Page 128 of Born of Starlight
The illuminated figure seemed to close its hands in front of itself, patiently watching me. “In part.”
“Will I stay here then?” Finally righting myself, my gaze wandered around the endless space and over my mesmerizing limbs. The allurement of this place made me feel anchored, a safe harbor.
The figure shook its amorphous head slowly, and despair threatened to rear within me. This place—it was so endlessly radiant, entrancing.
“Let me stay.”
I wanted to stay through the rest of eternity. I couldn’t leave this place to move on to whatever came next.
Was there anything next?
“You are not made to be here—you cannot survive this place for long. Your place is with the fireling and sunling. You must return to them.”
Unwilling to give this place up, I shook my head heartily like a petulant child.
But then images of two figures—one aflame and one made of golden light—filled my head. It was as though the Stars showed me the Origins of Fire and Sun themselves. They both felt so familiar.
Fenris. Emmerick.
“They need you, my starling. You must show them the way. The Origins bestow a great duty upon you.”
What had happened before my body and essence split?
It all flooded back.Emmerick in the clutches of Firose. Fenris’ bed left cold where I should have been.He would know by now that something was terribly wrong. My only hope was that he wouldn’t blame me for the choices I’d made or Emmerick for the choice I made for him. Or worse, blame himself. My heart suddenly ached to be with them.
Fen’s words the night before Firose had taken me flooded my mind like a dam breaking.“I’ll be wherever you are. Wherever you go. I knew that from the moment I set eyes on you.”
But he couldn’t be where I was.
I needed to be where he was.
“Please, please.” I knelt before the illuminated form and bowed. “I want to return.”
A cold wisp of a finger picked up my chin.
“Young Asterie, I did not give you life for you to waste it. Try not to make Death more than an acquaintance. He is difficult for me to negotiate with.”
I nodded and spoke to Fenris, who I hoped awaited me in a faraway place.
“Wherever you are. Wherever you go, I will be there.”
Then everything went dark once more.
Chapter38
Queen Sybilla Wymark
With Darvanda at my back, the steps down to the bailey took a century to climb down. I had felt vulnerable the moment he’d held his arm out to motion for me to go first. The King of the Wastelands didn’t press for any conversation as we rounded the stairway. He was a domineering presence with nothing but severity in his gait. The levels crawled stone by stone, step by step.
Emmerick’s anger led me down into the bailey. His rage and despair roiled in the air in a way that made me brace once we hit the landing.
The scene was chaotic. Guards were racing to help Emmerick place Asterie on a bedroll. A healer was checking her vital signs with a grave expression that told me all I needed to know.My High Enchantress, the woman I’d summoned here to help us, was dead.
My heart raced, and it was difficult to hold my posture straight as the guilt raked through me.
Stupid. I was so fucking stupid.I felt sick to my stomach, and I bent at the waist for a moment, wishing it away.
Would she be dead if I’d allowed Fenris to look for her?
