The Chronicles of Fire and Ice

Magic

  Present Day

  “Lakyn!”

  Lakyn couldn’t believe what his eyes told him. It was really her, not the youthful Nephilim girl he remembered from the convent ruins.

  “Rachael, how…?” Words failed him. All this time he had believed she was dead, and now she was in front of him, perfectly alive.

  “Hello, Lakyn,” she smiled winningly.

  “No! You can’t simply ‘hello’ me. What happened to you?” His feelings rushed wildly. Was he going to snap? She stood amazingly before him. “You disappear for fourteen years leaving not a trace and now you just turn up! And of all places, you appear in the very spot we spent our first night together?” he said in anguish. “I don’t understand.”

  “Yes, indeed. This is the place where it all began.” Beautifully, she walked towards him. “I’m trying to fathom what has happened just as much as you.”

  Lakyn, at a loss, seated himself on the bed. He could hardly believe she was there with him.

  “And what have you come up with?” he asked her.

  “You remember what my brother did to us?”

  “Yeah. How could I forget what Adam did? Being zapped with his bright… magic. I’ve never known anything like it.”

  “Adam’s Trait is unique. He has the ability to wipe people’s memories clean and push them back in time, so they can start over.”

  “And that’s what happened to us?” Lakyn wondered.

  “I believe so, yes.” Rachael said. Lakyn pondered that for a moment, and then spoke.

  “No wonder I couldn’t remember you, except in the past few days. And even then, it’s been in little flashes.”

  “You’ve remembered because… I’ve been trying to find you.”

  “You couldn’t have just come to me at the Academy?”

  “No. I had to find you in your dreams,” she murmured tenderly, stepping towards him, “but it wasn’t successful though. Something blocked me.” She sat on the bed beside him.

  “It wasn’t me, I swear. I’d never block you,” he assured her. Rachael smiled and moving closer to him, put her hands in his. Lakyn drew back warily however, and dropped them.

  “But why now? Why so long?”

  Rachael didn’t reply but stood up and began pacing backwards and forwards.

  “Rachael?”

  “It was for my daughter,” she declared to his amazement. “Okay? So it’s important.”

  Daughter.

  Lakyn’s head swam. Rachael has a daughter? Who’s the father? His thoughts tangled.

  “You have… a daughter?” he asked in disbelief.

  Rachael nodded. Slowly, Lakyn began to put the pieces together.

  “That Nephilim girl in the ruins… that was her?”

  She nodded again. “Yes. She’s been trying to help me remember.”

  Lakyn stared at the wall opposite. He was beginning to see it all now. If the young Nephilim in the convent ruins was Rachael’s daughter, and she appeared to be fifteen or sixteen years of age, then she would have been conceived around…

  “That’s the reason, isn’t it?” he burst out. “You’re seeking me out now, because she’s my daughter… isn’t she? It fits.”

  Rachael slowly looked down at her sandals and then back up at him. “Yes, she is your daughter,” she affirmed, watching him tenderly. What seemed to be minutes passed.

  “What’s her name?” He could barely whisper.

  Rachael stepped towards him and sat back down on the bed. “Eden.” She met his eyes. “Lakyn, forgive me. I’m sorry for delaying this so long. But I only just remembered.”

  “Remembered… what?”

  “Who her father is. It’s her eyes, something clicked. They reminded me of you. It’s undeniable whose eyes they are.”

  An image flashed before Lakyn: the young girl in the ruins looking earnestly at him when she reached and held his arm… her eyes the colour of a cloudless sky. In that moment he knew it was true.

  “You said it was important for her sake, that you find me. Why?” he asked with puzzlement.

  “She has begun to show a Trait, and it frightens me.”

  “What is it?”

  “Death.” Rachael’s voice barely came out as a whisper. “Her Trait is death.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four