Rise of Souls: A Prophecy of the Sisters Novella (3 page)

One day, Una had found the courage to voice her concern to Dimitri. Lia had been visiting with Louisa, who had come to spend the warm summer months on the island. Una had been in Lia’s working chambers, sorting her correspondence, the question of the Souls and the possibility of their ongoing threat weighing heavily on her mind as Lia and Louisa wandered the island alone and without protection.

Dimitri had come in, shuffling through some of the papers on Lia’s desk, looking for a requisition made by the stable master.

Una had bit her lip, trying to summon her courage, before speaking.

“Brother Markov?”

“Hmm?” He was distracted, his attention on the stack of papers in his hand.

“Do…do you think…” She had not figured out how to phrase the question in advance. Now she was worried that it would sound challenging, disrespectful.

Dimitri looked up at her. “What is it, Una?”

“Well…I was simply wondering if it’s truly safe for Lady Amalia to walk the grounds unattended. If the danger has well and truly passed.”

His eyes darkened, his body coiled for action, as if he might race after Lia that very second. “Is there a threat at hand? Something you have not reported?”

She shook her head. “No, no. Nothing like that. I was just thinking about…about the Souls.” She did not like to say it out loud. They had grown to nearly mystical proportions to all who lived on the island.

Dimitri’s expression softened. “The Gate is closed, Una.”

“I know. But what about…Well, what about the Souls who had already crossed? The ones already in the physical world?”

“They have no leader,” he said simply, turning his attention back to the papers in his hand.

“And they cannot bring harm to us without one?” she asked, growing braver with Dimitri’s calm acceptance of her questions.

“That would seem unlikely,” Brother Markov said. “They are not sentient. Not in the way one would need to plan an attack on the island.”

Una bit her lip, hesitant to push the issue further but knowing it was now or never. “And we know this? For certain?”

“Why else would they wait for Samael to lead them?” Brother Markov muttered. “If they had been able to launch an overthrow themselves, they likely would have done so, rather than wait thousands of years for Samael’s return.” He looked up then, meeting her eyes as if he had just remembered her presence. “Yes?”

She considered his words. He was right; the Souls had waited centuries for Samael to cross from the Otherworlds. Either they were very patient or they simply lacked the cognizance to plan an attack of the scale required to overthrow the Sisterhood, the Brothers, the Grigori.

She had smiled, feeling some sense of relief. She had been paranoid, that was all, her common sense colored by her desire to protect Lia and the island that was her home.

“I’m sure you’re right,” she had said, forcing a laugh. “I’m sorry to be such a ninny.”

But now, running toward the Sanctuary as the sky slowly turned from indigo to the palest of gray, the rising sun blocked out by the early morning fog, she knew she had been right; the Souls would not be content to live mortal lives.

They were here to demand the power they had been promised. To take it.

The realization prompted her to move faster, the Sanctuary growing nearer and nearer. When she finally reached it, she took the steps two at a time, hurrying along the portico until she came to one of the archways that acted as a threshold to the main building.

She took the corner at a dead run, her robe billowing out behind her as she continued along the hallway. The sconces were still lit, their flame casting flickering shadows along the walls. When she finally reached the door to Lia and Dimitri’s chambers, she hesitated for just a moment, half afraid of what she would find, for wouldn’t the Souls come here first? Wouldn’t an attack be easier without a leader in place to issue commands?

But there was no time to contemplate the possibilities. She pushed open the door and hurried into the room, crossing to the cradle, her heart in her throat as she waited for the sleeping babies to come into view.

Time seemed to slow as she peered over the edge, her mind already preparing to see the tiny infants, nestled together as they always were, Brennus fast asleep while Connall gazed about as if he were afraid to miss anything in the name of slumber.

The cradle was empty, even the blankets gone.

Una spun around, surveying the room, wondering if the Souls lay in wait, if it might still be possible to stop them from taking the babies.

But the room was silent. Her gaze fell on the door leading from the nursery room to Lia and Dimitri’s private chamber. It was ajar.

