Blood of Retribution (6 page)

Chapter 6

What am I doing?  I don’t have the first clue how to find anything in here.  There has to be at least a million pieces of paper and books.  There’s no way I can look at them all.  I’d be as old as the scribe by the time I finished.  And some of them are so old that I don’t dare touch them.  I really hope none of them hold the answers.

Choosing an aisle at random, I study the columns of ancient texts.  There’s an unfortunate odor to them.  They smell like chocolate-covered, used sweat socks that a zombie wore for a week or so.  A sickly sweet smell covering a rancid, damp one.  I’m pretty sure I’ll never get this smell out of my pores.  Kallen had better like his wife stinky.

Stopping in the middle of the aisle, I reach my hand out to touch a random book.  I jump back when the book slides towards me on its own.  A soft whispering is coming from it in some language I don’t understand.  I’m sure it’s saying ‘pick me’, but it’s saying a lot more than that as well.  Probably something along the lines of ‘pick me and kill everyone you know just by reading one of my pages’.  I decide to move farther down the aisle.

The deeper into the dark magic section I get, the heavier my body feels.  I feel like I’m wading through a giant vat of chocolate pudding.  Soon, I find that I’m having trouble putting one foot in front of the other until it feels as if the pudding has turned to sludge.  I finally reach a point where I cannot walk anymore.  Great.  What am I going to do now?

With a painful zing, a spell pops into my head and before I can stop myself, I say the words out loud even though I uselessly try to bite back each syllable before I give voice to it. 
“Masters of old, trapped inside your cage, pushed aside by those less sage, this fate bestowed in a cruel and blind age.  I call upon you to rise again, make the world as it should have been and save us from this sickening fen.  Walk among us and show no mercy to those who have left you thirsty.  Your power is restored to share your wrath with those who have kept you from your rightful path.”

As the last syllable of the spell leaves my mouth, a scream is wrenched from the bottom of my soul.  I fall to my hands and knees, still screaming as pain shoots through every pore.  My magic is forcibly pulled through me, lighting the dark walls, setting free god knows what.  In a fog, my ears can barely pick up the sound of Kallen’s voice.  He is shouting, fright and anger and worry mix in his voice, but what pulls me from this fog is the love I hear.  Whatever else he is thinking, first and foremost, he wants to know that I am okay, that I am still with him.

That is what gives me the strength to stand amongst the paper cyclone the dark section has become.  It gives me the strength to fight against the pull, to fight for control of my magic that is being absorbed into these pages and giving them life.  With every ounce of strength I have, I pull my magic back.  I rip it from the unseen hands that are grasping it, reveling in its glow.  I take it back and then I turn it around.  I push the books back to the shelves.  I push the scrolls and the parchment back to their places. 

There’s too much of it, though.  I can’t find it all.  My heart sinks as I realize some of the darkness has already escaped.  Doing what I can to subdue the rest, I ignore the pain in my chest that has come with the realization that I have let loose darkness and despair into the realm. 

I have become Pandora.

Chapter 7

When every scrap of paper I can find has been returned to its rightful place, I stumble my way back to Kallen.  He is so far away.  I feel his magic as he tries over and over again to penetrate the wall keeping him out, but it’s no use.  He will not be able to enter the darkness no matter how much he tries.  The magic is too strong.

The relief on his face when he sees me is palpable.  I try to rush to him, but I can hardly stand, let alone run.  I am utterly exhausted.  I have to inch my way to where he stands, using the outer wall of the archives to keep myself upright.  What I wouldn’t give right now for a soft place to lie down and close my eyes.

After what feels like an eon, I am finally in front of my husband.  My dear, loving husband who doesn’t know what he should feel first: relief, anxiety, anger or love.  When I fall into his arms, I know that love has won.  Kallen scoops me up and holds me to him, murmuring words of love as I fall into a stupor, the weight of the last few minutes pushing me quickly into unconsciousness.  The last thing I hear before I am lost to the darkness is the scribe.  “She has set evil loose.  She is the plague we all knew she would be,” he rasps, absolute conviction coloring his voice.

When my eyes open again, I am in an unfamiliar place.  The walls around me are a pale pink and the bed I am lying on is covered with a deep pink comforter with embroidered red roses.  The amount of gilded fixtures on the wall tells me that I am still at the palace.  Dagda has very tacky taste. 

