Bloodleaf (Bloodleaf #1)(99)

I saw everything. The knots, the connections both minuscule and massive. The patterns in the stars and in the roots and limbs of trees and the ley lines and in the cobwebby network of vessels that carried blood from heart to head and hands and lungs and round and round and back again. I saw the three points of Achlev’s gates and the three-petaled bloodleaf flower and the three round circles of red on the bloodcloth. And in the center of it all, it was just Zan and me.

It was time to cast a spell. The final spell.

I could feel the pulse of magic deep within the earth, thrumming like a beating heart.

I concentrated on the flow of blood within my own veins, until my awareness expanded to the other connections hidden within them—?the crisscrossing course of vitality, of life force, that pushed the blood down the channel in the first place. Then I let that power seep out from my hands and into Zan’s chest, traveling the circuits inside him. It was a call to arms; I sent my life force marching through his body, leading his stagnant blood back into motion, ordering his heart to pump and pump again, commanding his lungs to stretch and release, stretch and release . . . but his body would never do this on its own if the wound in his back remained, so I took his wound on myself. His skin knitted together even as mine came apart.

There was only one more thing left to do: retrieve his spirit.

It wasn’t hard to find death; hadn’t I always had one foot planted in it?

It wasn’t a great beyond, like I’d always imagined—?it was just like the world of the living, seen through a looking glass. Two sides of a coin. The same but not the same.

It was cold in death. Not a winter’s cold, where warmth can be attained by striking a match or huddling beneath a heavy cloak. This was the cold of a place where warmth simply did not exist. I didn’t have to go far, however; Zan was right there, blinking at me as if I’d materialized out of thin air. Perhaps I had.

“You,” he said in surprise.

I ached at the sight of him looking so alive. “I should have told you,” I said stumblingly, “on the wall that night. I should have told you what you were to me. I should have given you the truth.”

He touched his hand to my cheek, letting his thumb rest on my bottom lip. I couldn’t feel it physically—?in here, I couldn’t feel anything—?but whatever bits of light and noise that made up my unruly spirit surged under his touch.

“Then tell me now.” His voice was soft. “Before I have to go. What am I to you, Aurelia?”

I said, “Everything.”

And then I took the tattered threads of my soul and knotted them tightly around his. When I knew I had him secure, I pushed him over the border and stepped into his place on the other side. My death, as Aren’s was meant to all those years before, would finalize the spell and heal this gap forever. I saw just a flash before the border sealed up—?Zan’s eyes as they fluttered open.

Aren had given up her last spark of life to save mine; now I had done the same for Zan, exchanging my own life for his. My death, in this place and on this day, would fulfill Aren’s mission and keep the Malefica sealed in her kingdom down below. It was my choice, and I was at peace with it.

“Aurelia?”

I whirled around, startled. “Mother? What are you—?”

“Look at you,” she said wonderingly. She was standing on the wrong side of the border. On the side of death. “So beautiful and strong.”

“No, Mother. No. You’re not supposed to be here.”

“Of course I’m supposed to be here,” she said. “Did you forget the bloodcloth spell? Three lives now tied to one, bound by blood, by blood undone.”

“This can’t be happening,” I frantically stammered. “It’s my life I meant to sacrifice. Not yours, Mother. This isn’t what I wanted to do.”

“My sweet girl,” she said. And she put her arms around me and held me while I remembered all the times I’d treated her ill, punishing her for what was wrong with my life when everything she’d ever done was to ensure that I’d have one. “You wanted to save someone you love, I understand. So do I, dear one. So do I.”

She stroked my hair as I clung to her, crying because I’d never get to smell the rosemary soap she used in her hair again and she’d never get to chastise me for all the stupid, reckless things I’d done in Achleva, and because she was here only because I forgot that if I died, someone else would die in my place.

“Mama,” I cried, “I’m so, so sorry. I love you.”

She smiled, her hand on my cheek. “I know, love. I always knew. Go now and live.”





?38




A lick of flame formed from smoke and silence. I watched it curiously as it glimmered and grew, forming wide, outstretched wings and great clawing talons. A bird of golden fire. It glittered orange and red, yellow and red, orange and red.

I blinked and attempted to focus on the bird that was dancing and twisting in front of my eyes. It wasn’t a real phoenix, no. It was small and made of gold and gemstones, and it dangled from a leather cuff. Zan’s cuff, around Zan’s wrist.

Zan. I tried to sit up, but I cried out in pain. My body creaked when I moved, as if I’d been left too long in the rain and had begun to rust. And my back—?it was slick with blood. My blood, from the wound I’d taken from Zan and made into my own.