Bones of Faerie03 - Faerie After (16 page)

Pain flashed across Caleb’s face. Matthew’s flint sparked. Tinder caught, smoldered. Caleb put his hands gently to Allie’s temples, and Allie lay back on the stones with a sigh.

Light flashed beneath his hands. Allie shuddered, then smiled, like a child dosed with whiskey against pain. “Oh, that’s better. I can still feel it, but I don’t care so much.” She closed her eyes. We waited while Matthew fed small sticks to the fire and Allie’s breath began to slow into sleep.

Her breath sped up again, grew uneven. She squeezed her eyes shut more tightly, and tears leaked from them. “Not enough.” Her voice rasped. Caleb frowned and put his hands to her chest. Allie bolted upright, screaming. “Too much! Too much is missing! I can’t—” She shuddered violently. Caleb grasped her shoulders, trying to still her.

She fought him, convulsing in his hold. My heart pounded. Matthew moved to my side, but I barely noticed. I needed to do something, anything. I couldn’t lose Allie now.

Light flowed like a blanket from Caleb’s hands, wrapping around her. Allie went limp as the light faded, but she didn’t stop screaming. “I can’t! So empty—send me back, Caleb. There’s not enough of me left. You have to send me back!”

Caleb laid her gently on the stones. Her motionless body was at odds with her cries. Caleb must have frozen her limbs. He’d fix this. He had to fix this. My chest hurt, as if a piece of me were missing, too. Allie never should have killed that owl, not for me.

“I will make this right,” Caleb whispered. “You have my word.”

Matthew’s fire wasn’t enough to keep away the chill. “How will you make it right?” I demanded. “By healing her or killing her?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Allie whimpered.

Matthew shivered, though he was nearer the fire than me. “It does matter,” he said.

“Without the magic, there’s nothing left.” Allie’s cries gave way to ragged wheezing.

“Breathe, Allison.” Caleb pushed Allie’s hair back from her face. “As I taught you. You can breathe through this.”

Allie shut her eyes, as if breathing took work. The flow of air in and out of her chest deepened. “I can’t do this,” she whispered.

“You can, and you will.” Caleb moved her arms to her sides. “You are more than your magic. You always have been. You always will be.”

Allie continued to take ragged breaths. Her eyes remained shut against pain I could not see. She wouldn’t have been in pain if I’d let go her hand.

Caleb turned to me. “If this does not go as expected, Liza, there must be no calling of anyone back from the dead. Not this time.”

A wind picked up, blowing smoke toward us. “Was I wrong to bring her back?”

“I do not know.” The smoke drifted past Caleb’s face, obscuring his expression. “I only know I’d have done the same, had I your power. But I need your word you will not use that power now, no matter what happens. I know it is a hard thing I ask. I do not ask it lightly.”

He wanted me to let Allie go if he couldn’t save her. He wanted me to promise not to call her back again. Smoke made my eyes sting. I’d done all I could. I would have to trust Caleb to do all he could in turn and to know when nothing more could be done. “You have my word. I will not use my summoning here.” I swallowed. “Do we need to take away her seed?” If Caleb failed, would it be better to let Allie go with her name or without it?

“One of your quia seeds?” Caleb asked. The wind shifted, taking the smoke away.

I nodded and drew a seed from my pocket to show him. “Allie has one, too. With the seeds, we were able to hold on to our names in the gray.”

Caleb took the seed in his hands, and I saw a strange sort of hope in his eyes. “Allison. You carry a seed as well. Do you wish to keep it?”

Allie’s eyes took a moment to focus on him. “Yes. Please.” There was blood on her lip. She’d been biting it.

“You have others?” Caleb asked me. I nodded—there were two more in my pocket—and Caleb said, “May I keep this one, then? To study as I may?”

“Of course.” Could he feel the life in it as Allie could?

“Elianna has told me much of what happened in Faerie.” Caleb gave his niece a long look. She returned it, and I couldn’t read what passed between them. “She has also told me why I cannot return there. I know well enough I ought to tell you not to return, either, but I’ll not deny I’m glad you can go where I cannot. If I can restore Allison’s magic to her, she should be able to render my sister senseless long enough to get her free, if only she can get close enough.”

“Like you did,” I said. In my vision, Caleb had used his magic to make Karin fall unconscious. Matthew piled thicker branches on the fire. Orange flames licked the night.

“Like I did,” Caleb agreed. He slipped the seed into his pocket. “One more thing I can give to you: Nysraneth’s name.” Something dark crossed his face. “In abusing my student, my father has forfeited all right for me to hold that name safe.”

Allie bit her lip harder, making it bleed more freely.
Caleb put his hands to her chest. “You are Allison. You are my student. I will not leave you like this.”

The crickets chirred, loud in the night. I reached for Matthew’s hand, hoping, afraid to hope. Elin bunched her hands in the skirt of her dress.

Light sparked beneath Caleb’s hands, green-gold, restless as summer lightning. I felt its heat against my skin, nothing like the silver chill of most magic. This was the warmth of dawn, of sunlight, of life.

Elin made a sharp sound. The green-gold light spread through Allie’s body, like spilled water through parched soil. Bone shone through skin, everything about her turned to light. Her breathing steadied, and a smile crossed her face, the first smile I’d seen from her since we returned from Faerie.

Caleb’s arms stiffened against her, and he smiled, too, but there was sorrow in it. “Forgive me, Tara.”

What? Why—

Allie’s eyes shot open. “Caleb, no!”

He crumpled on top of her, and his shadow flickered out.

