“No,” said Othum.
Whispers came from the other gods.
“But, Father, she’ll never talk if we don’t—”
Othum raised his mighty hand and silence fell. He looked up at his daughter with big, watery eyes. So emotional, I thought, though it was not a revelation by any means. He wore his heart on his sleeve, which was more than I could say for the other Illyrian gods I had met. Sometimes I was convinced he was the only one with a heart. Long had I worshipped at the feet of the Illyrians, as any elf did. But now...now it was different. They seemed like humans to me, with all this squabbling and betraying. Humans with lightning and fire and snow at their command.
“Helia,” Othum croaked, after which I saw more than a few eye rolls from the other gods, “My daughter, do you know the damage you have caused? To this pantheon? To the Balance that keeps our world in order? So many traitors this pantheon has seen now...and for you to count yourself among them...” He shook his head in shame. “Even as we sit here, Illindria schemes to overthrow those in power, to see her own family perish in her thirst for power. Is this what you want, Helia?”
Helia’s hands slowly wound around the ivory tusks of her prison. She bore down on her father with heavy eyes, the crackling of the fire above and below the only sounds to be heard. “I...cannot...tell,” she said.
“Oh, for Triplets’ sake!” groaned Lady Borea. “She’s never going to speak, my son. You know this already!”
My eyes narrowed on her thin lips. They were quivering ever so slightly. Are you afraid, Lady Borea? Afraid that she might just speak and throw that old, wrinkled head of yours to the wolves?
“To the Darklands, she should be banished,” said Lady Borea. “To walk in darkness for eternity, in the same sort of darkness she tried to bring down upon this pantheon.”
“Grandmother, do you think that to be necessary?” asked Eos and Ezra, two goddesses that shared the same pair of long legs, but split into two torsos. Upon their shoulders sat a mantle of bronze armor decorated with opened paper fans, each colored an icy blue. “She has betrayed us, yes, but...she is still blood.”
Lady Borea looked at her granddaughters and blinked furiously. “I am two seconds away from plucking one of those hideous fans from your shoulders and swatting you in the face with it! You’d honestly call this traitor family? She has attempted to see you dead upon this very floor and you wish to spare her? Wake up, children! This is exactly why these treacherous things keep happening to us! We must show our enemies what we do to traitors, and this is the solution. Or at least a start. Since eternal punishments require a unanimous vote, all in favor, raise your hand.”
Perhaps it was from heeding the advice of their elder, or for fearing the wrath of Borea, one by one, their hands cluttered the air. Even the Skylord’s, however reluctant he was. Then, it was time to raise mine. But I did not. Instead, I crossed my legs, smoothed my dress over my knees, and directed my unblinking elven gaze at Lady Borea.
The hard eyes of Illyria fell on me all at once, weighing down upon me. But it was all right. Elves can stand the weight.
“I see we have some opposition to the idea,” Lady Borea nearly growled, as she glared at me from the other side of Helia’s prison.
I might not have been able to expose Lady Borea for what she was, but Triplets be forsaken if I was going to send Helia off to the Darklands for ‘all eternity’. And at the behest of this wretched woman, no less.
“Yes,” I said. “I have much opposition to this.”
“And might I ask why?” said Lady Borea, hand balled into a fist in her lap.
“Because it has just dawned on me that...I don’t think the right questions have been asked of Lady Helia.”
“And you have better ones?” asked Esereez to my right, a god almost half my height, with skin made of charcoal and shards of diamonds shooting out the crests of his shoulders.
I could sense how the gods felt about me now more than ever. It was another one of my gifts as a Blood Guardian—tapping into the emotions of others to feel what they were feeling as if the experience were my own. They did not trust me, could not trust me. I did not have Illyrian blood coursing through my veins like they did. I should have never been given a seat on this pantheon. I was only an elf.
But this elf sees with two eyes where you seem to see with none.
