AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The Oracle smiled, such a horrible expression I thought I might be sick. “I made you. You belong to me, like a dog belongs to its master.” Something inside me railed against the slithering possessiveness in her tone.
“Obey,” the Oracle intoned, her voice thundering across the cosmos. “Kneel.” My body trembled, my muscles straining as I fought her crushing power, but she was too strong.
My body slid out of the chair, my knees crashing into the floor, shaking hands pressed flat to the parquet. Bile burned my throat as I fought getting sick. The others held out longer—Raziel the longest—but a moment later we all bowed before her, shaking with anger and fear, all of us forced to heed the Oracle’s dominance.
“You are mine.” Darkness danced across her face, her will pinning us in place like butterflies who’d lost their wings, every bit as helpless as those fragile, delicate insects. “And I have waited long enough for my revenge.”
“The truth comes out at last,” Tavion managed to hiss between gritted teeth. “Using others to fight your war. You’re no better than either of the kings.”
I shot him a look. Nothing would be accomplished by defiance.
This was more of alive to fight another daysituation.
The Oracle’s eyes were silken menace as they drifted over to Torin. “Shall we do this the hard way, then?” Torin nodded, but her eyes were filled with misery when they found mine.
“You will bond. You will become my weapon to destroy the kings and bring the land back into balance. There is no choice in the matter, not for any of us, even me. If the magic dies out completely, all of Caladrius will be lost forever, a magicless wasteland between two verdant realms, and I will not allow that to happen.”
One glance told me the others were fighting this as hard as I was.Good. Weneededto fight this monster.
“What do you mean for us to do?”
Her head swiveled to the window, to the approaching Solarys army.
“You will bathe that battlefield in freshly spilled blood and magic. A sacrifice that has not been made in a millennium. From that rain of blood, a new magic will rise, born from the deaths of ten thousand souls. Then I shall mold this dead realm into a paradise.”
“Can’t you use your own magic?” I asked quietly, keeping my head bowed, slipping my shaking hand into Raz’s, letting his quiet strength anchor me. “Mine is dangerous and unpredictable. You don’t want me out there; I’d be as likely to kill an ally as an enemy.”
“The Fae are all enemies, girl,all of them. Every soldier. Every citizen.” The Oracle’s voice resonated with the power of the universe, the floor trembling. “Do you think I care how many die?Allof them must die for the magic to rise again. At the end of this, there will not be a single survivor on either side. Bodies piled high. Blood so thick on the barren soil the dirt turns to mud.”
“We’re Fae,” Tristan pointed out, his voice a hoarse rasp.
My eyes met the Oracle’s, and in them I saw the truth before she spoke. “Not any more you aren’t. You are something greater, and after this battle, you will be mine. I will own every last piece of you, and you will do my bidding.”
“Not me. I won’t kill two armies so you can save Caladrius,” I whispered over the knot in my throat, the full horror of how she meant to use me hitting home.
“As we’ve established, you most certainly will.”
“Torin warned the Fae King a week ago…Zorander Vayle would arrive today with his army. The entire Caladrian force is waiting to ambush them. Their first battle will be a bloodbath, which the king will watch from the safety of the Citadelle.”
Torin dipped her head, but not before I saw her unseeing eyes were lined with tears.
“If you want him to survive, you will fight, girl. All of you will fight. Every time her magic touches you, the bond between you strengthens, and by the end of this, there will be no breaking you apart.”
“Why would you spend a century…a millennium…to remove Carex then tip the scales in his favor?” This was bullshite.Utter bullshite.
Beside me, Raz thrummed with anger, Tristan panting softly as he fought against the Oracle’s hold. But Tavion was enraged, the cold, clear kind of anger that might actually get him killed if he was able to throw off this crushing power and leap on the foul creature.
“Because putting one of you in danger was the only way I could compel you to use your magic and shed enough blood to restore the balance. You will fight this war, Anaria, even if it’s unwillingly. You will use your magic to rain blood down upon Caladrian soil and you will finish this.” She hissed. “Don’t think I don’t know how you fight this.”
Her black gaze swung around the room, and all of us—even Tavion—shuddered. “How all of you search for a way to escape your fate. You will not. This is happening,” she crooned in her spider’s voice.
“The blood shed on the battlefield will give rise to a new world. This dead realm will live once more, and the world will be restored to what it once was.” The clicking of her tongue sounded like pincers. “Once, this world was mine. It shall be so again.”
Torin’s quiet voice was tinged with regret. “If you do nothing, Zorander will die on the battlefield today. I’ve seen this vision so many times I can’t get it out of my head. The only way he survives is if Anaria uses her magic.”
She lifted her eyes to mine. “I am truly sorry.”
I met her gaze and put every bit of my raging anger into my gaze. “You did this,” I hissed. “You betrayed us, and I will never forgive you.”
