I threw my other stars in rapid succession, each finding their target but not hurting him. Dakota began to glow slightly silver as he walked closer to Allison.
Kitana whistled. I looked back to see her holding a sword that flared silver. She stumbled to her feet, pale, weak, and limped after Dakota.
Allison screamed and ducked as one of Dakota's steel arms slashed down where her throat had been. She scrambled out of the way as he whirled.
When he saw the sword, his gold eyes flashed to silver. In that unearthly voice that was a mixture between a hiss and a snarl, he said, "So, your sword in enchanted. What good will that do you, sorceress?"
Kitana waved the sword at him, utterly pitiful, and crawled back under the table when he came after her. Dakota didn't bother to stop, he just plowed into the table, knocked it over. Kitana covered her head as broken black stone rained down on her.
Ryac mumbled something and darts of white light flew from his fingers and into Dakota, who turned on him. I got out of the way, went over to join Mary, Elu, Hedaris, and Amidan in the corner. Much safer there. I bent down to speak to Elu. "How do we beat him?"
"Kitana has to bind him," the boy whispered back. "Her sword can defend against him, but only for a little while."
Allison grabbed the sword, swung it at Dakota. He parried with a steel arm, then slashed at her. She barely got out of the way as Kitana scrambled out of the ruin of the table. She ran over to Jared and sat down beside him, apparently feeling quite safe there.
Allison dove out of the way and dashed over to us. Dakota snarled, laid off of her, and decided to attack Ryac again. The barbarian swore, said something in a different language, and disappeared. In her birdcage, Ashton started squawking, but I didn't open the cage.
I should have, I know I should have. It was really stupid not to. But it wasn't entirely my fault, because no one else thought to release Ashton either.
Dakota stormed over to Kitana. "Get away from her," he hissed.
"Sentiment, Kotalilaj?" she asked through gritted teeth. She winced as he came closer. "You will not hurt me when there is the least chance of hurting Jared, will you, Kota?" She rested one thin, pale hand on Jared's arm. "Stay away from me."
"Are you afraid?" he murmured, black wings fluttering eerily. "Are you afraid of me, Kitana? Why else would you hide?"
She raised an arm to hold it over her head, dropping her eyes and shuddering. "I am not afraid."
"You lie."
She looked back at him and slowly stood up, stepping away from Jared. "You idiot!" I cried. She ignored me, spread her arms wide.
"What have I to fear?"
When Dakota swung his arms together, they met with a clash, because Kitana was gone, translocated to the far end of the chamber. She sank down against the wall, coughing uncontrollably. I saw a knife on the floor, one of Jared's, slowly bent down to get it as Dakota slowly, slowly stalked Kitana.
The sword! Allison had dropped it under the table. I got the knife and stepped away from the group, my eyes never leaving Dakota as I took careful steps towards the sword.
Kitana got out of the way, and something reddish-white fell out of her pocket. Dakota didn't see it; I did. I squinted, tried to see, but it was too small, so I lunged for the sword, rolled, came up with it pointed at Dakota, who stopped, laughed as Kitana got behind me.
"Would you defend the witch?" he asked.
"She is my friend," I replied. "I also defend the royal family and my other friends - including your precious Jared." Out of the corner of my mouth, I whispered, "What is that?"
Kitana coughed, didn't answer the question.
I dove forward, rolled, slashed at Dakota's legs. He leapt over the blade, landed on top of me, claws digging into my back. I yelped and swung up, connecting with his leg just above the knee.
The enchanted blade sheared through flesh and bone, and half of his leg fell on top of me. I screamed, struggled to get away, but Dakota bent down to put his face near mine.
"Foolish mortal," he murmured. "Foolish, foolish human child."
I swung the sword up, but he blocked me with his arm, yanked the sword from my hand, sent it flying. He jumped off me, and I dragged myself backwards, staring in horror at his bloody leg - which he didn't seem to miss.
He went after Kitana again, stalking her slowly, taking a perverse pleasure in making her sweat. He moved erratically, but the lack of a leg seemed not to stop him. Kit was worn out; any moment she might collapse. I kept moving backward, feeling for the red thing that had been in Kitana's pocket.
I touched it and knew it right away. I gasped in terrible fascination as the feeling flooded my body - pain, but a delightful kind of pain, a magical pain that acted like a drug. I picked it up, looked at it. It was a small braid, reddish, and it left a stain on my fingers.
Blood.
