Guardians of the Boundary (The Conjurors Series Book 3) (33 page)

Skye left Leo and trotted to
Valerie’s side when he spotted her.

“You fought well. More
importantly, you led the Fist well. Without your quick decisions, Arden and all
of its guilds would be in the hands of the Fractus today,” Skye said, shaking
her hand with his firm grip.

Skye’s words took Valerie aback.
She hadn’t considered the repercussions for the Globe if the Fractus had a
total victory.

“The portal to Earth is open,”
Valerie said, and Skye nodded, unsurprised. “Reaper probably considers the
battle his win.”

“Then he is mistaken. Though we
were outnumbered, you led us to victory. Because of our success yesterday, we
can fight again tomorrow. This was one battle in a war,” Skye replied.

“We can still save Earth,”
Valerie said, realizing the truth of her words for the first time.

She could never consider the
battle anything other than a horror that she hoped to never revisit, but it
gave the slaughter a small piece of meaning, knowing that it happened in
service of saving many more lives, human and Conjuror.

“We will define a better future
for both worlds, as you say,” Skye said.

“Thank you,” Valerie
said, and Skye thumped her on the back once before trotting away.

With her duties done, Valerie
was ready to turn her steps home. She was halfway to her house when she remembered
that Oberon wouldn’t be there, waiting for her to return. After Midnight had
died, she’d decided never to live in the home they’d shared with her again. It
was as if, without Midnight’s presence, they had no right to be there.

But this was different. This was
the home that her father and mother had built for her and Henry. As painful as
it would be to live among the things that reminded her of her father, there was
nowhere else she’d rather be. Henry had left his mind open a crack all day so that
they could keep track of each other, and she knew that he was waiting for her
there.

She also sensed some
apprehension coming from him that made her hurry as she got closer. When she
entered the house and made her way to the kitchen, she saw why. Sitting at the kitchen
table, drinking tea, was Claremont.

Valerie drew Pathos from its
sheath, though the sound of her blade scraping metal made her stomach hurt. She
knew that she’d always associate that noise with death now.

“Valerie, wait,” Henry said, and
she paused, realizing that Henry and Gideon were also in the kitchen.

She tried to make sense of the
scene, but couldn’t. Still, she sheathed Pathos.

“Hear what Claremont has to
say,” Gideon said.

Valerie sat down, and Henry and
Gideon both left the kitchen. It took a while before Claremont would meet her
eyes.

“Believe me, this is harder for
me than it is for you,” Claremont said. “Keep in mind that no matter what I’m
about to say, I don’t like you.”

“Right back at you.”

Claremont fought a brief smile,
but then her face turned serious. “I don’t like you, but I hate the Fractus
more. If I have to choose between the two of you, I choose you.”

Valerie couldn’t process the
meaning of Claremont’s words. “What are you saying?”

“It scares me that the leader of
the Fractus is a total nut job,” Claremont snapped. “I’m saying that I quit the
Fractus. I’m all for using my magic to help me get ahead, but I don’t want to
kill people for no reason.”

Valerie eyed her, not sure if
she totally bought Claremont’s story. Claremont huffed in frustration.

“I’m also not suicidal,” she
admitted. “Reaper expects us to lay our lives on the line, to throw them away
if he says so. I’d like to live to see my next birthday.”

That, Valerie could believe.
Something about Claremont’s expression forced Valerie not to dismiss her words.
It would be easy to think that her enemy was trying to spy for the Fractus, to
get close enough to hurt her, but her instinct for danger wasn’t going off.
Still, it didn’t make sense to trust her, either.

“I’m happy you’ve decided not to
kill innocent people,” Valerie said, unable to keep all of the sarcasm out of
her voice. “But why come to me? Why not hide out till all this is over?”

Claremont gave her a level
stare. “Because I want to fight with you. And I’m not the only Knight who wants
to leave the Fractus and do what’s right.”

“There are others?” Valerie
asked, unable to keep the hope out of her voice.