“Lady Helia,” I began, and her gaze fell on me, her exhaustion tiring my bones. “Would you really have us believe you did all this on your own? That you had been foolish enough to invite the Twins to Illyria, and free Illindria all by yourself?”
The gods were quiet, I was surprised to note. Could they actually be considering my words? And were they really so blinded by their anger that they were surprised by the idea I had brought to light? Helia remained solemn, though—as any god of death would.
She studied me with those tired, yet piercing eyes, and did so for quite a while. That was, until her lips parted, and she said, “You are right, Lady Lillian. To act alone is to act foolishly.”
A collective gasp swept through the Hall, and I felt fear grip at the throat of the pantheon. Had it really required a fourteen-year-old elf to open the eyes of these gods? We are doomed, this world and I.
“We...why had I never thought of that,” said the Skylord. “Helia, you cannot be telling the truth?”
“Is it all that impossible, Father?” she said. “To think that yet another god chooses to betray you? Betray this pantheon?”
The Skylord considered this for a moment, his eyes searching the sandstone floors.
“She lies!” snapped Vasheer, spitting in the fire and calling them upward, demanding Helia to scream.
I watched with gritted teeth as the blue tongues of the fire snapped at Helia’s prison, grimacing at the sounds of her skin sizzling, burning. Enough. I leaned forward, and with one powerful breath from my Blood Guardian lungs, I blew out the fire altogether. I regretted it immediately, of course, most especially when yet again all the eyes of Illyria fell upon me.
“Did you just see what she did?” Vasheer snapped petulantly. “She blew out—”
“We saw what she did, child,” Borea growled. She shifted her focus to me. “But why? Is Helia your friend, Lady Lillian?”
“Hardly,” I replied, leaning back in my throne. “I am a Guardian, and I cannot help but protect an Illyrian, even one behind bars. It is my nature, Lady Borea. The same nature that has guarded this pantheon for two hundred years. The same nature that helped Illyria win the War of 2100. But I sit here now, wondering where that line begins and ends. For it seems just now, Illyrians are trying to kill other Illyrians. So tell me, where do I stand in all of this?”
Lady Borea moved forward in her throne. “You, my dear, dear Guardian, will stand where we tell you to. And right now, we ask that you sit back and no longer interfere in our interrogation.”
Our gazes battled one another, fighting a war that I knew I would lose. With nothing but cowardly shut mouths around me, I folded my hands over my lap and nodded to Borea.
“My apologies,” I said. “Commence with your torture.”
Lady Borea took a deep breath and addressed everyone but me. “Illyria—Lady Helia desires our destruction. To listen to her would mean allowing the Darkness to further seep into this pantheon! She sows discord between us, even now behind prison bars! That is evil if ever I’ve seen it.”
Othum looked upon his daughter once more. Please, Skylord, I thought, keeping my face a mask, see what I see. “Lady Helia might be many things,” he said, “but foolish she is not. Acting alone, risking her life in such a way—she would never do that. Not by herself.” He gazed out at his fellow gods. “Someone among us is a traitor. And perhaps...it is more than just one someone. Helia, I will ask you only once...who did you conspire with?”
The goddess stood there for a moment. As she considered her options in this game, my eyes narrowed upon her chewing on the inside of her lip.
Well? Go on! Tell them
who you conspired with, you fool!
“I...I cannot tell.”
Othum sighed with almost all of the other gods. I noted the twitch at the end of Lady Borea’s lips—a twitch of the faintest smile. You’ve trained her well.
“Take her to the Darklands,” Othum said grimly, slouching in his throne.
“No!” I shouted. “You...you must not. She is nearly cracked. I can feel it!”
Othum thought for a moment as he looked me over. “You do?”
I nodded. “Please, Othum. Allow me to speak with her in private, and perhaps, just perhaps, we can get to the bottom of this.”
I detected a tightening in Borea’s throat, a wariness about the air around Helia. Yes, you scheming little goddess...your mission has not yet succeeded.
“Very well,” said Othum, rising tiredly from his throne. “Tomorrow, at dusk, I shall take you to her cell in the dungeons.”
