The Hierophant (Book 1 in The Arcana Series) (16 page)

I smile and, abruptly, every inch of me grows heavy with fatigue. “Whoa,” I grab his shoulder, and he catches me before I collapse. “Suddenly…exhausted…”

“That’s to be expected,” Trebor assures me, steadying me. I lean against him, fighting the weary weight of my eyelids. “But it’s excellent progress.” He brushes my hair out of my eyes and puts his arm around my shoulders, sighing. “Pretty soon you won’t be my damsel in distress anymore.”

I want to say something sharp and witty back, but I’m so tired, and all I can think in my post-magic stupor is that he called me
his
. And while I don’t like the idea of belonging
to
someone, there is a very nice feeling around the idea of belonging
with
someone.

— 35 —

I’m late to school Monday morning, even though I don’t have class first period. I try to make it into my second period study hall to hang out with Kyla most days, but these last few weeks it’s been hard. I’ve been so tired most mornings, I just sleep in.

It doesn’t really surprise me that she’s already ensconced by her senior class friends by the time I get there. I take a breath and try to seem totally comfortable and natural taking a seat at the same table. I smile and wave to Kyla; she smiles a tight-lipped smile back, and I know something is wrong.

The period passes in a wash of other people’s conversations. Kyla doesn’t say a word to me. No one does. I pretend to do homework, feeling even more uncomfortable than usual. When the period ends, I have to stop Kyla before she leaves with everyone else.

“Hey, Kyla. What’s going on?” My brow furrows. “Are you okay?”

She looks at me strangely. “Yeah. Are you?”

I swallow, and everything in me goes rigid, like the air around her has turned to barbed wire. She’s lying to me. My best friend in the whole world is lying to me.

I nod.

She nods, too, and gives me another close-lipped smile, before she hurries out the door to catch up with her friends.

I feel a thickness come over me, like I’m drowning. In eighth grade, when my mother was dying, I used to have this feeling in waves—powerlessness, abandonment, absolute crisis and a supreme need for isolation. I would hide in the locker room and cry, sometimes for an entire class period. It was easier to miss the whole class than come in half way with no hall pass.

I’m considering taking up the habit again, when Kyla—transformed—comes storming around the corner into the empty cafeteria.

“
Fuck this shit
,” she snaps, glaring at me. “Where the hell have you been this past month, Anastasia Flynn?”

I stare at her, mouth agape.

“I feel like I haven’t even talked to you since you
almost drowned
. Which, to be honest, I was kind of hoping would have the opposite effect.” She crosses her arms over her chest. “All of a sudden you’re so goddamn busy with homework all the time, which is a joke because you’re failing most of your classes and we both know it. Shit, you spend more time with
Andy Pavlovic
than with me these days. What the
hell
is going on, Ana?”

I shake my head, words, lies, and truths escaping me. There is so much I haven’t told her. How can I start now?

“Kyla, I’m so sorry,” is all I can say. “Honestly, time has kind of gotten away from me. I’ve been in a weird place for a while now, and…I’m sorry.” More lies? Not really, but not exactly the truth, either.

Kyla looks at me like I’m made up of hieroglyphs. “And what else?”

“Andy told me some things. About my mother’s clan. I had to digest it, I guess.”

“Without me.”

“Kyla…”

“Or, should I say,
with Trebor
?” She stares at me.

I don’t know what to say.

The bell rings. We’re late for class.

Kyla shakes her head. “I’m your best friend, Ana. Your soul sister. Remember?”

But would you be, if you knew how far everything had gone? How far it could still go?

I nod, heart hammering, the familiar suffocation of anxiety fogging my mind.

She scoffs in frustration. “God, Ana. Give me
something
. Anything. I know you’re holding back. Just…at least tell me
why
you’re holding back.” She looks like she’s going to cry.

I sniff, stifling my own tears with little success. “It’s all messed up, Ky. I’m so sorry. I just don’t want to drive you away.”

She thinks about it, considers me and my tears, and nods after a moment. “Yeah. Well, you’re doing that anyway.”

Her words hit me hard—hard enough that I almost stop, almost let myself pull back again. But she’s right, of course. “I don’t mean to. Honestly. You know me—I’m…I close up, when I’m stressed…when I’m…”

“Scared.” It’s not a question.

I swallow, and nod.

Her eyebrows pinch together for a moment before she looks at the ground. “Are you still going to the dance this weekend?” Kyla asks quietly. But she’s changing the topic on purpose, I can tell.