I shrieked, just in time to prevent Dakota from running an arm through Kitana. He turned to face me, shrank away, eyes wide. His mouth dropped open and he screamed.
I pulled myself up and ran toward him, the bloody braid held aloft. "Are you afraid, Dakota?" I cried. "Are you afraid?"
He screamed again, a wild, dreadful sound. He spread his wings and flew off, through the door.
I laughed, ran back to my friends, heard Kitana following more slowly. "We did it!" I shrieked. "We did it, we did it!"
Amidan pushed on the glass wall and it fell over, narrowly missing us as it shattered on the floor. Elu's chains crumbled into little pieces, and he ran into my arms, giggling. I swung him around, looked at Hedaris.
He stared back, those beautiful gray-green eyes looking at me alone. I put Elu down, couldn't stop staring at Hedaris. My prince...prince charming...
"You did well, Lady," he whispered. I nodded, smiling a bit foolishly. Amidan grinned.
"When's the wedding?"
And then we were all laughing, except Allison, who shot death glares at me. Mary picked up Kitana's enchanted sword, examined it. We all ignored Asjanel, who still lay dying in the corner, slowly being poisoned.
Even now I look back on that time and I want to hit myself. How did we ignore Ashton, Kitana, Meg, Asjanel? How did we do that? If we had paid attention to just one of them, maybe what happened next could have been averted. Maybe.
Ashton screamed suddenly, a bird's scream, and beat her wings against the cage. Her scream was mimicked by Kitana's gasp of pain, and we all whirled around.
Meg had left us, had run over to Kitana. She still had that key, and in one awful moment I remembered what she had said.
"I bet you could stab someone with it..."
That key, that horrible key! Meg buried it in Kitana's stomach before anyone could do anything, then yanked it back out. Asjanel laughed, a wheezing, crazed laugh.
Meg, freed of his spell, dropped the bloody key and screamed as Kitana fell to her knees, then to her side, hands crossed over the hole in her stomach.
*Mary*
I couldn't think, couldn't breathe as Kitana's legs gave out and she crumpled to the floor. I couldn't move. I think I may have screamed; I don't know.
Ashton slammed herself against the cage, knocking it off the hook and onto the floor. It bounced twice, opened, and she tumbled out, turning back into a person. She got up, limped toward Kitana.
"Oh, my God," Allison said beside me. I heard a thump as she sat down in horror, but I didn't look at her. All I could see was Kitana, Meg, the others as they gathered around our dying friend.
Dying. No!
Elu buried his face in my stomach, which was about as high as he could reach. I managed to get my hand to move, stroked his hair as he sobbed bitterly. "I - knew - it..." he gasped out. "I knew someone was going to - going to...die..."
I still held the enchanted sword. I disentangled myself from Elu and stalked over to Asjanel, raising the sword. "It was you!" I screamed. "You made Meg kill her!"
He laughed again, his eyes glazed over from the poison and from his own insanity. "Will you kill me?"
I hesitated only a second before plunging the spelled blade into his stomach, then yanking it back out. "You're dying anyway," I snapped. I kicked him for good measure. "Have fun in hell, you bastard."
Kitana coughed, and I ran over there, almost stepping on Jared, who had begun to come around. I ignored him and joined the little circle around Kitana.
"Don't touch me," she gasped, waving Ashton off as the redhead persistently tried to get close enough to do something.
"You idiot! I can still save your life!"
Meg cried into Hedaris' shoulder. "I should have been able to get free of the spell!" she wailed. "I'm a murderer...oh, God, I'm a murderer..."
"She was evil," I said. The words didn't sound right, so I repeated them. "She was evil. She deserved to die."
"We all deserve to die!" Ashton snapped. "Everyone deserves death, but in Christ we have life. She wasn't evil. No one is completely evil."
"That's my line," Kitana whispered. She coughed, leaned forward, dark hair falling across her face. "Stop talking about me like I'm dead."
"Well, you are," Amidan said. "Almost."
Elu shuddered, turned away, went over to comfort Allison.
Jared groaned, and I glanced back as he sat up, hand to his head. "What happened?"
Shannon took a deep breath. "Asjanel is dead, Dakota is evil, and Kitana is dead."
"Not yet..."
Jared blinked, took a moment to process the thought, and said slowly, "The last time...you said that...she wasn't really dead."
"Well, this time, there's a very visible hole in her stomach!"
Jared got up, staggered, almost fell over. "Really?"
"Yes, damn you! Really!"