CHAPTER THREE
THE THUNDER LORD
With a thunderous boom, the waves of the Boiling Sea dashed against the cliffs just below my balcony. Mist flew upward, wetting my face just lightly enough to be noted. It was refreshing after a day of flying through the blistering heat of the Southernlands, the dreadful continent that’d been my home for the past year.
Gigantic columns of rock sprouted up around the circumference of the large lagoon below. The Five Fists, they were called. Their cliff sides were decorated with buildings carved of pink marble, which burned orange in the light of the setting sun. Each great column of rock was connected to the others by way of sturdy marble bridges. Children had once played on those bridges, I couldn’t help but think. Powerful men and women once hatched ideas of war in the Great Hall sewn to the side of the main rock across the way. And in the Silent Gardens at the top of the rock to the northeast, couples once strolled, watering their newly budding romances.
Of course that was back when the Five Fists counted as one of the remaining Citadels of the humans. Before the Skylord and his sister, Nepia the Sea Queen, turned their attention to it. They had swallowed the coast of the Southernlands with a monstrous wave and a hurricane so incredible it could be seen across the Boiling Sea. Or so it was said.
The humans of the Five Fists didn’t last but a week. Now these buildings of pink marble served as the sanctuary for the newest pantheon to walk the earth.
The Endari. My pantheon...at least for the last year.
After I’d left the floating Isle of Illyria those many months ago, this had been the first place I was taken. It was strange, now that I thought about it, but I never shed a tear after I’d left. I simply slid into my role as Thunder Lord of the Endari as though I’d been born and trained for it from day one.
I gazed up at the Silent Gardens across the lagoon, where I’d learned from my new trainer the secrets of the Dark Balance. Another wave crashed against the cliff side below, and as the mist kissed my face once more, I recalled one of the first nights of training I’d endured.
“Summon your anger!” She had yelled at me. “Remember the horrible things the Illyrians have done to you! How they took your mother! Your father! Forced you into slavery! Show them what you can do, Ionikus! YOU MUST SHOW THEM!”
My arms had been propped in the air for hours, so long it felt as though they were no longer my own. The rain had flooded down from the black skies that night in torrents, soaking me down to the bone it seemed. It’d been cold as ice and the longer it fell, the weaker I became. Rain Induction had been the first power She’d taught me. The most important, She’d said.
The first of many powers and capabilities that would’ve taken years to call forth and master. Rain Induction itself was not a move exclusive to the Dark Balance, but what summoned it was. The key was the anger, the embracing of the Dark memories...the Dark need for revenge. What we consider Dark is not always so, She’d explained. For it’s the very gods you despise the most who’ve established what is Dark and Light in this world.
Embracing the forbidden emotions was meant to increase my control and summon powers I might not have even lived to see birthed. Of course, such powers did not come without repercussions. The change of my skin when I used my powers was something I hadn’t gotten used to. And the sadness brought on by my exposure to the Darkness...it was crippling most days. And it had numbed my other emotions, I was certain.
But alas, Her teachings had worked.
To my right, standing at the balcony by my side, was a boy who looked no older than ten, his head bald, eyes big and bright. He gazed thoughtfully out at the lagoon, his hands linked behind his back. Thornikus White, I thought. My first life. The life the Illyrians had made to wreak destruction upon the Outerworld and those who called it home. Thornikus had caused me much grief in the year before I’d left Illyria. He’d appear so suddenly and when I was at my weakest. But now he was here not of his volition, but of mine. I’m in control now. Not you. And in the wake of my blink, he was gone. Sometimes I couldn’t believe how much had changed in the last year.
I was fourteen now, and I’d grown to a healthy five-foot-nine, with more feet ahead of me in the coming years, I was sure. My hair hadn’t been cut in six months, and it hung around my face in dark wavy strands. It’s just as thick as Mother’s, I thought, running my hands through it. My father’s jaw was coming in too, strengthening the structure of my face as though the iron jaw hadn’t already made me look hard enough. The metal, too, had grown, resizing with the shape of my face. In all honesty, I expected no less a strange thing from the Connection Seal. Its unpredictability had become the most predictable part of my life.