“I…yeah.” I don’t know if there’s room in my schedule, but I’ll make it happen. One night off of training won’t kill me. “Yes. If you still want me to go with you and Vanessa.”

Kyla rolls her eyes and looks at me. “Of course I do, A. I miss the shit out of you.” She frowns. “I know I pushed you to let people in. Maybe I pushed too hard, maybe
I
pushed
you
away. But when are you going to let me in again?”

“Ky,” I say and stride over to her, stopping just short of embracing her.

She hugs me first instead, and I hug back.

“I miss my best friend,” she says.

“Me too.” I whisper. “Me too. I’m sorry.”

“You can’t keep doing this. We won’t last like this.”

“I know. I know I need to talk to you about all of it. And I will.”

“When?’

“Soon. I promise.”

She pulls back and looks at me, eyebrows beetled together and forehead creased. What is she thinking inside that dreadlock-draped skull? Is she wondering why she bothers? Is she doubting my word? It she tired of waiting for me to embrace her first when she’s been standing here with her arms wide open the whole time?

“Do you at least have a date for the dance yet?” she asks quietly, allowing a small smile.

I respond with a weak laugh, an indefinable sadness humming in my chest. “I’m working on it.”

— 36 —

That night, Trebor and I sit beneath a gnarled apple tree in the middle of the orchard, and the magic still does not come easily. I focus, unfocus, refocus, and continue to battle the explosions simmering under my skin.

“What’s different?” I wonder, breathing slow and deep, trying to calm the magic inside of me. “I did
exactly
this last night, and then…what?”

Trebor is peering at me strangely, narrowing his eyes. “I think I might know.” He touches my forehead with his fingertips, over my third eye. “
Ahuvati, sheli
.”

It happens again, though it’s much less profound this time. A cool, white calm spreads behind my eyes, floods through my body, and I feel at ease for the first time since last night.

Trebor lowers his hand. “Better?”

I nod, still feeling the light pressure of his fingertips on my skin. “What does that mean in your language?”

Trebor shakes his head and grimaces. “It’s a secret. You learn to control your magic without that, and then I’ll tell you.”

I roll my eyes, and look down at my hands. “Okay. Focus…
casually
.” It takes a few moments of clearing my mind and feeling my way towards a gentle flow, but soon enough my hands begin to glow amethyst. “Ha! Easy. Kind of.” I raise my hands and wiggle my fingers, sprinkling bits of magic into the air. “Now what?”

Trebor points to an apple tree about twenty feet away. “There’s a wraith over there.”

“What?” I hiss, and jump to my feet, scanning. Sure enough, high-beam eyes blink open, into the darkness, and a toothy grin fills the shadows beneath. The tall, thin, not-quite-man-shaped shadow takes a step forward.

“Trebor?” I worry as the wraith slinks closer, spreading his arms as if expecting an embrace.

Trebor stands behind me. “I’ve got it covered. But you try, first.”

“I don’t know how.”

“Sure you do. You did it last night.”

I swallow, and the buzz returns to my veins.
It’s just my fear
, I realize.
My need to control is because I’m afraid. I’m not afraid though. I’m not afraid
, I tell myself, but the hammering in my chest says otherwise.

“Easy,” Trebor says, putting a hand on my shoulder. Of course he knows my heart is racing—his heart would be racing too.

But if he’s calm, maybe my heart can imitate what his heart should be doing.

I take a deep breath, let my heart follow his, and raise my hands to the wraith.

It stops, cocks its head, and bares huge, pointed fangs. The wraith hisses, growls like a jaguar, startling me before it jumps—

I cry out in surprise, letting loose a blast of light from my hands that sends me flying backwards into Trebor, knocking us both down.

Somewhere in the dark, the wraith cries out and fizzles into shadow, but meanwhile I’m lightheaded and breathless on the ground—on top of my teacher.

Trebor chuckles beneath me. “Are you okay?”

I moan, pressing my palm to my head to hold my shifting brains inside. “Why didn’t you warn me before we got started?”

“I knew you could handle it. Come on.” He helps me sit up, but I’m so lightheaded I just keep falling forward. “Whoa…” He catches me again and lets me lean against him. “Dizzy?”

“Yeah,” I breathe.

“Power backlash,” he explains. “Another thing to work on. But you did it, right? You took care of your first Sura.”