“Yes. And I’m going to help you
recruit them,” Claremont replied.

The next morning, sounds from
the kitchen woke Valerie up. Her heart lurched. It wasn’t Oberon, and never
would be again. She turned her head and let her tears soak the pillow. The box
she’d tried to stuff her emotions in wasn’t holding. Her loss was too big to be
contained. How did anyone put one foot in front of the other and keep on living
after something like this?

Henry pushed the door open, and
he had a plate of pancakes in his hand. It only made Valerie cry harder, but
for some reason, it hurt a little less.

“I bet they taste better than Dad’s,”
she managed to say.

“They couldn’t be any worse,”
Henry said, and she managed a watery smile for the brother who had set aside
his loss to help her through hers.

They padded into the kitchen. Through
the window, she saw that Gideon was outside, practicing his martial art forms
in the rising sun.

“Did he stay all night?” she
asked as she bit into her brother’s pancakes.

“He’s here for good, I think,”
Henry replied. “Didn’t bother to ask either of us if that’s what we wanted,
either.”

But Henry didn’t sound mad. He
sounded tired and grateful that someone had come to watch over them.

“Azra came last night, too, but
Summer wouldn’t let her stay until you woke up,” Henry added.

Valerie guessed that Azra’s
presence was the reason why she’d been able to sleep at all.

“Is she still doing okay?”
Valerie asked.

“She’s going to drop her foal soon,
but yes. She wants you to come and visit her,” Henry said.

“Let’s go together. I’d like to
see a new life born into the world, instead of another one leaving it,” Valerie
said.

Henry didn’t say anything, but
she could sense that his feelings mirrored her own. An unlikely burst of
gratitude made her swallow a lump in her throat. She was an orphan again, but
she was not alone.

Henry paused and then glanced
behind him. “Someone’s here to see you. She’s at the door.”

Sure enough, when Valerie opened
the door, she found Sibyl fluttering a few feet off the ground.

“I heard of your loss. My heart
is with yours,” Sibyl said, and in her eyes, Valerie saw an echo of her own
pain and knew that Sibyl was remembering losing her own mother not so long ago.

“Does it get better?” she asked,
sitting on the steps and staring at her father’s garden.

“You learn to live your life
around the pain. It will always be in your heart, but, if you let it, it can
live next to your love for others and joy in life,” Sibyl said. Valerie
wondered if all Oracles were so gifted with words.

“Gideon said that your input
into which battle strategies would work best was invaluable,” Valerie said,
unable to talk about Oberon any longer without crying.

“Though it was in service to
pursue a path of light, it was difficult for us to advise on tactics of war,”
Sibyl said. “It is not the way of the Oracles to solve problems with violence.”

“Now that the Fractus are
scattered, we could try to recover the Roaming City for you and your friends,”
Valerie said, though the amount of effort that would be required made her want
to crawl back into bed.

“The time is not yet right,”
Sibyl replied, to Valerie’s relief. “I came here today for another purpose. Not
as an Oracle, but as a friend, which I hope I am.”

“Yes,” Valerie said, meeting
Sibyl’s eyes and absorbing the warmth there. “You are.”

“As an Oracle, I am bound to
keep prophecies secret, but I am not in the Roaming City now. As your friend, I
would break that rule today,” Sibyl said. Mystified, Valerie watched as Sibyl’s
wings fluttered nervously for a moment. “I received a prophecy for your friend,
Cyrus. It led to the path of light, and I was duty-bound to deliver it to him,
though I knew it would hurt him very much.”

Valerie couldn’t take her eyes
from Sibyl’s face as she tried to imagine why Cyrus had never spoken of the
prophecy. He’d had chances to tell her.

“How can a prophecy that hurts
someone lead to the path of light?” she asked. Though it wasn’t fair, anger
rose in her at the thought of anyone causing Cyrus pain.