The hissing in the air tells me that my familiar has found me.  He is standing at the edge of the bed, his teeth bared and his hair standing straight at the ruff of his neck.  My eyes follow the path of his and there are two extremely angry Fairies wanting with every fiber of their being to incinerate the little beast.  Unfortunately for them, their magic can’t touch him.

“Stop it,” I say to my familiar.  I put a muzzle on him to emphasize my words. 

“Mmmm mmm, mmm mmm mm,” he says in return.  Considering he has my personality, I know for a fact I don’t want to know what those words he just muttered are.

The first to speak is Dagda.  “Has it been a lie?  Have you gained my trust only to wreak havoc on this realm in revenge for what I tried to do?”  His words are harsh and his face is twisted into a snarl, a hateful snarl.  I have to admit, he looks pretty damn scary right now.

“Uncle,” Kallen says, but Dagda cuts him off. 

“Do you know what you’ve done?” Dagda shouts.

I close my eyes and count to ten before I answer him.  “Yes, and I’ll fix it.”

“You’ll fix it?  Damn right you will fix this mess.”

I glare up at my biological father.  “It was an accident.”

When Dagda opens his mouth again, Kallen says, “Uncle, let her speak.  Your anger is not going to get us answers.”  Kallen pinches the bridge of his nose and closes his eyes.  I get the feeling he’s been dealing with Dagda’s fury for a while now.  “Xandra, tell us what happened.”

The door to the bedroom opens wide and smacks against the wall.  “What is going on here?  Why are there guards on this door?  You will not keep her hostage no matter what she has done,” Isla says, marching into the room. 

“The guards are for her protection,” Dagda growls.  “The Fairies of this realm will not react well when they find out that evil has been released.”

Isla wants to rip into him and call him a liar, but I can see that she’s torn.  My reputation precedes me.  Turning to me and keeping her anger in check, she says, “Tell me what happened down there.”

“We were getting to that when you stormed in,” Dagda snarls, and the two glare at each other, both just seconds away from pulling magic.

“Xandra, please,” Kallen says.  “We need you to tell us every detail.”

I close my eyes hoping that I’ll slip into unconsciousness again, but no such luck. With great reluctance, I open them again.  “I said a spell.”  My lips clamp closed not wanting to say more.

“What kind of spell?” Isla demands.

I wonder if I can take my own voice away.  Or maybe I should teleport somewhere.  Anywhere other than here.  At the moment, I’d rather be a coward than face the truth of what I did.  My traitorous conscience won’t let me get away with it though.  “I was walking down an aisle and the air got so thick I couldn’t move.”  My teeth bite down on my tongue, preventing me from continuing.  I swear, they did it all by themselves.

Kallen sighs in frustration.  “Xandra, please just spit it out.  You are not helping the situation by saying one sentence at a time.”

Fine.  Here goes.  “I felt a sharp pain in my head, a spell formed in my mind, and then I couldn’t stop myself from saying it.  I tried so hard to stop, but my lips kept moving, saying that terrible spell.”

Dagda’s brows shoot up.  “You seem to have no problem controlling your tongue at the moment.  Why should we believe you did not have the same ability then?”

I want to shove his words back down his throat with my magic but I can’t.  He’s right.  “I don’t know why I couldn’t stop.  It was sort of like someone sticking their hand down my throat and pulling the words out.”

“How graphic,” Dagda snips.

I give him a sour look and continue.  I’m getting desperate for them to believe me.  “You’ve never been down there!  I was surrounded by so much darkness!  I didn’t know what to fight off first; in my confusion, I was compelled to say a spell.”  I look around nervously, trying not to meet anyone’s eyes.  “A spell that set some of the evil from the books free.  I tried to pull it all back, but I couldn’t.  I got most of it, but some of it still escaped.”

“Yes, we know,” Dagda growls.  “Several Fairies were injured as the darkness swept through the palace and escaped out into the realm.”

Oh no!  “Were they hurt badly?” I ask.

Kallen nods.  “Yes.  The palace physician is working on them now, but she fears their injuries will ultimately be fatal.”

I sit up and throw the comforter off from me.  “Where are they?  Maybe I can help them.”

“No!” Dagda growls.  “You will not go near them!”