“Did I kill it?” I wonder, going pale. Even if they’re demons, I don’t like the idea of
murdering
them.

“No, just sent it back where it belongs, in Sheol.”

I put my hand against him to push myself up, and notice the light is gone from my fingers. Then I notice my hand on his chest, his arm around my waist; I become aware of the fact that my thigh is pressed against his, that to anyone who didn’t know better, we might look like teenage lovers fooling around in the woods at night. I feel his heart beat a little faster under my hand, in my own chest, and wonder if he’s realized the same.

I clear my throat and sit up straight, putting space between us,  fidgeting with my hands in my lap. Even in the best of situations, I’m not good at
boy stuff
. Hell, Trebor isn’t even a boy, he’s an Irin. And besides, there’s no
stuff
to happen, we just—

“We should get you home,” he interrupts my train of thought. “The Sura will be out in stronger numbers until after Beltane—the nights are getting thinner.”

“Right. We should go.” I pause. “Wait. Thinner? What are you talking about?”

He looks at my fidgety hands when he speaks. “Beltane—the first day of May—is one of the nights when the veils between our worlds are thinnest. The weeks leading up to it are when the veils become thin—we call them the Thin Nights. Sura can slip into your world more easily then.”

“Oh. Do they cross into Shemayiim, too?”

Trebor shakes his head. “No. They can't. They can't really exist in Shemayiim; it exists on a wavelength too disparate from theirs. The same is true of Irin and Malakiim—our wavelength is much higher than Sheol. We can't exist there either, not without Falling.”

“But you can all exist here, in my world.” I cock an eyebrow. It seems convenient, like the justifications of a schizophrenic for his belief in his own hallucinations.

“Yes. This world has a greater spectrum of order and chaos, good and evil.”

“So, can
I
exist in all three worlds?”

Trebor blinks. “I think so. I’m not sure. No human has ever come to Shemayiim—and the Malakiim would be pissed if they did.”

I frown. “The Malakiim sound like a bunch of stuck-up control-freaks.”

He laughs. “Yup.”

“Then why do you work for them?”

Trebor finally looks at me again, considers something, then scans the darkness around us. “Come on, we should go. It's not safe out here.” He stands and takes my hand, pulling me to my feet, but he lets go of my hand once I'm standing too.

We head back through the nunnery parking lot just outside of the orchard and begin the walk home. It's quiet, nothing but the distant whisper of traffic on Main Street, and the chirping of crickets and creepers, until Trebor finally decides to answer my question.

“We're not given a choice, really,” he says. “We're born and bred for service. We were created to walk among humans, to spy on you, and protect you. There really isn't a life for us besides that, at least not in Shemayiim.”

“So, what, you're slaves?” I ask, angry on his behalf.

“Not exactly. We're a class of people whose purpose is pre-determined—more like a caste. The Malakiim are in charge. They make the laws. And we have to live by them.”

I can feel myself bristle against their authority, even though it's not over me. Not yet, anyway. “What kind of laws are you talking about? I mean...besides their policy on Sura and Falling. Are they like human laws?”

Trebor bristles, too. “Some are. But they're trying to maintain order in a system that encompasses much more than personal responsibility and morals. Murder is illegal, yes—but an Irin would never murder, unless he had Fallen. It just doesn't happen. The laws that exist have more to do with preserving the purity of our magic, and all the separate races.”

“Purity of the race? But if some of you Fall, that doesn't affect the rest of you, does it?”

“No. I don't mean it like that.”

I think about it. “Oh. You mean...breeding.”

“Yes.”

I squirm. “So has that been, like, an issue in the past? Irin and Malakiim?”

Trebor laughs. “No. There are other races in Shemayiim, other than the Malakiim and Irin. And besides, the Malakiim are incorporeal in Shemayiim. But…” He raises his eyebrows. “They
can
come down to earth and take up human form. A long time ago, one of them did that. In fact, she fell in love with a demon, and they had a child together.”

“Oh,” I coo. “That’s kind of romantic.”

“Except then the Malakiim tried to execute them all for their transgression.”

“Oh. Okay. Less romantic.”

Trebor shrugs. “If it makes you feel better, before she was executed, the mother gave her immortality to her lover and their child, protecting them from the Malakiim's wrath.”

“Yay! Romantic!” I cheer. “What happened to the lover and their child?”

