Redemption (14 page)

“When am I supposed to look at
it?”

Another hard swallow. “You’ll
know when.”

We were approaching the lake now,
and I could see Arrol and Kayden standing on its shore, waiting for us. Nelly
squeezed my hand. “I don’t want to do this, Alexa,” she said, her voice picking
up speed in sudden panic. “It…it seems so terribly final, so
wrong
, and
I don’t know why. It won’t be long, right? You’ll be here when I get back from
wherever I’m going?”

I put the hand that was wrapped
around her shoulder over her heart, knowing that my own was breaking into bits
of nothing inside of me. After this, none of it really would matter. “I’ll be
right here,” I said, tapping the place where her heart beat. “I’ll be right
here always, Nell.”

She didn’t get a chance to
respond to that because Arrol said, “You ready?”

I nodded, even though I was not
ready for any of this at all. “Yeah, is everything set up? The Seer knows she’s
coming?”

Arrol gave me something like a
smirk, but it was too tight, too
forced
. He no doubt knew what this
decision meant. “Of course, Warrior. The Seer will keep his word. Do you want a
minute before she goes?”

No, I didn’t want a minute. I
wanted a whole damn lifetime. I wanted to keep Nelly here with me, to have her
beside me every step of this insane journey. I wanted so many damn things that
I couldn’t have. But if I allowed this to drag out much longer, I might not be
able to do what needed to be done, so I shook my head, pulling Nelly into one
more hug. Somehow, it seemed so much like
one more hug
.

“I love you so much,” I said
again. “When you go in there, you be careful, okay? Look after yourself.
And…don’t make any deals.”

Nelly pulled back, her brow
furrowed. “What are you talking about, Alexa? The closer I move to this, the
more I’m feeling like I don’t want to do it at all.”

“Don’t you worry, Sis,” I said,
placing a small kiss on her forehead. I breathed in deep, taking in the smell
of her that was so familiar to me. “When you come back, everything will be
taken care of.”

Now Nelly cried. She reached out
and grabbed me and buried her head on my shoulder and cried. Kayden and Arrol
stood off to the side with the look of men who don’t know how to fix the
problem, and are uncomfortable for it. I held my sister in my arms and stroked
her hair, mumbling sweet nothings that ricocheted in my head. Pulling Nelly
back from me at last, when I just couldn’t hold her anymore and not break down
myself, I looked in her eyes and said, “It’s time, Nell. Say you’re ready.”

“Just a few hours?”

I nodded.

The strength in her voice when
she said her next two words was enough to warm the pieces of my frozen, broken
heart. “I’m ready,” she said.

And then she was gone.

Nelly was gone.

Nelly

Something was sucking me up like
so much liquid in some universal straw. Everything that had been around me just
moments ago was gone–red maple trees, blue sky, silver lake, my sister, and now
the world around me was just a blinding white. I knew instinctually that I was
in fact in no world at all, but rather, in a place
between
worlds, a
place where time made no matter and nothing but the rare traveler ever existed.
Terror struck me like a cold stake to the heart, and felt myself trying to cry
out, but whatever sound I was making was being sucked away to the corners of
world between worlds.

And then I was standing on my
feet again, as if some cosmic hand had thrown me up and set me back down again.
I felt my knees tremble slightly and locked them into position before I fell to
the floor. I blinked. Looked around. There was so much to take in and yet
nothing to take in at all. Just a room, four walls, and ceiling and a floor,
made of all white. I took a step forward, almost expecting to be sucked back up
and into nowhere again, but wasn’t.

On closer inspection, as the bulk
of it was nearly undetectable in all the whiteness, I could make out a sofa
against one wall. I wandered over to it, swiping with my sleeve at the tears
that had been on my face from when I’d been with my sister only moments ago.
The color of my skin and clothing was the only color in the room, and it made
me feel instantly out of place here.

“Nelliana Montgomery, I am
pleased you have decided to come.”

I spun around on my heel, the
voice having come from nowhere, as if a whisper in the wind that had breezed
through my head. “Who’s there?” I said, feeling like a stupid girl in horror
movie. I tried to reach out with my mind and was rewarded with nothing, nothing
at all.

My wounded heart sunk down to my
feet. It seemed my powers meant nothing in this world. That was not good.

