Unaware of the momentous events happening back home, or the evil planning happening ahead of them, the Resurrection Cultivators continued across the plains for two days before finally reaching another forest. Rather than go through, they decided to divert around it to head toward another river nearby to follow downstream.
"Let's take a break," Tasia said. "Most of us are not used to walking so far for so long."
"My butt is going to look so fabulous in shorts when I get home," Theo groaned as he sat down.
"Hopefully, mine will too," Rachel grumbled.
"Hey, give it a couple months and you'll definitely have a curvy figure. Or look like you swallowed a watermelon. Could go either way."
"You're a bastion of helpfulness, Theodore."
Tasia took the opportunity to stretch and warm her muscles, and Rhya sat beside Raine to watch her. She even moved like music, with a powerfully fluid grace that very much reminded Rhya still of her aunt. They had been watching Tasia become stronger and faster in embracing the Dark in her core, and the effects could be seen visually. Whether or not she had acted fast enough to save her soul, no one knew, but she tried. If Rhya felt any real unease, it was confronting anew that Tasia really did rival Shanae for skill. It felt like she needed to know why it would happen like that, and yet did not want to know at all.
"She's really amazing," Rhya said.
"Mmm. A good teacher too. The reason the rest of us are as good as we are is because she's trained us. She mastered pretty much everything thrown at her within two or three years of starting to learn it. I can only imagine how much faster that would have been if she hadn't been unintentionally stunting her own potential." Raine leaned back on her hands. "You ever thought about trying to train? Or are you happy being just magical?"
"I don't think I ever thought about it. I've never felt a real urge, not like Leslie, so maybe it just didn't cross my mind to try. I mean, I'm not like my cousin. I'm not half of each of my parents." She laughed as she said it. "More like eighty-twenty, leaning to Mom's side. Which can be annoying sometimes because, yeah, I trip over my own feet half the times, but Dad said he wouldn't know what to do with himself if he wasn’t always sweeping up behind us."
Proof she had been listening at range, Tasia walked over and crouched beside Rhya. "You want to try? That twenty might be more than enough. I mean, look at your uncle. He overcame one hundred percent magical inclination to be one hell of a warrior, to better be Shanae's perfect Caretaker. And directly in your lineage is not just Protean skill, but that ability to overcome because Evan also overcame his inclinations to become really magically adept in a way that Proteans usually aren't. So there's absolutely a chance for you if you are willing to work hard."
Rhya frowned at her. "Aren't I too old to start training?"
"Please." Tasia grinned. "You're immortal. And even if you weren't, I'll note that I have a couple of students at my school old enough to be my grandparent and they're working hard and getting good. Give me a chance, and I'll prove to you that you're more than you think. Yeah, you'll never be like us with Dark in our core, but at least you'll help preserve the sanity of your Cultivators by not being so damned squishy!"
"Really?"
"I don't say what I don't mean." Her voice cooled. "Just remember that when you're under my instruction, you're no longer one of my princesses and you're no longer one of my friends. I'll show you no more mercy than I show anyone else. And believe me, when I see potential being wasted, I have no mercy at all. Waste royally pisses me off." She straightened. "If you can handle that, then I'll start training you."
Rhya didn't have to think twice about it; she knew a good deal when it was offered. She also had the sneaking suspicion that the harder Tasia trained her, the better she would do. She really did want to be seen as an equal among her friends, and even the four Light Defenders of their generation had been showing amazing skill. She had no excuse for not trying. "Okay!"
"You know," Tasia mused, "with us crossing the lines as we have, we had better quickly decide on split teams of four so each High Princess still has four personal protectors. I think Raine and I go without saying for obvious reasons, too. To better divvy magic, let's make it me, Theo, Rachel, and Beth to Leslie, and Raine, Storm, Emily, and Ryan to Rhya. Which is all but swapping the Light/Dark planets, but, eh."
"Yay!" Leslie hugged onto Theo tightly. "Mine!" she announced.
He just laughed at her. "You just love me because I share your addiction to shopping!"
