Page 25 of The Coveted
Daelon combed his fingers through my hair, sending shivers down my spine. “People are notoriously bad at drawing critical connections when it disrupts their entire worldview. Whatever magickal veil Lucius has over the truth doesn’t help with that.”
“What’s next?” I asked for the second time today, determination flooding back into my veins.
“We need to ask Amos about what the girl said—her strange message and her mention of what she called theAkashic Records. Maybe that’s the same place Amos says you need to travel to in order to uncover the past. I think our first step is figuring out whatever magick led to Lucius’s rise to power, so we know how to undo it. Lucius’s binding spell over history prevents even me from remembering anything about how Lucius took the throne. One minute his father and his men were in control, and the next Lucius was King and that was that. That time period is like a black haze. A void.”
“How strange,” I murmured. It still weirded me out to think that Lucius considered Daelon his brother. They spent most of their lives together, and not even Daelon knew the truth.
He snapped out of a faraway daze and nodded. “Our next step is beating Lucius at finding our allies, because the more help we have, the more you stand a chance against him here, where he’s most powerful. Our parents and our people left a roadmap, split into all these pieces to keep it safe from discovery by anyone but us.”
“We just need to keep gathering all the pieces,” I finished. “But we don’t even know where to look.” What lay ahead of us felt so insurmountable, but also so certain. It required more faith than I felt I had.
“This last one foundus.I think you do know where to look, Áine. You can see into people’s souls, for one thing. You can swim in that vast ocean of magick—all the power that was thought to have left this land—and it’s on our side. You’ve been receiving guidance from the very beginning.”
The tide of my power rose up in agreement, sending tingling shivers through the length of my body. It was a strange feeling to be so alone in this world and yet also connected to everything all at once. It was just the two of us, igniting a revolution, but it was also all who came before us. This land was speaking so clearly, but I could feel it wasn’t just the witch realm that was calling out, it was the human and the astral planes too. Like they were all bound together by the same fabric.
It was a multidimensional story told in different tongues, weaving a web of triumph and loss, oppression and uprising, cruelty and compassion, creation and destruction, all of these forces that chanted and echoed. I knew I was not the only one who heard its song. It whistled through trees, snuck through open doors, found itself in the hum of a servant or the grunt of a factory worker—it gathered up impressions of all of us in its wake, like a ball of snow down a steep hill.
This was our song. A song for all of us.
At first, I thought I’d awoken when I saw Daelon’s motionless body. His face was relaxed, and I found myself marveling once again at how innocent and vulnerable he looked in his sleep, when he had no walls to build and maintain. But as I reached out a hand to touch him, I realized my fingers were more translucent than they should’ve been, with a slight silvery glow.
I was in the astral realm again, where pure consciousness reigned, and everything was fluid. I still hadn’t quite figured out its rules and logic, and no one had really been able to explain it. It was a blend of dreams, imagination, magick, and materiality. I could travel to places that really existed on Earth and Aradia, but also places of myth and religion. Realitywasn’t quite as concrete as I’d once thought.
I’d fought an astral battle here; I’d possibly seen my mothers and our coven in the afterlife when Daelon nearly killed me while possessed by Lucius. I’d also been summoned to see parts of Aradia like Lucius’s castle or the clearing in the woods nearby, where a mysterious black altar told tales of death and destruction. The voices in my power told me to remember what I saw. It was an important part of the story.
The best part, by far, of astral projection was that I was completely untethered to my physical body, free to fly and move around just like in a lucid dream. Most of the time it felt like I’d been pulled from my body, either by Lucius when he was trying to scare me or my mothers when they’d been trying to show me something. Usually, witches had to consciously will themselves to project, and it was a rather difficult thing to do.
I glanced around at my surroundings, realizing there were certain things about the room that weren’t quite the same as in the physical. The mirror was black, the curtains were purple instead of grey… small differences.
Áine, Bringer of Hope. I have something to show you,said a young, feminine voice.
I sighed. Couldn’t I just fly around and explore just this once? This realm was supposed to be a spiritual playground, and all I’d ever done was go head-to-head with enemies and see a super creepy evil forest. Although, that time I’d seen my own immense power shooting up into the sky as white light was sort of cool. As was hanging out in outer space.
Do not be afraid. I’m going to bring you to me, so you can see. We are from the same coven.
That definitely piqued my interest, and as she reached out to me, I sensed that she was telling the truth. Energy couldn’t lie. A portal opened beside my bed, like a mirror made from blue light. I cast one last glance over my shoulder at my body nestled into Daelon’s before I was sucked through.
Everything went black for a moment, and then I opened my eyes. I was standing in front of a mirror, holding a candle and a jagged crystal, but it wasn’tmestaring back. It was a woman with light brown skin, tight curls of black hair, dangling gold earrings, and a flowing green bohemian style dress. She bore a great deal of resemblance to my best human friend, Steph, who I missed so very much.
“I’ve cast a spell to let you see through my eyes, just for a short while. You need to see what we face here, outside of the castle and in the cities.”
I wanted to cock my head and contort my face in confusion, but I realized I didn’t have a body to move.
“I’m honored to have you with me, but please do not try to fight against my control of my own body.”
Oh, oops, sorry. This is new to me…obviously. I was so beyond wigged out right now. I fought hard against the instinctive wave of panic that came with residing in a body that was not my own.
She waved her hand. “I understand. You can leave whenever you want, but it’s part of my life’s purpose to show you this. Thank you for trusting me without knowing me. That is the only way our people have been able to survive.”
I’m here,was all I could manage to say. Was this what Daelon felt like when Lucius took possession of his body? Like he was just a bystander in his own mind? Well, I guess it was different since this washermind.
What’s your name?I asked.
She smiled, and then she set the candle down on a dresser to our right. “I’m Seraphina. Again, I’m so glad you’re here. I wish we could’ve met under better circumstances, but I’m certain we will be reunited once the tides turn. If I survive, that is.”
I—I was starting to worry that there weren’t many of us left.
“Of our coven, no. But people who practice the old ways are still here, lurking in the shadows. Those who escaped the genocide, those who saw it coming, and those who were protected by the sacrifice of others. We’ve all been waiting for you.”