Chapter 14

“S
moke and ash,” Elin hissed. Matthew and I rolled Caleb over, Allie putting her hands to his chest as Matthew felt for a pulse. I knew from both their faces—from the way Caleb’s silver eyes stared up at the night sky, from the way my own eyes saw no shadow within him—what they found.

Kaylen!
His name stuck in my throat.
You have my word
, I’d said.
I will not use my summoning here
. It wasn’t Allie he’d been afraid I’d call back from the dead. It was himself. My heart pounded, like a wild thing trying to get free. Of course I had to call him back. Yet my promise bound me. I couldn’t get his name past my lips. “He knew,” I whispered. “He knew this would happen.”

“Of course he knew.” Elin’s voice was rough as coarse-spun wool. “My people do not do things by accident as
yours do. I do not understand this sacrifice, but I will not have you diminish it by deeming it a mistake.”

The fire was burning down, leaving behind a cold, cloudless night, but no one moved to feed it. I was cold, too, cold and numb. Matthew clutched the leaf he wore. It crumbled to silver dust in his hand. Caleb was truly gone, beyond the reach of any of our magics.

Allie’s hands remained on his chest. “You never asked, Caleb. If I wanted this! You’re the one who taught me you’re always supposed to ask.” She looked up at me, tears streaming down her face. “Why doesn’t anyone ever
ask
?”

My throat hurt. I wasn’t sure I’d ever find words again. “I’m—” I couldn’t tell Allie I was sorry she wasn’t dead. I reached for her instead.

She jerked away, staggering to her feet. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” I was on my feet, too. Beside me, Matthew quietly closed Caleb’s eyes, getting silver dust on the healer’s lids. There was more dust on Matthew’s sweater and hands. It shimmered like starlight in the growing dark.

Allie’s eyes were wild. She whirled from us and fled, across the stone and into the forest. Matthew and I exchanged a glance and ran after her. A ragweed shadow snaked out from among the trees to wrap around Allie’s thigh. She fell to the forest floor.

“Go away!”
I hissed at the shadow, and it withdrew. I knelt to press my hands to Allie’s leg. It was sticky with blood.

“Leave me alone!” Allie shoved my hands away. “You never know when to leave anything alone!”

Matthew lifted his head, as if at some scent. Something stale drifted toward us. Just behind Allie, dust trickled from a poplar tree to the forest floor. Behind it, a patch of darkness crept toward us.

“Allie.” I whispered my warning.

“Don’t talk to me!”

“You need to come back with us, Allie. The crumbling—”

“I don’t care!” Allie beat the dirt like a much younger child. “If the crumbling takes me, everything will be over, like it’s supposed to be, and even you won’t be able to change that.”

Another trickle of dust. I wanted to hit and kick and scream at things, too, but we couldn’t afford that, not now.

Matthew knelt to touch Allie’s shoulder. “Dying won’t bring him back.”

Allie didn’t push him away, not like she had me. “I know that, I do, but—” She looked up at him, eyes bright.

Matthew reached out his hand, and Allie took it.
“This will never be right,” she said. “Never, never, never.”

“I know.” Matthew led her back to where Caleb lay, but I just kept staring into the forest. If I’d noticed the owl sooner—if I’d fought Nys off better—if I’d called Allie back sooner—I watched as the branches of the poplar crumbled away, one by one, and color drained out of the world. Behind me, I heard Allie’s sobs, heard Matthew making shushing sounds, but that seemed far away, nothing to do with me.

Forgive me, Tara
. The darkness sank down into the soil, leaving behind a bare trunk, but color did not return to the world. The last of the sun was gone. How could I ever tell Mom about this?

There’d be no one to help her if anything went wrong with the baby now.

I returned to the others. Of course I did. I could no more let the crumbling take me than the rest of them, if I had a choice.

Matthew had bound Allie’s leg where the ragweed shadow had touched her. She ran a finger along his cheek as she chewed on some dried meat. Silver light traced the ragged cut there, and then the cut was gone. “It’s back. My magic. It’s back, and I’m fine, and—” She looked back to Caleb. “What did you
do
?”

“He gave you his magic.” Elin knelt at Caleb’s feet,
not moving. By the dying firelight, her face and Caleb’s looked equally pale. Once before, Caleb had nearly died of a healing, but I’d called him back. Calling him back had been right then. How could it have become so wrong, so fast?

“It is a thing we can do.” Elin’s voice was hard and pitiless. “To share our power. You should know that, Liza. My mother shared her magic with you when you called back spring. It is meant to be a brief thing: a loaning of magic, not a gift. If Kaylen and Allie’s magics weren’t the same, he never could have given his power away so completely.”

Matthew blew on the fire. Red coals glowed, returned to gray.
“Come here,”
I whispered to the fire, but it didn’t listen to me. I could no more call heat from coals than I could call Caleb’s cold body to life. What was the point of my magic if it couldn’t bring back those I cared for? Only Rhianne’s magic could hold back death—but that was wrong, too, so wrong.

A soft sound escaped my lips. Matthew abandoned the fire to grab my wrists. “Liza. You know this isn’t your fault, don’t you?”

“Tell Allie that. Tell Caleb.” I knew no such thing.

Matthew tightened his grip on flesh and stone. “Blame the owl. Blame radiation poisoning. Blame—” He glanced at Elin. She looked right back, no apology
there. “Blame the goddamn War if you have to. Just don’t—don’t—” Matthew leaned his head on my shoulder. He was trembling. So was I. His face brushed the side of my neck. “It’s awful,” he said. “That’s all.”

“That is
not
all.” Elin stood as we pulled apart, anger in her every movement. “It is Liza’s fault. It is all your faults. You die so easily, so soon—in a season you will all be gone, and this death will be for nothing. That one of us should die for one of you—nothing can make that right.”