"I wish everyone would stop acting like I've died already," Kitana complained. "I'm going to be alive for at least five minutes, so would you all please just...I dunno...calm down and let me live the rest of my life in peace?"
"Sure," Ashton said, resigned. Then she sat down and started reciting poetry under her breath. Anything to keep it out of her head, I guess.
Kitana finally seemed happy and didn't move. We waited until we were absolutely sure she wouldn't yell at us, then silently prepared to leave.
Hedaris carried her body through the maze, up the stairs, past the Door. Allison and I closed it, followed our friends from the armory, through the deserted Library.
It was long past midnight when we found Imarath. He listened quietly to our story, then sent us all to bed, asking Hedaris and Amidan to please accompany him somewhere. I didn't hear where. I was exhausted with grief and...well...exhaustion.
I thought I would sleep like a baby, as they say, but my head was filled with such terrible images - fire and dead plants and knives and swords and so many other horrors. I cried myself to sleep and woke up crying after an hour of sleep marred by nightmares.
"I want to go home," I whimpered.
I heard someone else start crying, and then out of the darkness, Meg whispered, "We'll never go home. She's the only one who could get us home. Oh, my God, we'll never go home and it's all my fault!"
"It's Asjanel's fault," Allison said brokenly. "He had you spellbound."
I slept for a short time, woke up screaming and sobbing in terror. I had nightmares about Dakota coming after me, killing me...no...
So much terror.
In all, I couldn't have slept more than two hours before dawn came and we all chose to get up and go to the roof. We stood there, the warm wind of late summer touching us, and watched the sun rise upon Avrien.
Avrien. The other world. And now possibly our world. Forever.
We didn't speak, just stood there, six Earthlings out of seven, alone in a world that wasn't ours and would never be home.
Allison suddenly started crying again. "We're going to die!" she wailed.
"Whoa, calm down," Jared said. "What do you mean?"
"We didn't bind Dakota...and that means...that means we're going to suffer chylaj keminori. Endless torment." She shuddered. "I can't stand it, I can't stand it. I want to go home..."
"We all do," Shannon whispered. "Don't we? I've got Hedaris here..."
"I'm special here," Jared muttered.
Meg shook her head. "My father went and got married over there," she said.
Ashton held up her hands. "Whoa, wait a sec. Are you saying that none of you three want to go home?"
"I don't know," they all said at once.
I stared out at the forest, touched with the sun's rays. I looked east, saw the flooded plateaus, the barbarian camp.
"Could be worse," I said.
"Huh?"
"We could be like them," I said, pointing toward the vaguely visible outline of the barbarian camp. "They lost a leader last night. Probably not a friend, but a leader. They're lost, far from home..."
"Duh, so are we," Ashton said. "Farther from home than they'll ever be."
"Calsa burned to the ground. All those people...and the army died. They lost family and shelter in one. Winter will be here in a few months. What then? Hedaris and Amidan - I bet their parents died in the fires. Elu lost everyone in his village. Our families are still alive...somewhere..." I stifled a sob. "We've wreaked so much havoc on this world...and now our reason for being here is gone. I bet we'll just continue to destroy their lives until..."
We didn't talk again, just watched the sun move across the land until we were so tired we couldn't stand up. We went back to our rooms.
And this time...I slept.
*Ashton*
We wandered around for maybe a week without really seeing anything. All in all, it was very depressing. Mages always wear black, but now they were in mourning, so all the women wore black ribbons in their hair, and the men tied black bands around their heads.
Meg didn't ever leave our room or eat anything, preferring to sob about how everything was her fault. I think she tried to starve herself. Eventually she developed a fever and had to stay in bed whether she liked it or not. I couldn't stand to be in the same room as her - all she did was moan about how she was going to die a slow and painful death for what she had done. Even though it wasn't really her fault.
Jared quietly slipped around, stealing things, but his heart just wasn't in it. He didn't speak to anyone, just listened and watched, dark eyes haunted.
Allison read books, or so she said. I watched her for an hour one afternoon, and she never got off the first page - just stared at it, not absorbing it but using it as a cover for her grief.
Mary took the opposite road - she did something. She ignored funeral preparations and went with Kyretholle and Amidan back to Calsa to see what could be done to prepare for winter. I didn't see much of her.
Shannon got drunk. Very drunk.
I was in the room at the time. Hedaris brought in a bottle of wine that smelled suspiciously like cheap beer. "Don't drink that," I warned.