"That and it will be really funny watching you and Beth try to bodily protect me when I'm taller than you."
Romalia shook her head in bemusement from where she sat beside Rachel. "I still am not sure whether I am grateful or disappointed that Aria has never had Defenders so we Rulers did not have that sort of personalized protection."
"It really could go either way," Rachel agreed on a grin. "But you have us now. Aria seems to have at the least adopted Tasia, so you have her now, and the rest of us have kind of already been acting like personal guards for you anyway, Roma. You've recovered from Seed weakness, sure, and you're damned skilled with a sword, but you lack armor or magic, and what majik you kept is on the lower side now."
Solemnly, Beth added, "And you're sort of like family to us, you know? Because you're Tasia's mother-in-law. So that means we are defaulted to wanting to keep you healthy. Rodi's fair game, though. We're all considering kicking him. But we could protect him too. If he wasn't being blindly stupid."
Romalia had to hide a smile. She felt that she too could see the obvious answer, but then again, she swayed to Light Shadow.
After the break, they got on their way again and headed toward the river. They did not walk directly beside it, but they did walk close enough they could hear it. It was still relatively early in the morning, so more than one person patted away a yawn now and then. Leslie didn't, which prompted to Tasia to say, "For someone so difficult to wake before dawn, you're remarkably good in the morning."
Leslie grinned at her. "I am, in fact, a morning person. I just prefer it to be morning. Don't let my perpetual tardiness fool you. I get up with the dawn without trouble—that's with the dawn, not before. No dawn, no wake! Dad's Delphinium blood just knocked my clock off-kilter so I have trouble keeping track of stuff. At least I don't sleep like the dead. He could sleep through anything." She giggled suddenly. "He did, in fact, sleep through an attack on the kingdom by evil when I was three. I shouldn't remember it, but I do because it was just so damn hilarious to see Uncle Sabin hauling his half-dressed butt down the hall under his arm."
Rachel started laughing. "Oh, gods, I remember that too!"
"It was not any better on Delphinium," Rhya grumbled. "I woke up with Uncle Dane carting me down the hall under his arm, and Aunt Ashe was carrying my half-awake and sort of dressed mother. I still stand by my assessment that we didn't wake up because we knew it would be no big deal because the Defenders and Commanders could handle it. So, nyaa." She stuck her tongue out.
Storm went to check the canteen most of them had taken to wearing, and he found his to be empty. "If we're near the river, we should probably refill. Ry can purify the water once we've collected it. Too dangerous to drink it straight."
"I'll get it," Tasia offered. She collected the canteens and then smiled when Leslie held out her hands. "Okay, you too." She handed over several of the containers and then headed off the road and into the thicker brush and trees that lined the river.
They found the bank shortly and knelt to begin filling the canteens. The bank had no shore or slope, dropping off directly into the rushing water inches below. In addition to being violently turbulent, it also looked murky and unpleasant because of the toxins in it. That was why Ryan had started using his Ruler magic to purify the water for them rather than Tasia literally conjure water with majik; even Tasia had not been sure if the water she conjured was safe since it usually came from the world around her.
Leslie had just leaned down to fill her last canteen when she felt the ground under her hand shift. She took a quick breath but got no more warning before the land gave way and she fell into the water. The rapidly rushing water immediately began dragging her away in a way she could not compensate for with swimming. "Tasi!" she yelled.
Tasia did not even pause before diving into the water after her. She swam swiftly after Leslie and caught her in her arms. She could not get them back to shore, however. The river seemed to lose whatever sanity it had retained and became nearly alive as it rose up in waves from its bed. The sound it made resembled a wounded animal, and a mournful cry welled on the air.
The sounds and shouting had alerted the others, and they came rushing up to the shore just in time to see Leslie and Tasia disappear around a distant bend. Rhya lunged for the river on a panicked cry, but Raine grabbed her off her feet. "Stop!" she ordered fiercely despite her own fear choking her. "If you go in, it'll kill you! Ryan, can you do anything?"