“Um. Well. They’ve been sealed up in a tower in Sheol, ever since.”

“That's horrible.”

“Yes, it is.” He looks sidelong at me.

I swallow. My heart is doing strange things, playing cat's cradle with my innards, and I wonder if he feels that, too.

“The Malakiim fear that the union of any of the different races might create a creature more powerful than they can manage. So far, we've been evenly matched, the Irin and Sura. The Malakiim have great power as well, but they can't risk coming to Iritz and becoming mortal. They send
us
to police the Sura—and humans, because they don’t like it when you remember how to use your magic.”

I turn to him, eyebrow arched. “Then why are you trying to
teach
me to use it?”

“Because if I don't teach you to control your magic, it will find a way to control you. Magic is a force—like lightning or fire. It is not good, and it is not evil, but left to its own devices it will destroy everything it touches. Chaos is necessary for creation, it's true, but think of your own mind. You can let it run wild and it can drive you mad, or else you can control the chaos, focus your thoughts, and solve problems, understand consequences, and make decisions.” He works his jaw, biting down on some hard truth he doesn't want to let out.

“So, wait a minute. If we're so dangerous, and the Malakiim are so controlling—why do they allow us to exist at all?”

Trebor looks strangely at me. “They're not total monsters.”

“Just partial?”

He smirks. “Maybe. But besides that, human faith—and there is a lot more of it than you realize—that's what keeps them alive. It's your own wild unconscious minds that have given life to other worlds, other beings—angels, demons, heaven, hell. Those things have always existed, but like undeveloped photographs. If no one knows a thing exists, does it really exist at all?”

“What are you talking about? Are you saying we created you? That we created the Malakiim and the Sura?”

“Origin theory is all
chicken or the egg
at this point. What I'm saying is that these things couldn't have come to exist in these forms
without
humans.”

I can't honestly wrap my brain around that, but I nod and keep walking. The street is empty, the village silent, and I feel very insignificant indeed.

“Hey,” Trebor says after a while, looking at me. “I know this is still probably pretty overwhelming for you. But I promise, the magic part isn’t as hard as you think. Once we figure out how to get past this barrier, using magic will be intuitive. We just need to figure out how to fine tune you.”

“Like a well-oiled machine,” I mutter, almost laughing. “What you mean is figure out how to make me relax and stop holding on so tightly. Stop trying to control everything.”

He smiles. “Maybe.”

“And what then? When I know how to use magic, I mean.”

He cocks his head. “You'll be safe.”

“And where will you go? Will you keep looking for the key?”

Trebor looks at the sidewalk disappearing beneath our feet. “I'm not sure any more.”

“Why not? Won't the Malakiim be mad if you drop the mission?”

Trebor opens his mouth, then closes it. “It's complicated. But I worry that maybe the Sura are using me to find the Key, and I'm not sure it's worth it any more to continue the search.”

“Can't you call for backup or something?”

Trebor inhales, shakes his head. “No. Not this time.” He forces a smile. “But let's not worry about it for now. There are other pressing matters at hand.”

“Yeah. By the way, I need to tell Kyla everything that's been going on.”

Trebor straightens, nods. “Okay.”

“The Malakiim don't have a law against that?”

He laughs. “Oh yes, they do. That's an absolute no-no. But they're not here, are they? And besides, she already knows about Sura, and she knows you can see them.”

“Oh. Okay. Well, that settles that.”

“Why haven't you told her already?”

I shake my head. “Because I'm a coward. I'm afraid she's going to hate me for not telling her, or think I'm a freak, or worse, be afraid to be my friend.”

Trebor laughs. “Your best friend? Kyla, of all people? She's going to be ecstatic.”

I wince. “Maybe.”

“You really have a fear of people leaving you, don't you?”

I wince again. Called out. “I have a very…
tenuous
sense of place. Almost no sense of belonging. My father loves me, but we're like strangers most of the time. Kyla is loyal to me—we share things no one else can, and we've known each other since birth. You know what I am—know more about me, probably, than anyone besides Kyla.” My cheeks grow warm. “I know I shouldn't, but I use you all as anchors, holding me in place. If I lose you—any of you—I'm afraid I'll drift out to sea and never come back. And I have no idea what that metaphor means, only that it fills me with so much dread, and so much sadness...” I grimace, and clutch my chest. “It's like a hole in my heart, threatening to swallow up everything that means anything to me. Everything I know about myself. Everything I believe.”