She looked around, searching for anything she could use as a weapon. She was not trained in or accustomed to the art of physical defense, but she would do what she could, sacrificing her own life if necessary, to keep the twins from the Souls.

There was little to work with save a silver filigreed letter opener resting on one of the side tables. Una recognized it as one that had belonged to Lady Abigail before her death. Una had used it several times when opening Lia’s correspondence. She didn’t know why it would be in the baby’s room, but perhaps Lia had been trying to work while seeing to her sons.

Una picked it up, reassured by the weight of it in her hand, and approached the partially open door.

She stepped carefully across the floor, grateful for the large carpets, woven on Altus and installed to muffle noise both within and without the infants’ room. The wood floors underneath were impeccably maintained, but there was never any guarantee against the creaking of an occasional loose floorboard.

When she reached the door, she paused, holding very still and listening for noise from within the room. She thought she heard the muffled sound of voices, and she leaned forward, willing her ears to decipher the words.

It was Lia, that much was certain. Una would know her mistress’s voice anywhere. But she could not make out the words themselves, and she readjusted her grip on the letter opener as she pushed open the door just enough to slip through the crack.

The room was still dark, the gray light of morning fighting its way through the draperies at the window. A single candle was lit on a table at the far side of the room, a figure splayed out on the bed. She craned her neck for a better view, her heart catching in her throat as she saw that it was Dimitri, facedown atop the coverlet.

But where were the babies? Where was Lia?

“Una?” a voice called out softly from the shadows. “Whatever are you doing? Is everything all right?”

Una’s gaze followed the voice to the rocking chair in the corner. It was Lia, sitting with one of the infants—Connall, probably—at her breast.

She exhaled a long rush of air. “Lia…where is Brennus?”

“With Dimitri on the bed,” Lia said. “Brennus went right back to sleep after being fed, but little Connall here is too curious for sleep, as always.”

Una stepped closer to the bed, needing to see Brennus for herself. He was there, sleeping soundly next to his father on the bed.

Satisfied that he was safe, she slipped the letter opener in her pocket and hurried across the room to Lia. As soon as Lia saw her face, she paused in her rocking.

“Una? What is it?”

Una shook her head, wishing she’d rehearsed the words. “We are under attack. The Souls have breached the island.”

Lia stood, her face pale. “What do you mean? What are you talking about, Una?”

“Fenris and I…we found a girl on the beach. A guide who was dispatched early this morning to ferry someone to the island. She washed up on the north shore. She said she’d been overtaken by the Souls on the ferry, that they were on their way to the island.”

Lia shook her head. “But…how can that be? The Souls…” She crossed to the window, pulling back the draperies and gazing out over the fog-covered hills. “Everything seems fine.”

For the first time, it occurred to Una that perhaps the girl had been lying. Perhaps she was mad with hallucinations from being in the water. Perhaps she was simply wrong.

“I seek only to tell you what the girl said.” She bowed formally to Lia, her mistress, her friend. “You are the Lady of Altus, and I am yours to command.”

Lia’s eyes were shrouded with indecision. Her gaze slid to Dimitri, still asleep on the bed. She was opening her mouth to speak when a scream rang out across the island. High-pitched and filled with horror, it was cut off a moment later.

Lia’s eyes met Una’s a second later. “Sound the alarm.”

“Which one?” Una asked.

Lia hesitated only a moment. “Counterattack and evacuation.”

Una had not wanted to leave Lia and the babies, but Lia had insisted. Una should sound the alarm while Lia woke Dimitri. By the time Una returned, they would have come to an agreement about a course of action.

In the meantime, the rest of the island needed to be warned.

Una flew through the halls of the Sanctuary until she came to a simple wooden door at the back of the building. Flinging the door open, she hurried up the circular stairs to the bell tower, lifting her robe as she ran, not wanting to trip, not wanting to do anything that would slow her progress to the bell, which was the alarm for the island.

She did not hear anything until she reached the top, the tower exposed on all sides to the open air. Then she heard an assortment of muffled shouts, screams, and somewhere in the distance, the clang of metal on metal.

