The others all feel it too; I am not alone. We’re not far. We’re almost there. I repeat it to myself, letting it comfort me and calm my energy. We are not far from Violetta, where she waits for us in the realm of Moritas.
The others turn away, and I start walking after them. Magiano stays beside me, his hand now intertwined with mine. I try to concentrate on the warmth coming from him. I’m too afraid to look back at the treetops, for fear that I will see the dangling bodies again. I’m afraid that this time I might see bodies of those still alive, those who can still die.
As we go, the moons seem to move in the skies, edging closer together, growing ever larger until they look like they might hurtle right into us. They are going to align, I realize, each overlapping the next, when we reach the entrance to the origin point. At the edges of my vision, dark shapes still flitter through the forest, vanishing when I try to look at them directly. I grasp for the threads in my chest and then try to hold on as tightly as I can, to stop my unconscious weaving. The figures waver and vanish for a while. But they don’t go away altogether.
Finally, ahead of us, Maeve and Teren slow down. Through the forest and the night, a thin shaft of light shines in a clearing. I see it first. It glows against the bark of the trees, and as we round the corner, the glow intensifies, washing the landscape in an ethereal blue-white light. I squint. The trees grow sparse, then stop altogether. We step out into an enormous clearing of pristine snow. From here, we can see a valley nestled deep in the center of sharp, steep mountain ranges, with forests growing wild on either side.
In the middle of this valley is the source of the blue-white light, a narrow beam that seems to be pouring from another realm.
At the same time, the pulse of energy that I have been feeling for the past few days suddenly intensifies a dozenfold, sending a sharp stab of pain through my chest that reminds me of the way Enzo’s tether had pulled. I gasp. The others do too—they must have been affected in similar ways. Magiano groans and clutches his head, while Raffaele hunches over and winces. Ahead of us, Maeve falls to a kneel, while Teren stabs his sword into the snow and leans against it. My illusions flare, sending sparks of dark silhouettes dancing through the snow around us.
This is the origin, the point where Laetes had once descended from the heavens to become a mortal, where the energy of the immortal world had originally torn, seeping into our world, where the Dark of Night formed around it, twisted by divine energy. Where the story of the Elites began. Even without Raffaele, I can feel the energy emanating from this place, made of threads from every god—War and Wisdom, Fear and Fury, Ambition and Passion.
I stand closer to Magiano, touch his arm, and move toward Raffaele. As I do, something flickers in the forests of the valley. At first, I think it must be my illusions again. Dark shapes, silhouettes that look like monsters.
Except that Teren also turns to look at them. He raises his sword at the same time Maeve does. “What is that?” he asks.
As the words leave his mouth, one of the shadows wanders out of the forest and into the clearing. It makes a sharp, clicking noise with its teeth. I recoil in horror. The creature has no eyes at all, only two soft, empty sockets where they might once have been, and a wide mouth full of fangs. It skitters forward on four legs, leaving prints in the untouched snow. In its wake hovers a blanket of fury, an energy so dark and vile that it makes me ill. Behind it comes another. Then, a third. They emerge from every corner of the forest, licking their lips.
“They are drawn to our energy,” Raffaele whispers, his eyes wide.
Monsters, the whispers of the dead tell me. Monsters from the Underworld.
I glance back at the way we came. More shadows stir in the forests behind us. They are suddenly everywhere, drawn out by our powers. The clicking of their teeth echoes through the trees.
Run.
We all break into a sprint toward the beam of light. Our sudden movement causes several of the creatures to swivel their heads in our direction—they sniff the air, then pull their mouths open to reveal sharp fangs. They bolt.
My breath comes in ragged gasps as the icy air burns my lungs. In front of me, Lucent stumbles in the snow—I reach out and catch her before she goes down. Maeve pulls away from us, leaving some room between herself and Teren, then twirls her blade. Her eyes narrow into slits. She bares her teeth, hefts the weapon as one of the creatures draws near, and swings at it.
The creature snarls and lunges toward her. Maeve’s sword slices right across its gaping jaws, slashing deep into each side of its mouth. The creature screams—the sound is deafening. A shudder of fury and fear ripples through me at the attack. It is as if Maeve had cut me along with the creature. Maeve herself winces too.
We both align with the Underworld. These creatures are monsters from the immortal realm, creatures that are a part of us, connected to us.
Maeve slashes at the creature again. This time, she catches it in its side and sends it tumbling into the snow. There it twitches, while Maeve continues to run. “Hurry!” she shouts. Behind her, the creature starts to rise again.
Teren fans out to our other side. As we hurtle between the trees toward the blue beam, he swings at two creatures that come at us from the right. His swing is so powerful that it slices straight through the first creature’s neck, decapitating it, before hacking deep into the second creature’s chest. The first falls writhing in the snow, spilling black blood everywhere, while the second screams and thrashes. I gasp at the rush of pain from its death, stumble, and clutch at my neck. Lucent does the same. Maeve staggers to us, hauls us to our feet, and motions for us to keep going. We run faster.
Magiano darts away from my side. He spins around to face a growling creature behind us, draws a pair of daggers, and stabs them deep into the creature’s face. Another jolt of pain courses through me. He yanks out the blades. We keep running as the creature collapses, shrieking.
I reach the valley first. Here, the trees are so close together they seem to form a maze leading to the center of the origin point. As we run, I look through the trunks and see my reflection flash by in small pockets of ice amongst the snow, fleeting and distorted. My face is pale, my hair a stream of silver. I look panic-stricken.
“Watch out!” I shout at Raffaele as a creature barrels through the maze of trees toward us. Raffaele jumps back in time for the creature to lodge its face in between a split trunk. It snarls and claws for us through the narrow gap, fangs snapping. Raffaele stumbles backward and falls in the snow. A sword streaks out of nowhere to cut the creature nearly in half. It’s Teren, both hands gripping the hilt of his sword tightly, standing over Raffaele like a strange guardian. More creatures leap for him. He swings at them, forcing them back. Another creature dies by his blade.
“Move,” Teren snaps over his shoulder at Raffaele. “Don’t make me save you again.”
Raffaele needs no second warning. He leaps to his feet and continues running for the beam of light. I do the same. Behind us, Teren pulls out a long knife and stabs one more creature.
Then another leaps out in front of us, landing deep in the powder snow. It turns its sightless sockets on us and smiles with its fanged mouth. Beside me, Lucent rises from her painful crouch and grits her teeth, then brandishes her own sword and swings at the creature. The whispers burst to life in my head, and I can almost understand what it wants. It focuses on me.
Kill them, it says.
A shudder ripples through my body. The creature takes a step forward. No, I think in return.
You are one of us. You don’t need them to visit the Underworld. You belong there yourself. It is your home.