"Someone grab my pants." He knelt beside the river and waited until Emily and Rachel had anchored him before plunging his hands into the water to call his magic. All he got for his effort was painfully burned, and he yanked his arms out on a yelp. Terrible burns and wounds had formed across his skin. "Wha-what happened?"
Romalia fought back the urge to be sick. "Aria. She—" Her voice broke and then steadied. "She gets worse. She's becoming dead to magic."
Rachel stared with burning eyes at the river. "That . . . this could have happened to Protea," she whispered. "That's why things happened as they did. Why the other worlds suffered and took so long to heal, even after being cleansed. Only that false Seed that Shanae created via Robert's Illusion magic saved Protea until everyone got reborn. And only Rodi's own Seed is now what holds Aria together. But it's not enough. He has to be on the throne."
Raine looked at Striker where he had been on Beth's shoulder. "Find your mistress," she ordered. As next strongest after Tasia, she rose to the role of leader in absence of the Lead Defender. "We will wait here until Striker returns." She began to competently heal Ryan's wounds.
"What if he can't find them?" Storm asked softly.
"Then we start looking manually. We will not lose our sister or princess, Stormy." She felt a soft stirring of the small bit of Sight she had inherited from her lover. "Destiny still has need for them."
The rebellious river carried Tasia and Leslie several miles before the Iris Cultivator was able to grab onto a far-reaching root and anchor them. She fought to hold on with all of her strength and try to drag them closer to shore. Leslie dangled unconscious in her grip. The poison she had absorbed had stolen enough motor control that she had been unable to avoid hitting her head on a passing log. If she could be removed from the water, however, she could likely recover.
Tasia threw all of her considerable will into getting her twin to safety. Her own time felt limited. Her efforts to keep her unconscious princess above water had forced her to personally go under multiple times. She had swallowed some of the water in the process, and she could actually feel the poison moving in her blood. Every muscle screamed in agony as razor blades cut at her from the inside out. Her eyes had gone blurry and were going blurrier by the second. She forced them to keep working in the daylight by drawing powerfully on her Light element, yet that only made the battle inside her soul wage harder as the Dark protested furiously at being denied again.
It seemed like forever until she managed to drag herself and Leslie out of the water onto the shore. She moved them just beyond the reach of the water and then collapsed beside her twin. She just had no more strength. Her eyes began to close in exhausted pain. She was going numb everywhere. Her mind was numb. Her soul was numb. Her body was numb. Even her heart seemed to have stopped feeling.
Her blurry eyes made one last attempt to focus, yet her dazed mind called it a lost cause for she saw nothing but a hallucination. She was not seeing Rodi running toward her, and she was not hearing his voice calling her mind. The last of her strength left, and the darkness inside leapt out to consume her. Black covered her sight even before she was unconscious. The war had ended inside her soul. She just did not know who had won or what it might mean. She didn't even know if she would survive to find out.
* * * * *
That night, as the Cultivators gathered around their campfire, nearly no one spoke. Striker had not yet returned. The fork not far from their location meant that he had twice the landscape to cover and twice a chance of missing them entirely. They could have been anywhere, and it seemed a guarantee that they would not be in good condition, considering the state of the water. If it had struck at Ryan that terribly, then Leslie and Tasia would have gotten it worse. Tasia had not entirely confirmed if she could heal poison or not, but even if she could, healing both of them might be more than she could handle alone.
"We'll find them," Raine repeated. Ever since they had made camp, she had been standing alone near the edge. They had left her be; no one wanted to risk her uncertain control. "And we'd better do it fast. We're on an unknown planet, and no matter how strong Tasia is, she can't handle a ton of monsters alone. This is exactly the sort of thing Armand might take advantage of."
Rhya hid her face in her up-drawn knees. "Who protects the Lead Defender when she protects everyone else?" she whispered.
"Her Caretaker," Beth said with a bit of sad wryness. "Everything . . . it feels so deliberate."
"Yeah," Rachel agreed softly. "In more ways than you may know."
