they?” The young woman knelt beside Lexi. “Here,” she said, holding out a bright pink rain poncho. “It’s my girlfriend’s. She—” The woman’s voice cracked. “She wouldn’t mind.”
Lexi wiped her nose with the back of her hand and thanked the woman, her teeth still chattering as she babbled, “It’s going to rain. It’s not supposed to. Not till later. But it’s going to. Pink’s not really Mom’s colour but I guess she won’t mind. She gets cold so easy. It’s so cold.”
The young woman placed her hand on Lexi’s and gave it a squeeze. “Here, let me help.”
Together, they covered her mother in layers of clothing, leaving the poncho for last. “There, Mommy.” Lexi smoothed her mother’s hair back from her bloodied face. “You’ll be warm and dry while I go for help,” she said, voicing the decision she’d only just made.
“Go for help?” the young woman said. “You’re not serious?”
Lexi hugged herself. “I can’t just sit here and watch her die.” And she couldn’t handle the devastation around her. The broken, bleeding bodies, including her own family’s. The wailing survivors. The calls for help. They all added to her own pain, soaked up like a sponge in a churning ocean.
“Stupid girl,” the bald man said. “You will get lost in the forest.”
She clenched her fists. “Better than being stuck here with you.”
The young woman placed her hand on Lexi’s shoulder. “He’s right …what’s your name?”
“Lexi.”
“Janet,” the woman said, touching her own chest. “He’s right, Lexi. It’s too dangerous.”
“I need to leave her a note,” Lexi said, pretending Janet hadn’t spoken. “Don’t want her to wake up and wonder where I am.”
The man cursed and limped away towards other survivors. Lexi headed in the opposite direction, where she’d spotted her backpack. Janet followed. “Lexi, you need to stay here.”
“I can’t.”
“You said it yourself. What if your mom wakes up?”
“Then she’ll be glad I headed down the mountain to find help.” Lexi grabbed her backpack off the forest floor and brushed dirt and ashes from it. Other than a few small holes melted by sparks, it was intact.
“You don’t need to find help. It’ll come. It’s probably already on the way.”
Anger flared. At herself. At Janet. At the world. “No! Don’t you get it? This is my fault! If I’d stayed home, they wouldn’t have been on this flight. They’d have stayed in Italy. All because selfish me wanted a new horse.” Her voice cracked. “So I’m gonna do what I can to help the only family member I have left.” Choking down fresh sobs, she stormed away.
Taking care not to catch sight of her father or Lee, she opened her backpack, pulled out paper and a pen, then crouched beside her mother, trying to decide what to write while ignoring Janet, who had followed her again. At the sound of approaching footsteps, Lexi looked up with a glare, expecting to see her bald nemesis. Instead, it was a black-haired guy in his late twenties or early thirties, his arm in a makeshift sling.
“The old man said one of you is going for help?” His accent she recognized: French.
“No. Nobody is leaving,” Janet said.
The guy looked back and forth between Lexi and Janet, his brow furrowed. “But he said—”
“Lexi’s changed her mind, haven’t you?”
Lexi ripped the piece of paper from her notebook, gritting her teeth. If she spoke, she was going to lose all control of her emotions. That’s how it always was with her. No halfway, no shades of grey. If she could keep things bottled up, she would, because once she allowed those emotions to show, once the dam broke, she would explode in one way or another. Uttering as little as one word or thinking one wrong thought could trigger a meltdown, something she preferred to avoid.
She tucked the note under the pink poncho where it would stay dry, even as the first raindrops pattered on the plastic, the sound fuelling her sense of urgency.
“Fine.” Janet’s tone had become sharp. “Ignore me.”
Indeed, she did ignore both Janet and the French guy—he introduced himself as Denis—as they talked about her as if she wasn’t there.
Should she go say goodbye to her father and brother? Did she have the strength? Her stomach churned at the thought. No, seeing their bodies once was more than enough. There was no way she could bear to look at them again. Decision made, she kissed her mom’s forehead, pulled on her father’s hoodie, tossed her backpack over her shoulder, and started to walk. At the sound of someone coming up behind her, she turned, her mouth open and ready to let loose on Janet, but it was Denis.