Shannon shook her head, got a glass, and filled it. She drank it in gulps that made my throat burn just watching.
After a while, she was totally drunk. "I just don't understand how this could happen," she said, her words slurring. "I mean, all of it. Stuff like this doesn't happen to me, you know? It happens to other people. Not me."
I tried to take her glass away, but she wouldn't let me. "You're going to have a really bad hangover," I predicted. Then I left, thinking very hard.
Mary returned near sunset. She eventually found me on the roof, staring out at the land. "You're not trying to commit suicide, are you?" she asked nervously.
I glanced at her, drew my cloak closer. "It's not supposed to end like this," I whispered.
"What do you mean?"
"Good fantasy never ends like this. You can't have one of the good guys die and not have the others get home. It's just not done."
"If you haven't noticed, this isn't good fantasy. This is real life." She winced, laughed bitterly. "When did I ever think I'd say that? Real life. This isn't life - it's a nightmare!"
I shrugged. "It might be a dream. I could be in a coma. But I doubt my subconscious could dream this up. I don't even know you - well, I didn't, on Earth."
Mary sighed. She rubbed at the healing scar on her arm. "Dreams don't hurt."
I folded my arms across my chest. "I can't help feeling that we're missing something. Something we should remember, something that will help..." I shivered. "I just wish this was a story and I could go back, read it over, pick up on the little hints. But there's no author for this novel, no clever little sentences designed to make us go 'Oh, I should have thought of that!' If we want to escape, it's actually up to us. Not some author. Us. Are we good enough to figure out the clues?"
True to my prediction, Shannon woke up with a hangover and spent most of the next day throwing up and drinking. Again. Meanwhile, Allison and Jared joined Mary and I in the Library. I told them about my thoughts.
"Yeah," Jared said. It came out raspy, since he hadn't spoken in over a week. He cleared his throat. "Yeah. That sounds good."
Allison closed her book and threw it across the room. "I've been reading the books about necromancy," she said. "It won't work. All of these books say you can't return a dead person's soul. If we tried it, Kitana would just be an empty shell. We might go home, but she would have a cursed life, and that's not right."
"The book!" Jared cried, standing up, his eyes wide. "That's it, the book! It's got to be the book!"
Allison blinked, then grinned. "The book!"
"What book?" a soft voice asked from behind us. We all turned to see Meg, who had dragged herself out of bed. She was paler than Kitana had been, far too thin, but she managed to stand without too much trouble.
"The Book of Lost Arts," Allison clarified. "One of them is necromancy. Maybe that means the art of restoring a soul is in there!"
"That might work," Meg said. "Let's get this book, then." She was calm, but her eyes sparkled with hope. I smiled.
"Problem," Jared said.
I groaned. "Of course, there's always a catch..."
"There are two keys for the book. One of them is beyond the Door. The other one, I don't have anymore."
"Well, then where is it?"
Jared thought hard about that. "Ryac," he said finally. "The barbarian. I think he's got it, because I had it, but by the time I...fainted...it was gone. He's the only one who could have stolen it."
We all agreed, mostly because we were terrified that both keys would be downstairs. None of us wanted to pass through the Door again.
When Shannon recovered from her stupidity, she voiced another suggestion. "If the new moon is when you kill someone, I bet the full moon is when you resurrect someone."
Mary checked her calendar. "That's only five days from now!" she cried.
When we asked Kyretholle for the use of her plane, she agreed immediately. However, Elu grabbed my arm and drew me aside.
"I'm worried," he confided. "About everything. Dakota isn't dead - far from it - and the only person who can combat him is Kitana. You've got to be successful in this venture, Ashton, or we're all lost."
I shook my head. "Dammit!" I swore. "Just like a book. One evil gone, another waits in the shadows. Reminds me of anime."
"What?"
"It's a sort of TV show. From Japan."
"From where?"
I gave up on him and went over to Meg. "You can't go with us," I said bluntly.
"What? Why?"
"No offense, Meg, but we're walking straight into the barbarian camp. You've got quite a grudge against them, and we can't trust you." I gripped her by the shoulders. "This is our last chance for redemption. We don't need a political incident."
"Politics!" she spat. "I hate politics. I'll stay here."
"Good." I turned away to accompany the others, thought of something else, and had a little word with Shannon, who poked me viciously but agreed to stay behind. Another thing we didn't need was a half-drunk, hungover Lady.
"And no more beer," I yelled over my shoulder.
"What the hell ever," Shannon yelled back.