I gripped the rails of my balcony, my face kept solemn, hardened—though these days it seemed incapable of doing anything else—as I studied the two gods who appeared in the lagoon below. They stood on the jagged rocks that jutted out of the churning waters just outside the violent reach of the crashing waves. The boy remained completely still on his rock, feet bare upon its surface, eyes closed. He’d grown a lot over the past year as well, and at fifteen, he already stood a good six feet tall. His shaved head was thick and sat upon an even thicker neck. Sandstone armor weighed down every inch of his thick body, his flesh impenetrable. The same set of armor he wore the first time I met him atop the Acropolis on Eldanar.
His name was Spike, and even as big as he was, he still made up only half of the mighty Twins who I’d come to dread, fear, and hate.
He stared intensely across the waters, at the goddess who completed the duo. Her eyes shone so bright and green I could see them from my balcony. Her fists were tight at her side, somehow whiter than the rest of her skin, which was so pale she could’ve been mistaken for the dead. Her red hair whipped about with the gusts from the nearby crashing waves, her white tunic just the same. Solara, Endari Guardian of Life. The title had never truly fit her.
I closed my hands tight around the railings of my balcony. Solara was the goddess who’d murdered the late Lady Vinya, the goddess who’d carried me to term. My mother. At least one of them. Being around Solara for this past year had been even more difficult than I’d expected. Having to endure her snickers, her sneers, to see her face almost everyday and train alongside her. It took all I had to contain myself and my need for revenge.
But I had a plan more important than killing Solara. A plan that would take down all of my enemies—those here before me, and those on Illyria. So my revenge must wait.
In a flash I almost missed, Spike cut his arm diagonally through the air, and a jagged rock roared up through the surf toward Solara. It pierced the air beside her, but she leapt off her rock just in time, landing on another a yard away. Again and again, Spike sliced his arms through the air, and again and again, serrated rocks cut up through the churning seas. Solara leapt from one rock to the other, as nimble as the wind.
He roared and stomped the earth, while from out of the waves before him rose a massive rock. It hovered in the air for only a second before Spike sent it rocketing toward Solara with a mighty kick. She jumped
one last time and soared over the rock, rebounding off its surface with her hands. In mid-flip, she cupped her palms together, and green and purple light was pulled from the leaves of the ivy growing on the Fists. It gathered in her palm in a flash, compacting into a glowing sphere. She threw it, and the screaming ball of light exploded against Spike’s sandstone chest plate, launching him backward into the cliff side. My balcony shook with the force of the blow, while Spike fell into the sea and another wave dashed against the cliffs in his wake.
Solara stood proud on the rock where Spike had been, her grin mad with victory. She was getting stronger every day, her powers growing just as fiercely as mine.
It wasn’t until after I’d joined the Endari that I’d learned Solara and Spike had been trained in the Dark scales of the Balance since they were children. They drew their power from fear and anger, and fed off those elements of the Balance like leeches to blood. They’d been practicing so long their skin didn’t even make the sickening changes mine did when I summoned my storms.
The spot in the waves where Spike had disappeared began to bubble until a great blackness rose from the waters. The blackness turned to a massive creature, his skin tattered and dead and black, with shards of glass growing out of his shoulders. His rib cage was exposed, the spirits dwelling within filling the air with horrible moans. His one and only arm—a merciful act of mine—was held in the air, its glass fingers wrapped around Spike’s neck.
“How many times must I tell you?” K’thas growled at Spike, voice as ghostly and deep. “If you can’t be faster, be heavier. That blast should’ve never thrown you so far.”
K’thas. Lord of the Darklands. I recalled the spirit of my mother, the spirit he’d used to coerce me into freeing him that dreadful night on the Acropolis. You’ll fall to my lightning one day, too.