* * * * *
Leslie awoke to a headache the size of her planet and rolled over under her blankets on a groan as she tried to escape the sunlight on her face and the throbbing pain in her head. She vaguely remembered Rachel talking about hangovers and suspected this was what one felt like. If it was, she was never drinking that much, and that was a promise.
Memory returned on a rush that had her scrambling out of her blankets and onto her feet in a single movement. Her head whirled on its axis and she would have sunk mindlessly back down onto the ground in agony if someone hadn't caught her and held her upright. The hands were too big to belong to Tasia, so she said sluggishly, "Thank you, whoever you are. Did you save us?"
"No," an unexpectedly familiar male voice said gently, "Tasi did that. I chased you down the river until she managed to get you to shore. I moved you from there to here where there was relative safety."
Her eyes flew wide and she jerked away from him. She spun around and then groaned as her head continued to happily rotate without her order. She shook it off furiously and focused her eyes on Rodi. He was watching her with an understandable wariness, and her temper roared to life. "You bastard!" she shouted at him. "Do you know what you did to her?! When my head stops spinning, I'm kicking your ass! Oooh." She pressed her hands to her head. "That hurt."
"Leslie Ann."
It was the fear in his voice that got her attention. She looked at him sharply. "What?"
"Feel."
She already felt so much pain that it actually took a moment before she realized not all of it was physical. There was a gut-wrenching and tearing pain inside her soul as if someone tried to rip out her twin by the root. Or was she being ripped from her twin? She couldn't tell. She only knew that their souls had lost traction together. The remaining color in her face bled away. "No."
He looked to the side and she followed his gaze. A little cry locked in her chest as she saw Tasia lying as still as death under a pile of blankets. She stumbled over her own feet as she desperately tried to move closer. She fell to her knees and slowly reached out to touch her twin's arm. Her skin felt colder than her ice magic, and her breathing sounded both labored and faint. "She's alive?" she barely managed to whisper.
"Barely." He took a deep breath as he walked over to kneel beside her. "She swallowed the water in her attempts to save you. Her body struggles even unconscious to use her magikry to save her, but she can't do it alone. Majik can only protect you from so much on a dying world. If she hadn't had her majik, she would well have died just diving in after you."
Leslie frowned at him. "So why am I in better shape, even not swallowing the water? I don't have majik." Her breath caught as he just looked at her quietly. "What? But . . . how? How did I not know? All of us? Is it all of us?"
"All of you," he confirmed. "As for why . . . I do not know. Even with five of you in lockdown, I felt the majik in you. I'm sure Tasia did as well. Anyone of our strength would, and nearly everyone on Aria would see it too." With shaking fingers, he smoothed Tasia's hair out of her face. "Only she can unlock what is inside you." He let out a long breath. "You may never be unlocked."
If she had been white before, she went positively colorless at that. "She's dying?" The utter heartbreak on his face shattered her own broken heart. She forgave him for everything in that moment. The problem was not that he didn't love deep enough; he loved too deeply. Even knowing that Tasia should survive for she had to produce an heir for Iris did not take away the bone-deep fear inside them both that maybe they could be wrong. And Leslie felt a sudden wrenching premonition of her own as she stared at Rodi. If the unthinkable happened and Tasia did die permanently . . . Rodi would not last long without her. Lovebirds. She could just see how they were more like lovebirds than any other soul mate pair she had ever known. She just . . . did not think they could actually live without one another, no matter what either of them thought.
"I won't let this happen!" she shouted as she leapt to her feet again.
He didn't look at her. His gaze was fixed to his mate. "Her powers are all that's keeping her alive right now, which is as much a testament to her power's potential as anything is. But if we could flush the poison from her body, though, she might have a much better chance." He hesitated, knowing it was a long shot, and then said, "There should be an antidote in the woods somewhere around here. Aria has incredibly potent healing herbs, and one became a near cure-all for just about anything. If anything has a shot at removing the poison, it's that herb."
"I'll find it! What does it look like?"