“I will come with you,” he said.
“I’m fine.”
“Even so, I will come.”
“I don’t know you.” That’s just what she needed, to end up trapped in the wilderness with some serial killer or something. It would be her luck.
“You cannot go down the mountain alone.”
The rain changed from drizzle to full-fledged drops. Lightning flashed. Another crack of thunder. Ozone scented the air, one of her favourite smells. At least, it had been. It would be ruined for her now, forever associated with this day. She sighed. “Fine.” He’d probably end up turning around anyhow, given the state of his arm, and his limp that she only now noticed. At least she’d be able to outrun him if she had to.
She set off again, Denis at her side. He tried to get her to talk a few times, but she wouldn’t reply. Couldn’t reply. Her emotions had to stay in check. Besides, they needed to concentrate on their footing. The rain was making the already treacherous terrain even more so.
Just keep walking. Just keep walking. You’ll find help. You will. But with each step, more adrenaline wore off, her pain intensifying until her aching legs were ready to give out. She glanced at Denis, who had become frighteningly pale. There was no denying it any longer; they needed to find shelter.
“There,” Denis said, pointing.
Lexi squinted into the distance where a lightning flash revealed the mouth of a cave. A fleeting concern about cave inhabitants of the clawed and fanged variety gave her pause until another clap of thunder made the trees tremble. Cave it was.
She led the way, helping the increasingly unsteady Denis navigate the boulders and roots in their path. She hesitated outside the cave, squeaked out a feeble, raw “Hello?” and tossed some pebbles into the darkness. When nothing came roaring out, they both limped inside.
She could touch the ceiling, but otherwise the cave was huge, the back not even visible. The air inside smelled of cold, wet stone and moss. She sank to her knees and curled up against the wall, staring at the rough rock across from her, listening to the rain and thunder. Denis eased himself down a respectable distance away, much to her relief, and they caught their breath, rubbing their aches and pains in silence.
Naturally, Denis was the first to speak. “Your mother, she will be very proud when she wakes, to hear how brave her girl is.”
Lexi’s eyes stung. It was a nice thing for him to say. Unfortunately, thanking him restarted her tears. The grief was a living thing in her chest, trying to claw its way out. No matter how hard she cried, it only seemed to grow. The last time she’d cried like this was when her cousin shot himself. That time, she’d broken blood vessels in her eyes.
Denis scooted closer, patted her shoulder, and made comforting noises. Likely trying to distract her like her father had with facts about the Transit, Denis began to tell her about his wife, how they’d been in Italy celebrating their fifth anniversary, and how they wouldn’t make it to six. He’d been introduced to his wife by his younger sister, Danielle, and he cried speaking of how worried Danielle would be when she learned of the crash.
As Lexi listened, her cheeks warmed with shame. She hadn’t asked him anything about himself or if he’d been alone on the plane. How selfish of her. “I’m so sorry,” she managed to say, her voice strangled.
Neither of them spoke for some time. She hugged her backpack, unable to take a deep breath, questioning her decision to leave her mother. Maybe she should have stayed, especially since she and Denis hadn’t made it nearly as far as she’d hoped. Why and how had the storm come out of nowhere? The forecast had only mentioned light rain hours from now, not the monsoon that was assaulting the forest outside the cave. She’d made a mistake. She should be with her mother. She’d head back to the crash site as soon as the rain stopped.
I’m sorry, Mom. I should have stayed with you.
Between sobs, she thought she heard a woman’s voice. Once, and then again. She tried to catch her breath long enough to hear it again. And she did. Her heart leapt. Rescuers. “Get up. Get up.” She scrambled to her feet.
Denis frowned up at her. “What? Why?”
“Hear that? Someone’s coming.”
“I hear nothing.”
There, again. “Hear it that time?”
“Sorry, but no.”
Lexi tried calling out, but she couldn’t project her voice after all the sobbing.
“Perhaps you should sit. You may be concussed. Hearing things.”
