Page 98 of The Ember and the Emerald

Then. That moment. Pain struck, sharp and sure, and I lost sight of her, too. My body seized, my head falling back, arms spreading, spine bowing. Hundreds of lives played out in warp-speed bursts, resetting over and over, images, conversations, and emotions rushing through me in tandem.

The different families Mom and I had lived with in the human world, when Elowen had switched up her strategy. All the monstra I’d encountered. Flames. Death. So much death. Everything flashed, there and gone, playing backward, leaving behind a tangled string of memories.

Crying out, I gripped my temples and squeezed my eyes shut. Too much, too much! Finally, though, one life crystallized—the nucleus of every other. That life locked. The very first.

In a heartbeat, I entered the scene, becoming part of the vision.

Cool stone and shadow wrapped around me, and I breathed in the scent of pine and damp earth. I crouched in the forest, gazing from my oasis with longing. The royal palace loomed beyond the trees, ivory towers visible through branches. A promise I couldn’t yet claim. For now, I was to remain inside this hideaway, unknown even to my parents. For the good of the kingdom.

I spent my time painting and training, always warded against monstra. Anything to protect the Ember inside me. A spark eager to ignite.

I saw myself: lean, sharp-eyed, restless, glowing bright green. My body bore the marks of hard battle: bruises both blooming and fading, muscles forged by blades, fire, and determination.

When I tired of staring at the palace, I paced the narrow clearing outside my cabana, fingers flexing, power humming beneath my skin like a caged sun.

The whole of my life, I had trained in secret while awaiting the arrival of the monstra, as foreseen by my sister. Now, they were here. I was ready. The Ember was ready. It must be. We waited only for Elowen’s approval.

As if she heard my inner cries, she rose from the spring that ran through my oasis.

Instantly breathless, I raced over. “Sister!”

Silk and shells clung to her ruby form, droplets sliding over flawless, sun-kissed skin. Queen of the Water Maidens. My best friend. My only constant.

She was clearly worried about something, but she smiled with adoration, just as always. “The moment is here, sister mine. I feel it in the tides. Hakeldama calls for you.”

Relief and fire crashed together. “I won’t let you down,” I swore. “I’ve given my life to the Ember. It will shine for me when I reach the battlefield. I know it.”

She nodded. “I know it will, too.”

I waded into the spring beside her, and she offered me her hand. I took it, gripping tight as we pressed our foreheads together.

“I’m so proud of you,” she whispered. “You know that, yes.”

“Yes. Just as you know I’m proud of you.”

“Sisters until the end.”

Forever. Always. “Sisters until the end.”

She drew back, eyes blazing. “Steel yourself. I’m taking you straight into battle. Royal soldiers are falling in droves, and without you, all will be lost.”

“I’m ready,” I swore, palming two daggers.

“Then we go.”

Together, we sank into the liquid. The world tilted, and a new landscape locked. Heat kicked the air from my lungs as the battlefield formed around me. A haze of ash and smoke. Violet sky. Screaming earth. A village market.

I gawked, stunned. No stories, no lessons, no sharp warnings had prepared me for this. Nothing could have.

A monstra waited for us, as if he’d known when and where we would land. He didn’t aim for me but my sister. Fire slammed into Elowen’s middle, hurling her across a line of dead, smoking bodies, into a boulder.

“No!” I rushed over to kill the flames and drag her behind the rock.

“I’ll heal,” she rasped and pulled herself upright. “Go. Fight. Kill them all.”

Yes.

“I’ll love you until the end,” I told her, then hurled myself into the fray, an assassin trained from birth. I killed her attacker first.