"That's the problem. Most of us don't know what the plant looks like in the wild. It's rare, Les, and it grows so sporadically. These woods are its known main spot, but with the state of Aria, there's no knowing where it may be. I can barely hear my Mother's voice. She's so sick." His shoulders hunched. "How is this fair?" he whispered achingly. "Everyone I love is suffering and I can't do anything."
"Well, I can!" Leslie curled her hands into fists. "Raine isn't here to remove poison, so I'll find the antidote no matter what. I'm a Nature Flower Element, and I'm good with flora! I'll try. I'll reach out to Aria myself and see if I can help, see if she can help us. Aria loves Tasia, Rodi, as much as we do. I know it! I will save my twin!" It might have technically been Tasia's duty to protect her, but the bond went both ways. She would be double damned if she let her Defenders sacrifice their lives when she could save them, especially her twin! "I'll be back soon." She started to walk away and then turned back around to look at him. She had no idea that her posture, her face, showed the High Queen she would be some day. "Protect her well, Rodi. She's mine."
He watched her half walk and half run into the trees around them and then very gently reached out and covered Tasia's cheek with one of his hands. He would have given anything for her to open her eyes and look at him, even if it was in anger. He lowered his head and began praying in every language he knew, hoping that one of the gods was listening. He couldn't lose her like this. He just couldn't.
Leslie walked deeply into the forest and tried to close out reality and focus on the nature around her. Her head was throbbing so hard, though, that it proved difficult to concentrate on anything. To catch her breath, she leaned against a tree and closed her eyes. She immediately tumbled to the ground with a shriek as the tree quite simply moved out of the way.
She sprawled on the ground and stared wide-eyed as a bush uprooted itself and skittered across the ground to replant itself. She got to her feet and started to edge around the bush but crashed into another tree that suddenly appeared. She fell back on the ground again, this time on her back. Either she was hallucinating from the poison after all, or Aria's remaining strength had been channeled into sheer ridiculousness. Based on the humor she had witnessed in her Rulers, she could not help but suspect the latter.
She rolled back up to her feet and resolutely walked deeper into the woods. Death. Either she found overly lively flora, or she found death. Even as she watched, a bush moving to re-root itself just . . . fell. It stopped moving and decayed before her eyes. Tears welled and she fought to blink them back.
The wind rustled softly through the branches around her, and across her mind, she heard a beautiful but tired female voice say, I hear you, Daughter of Protea. I am here. I have been here. I am sorry I cannot do more.
Leslie's heart started beating harder as she thought of what her friends had said happened to Activate them. "Are . . . are you . . . Aria?"
I am. And I am so sorry for what my false lineage has done to you and your friends. I have tried to do everything I can to help you, but . . . I am stagnate. I am dying. I am so tired. Were it not for the generous magic of my Ruler, the beautiful majik of my Defender, I would have crumbled already.
"Then . . . then you do see Tasia as belonging to you," she whispered. "You consider her your Defender even though Iris created her Seed."
Her ties to me run deep. Her love and bond with Rodi is a result of those ties, not the other way around. I am fond of all of you Defenders, though, so I have done all I can to aid you. You must remove Armand and put the True Born on the throne where he belongs. When I am whole, then the future of the lineage may be addressed. Destiny planned for everything, if only the two involved can see the answer. Take this last gift, Leslie Ann. Save our beloved Anastasia and then save me.
A bush scooted forward across the ground and stopped before Leslie. It shivered hard enough that many leaves fell to the ground and then scuttled away again to safety. She knelt down and knew she looked at the antidote she needed. She gathered up the leaves and held them to her heart. "I won't let you down! And thank you!"
She ran quickly through the comfort of the woods until she neared the campsite. She almost stumbled over a root but it moved quickly before she could fall. She barely noticed as she scrambled into the camp. She skidded to a stop next to Rodi and dropped down onto her knees. "I did it! I talked to Aria and I got the antidote! She's tired, and she's dying, but she wants to survive. She—she said that she's been Activating everyone all along, and that she sees Tasia as being her Defender as wholly as Iris does."