“He had to make a choice that no
one else could make for him,” Sibyl replied. “My prophecy told him the truth
about why Thai didn’t come to the Globe. It was up to Cyrus to decide what to
do with the knowledge. He would be the only one to ever know the reason, unless
he decided to share it, and Thai would remain ignorant of Reaper’s lie.”

Sibyl’s words were so unexpected
that Valerie’s brain almost couldn’t process it.

“You’re saying… Cyrus told Thai
that Chern was Reaper, which is how he figured out that the prophecy that kept
him from coming to the Globe was false?” Valerie asked.

“He did. He made Thai swear that
he would never reveal his role in bringing him to the Globe, but he did not ask
me to promise. I thought you would want to know,” Sibyl said, her wings
stilling now that she had told Valerie everything. “Cyrus could have chosen to
keep the lie alive, and Thai would have remained on Earth for the rest of his
days. No one would have known why he never came to the Globe. Instead Cyrus gave
you the choice to decide who to be with for yourself.”

Her hand was pressed against her
heart as she remembered her last few conversations with Cyrus before Thai had
come to the Globe. He’d told Thai the truth even though he thought he would
lose her.

“In telling Thai, he chose the
path of light,” Sibyl said. “I believe that is why I received his prophecy.”

“I never would have guessed the
truth. Thank you, Sibyl. As close as we are, I didn’t know Cyrus as well as I
thought I did,” Valerie admitted. She’d underestimated him—again.

“It goes against my nature to
see such selflessness go unnoticed,” Sibyl said. “Only you can decide who is
your other half, but I thought you would want to know all the facts before you
decided.”

“I don’t understand why Reaper
would go out of his way to lie to Thai,” Valerie said, her foot tapping against
the step.

“Putrefus delivered a prophecy
to Chern the day that he visited the Roaming City with you, Henry, and Gideon,”
Sibyl said.

“What did it say?” Valerie
asked, stunned. She had a dim memory of Chern pulling Putrefus aside to scold
him, but he must have been seeking a prophecy of his own, from an Oracle who
could help him toward a path of war.

“All prophecies are recorded,
but Putrefus barred those who followed the path of light from visiting the hall
of records,” Sibyl said, regret in her eyes.

Valerie nodded
mutely, and her perspective shifted at that moment, more than it ever had under
Reaper’s spell.

Henry and Valerie spent the day
preparing to visit Azra and letting their friends know that they’d be gone for
a few days. They had decided to visit her alone, and everyone understood. It
was unspoken, but they needed to be away from the rest of the world to grieve.
They would go at dawn the next day.

That night, Valerie couldn’t
sleep. Instead, her feet led her to The Horseshoe. Arden’s guilds seemed
otherworldly in the moonlight, and it brought her comfort to think of Skye’s
words and know that in an important way, the battle hadn’t been for nothing.

She saw a figure sitting on the
fountain in the center of The Horseshoe, and even in the dim light from the
stars, she knew the silhouette.

“Kind of makes the view from my
tent look pathetic, doesn’t it?” Thai asked, staring up at the stars as she
approached.

“I don’t know. There was a lot
to be said for that view. I happened to love it,” she said.

“Me, too. I wish my family could
see this one, though,” Thai said, homesickness thick in his voice.

Valerie was struck by the
thought that Thai had come to the Globe for her, only to discover that she had
found someone else.

“Are you sorry you came?” she
asked him.

He turned his head, and even in
the dark, the intensity in his eyes made her heart beat faster.

“Never. This is a world of magic
and possibility. There is a lot of good we can do here and on Earth once the
battle with the Fractus is over, and I can help so much more if I’m on this
side,” Thai said.

His thoughts mirrored her own.

“But even if it weren’t for
that, I would always choose to be where you are,” Thai said.

Valerie wished she could touch
his hair and press her face into the side of his neck. She remembered exactly
what that felt like, and how much comfort it brought her. But she would never
betray Cyrus, in word or deed.

“It’s more than I deserve,”
Valerie said, staring at the ground.

