Of Blood and Bone (Chronicles of The One #2)(86)

“I didn’t mean—”

“What did you do?” he demanded. “Did you go in?”

“No! No, I swear. I wanted to look, to see the place of the first shield. I dreamed of it, and I wanted to see it. It’s deserted, but not dead. I felt the light and dark pushing at each other, the dark’s stronger there now. And it came. I …”

She looked down at her hand, unmarked. “It spoke. And it had claws in my hand. And I felt …” She thought she knew, and the shame rolled through her. “It made me feel …”

“Yes, I understand.” He sheathed his sword. “Seduction can be another weapon. You refused it, rebuked it. And destroyed its harbingers. Are you certain you didn’t go in—not purposely, Fallon. Did it draw you in, even for a moment?”

“No. It’s strong, but the crystal is mine. It can’t take me where I don’t want to go. I almost did, for a minute, want to. But I didn’t. How did you know to come?”

“You called me, mind to mind. I’ll always come when you call me.”

“Can you call me?”

“I can.”

“I’ll always come when you do.”

He laid a hand on her shoulder. “You did well. We’ll have some food before we work.”

“I could eat. And I’m ready to spend some time with potions instead of … Do you hear that?”

“What do you hear?”

“It’s like … singing. Maybe the faeries are coming to see us, but—”

“It’s not the faeries.”

“No, it’s not like that, exactly.” It sang around her, sang inside her. “But it’s beautiful.”

She stepped out, and saying nothing, Mallick followed her across the small cottage, up to the workshop.

Like a thousand voices calling to her, but quiet and lovely, more welcome than demand.

The locked cupboard stood open, and light pulsed as the dark had pulsed from the defiled ground.

“Did you open it?” she asked him.

“No. You opened it.”

“How?”

“By refuting the dark, by honor and by acceptance. Take what’s yours, girl.”

Heart fluttering, she stepped to the cupboard. Inside the light sat a thick book, its cover deeply carved with magickal symbols. The book sang, in harps and bells and voices that stirred her soul.

“It’s mine?”

“It and all it holds, if you choose. Another turn on the path, Fallon Swift. It remains your choice.”

Inside her, around her, through her, the song.

She stepped forward, flooded in light, and lifted the book.

“It should be heavy, but it’s not.”

It has weight, Mallick thought. So much weight.

“A girl will open the Book of Spells, the oracles say. And all within will be within the girl. She will know, and knowing will enter the Well of Light. There she will take up her sword and her shield, forged in the light, tempered by the fire. And so The One will rise.”

Fallon opened the book.

The singing rang out, a thunderous chorus. A wind blew, warm and wild and tasting of earth and sea, flower and flesh as flames burned across the pages.

And wrote her name.

The force of power stole her breath. In her, around her, through her, of her.

Her head fell back, her eyes rolled up white as it flooded her. And still, she flung out her arms to take more.

She stood, tall and slim, legs braced, and drank in what was hers. As on the night of her birth, lightning slashed across the sky, and the wind howled and whipped the trees.

The singing swelled, rose up ringing in the warm, whirling air. In the window overhead, the sky burst with light.

When the storm passed, when the voices stilled, she closed the book.

“It’s … so much.”

“Every spell ever written, ever conjured, ever cast, black or white, for good or ill, is within you. This knowledge and the weight of it is yours. This trust and the burden of it is yours. Others may open the book, but it will not speak to them.”

“My father paid the price for me to stand here. There’s always a price, I know that. But I’ve seen what the cost is for not paying the price, how much worse.”

She set the book down, laid her hand on it. “It was your book first.”

“No, never mine. I helped create it, and I’ve kept it safe a very long time. This has been my duty and my honor.” He lay his hand over hers. “Will you go to the Well of Light, Fallon Swift?”

“Yes.” She let out a long breath as she turned to the cupboard, the light. “Yes, but I left my sword downstairs.”

Mallick stepped back, folded his hands. “You’ll have no need for it.”

Trusting him, trusting herself, she stepped to the cupboard. With a last glance at Mallick, she stepped inside.

And leaped.

Down and down through brilliant white light, within sheer white walls. The air rushed by her without sound.

She looked up where the light swirled above her—like water—and below where it gleamed.

She landed in a spread-legged lunge, a hand braced against the gleaming floor of the well. She felt the heartbeat pump with her own. Her blood and the living light.

When she stood, it flowed around her like the water, like the brush of hands, the flutter of wings.