Then I saw him, just a hunch of a
shape cloaked in all white, facing the wall. The hood of the cloak gave the
barest of movements as his head turned, and I caught a flash of skin like paper
and eyes like milk, and then he turned back to the wall and spoke again in my
head. Alexa had been right. I really couldn’t tell whether the Seer was male or
female. Without my Searching abilities, I couldn’t tell anything at all.

“You may have a seat if you
like. I understand we will be spending some time together.”

The Seer’s paper white hand came
up holding a paintbrush that blended into the rest of the room, and he stroked
it slowly and gently against the wall. “Where am I?” I asked, and found that
though I had tried to speak the words aloud, they had not broken the silence of
the place.

“You are in the White World,
Child of the Night.”

I stood staring at the back of
his hooded head, not liking that address at all. “Why?” I said. “Why am I here?
Why did you offer to keep me here?”

Silence. Then:
“Because your
sister owes a debt that she seems intent on paying very soon. We thought it
would be wise to offer her a helping hand in the matter.”

My teeth snapped together hard,
but made no audible click. My hands clenched into fists at my sides, nails
digging into my palms and drawing blood that seeped through my fingers and fell
bright red on the snow white floor. Something was wrong. Something was
terribly, terribly wrong here. What had Alexa
done
?

“What debt?” I asked, not sure I
was strong enough to hear the answer.

More silence.

“Answer me, damn it!” Panic rose
in me like a hot bubble of poison. My mind was racing, and everything that
passed by it was wreckage.

“No need to yell, Night Child.
I will give you the answers you seek…the debt your sister owes is her soul.”

Now my knees did go out from
under me and I fell to the floor, shaking and rocking mindlessly like a mental
patient.
No no no no it can’t be it can’t be oh please no oh God Alexa
please no no no!

“Yes, Night Child, I am afraid
so.”

I gripped the hair at the sides
of my head and screamed, the terrible sound only rebounding in my mind like
balls of nails. “Why?” I asked, my arms folding into my midsection, as if I
could rip out all the pain that seemed to be blooming there. My voice was
nothing more than a broken sob now. “Why would she do that?”

“She is a Child of the Sun.
She has pledged her heart to a Child of the Night. That is why…She sold her
soul so that she could save you, Nelliana.”

Oh God. Oh no. Oh, no, no,
no.

Alexa

I stood only inches from the Fae,
trying hard not to let my panic show on my face. “You’re sure she’s going to be
okay in there, Arrol? You know this for a fact?”

Arrol set his large hands on my
shoulders and met my eyes with his silver ones. “I promise you, Warrior, she
will be fine. The Seer has given his word, and he will not break it. Your
sister will not be harmed.”

I nodded, willing myself to
believe that. “Okay,” I said, more to myself than to him. “Okay, I guess it’s
done, then.”

Arrol shook his head, making his
longer silver hair ripple. “No, Warrior. There is still plenty to be done.”

I nodded once more and stepped
back, turning to Kayden. “What now?” I asked, realizing that my plan had only
extended as far as getting Nelly to safety. Arrol was right, it wasn’t over.
There was still that nasty business of a revolution to lead in my sister’s
stead.

Kayden wrapped his arm around my
shoulders. “Now, we rally the people,” he said, and something dark and dangerous
flashed behind his amber eyes. “And then, we kill the King.”

In true Kayden fashion, he
managed to say the one thing that could make me feel better.
Kill the King.
Now there was a reason to push through the rest of this day. A crooked smile
touched my lips, but faltered when an unsolved problem ran through my head.
There was a whole list of unsolved problems in my head, actually, and it was
time to start checking them off. No more running.

“What are we going to do about
Camillia and Silvia?” I asked Kayden. “If they tell everyone what they plan to,
there could be an issue with Nelly being…unavailable.”

Arrol was the one who answered.
“I think you should have a talk with the Queen. She seemed to be rather…smitten
with your sister. Perhaps she will be understanding.” He smiled. “And you won’t
have to kill her, or her sister.”

I nodded, turning back to Kayden,
who was eyeing Arrol with distrust. “He’s right,” I said. “That’s where we need
to go first, to convince Camillia to keep Nelly’s secret and let the people go
on believing that I’m the Savior. It’s the only way that any of this is going
to work.”