“Tan found me yesterday,” Thai
said, changing the subject as if he could sense her discomfort.

“Did he try to hurt you?”
Valerie asked, alarmed.

“He seemed different from how
you described him. Lost. Reaper gave him what he wanted in exchange for spying
on you, and now he doesn’t know where to focus his energy,” Thai said.

“What do you mean? What did
Reaper give him?”

“Venu, of course. Tan killed
him,” Thai said, his voice bleak. “And murdering someone changes you, even if
you think they deserve it. He’d never admit it, but I think he regrets taking
Reaper’s deal.”

“Maybe he can find his way back
to the path of light,” Valerie said, though she wasn’t sure if that was
possible.

“I’m going to try to guide him,”
Thai said.

“We’ll try together. We won’t
lose him,” Valerie said fiercely, and for the first time since Oberon’s death,
a little of her fighting spirit returned to her. She wouldn’t let Thai suffer
through loss like she had if she could prevent it.

“I wanted to be the one to comfort
you after Oberon’s death, but I wasn’t sure it would be right,” Thai said. “I
was trying to decide whether to climb through your window tonight, but instead
you found me.”

“I wish things could be
different,” Valerie admitted, not elaborating to Thai or herself what she
meant, and Thai didn’t ask.

“I’m here for you however you
need me,” Thai said. “I can’t shake the idea that the storm will get worse
before it gets better, and you’ll never be fighting it alone.”

Valerie had to physically turn
away from Thai to keep herself from touching him then.

“I hope someday I’ll
find the words to tell you what that means to me,” she said, and then she left,
knowing a piece of her heart was safe with Thai.

Dawn was beginning to light the
trees the next morning when Henry and Valerie walked to the Lake of Knowledge. It
was easy to find the silver path Azra had told them would lead to her location
in Messina. It shone in the growing light, and Valerie made sure that no one
was near before she stepped onto it.

“You’re sure she’ll want to see
me, too?” Henry asked.

“I know she will,” Valerie said.

They walked silently down the
path. With every step, Valerie’s pain was more distant, as if she was leaving
it behind in Arden. Through her connection with Henry, she knew that he was
relaxing as well. It was a welcome peace, and neither of them said a word,
afraid they might break the spell.

It wasn’t long before the forest
changed. Instead of bark brushed with glimmering gold or green, the trees
looked like regular pine trees on Earth. In Arden, Valerie caught the
occasional glimpse of a fairy child on the periphery of her vision, but now
there were only birds and small animals chasing each other about.

“We’re in Messina,” Valerie
said. “Can you sense it?”

“It’s like magic is laced in the
air we breathe in Arden, but here, it’s pure. Kind of refreshing,” Henry said.

“Maybe it’s just a different
kind of magic,” Valerie said, hardly daring to breathe as she caught sight of a
tiny unicorn struggling to stand on wobbly feet in a clearing a few yards away
from where they stood.

Azra’s little foal was pure
white, and her mane was iridescent, like her mother’s. But her eyes seemed much
bigger, and instead of black, they were a startling blue that reflected the sky
and mirrored the color of her little horn.

“She’s beautiful,” Henry
whispered, and he reached out his hand to grasp Valerie’s.

“Perfect,” Valerie agreed.

At the sound of her voice, the
foal trotted over, her earlier shakiness barely visible. Valerie dropped to the
ground, and the tiny unicorn came straight into her arms and nuzzled her head against
Valerie’s cheek. Her face was softer than anything Valerie had ever touched.

Gently, Valerie stroked her
mane, and in her mind, she heard a soft cooing. It was both similar to and
entirely different from hearing Azra in her mind. It was the touch of something
so innocent that anything it encountered was instantly made pure, too.

Valerie’s grief, pain, and guilt
welled up in her, but with the little foal in her arms, all of the negativity
drained away, leaving only an unpolluted love and gratitude for her life.
Beside her, Henry gently stroked the unicorn’s flank.