"I admit," Rodi said softly, "that I had wondered all along about that." He moved over to the fire and removed the pot of boiling water he had been making. He also always kept a canteen of fresh water on hand and had already set it to boil in a pot to be prepared when she returned. He crushed the leaves into the water and began stirring it quickly. When it brewed, he poured her a cup. "Drink every drop," he ordered. "You need it as well, though you're not in danger of dying."
She had never liked tea that much, but she did not argue. She blew on the hot liquid to cool it and then sipped the slightly bitter brew and sat on the ground cross-legged to watch as he gently lifted Tasia into his arms and began very carefully feeding her the antidote. The longer she sipped the tea, the more her head cleared and the less tired she felt. She still hurt like hell, but that seemed a minor inconvenience overall. "How long will it take?" she asked softly.
"Anywhere from a day to a week." He set the empty cup aside and held his wife closer. He pressed his cheek to her hair, and the look on his face made Leslie's eyes well with fresh tears.
She had never before quite understood how her father and Aunt Arista could get along even though they frequently bickered, but in that moment she thought understood perfectly. Reciprocity. There would inevitably be some sort of slough of emotion by their connections to the same soul. They both loved Shanae; they had to love each other as well. Leslie could not remain mad at Rodi for very long simply because she loved him more than she might love anyone else except her own soul mates. It would echo into him too; his connection to Tasia meant he would be compelled to protect Leslie as well.
He glanced over, saw the tears in her eyes, and shook his head slightly. "No tears. She'll be fine."
"That's not why I'm crying." She swiped a hand over her eyes. "I just . . . I knew you loved her but I didn't realize how much until now. I think that you love her as much as I do, just differently." Twin soul, lover soul. She was finally understanding it all.
"I hadn't either until I heard her screaming my name telepathically as you both went tumbling down the river. Yelling out to me to be safe, to avoid the water, to come find you and protect you if something happened to her. No thought for herself—just me and you." Anguish churned inside his eyes. "I thought I would die before I managed to catch up to you both."
"Will you stay with her after she's better?"
"No." He shook his head when she opened her mouth to protest. "No, and I want you to promise not to tell her that I was the one who found you. When she's a little stronger, I want to move her to the nearby village. My mother's best friend lives there and she will help you both out until you can get to the others."
"But why?" she shouted. "Tasia loves you, and you nearly tore apart her soul when you left! Why can't you be together for the time you have as opposed to being miserable before you have to? Damn it, Rodi, that's not fair to either of you!"
"Leslie," he said wearily, "leave it alone. I made my decision. Now get some sleep, will you? You need to rest to recover."
* * * * *
Tasia awoke slowly to a darkness as internal as external. A shiver rippled down her back. She hadn't seen any visions. Why hadn't she seen anything this time? She did not sense a black poppy at hand, and her clip had seemingly lost its power to help her. What had happened?
She lifted a hand slowly and discovered a cool cloth draped over her eyes. The tension left her shoulders in understanding. Had she imagined the war ending in her soul? No, it had to be real. Her soul still felt numbed. She could see the new gaping wounds and gouges that had been torn into her. Something had happened. She couldn't see Leslie anymore, either. Her twin had been removed from her as wholly as her soul mate, yet she felt nothing except that numbness.
"Tasi?" It was Leslie's voice and her hands lightly settled on her arm. "I'm here. You saved me. Someone was able to bring us safely to this village. I know you can't feel me. I can't feel you either. Something in what happened has torn us apart. I don't know why. It doesn't hurt me, though. I think—and I know it's crazy—but I think your Dark is protecting me."
Tasia reached for her hand and laced their fingers together. "Are you sure you're okay?" The sound of her own voice startled her. The mystical power had doubled, and her timbre had dropped from its original mezzosoprano to a contralto. She cleared her throat, wondering if it was a fluke. "Is there something wrong with my voice?" It came out a bit lower again, though she could still hit higher notes that implied she might be coloratura contralto—the most flexible of the range. Mystics could encompass every note of whatever range their voice opted to fall within, and range was determined by the element of their soul. Knowing it, the first hint of fear moved inside Tasia. What had changed inside her soul? "What happened to my voice, Leslie?"