She reached for the rope attached to the bell and pulled, ringing it in three long peals followed by two short ones. She did not know if an order of evacuation had ever been issued for the island, if the people of Altus even remembered the sequence for such an order. If they would know what to do.

But all she could do was ring it, the sound of shouting and screaming below growing louder and more insistent.

When she had completed the fifth peal, she hurried back down the stairs. Some of the Sisters emerged from their rooms as she ran through the halls. They were sleepy, disoriented, their eyes frightened.

“Is it a drill?”

“Who’s been trifling with the…?”

“What on Altus’s verdant hills was that?”

“You heard it!” Una shouted as she ran. “Prepare to fight or evacuate, on the Lady’s orders.”

“But what is she…”

“… this isn’t…”

“The Souls…a threat.”

Una did not have time to stop and explain. To tell them all that the order had been issued for a reason. That Lady Amalia would not have issued it if the threat were not clear and present.

They had been warned. It was all she could do. Now her responsibility lay in protecting Lia and the babies, in seeing them safely off the island.

Returning to Lia and Dimitri’s chamber, she was surprised to find one of the Brothers already posted at the door, a guard who barred her way. She was still explaining her position as Lia’s lady-in-waiting when the door opened.

“Una, come,” Dimitri said, pulling her into the room without a word to the guard. Though Dimitri had been fast asleep, his son at his side, when Una left to sound the alarm, he was now clear-eyed and alert. “There is no time to waste.”

She stepped into the room and closed the door behind her. The noise from outside was louder now. Shouting—occasionally broken by a scream, the collision of swords—made its way through the thick walls and windows of the Sanctuary. In the few minutes it had taken her to sound the warning, the situation had clearly deteriorated. She thought fleetingly of Fenris and the girl from the beach, wondering if they had made it to safety.

She pushed the thought aside almost as soon as it sprang to mind. She could not afford to think of them now. She must concentrate on Lia and her family and trust that Fenris would do what he must to protect the girl and survive.

She looked at Dimitri, a leather sheath holding a sword strapped to his waist as he rushed about the room, throwing things into a valise, while Lia wrapped the babies in thick blankets.

“What can I do?”

Dimitri did not pause in his activities to look at her. “You can accompany my wife in the evacuation and see to her safety and the safety of my sons.”

“Of course,” Una said.

She hurried to Lia’s side, taking Brennus from her while she wrestled a squalling Connall into a swaddling cloth. Dimitri set the valise on the bed and turned to the top drawer of the bureau, pulling from it one of Lia’s old gowns.

Lia’s hands stopped moving over the baby’s body, her eyes wary as she regarded her husband. “Why are you packing my gown?”

“You must be prepared,” he said simply. “For anything.”

Lia turned away from the baby, her eyes instructing Una to make sure he did not roll off the bed.

She placed a hand on Dimitri’s arm, forcing him to stop moving. “What, specifically, are you preparing me for, Dimitri?”

He took a deep breath. “Anything. Anything and everything.”

“But surely we will return,” Lia said. “We will evacuate as planned for such an attack, and whoever is responsible will be apprehended. We will be back on the island before the evening meal.”

He reached out, his eyes tender as he placed a hand on the side of her face. “I hope it will be so, my love.”

“And why wouldn’t it?” Lia’s voice was still low, still calm, but Una heard the undercurrent of dread in it. “This island has belonged to the Sisters and the Grigori since the beginning of time. Do you think it will be lost from us today?”

He hesitated. “I don’t know. Perhaps our hold on Altus seems more tenuous now that I have you to care for, now that I must see to the safety of our sons.” He shook his head. “I simply cannot take the chance, Lia. Not anymore. You and the twins will evacuate with the others as the plan requires. I cannot accompany you. Please don’t ask.”

She smiled sadly. “I will do no such thing. I know the man I married.” She stood on tiptoe to kiss him. “I will see to our sons and to our people, and you will do your duty, as a warrior must.”

He leaned down, pressing his lips fiercely to hers. “You are every bit the warrior as me.” He turned to Una, sitting on the bed with Brennus in her arms, one hand on Connall’s tiny belly as he squirmed in the swaddling cloth. “Are they ready?”