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Jason writhed below me, suddenly, as if the pain had seized him. Air whined from his chest, and I looked to Kalen, waiting for him to start working on the man again. But his hands swept up into his hair, and he walked towards the door to the infirmary, and opened it. Kalen looked at me, the Light in his eyes just a pale yellow, barely pulsing with his power, like a slowing heartbeat.
“Thank you,” he said to me. I cocked my head inquisitively, and he gave me a look that said,Go along. Let this be the one thing you go along with. “You’ve done all you can. Please, handmaid, let me escort me back to the workrooms while Dalwin says his goodbyes.”
I glanced back at Dalwin, who was now leaning atop Jason’s chest, their hands still entwined. Tears spilled out onto his dirty cheeks in clean streaks. Jason’s head lobbed to the side, and all Dalwin could offer was a chorus of, “I’m sorry” and “It will be okay.”
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. There was too much at once. Between the first stone and the death. Everything was too much.
After a moment, I gathered the blood-soaked linens from the table and tossed them into a bin. To sell the story. I was a handmaid who’d stumbled across this tragedy. I walked through the door and past Kalen into the hall. I ignored the Guardians who were still lined against the walls, waiting for news. I kept my head down and watched the floor. Kalen exited the infirmarybehind me and didn’t even bother to cloak me. Not that he had any magic left to, it seemed.
We crept our way through the endless maze of hallways back to my room, walking slowly, almost embarrassingly so. I couldn’t tell if Kalen was attempting to be vigilant, what with me completely vulnerable to be seen, or if he was just exhausted from it all. Kalen kept his attention in front of us the entire time we walked, the anger in his steps was palpable.
We finally turned down the corridor that led to my room, my heart sinking as we got closer. I’d asked him to do his best to explain what the vision in my stone had meant, yet we had gotten no closer to the answer. It had to be now.
I forced myself to grab his wrist. Kalen stopped walking.
“You never explained how I have anything to do with this war,” I said weakly.
Kalen turned to me. Dark shadows were painting the sunken part of his cheekbones. His head rolled as he moved to rub the back of his neck.
“You were there,” he murmured back. “During the final confrontation between the Light and the Shadow,” he clarified. “You were there.” Putting his hand down, he stuffed it into his pocket and shrugged with defeat. “The Light was taken by the Shadows, you were placed into the Binding, and everything in this world succumbed to darkness.”
Kalen opened the door to my room and ushered me in. I took a seat on my bed and tried to remain as postured as possible. I couldn’t let him know how much this day had affected me. He couldn’t see how terrified I had become. He had to trust me enough to tell me everything.
“But why? Why did you rescue me from the Binding, and give me my soul? What do you expect me to do about any of this?”
“Believe it or not, Gwyn, I didn’t do any of that out of kindness.”
“I certainly wouldn’t assume anything about kindness after the way you knifed me this morning,” I scoffed, and Kalen laughed a weak, and wicked-sounding chuckle.
At once, he began to pace the marbled floors, his reflection flashing across the swirls of black and gray and white. His hands flew to his hair, almost franticly pulling the roots back. There was conflict beginning in him again. Kalen was always at war with himself.
“You have to find the stones,” he blurted out like a blast erupting from the front lines of his mind. The rest of it followed shortly, raining mortal hellfire upon us both. “It’s the only way. There are three, I only had one, and I gave it to you. If we can reconnect you to the others and get you training again, you’d be strong enough to go back and retrieve the Light. To—”
“Go back where?” I scrambled from the bed, placing my hand against his chest to stop...him, his words...just tostop.
“To the Shadow faction. Where the Light was lost,” Kalen explained slowly, like the reason I’d been brought here was obvious to everyone but myself. Maybe it was.
I mimicked the look back to him. “And what exactly do you expect me to do once I am there? Fight the Shadow Sage for it?”
He certainly couldn’t have thought I would go anywhere outside of the castle walls. That I would risk running into whatever mortal hell it was that attacked Jason and Dalwin. Especially after I’d just witnessed Jason die. Had witnessed the Shadow of a Sage who seemed to kill anything and anyone who stood against her, or sat in a tavern bar outside their sovereign lines. Kalen moved to speak and then clammed up. My gods. That was exactly what exactly what he thought. Kalen wanted to sacrifice me to the most powerful being left walking this earth. Had wanted it so badly that he kidnapped me from a place of safety and happiness to do it. Here I had thought he was my savior, the person who rescued me from a hopeless and endlesslife. But all that he had done was selfish and desperate.
“I won’t do it,” I spit, storming off in the other direction. My tone was one of finality. End of argument.
Kalen caught my wrist, making me face him once more, and said, “Yes, Gwyn, you will.”
“I won’t,” I repeated, “and you cannot make me.” I held his gaze and willed him to feel that I was sincere.
We stared at each other for a moment before Kalen shook his head. Then with a sudden strength, he yanked on my arm, pulling me into his chest.
“You’re right. I can’t make you. I can’t do anything apparently,” he seethed. “Haven’t you noticed? My power is draining every day. So, I guess you’re free to use up all of my magic, roaming the halls and counting out loud to yourself like an insane person while the rest of us wait around for you to realize your fate.”
I resisted the urge to shove him off of me, opting instead to lurch even closer. This was the one thing he had told me today that made sense. Kalen had put on his fair share of shows since we’d entered the landing, but he failed in the infirmary. He’d failed even before, when he stopped cloaking me in the coutryard. My arrival was stretching the bounds of his magic, and with no source to draw back on, Kalen was limited. He was feeling the pressure of it, which meant he would say anything to get his way. He could be lying.
“I’ve been in the Binding for seventy-two years,” I countered. “Why did no one come for me in that time? Why now? You say I have to save your world, atyourword. How can I believe anything that you’ve told me, Kalen?”
“I don’t particularly care what you do or do not believe, Gwyn. You will search for those stones, and you will do what must be done to take the Light back for this faction—even if it kills you. Looking at you now, it seems that would be a courtesy toeveryone involved.”
Feeling cut off, I was in a rage. Kalen knew I’d been alone for the last century, and had figured it made me meek, unable. I wasn’t going to let him continue to think that his will was any stronger than mine simply because he was louder about it.