"It got sexier," she answered gravely. A smile filled her voice as she amended, "Okay, that's just kind of a byproduct. Cara said that because of the way we were torn apart that your soul might have endured some sort of forced change that would change your voice, too. You almost died, Anastasia." Her voice quivered. "We were torn apart, and now something won't put us back together."
"I'm sorry, Leslie." She squeezed her princess' hand. "I just don't know what's going on. Before I passed out, I could feel the Light and Dark inside me fighting. The war ended when I went unconscious. Everything is numbed right now. Who is Cara?"
"Romalia's best friend. She's been taking care of us. And for the record, I kinda like your new voice. It sounds more, I don't know, you."
"Gee, and I always wanted to sound like a sexy lounge singer. Lucky me."
A woman's voice laughed from somewhere behind Leslie. "Hello, Tasia. I see now why Leslie said you were perfect for my surrogate nephew." Her voice warmed. "I understand you married him on accident."
"My accident." Tasia held up a hand. "Destiny's sense of humor." She sighed and pushed herself to a sitting position. As she did, she pulled off the cloth and opened her eyes.
The world stayed black.
She slowly lifted her hands until they should have been in front of her eyes. Nothing moved in the darkness. "I didn't See anything," she whispered. Tears slowly welled in her sightless eyes. "I didn't have any visions." Her eyes closed helplessly. "So that's what happened. It took me. It took me forcefully. I couldn't make them reconcile. No wonder my voice changed." Her eyes opened again, and the muddied swirl of her power seemed starker than ever. "The Dark has consumed me where the Light once did."
"Tasi?" Terrified, Leslie waved a hand in front of her face. "Oh no. No, no, no!" She looked at Cara in horror. "She can't see."
"Calm down," Cara said as evenly as she could. "Let's determine exactly what has happened. Tasia, I'm going to turn off the lights in here."
As lights dimmed, Tasia's eyes began to work again. When the room had been rendered close to pitch darkness, she found she could see anew with perhaps surprising detail and clarity. Better than she ever had before, even after trying to embrace the Dark inside her soul and therefore strengthening her Dark Flower Element. "So. I was right. The Dark took me from the Light. I can see just fine now."
"Lights." Cara slowly raised them again and saw Tasia's lashes flinch as her sight went away. She walked over to sit beside the bed and carefully asked, "You had visions of darkness?"
"Of course. Had it been the other way, had I rejected the Light, I would have found myself in the opposite place of where I stand. I hid the Dark in my core for so long that I wounded my Dark Flower Element. Perhaps I wounded it more than I realized all along. It is only in my majik after all."
Leslie took a little breath. "If . . . if you were whole, you . . . could use Light and Dark magic?"
"If I was whole, I would be True Shadow. And because Aria claims me as her Defender, I would therefore have True Shadow magic, which is both Light and Dark. I don't know if I could use them solo, but let's be honest: I wouldn't need to." Her fingers clenched together. "Somewhere inside my core, Light and Dark have to meet. They have to fuse. But I resisted the Dark for so long . . . I knew . . . I knew the fight would eventually end and it might take me forcefully." Her laugh came out sad. "I'll have to dive to find my Light again."
Cara studied her face and then decided to not comment on what it truly meant to be True Shadow. Tasia would have to discover that on her own as she grew stronger. She would already suffer in the effort to claim her Gray soul. "You honestly should have been born intact with your Gray core and True Shadow magic/majik like Rodi was, yet you were not. It seems so very odd to me that you would be born . . . split like that. I am sure there must be a good reason for it though."
"There is." Tasia's voice sounded brutally calm. "It was done this way in order to force me to evolve in a particular way." Her fingers clenched together. "Leslie's mother, Shanae, and I are meant to be true kindred spirits. We are two forged into a similar shape by the same experiences. Shanae needs something from me that I can only give if we are more alike than not."
Terror welled inside Leslie as she understood what her twin was saying. "Y-you're going to have to . . . to shatter your own soul. Rebuild yourself from the pieces." She threw her arms around Tasia and held on with all of her strength. "No! No no no! I don't want you to risk yourself like that!"