Could she be? It was odd that Denis couldn’t hear the voice. The woman wasn’t just talking, she was chanting, and in a strange language that didn’t resemble anything she had ever heard. Another strange thing— the woman’s voice was coming from the back of the cave. How deep did this cave go? Had the woman been there all along? She hadn’t come in after Lexi and Denis or they would have seen her pass. It made no sense.
She chewed her bottom lip, ignoring Denis. Should she stay put or go check it out? The chanting was kind of freaky, but at least it was a woman’s voice, not a man’s. If she could handle a six-hundred-and-fifty-kilogram mare in heat, she could surely handle one woman if something went wrong. What was the worst that could happen? And she could always call out to Denis for help. “I’m going to check it out.”
Denis waved his hand. “Fine. If you must.” Clearly, he’d reached his limit with her.
Just in case she needed something to swing at the lady in self-defense, she slung her backpack over her shoulder and tried to look calm and confident as she began to walk. Still, she couldn’t stop herself from wincing. Every part of her hurt and she was weak, wet, and frozen. She trailed her hand along the rough wall, initially for balance, but it soon became her primary source of guidance in the blackness. The woman’s voice lured her deeper inside the cave, growing louder as Lexi got closer, but not responding when Lexi called out a greeting.
She stumbled and hit the back wall, slicing her palm on a jagged point. “Fudge nuggets,” she said, using one of Lee’s favourite mom-approved curses. She wiped fresh blood on the back pocket of her jeans. “This doesn’t make sense.” She could still hear the woman as clearly as if she were just a few feet away, but there was nowhere for Lexi to go. “What the hell?” Had she missed a turn? Was she wasting even more time and energy stumbling around in the dark? And for what? Auditory hallucinations? She pressed the button to light her watch dial—12:23—then trailed her bleeding hand on the rock as she walked alongside the back wall.
An abrupt humming in her ears made her shake her head and wonder if Denis had been right about the concussion. The sound grew louder and pressure built in her ears, then a faint glow appeared ahead of her, like the flickering of distant flames, and she couldn’t look away. A crack in the wall. She felt like it was calling to her. The opening was just wide enough for her to squeeze through. As she did, the hum became a buzz. Her head throbbed and spun. Her stomach churned.
As quickly as it had all begun, her ears popped and the unpleasant sensations stopped, as did the woman’s voice. Lexi took a deep breath, gathering the courage to step out of the crack and into whatever lay beyond. If this was a chance for help, she had to take it, no matter how bizarre or frightening. After all, her mother was back at the crash site bleeding, un-conscious, exposed to the elements.
She squared her shoulders and stepped forward, only to find herself inside a smaller cave where she met the wide eyes of a young blonde woman in a colourful robe who was standing in a circle outlined by chalk. Candles of various colours and sizes surrounded the circle, like second-hand birthday candles around the edge of a cake.
A smile that could only be described as overjoyed spread across the woman’s face. “Welcome, Daughter of Venus. I am—”
“I need your help. Our plane crashed and my dad and brother are dead but my mom’s still alive. At least, she was, and I need to get help. Please.”
The lady’s brow furrowed. “Plane crash?”
“Yeah,” Lexi said, an incongruous smile on her face. It was a habit of hers, this smiling at inappropriate times, an embarrassing one she couldn’t always control, like at her grandfather’s funeral when she’d walked around greeting people as if they were at some happy social event. “A plane. You know, an airplane.” Nothing. The woman was acting like she didn’t know what a plane was. What was going on? “A jet? Like a flying car?” She made a zooming motion with her hand. The woman looked even more baffled. Stupid Smile grew. “She’s really hurt. Can you help? Do you have a phone?”
“She is beyond my help.”
“You don’t even know what’s wrong with her.” Still smiling.
A graceful wave of the lady’s hand snuffed the candles. It was only then that Lexi registered the bright sunlight slanting into the cave. How could it be this sunny so soon after the storm?
“It matters not what ails her, my dear. I cannot reach her.”
“Just follow me.” Lexi turned. And found nothing but solid rock.
The crack in the wall was gone.
***
Do you want to read more? You can find Journey in paperback from select online retailers and in ebook everywhere.
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