Crown of Cinders (Imdalind #7)(116)
“He was the last of us to pass from this life,” Chyline suddenly interrupted. “He killed the three of us first.”
I hadn’t expected that.
Muscles tense, I looked between the three of them, not knowing what to say, so I just waited, knowing more was coming.
“He stabbed me through the heart when I challenged him,” Frain said, her eyes sad. “We were in the forest, and I would have escaped, lived on as he has, if he hadn’t taken me back to the castle and claimed one of the mortals had attacked us. From that point on, everyone thought me dead and my life as they knew it was over. It was imperative I remain hidden. It was safer anyway, what with what my death began.”
“It started a civil war,” Rinax whispered, the irritation that had lined his voice up until that moment gone, “one that I am sure still graces your textbooks. Thousands died, and magic was pushed into secrecy.”
“I was the last death in the war,” Chyline interrupted, my brain buzzing with the information I was being inundated by. “The last of the magic, or so the mortals were told by Sain. They tortured me in the bellows of a castle, beheaded me before a crowd of thousands. Sain had convinced them that the war was my fault, my bid for control.” She shook her head, her eyes narrowing as my sight flashed.
Eyes black, I saw that moment, saw the beautiful woman before me folded over a blood-soaked pedestal, the large ax glistening in the sun above her. The ax cut the air, hitting against her skin as the sight vanished, leaving me gasping in the dark as I stared at the woman before me, her head very much attached to her shoulders.
“But why would he kill you if you can’t die?” I asked, still trying to put the pieces of this fantasy together.
Chyline smiled as I stared at her, obviously understanding what I had seen. She wrapped her hand around her neck to illustrate the point I was having a hard time making.
“He didn’t know. He killed us all, assuming our lives would end as our entire lineage does. But we are tied to it, controlling our magic forever,” Rinax said simply, reiterating what was said before; only, now it made sense. “He probably doesn’t even realize that he himself is dead.”
“Then how do you know he is?”
“I know because I watched him die,” Rinax finally announced, the pride in his voice unsurprising, especially with what I knew of Sain. “When Edmund was torturing him to get the sight about you, Edmund slit his throat. I watched him bleed out until there was nothing left to spill from him. I watched Ovailia collapse in pain as the bond between them broke. I listened to his heart stop.”
“But … but …” I stuttered, desperate for some piece of information that would wipe away his confusion.
“He gasped for air minutes later,” Rinax went on, ignoring my stuttering interruption. “No blood in him, and he gasped for air. No life in him, and he stood up. No magic in him, and he still saw into the future. He is the first of his kind. We all are. You can’t kill us unless all of our magic is gone from the earth. The Drak magic that was still on the earth brought him back, blood pumping through his veins … just as our magic brought us all back … just as yours has.”
“But if he can’t die—no,” I corrected myself, “if he is already dead, how is anyone to destroy him? How am I to kill him?”
“You are the only one who can,” Chyline said as she came to sit beside me, her hand gentle as she patted my knee. “He can only die when all of the Drak magic is gone from the earth, and even then, it would take a powerful attack to end his life.”
“All the Draks …” I gasped, my heart tensing in pain as the last piece fell into place. “But Dramin is gone. I am all that is left.”
Rinax nodded his head, Chyline’s eyes grew darker. “You must die before Sain’s life can be truly ended.”
I didn’t even need Frain’s response to know what it meant.
“You must die,” Frain said. “To end all of this, you must die.”
“It is only for Ilyan that you will be able to accomplish all that you must,” the three of them began to recite together, their voices the same dull void that I thought was only for the Draks in sight. Yet, here it was, winding down my spine with a chill that made me shiver. “It is Ilyan’s place to protect you until the day that you pass from this world and into the next.”
“No,” I gasped, knowing what they were reciting and not wanting to hear any more.
“This child is power, power that is strong enough for the world,” they continued, causing my bones to twist further with the sound of their voices. “The one bred to change the world of magic. The one bred to die.”
Silence followed, a numbing low that wound around the cave until all I could hear was the distant rumble of a battle I had all but forgotten and the sound of water loud in my ears, calling for me.
I turned toward the large dark space, feeling the magic move over my skin, melting the last of the ice and warming me, heating me.
“No,” I sobbed, tears falling over my cheeks as I stared into the dark toward the water.
“I know you wish to save your love, Siln?. I could see your desperation to reach him earlier,” Frain whispered, running her hand over the hair on the crown of my head, pulling at the ribbon there. “You would give your life to save him.”