"It is an inevitable change." Tasia's eyes closed again. "No wonder you have been torn from me and sheltered. If I shatter while you are attached to me, you would be damaged beyond repair. It has to happen, Leslie Ann. We both know it. Please. I need you to accept it. I will need you to be strong else I never get through what Destiny demands."
Her lips trembled as she saw anew just how deeply alike her twin and mother truly were already. "Cara? If she evolves and becomes Gray, will her sight come back?"
"It will become better than new," Cara confirmed. "She will be incapable of suffering any measure of blindness. She will adjust equally, instantly, to any conditions of light or dark up to and including entire whiteout or blackout. The poison has not damaged her eyes. It weakened her to where the Dark could take her against her will, but it did no damage in the process. Getting that antidote into her as fast as you did saved her life, as did her own ability to combat poison. It'll take a few days for her to fully recover physically, but I don't expect lingering effects. After that . . . we will see."
Tasia gave a sigh. "I'm tired. I'm so tired right now. I can't feel anything. Let me sleep if I can. I will confront this when I am stronger."
Cara drew Leslie to her feet. "Let her rest. There are things even a twin soul cannot help with." She glanced out the door and her eyes narrowed. "And I need your help with . . . something."
The door shut behind them, and Tasia doubled over in pain. She curled up on her side and buried her face in her arms as hot tears spilled down her cheeks. Why was this burden on her shoulders? "Damn you, Destiny," she whispered. "What do you really want from me? What is it you want me to do someday?"
She somehow managed to slip into an exhausted sleep that remained dreamless and free of visions. So deeply did she rest that her senses remained silent when her bedroom door opened to allow Rodi to slip inside. He walked over and looked down at her for several moments before easing down onto the bed beside her. He skimmed a knuckle down her cheek and then leaned down to tenderly kiss her awake.
She awoke slowly and decided she was dreaming. She had actually never had a dream or nightmare in her life; her visions existed as a separate thing from either sleeping force and did not come from or go to the Immortal Fields. When she slept under the influence of labradorite or the black poppy, dreams and nightmares were rejected entirely to allow her mind to completely enter a deep, peaceful, rest-filled state. If this was to be her first dream, she did not mind. It was a wonderful dream of her lover kissing her as if she was the only thing in the world he would ever want. Her lashes fluttered as she woke, and he gently touched her eyes with his fingers. "Don't open your eyes," he told her huskily. "Just dream."
Nothing ever turned off a pattern master's mind. The sleep cleared instantly as she realized she could not be dreaming; he would not be telling her to keep her eyes closed if it was a dream. Fine. She could play that game. "I want to see you." She sat up and her hands unerringly found his face and tenderly framed it. "Stay with me. I miss you. I need you."
His heart seemed to simply shatter inside. With a ragged breath, he said, "I know you can do this, Anastasia. I know you can fuse your soul to Gray. It's not an impossible thing. I know how chaotic it is inside your soul right now; I can still feel it echo into mine even though we have been torn apart. I believe in your ability to make miracles happen."
She took a long breath. Somehow, what she faced felt a little less daunting with her Caretaker's endless belief in her. "I will do whatever I can, no matter what it takes."
He bent his head to softly kiss her, needing to know she was truly alive and in his arms. Her taste, that wonderful combination of marshmallow and chocolate, was temptation itself. Her tears stung his lips and seared his heart. "Hold onto this," he whispered thickly. "Let it be enough."
"It isn't. Don't leave me!" The words left her against her will, but he slipped out of her grip and seemed to simply disappear into the shadows of the night. Biting back the sob that welled from her very soul, she laid down once more. Hold onto just that one moment? She wanted so much more than that.
He leaned against the closed door on the outside and fought the urge to go back into her arms. His entire body trembled violently. Leaving her the first time had torn at his soul. This time he felt nearly gutted as well. If he had to leave her a third time . . . there would be nothing left of either of them.
©Stacy J. Garrett. Do not reprint or redistribute without permission.
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