Kayden looked a little reluctant
about all of this, but he nodded and began pulling me back toward Silvia’s
cabin. “Then let’s go,” he said. “We don’t want to give her a chance to spill
the beans before we can stop her.”

I picked up my pace, glancing
back to give a parting wave to Arrol, who had sat down by the lake side to
bathe in the sun. He blew me a kiss and laughed when I rolled my eyes. Kayden
and I all but ran down the red path that led back to the cabin. When we got
there, Tommy was standing outside, pacing back and forth and smoking a
cigarette.

Relief filled his face when he
saw us. “Finally,” he said. “I’ve been looking all over for you.” His eyes
flicked from Kayden to me, and widened. “Where’s Nelly?”

“She’s safe,” I said, glancing
around.

Tommy’s voice raised a fraction
in pitch. “Safe? What does that mean?”

I grabbed Tommy by the shoulders
to stop his manic pacing. It was starting to unnerve me. “She’s in the White
World with the Seer,” I whispered. “He promised me he would keep her safe until
this…whole thing is over.”

I didn’t miss the relief that
flooded over Tommy’s face, even though he tried to hide it. “I guess that’s
good?”

I nodded. “Good for her, yes.
Now, what’s happened, Tommy? Why do you look like a goose just walked over your
grave?”

Tommy handed me the cigarette he
was holding, and I took it gratefully. I breathed in the smoke deeply, taking
pleasure in the vice. I felt like I deserved it. You couldn’t tell a soldier
that he had to die for the country but couldn’t have a smoke if he wanted. And
I wanted.

Tommy reached into the pocket of
his slacks and pulled out a cream-colored envelope. When he handed it to me, I
looked up and raised an eyebrow. “Thanks, but it’s not my birthday.”

“Alexa, just open it,” Tommy
said, and by the tone of his voice I could tell that this was not good news I
was holding in my hand. Tommy had never, ever snapped at me before.

I looked at the envelope in my
steady, scarred hand and flipped it over. A growl rumbled in my chest as my
eyes settled on the King’s seal that had held it closed with scarlet wax. I
pulled out the letter that was inside, and then cursed the heavens as I read
the words on the creamy slip of paper tucked inside.

Thomas,

King William holds me prisoner
and has informed me that I will be killed if you do not do exactly as follows.
He offers us both immunity for your crimes if you come forward at once and tell
him all that you know about the Sun Warrior, her Accursed sister, and their
plans. Please, Son, I am praying you will make the right choice. You are the
only hope left for either of us. Give King William what he desires, and
whatever you do, don’t tell the Sun Warrior or her sister what you are up to. I
am counting on you. My life depends on it.

~Thomas Caslon

“It’s my father’s handwriting,”
Tommy said, taking the letter back from me. “Alexa, he’s going to kill him.
What am I supposed to do?”

I gripped Tommy’s shoulders hard,
forcing him to look at me. “No he’s not, Tommy,” I said, and my voice was the
cold, flat voice of my Monster. “Not if I kill him
first.”

Alexa

I stood on a platform in front of
what seemed like hundreds of people, the night sky glittering black with
speckles of sugar above. People had been wandering into the Outlands all
day–Brockens, Searchers, Wolves. The first ones to arrive were the ones who had
been in league with the resistance from the beginning, scouts and spies. They
had managed to get word out to the three cities on the list that had yet to be
“cleansed” of traitors by the King, and the people who had escaped were showing
up by the dozens. I knew that some who tried to leave would never make it here,
but a little hope spiraled in my heart to see some of them had. Some of them
had, but nowhere near enough, and of those some, only a fraction of them were
fighters.

I felt very much like a toy
soldier standing before them all, not at all equipped to lead an army. It
seemed like everyone who had begun this journey was here with me tonight,
except for a select few who had dropped out of the race already, lost to the
cause. I couldn’t help but think of Jackson as I stood facing them all, how he
was the only thing other than my sister that I had carried with me into this
world, and now he was lost to it forever. I knew that Jackson had made the only
decision he could. I understood that now better than I would have hoped for,
and because of his sacrifice all of this had come to pass, but that did nothing
to ease the devastating fire that burned so fiercely in my soul. So much had
been lost, and so much more still lay ahead.