Isla turns her stony eyes to him.  “You cannot believe the child has done harm to the realm on purpose.”  Child?  When did I become a child again?  Probably around the same time I became Pandora.

“How can I not?” Dagda retorts.

Kallen’s eyes flash with anger.  “Because if you know her at all, you know she is not capable of such a thing.”

Guilt washes over me.  I’ve done some pretty evil things lately.  I’m not sure that argument holds up anymore.  As if reading my mind, Dagda says, “I can recall several instances where she has caused great harm without remorse.”

“Hey!” I say, trying hard to put conviction in my next words.  “I only did those things to protect the ones I love and try to bring peace to the realms.” 

Dagda’s eyes meet mine in firm disbelief.  “Really?  Your actions have always been justified as such?”

Okay, there are a couple of times, well, quite a few times, that I caused harm for other reasons.  Like jealousy.  Or annoyance.  Maybe out of dislike.  Still, I say, “Most of the time, yes.” 

“Uncle,” Kallen says sharply.  “Think about what you are saying.  Are you truly going to turn against your own daughter?”

Dagda opens his mouth to say something.  Then he closes it again.  Running a hand through his hair, he sighs.  Looking me in the eye again, it takes him several heartbeats to speak.  Finally, he says, “No.”  Throwing himself into a chair across the room, he says, “Xandra, you are turning me into an old Fairy.”

I muster an ‘I’m sorry about that’ smile.  “Honestly, this was all a mistake.  I had no intention of letting evil out into the realm.  And I swear, I’ll make it right.”

“What was the spell you spoke?” Isla asks.

I turn my eyes to her.  “Um, how about if I write it down.  I don’t want to say it out loud again.”

Isla nods.  “That is probably wise.”  A pen and paper appear in her hand and she hands them to me.  I scribble down the spell and hand them back.  As she reads it, she intakes a sharp breath and puts a hand to her throat.  It scares the hell out of me.

“That bad?” I ask quietly.

Without answering, she hands the paper to Dagda who immediately blanches.  Looking at me again, he says, “Where did you learn this?”

I shrug my shoulders.  “Sometimes spells just pop into my head.”  Usually not ones that can wreak havoc on an entire realm though.

Kallen reads the spell over Dagda’s shoulder.  His eyebrows pinch together.  “Could someone have implanted that spell in her mind?”

Oh, I like where he’s going with this.  I love him even more at the moment.  “That seems plausible,” I say hopefully.

Unfortunately, Isla shakes her head.  She’s such a buzz kill.  “You are too strong for such a thing.  You would have felt the attempt and blocked it.”

I would love to argue, but she’s probably right.  “Then why did I say it?” I ask, hearing the desperation in my voice.

“We will find out,” Kallen says.  He sits down on the bed and brushes hair from my cheek.  His hand lingers as his thumb softly strokes my skin.  “I promise you, we will find out.”

“In the meantime,” Dagda says, rising from his chair, “we need to assess the situation and minimize the risk to the Fairies of this realm.  From what I can tell so far, those with the weakest magic and personalities are the ones most vulnerable to attack right now.  I believe that is temporary.  The longer the darkness is free, the more power it will gain and then we will all be at risk.  I can already feel it pressing in on me.”  Isla and Kallen nod in agreement.

I nod as well.  “Okay.”  I stand up, but I’m a little wobbly and Kallen has to steady me.  “Wow, I’m dizzy,” I mutter, clutching his arm.

“Remnants of the spell I would imagine,” Isla says.  “You should continue to rest.  Kallen and I will begin damage control.”

I shake my head.  “No way.  I made this mess; I’m going to help clean it up.”

For the first time since waking, I see something in Dagda’s eyes other than anger and frustration.  I see pride.  “Spoken like a true Princess.”

I’m not so sure about that.  It seems like a true Princess wouldn’t have been able to step foot into the dark magic section of the archives.  Or be able to release evil into the realm.  I can’t worry about that right now, though.  Like I said, I have to clean up my mess.

Taking a wobbly step forward, I find that my legs will hold me.  Moving slowly, with Kallen’s arm around my waist, I walk to the door of the room.  Isla steps aside so we can pass and then she and Dagda follow us out of the room.  What a crap day this has turned out to be.  I would give anything for a do-over right about now.