Page 263 of Spring Guardians & Songbirds

Empty. I felt empty.

Two strong hands cupped my face. I recognised them—they had held me so many times. “It’s okay,” he said, pulling me to his chest. “Whatever you did there, it is okay. It is okay, my love, it was not real. Whatever you chose was not real.”

“You failed,” the man said, clicking his tongue. “What a shame. Finicky you guardians. So much thinking with your heart and so little with your brains. Truly makes the distinction between us gods and you. But lucky me, I get to keep you.”

Kilian tensed and held me tighter. “What did you choose?”

Surrendered, I rested my forehead on his chest, feeling his heartbeat beneath my palm.

The warm taste of his magic surrounded us, and the old god stumbled a few steps back, hissing at the mist of black pouring out of Kilian. “How dare, you human filth!” he roared, and the grounds shook, gold and diamond began raining down on us.

Kilian smirked and a blast of absolute darkness sent the god of waters flying back and screaming in what I’d assume to be pain—if gods could even feel pain.

He got me to my feet and clutched my hand tight before dragging me through the endless mazes of gold. “Thora and Mal are waiting for us at the portal,” he said as gold, diamonds, and rubies flashed from the corners of my eyes.

“Why did you come back?”

He glanced at me over the shoulder as we took a turn “You didn’t just ask me that.”

The ground beneath shook and the sound of a hoard of hooves chased behind us, growing closer and closer. My senses vibrated from the danger, yet I somehow felt safe.

A bright white light flashed somewhere in the distance and my body hummed in remembrance. The sceptre piece.

I pulled my hand from his. “Go there first. I’m getting the sceptre.”

“No,” he gritted out, grabbing my hand again. “This is the last fucking time I get close to losing you. Next time will only be my death.”

I shook my hand free from him and sprinted the opposite way. “Go!” I shouted over my shoulder. “Keep my sister safe. You owe me.”

I didn’t turn back to see if he was following. If I turned, I would have run after him and damned the sceptre.

Though I couldn’t see where it was, I felt its presence pull and call to me. Reaching my hand forward, I called back to it, reciting those cursed words that made my magic shiver and crawl out of its depths. “Hur ma’hazur kahaz.” Kneel before the power. Before I’d finished saying the last syllable, the silver rod tore from between a pile of coins and right into my grip. And then I ran back—the fastest I could till Kilian came in sight, breathing hard and laboured from exhausting this physical mana to draw magic in this pocket realm. A few strange bodies lay on the ground, slain to ashes by his magic.

The moment he spotted me, he turned and shouted at Mal and Thora, “Go!”

Mal dragged my reluctant sister out and into the portal, stepping safely back into Adriata and relief lifted from my chest.

“There you are,” the god of waters growled. Dozens of pale creatures with fins and scales, almost resembling humans, stood behind him. “You belong to the god of waters. You will become a guardian of Akkamel, you will guard my realm along with my other guardians.” His eyes gleamed. “You’ve become my most precious treasure.”

Kilian raised a palm toward him. Blisters and sparks of night tore the sea air surrounding us and the water surface skies suddenly began murking and splattering with a grey that slowly grew to a deep black.

The creatures of Roto shrieked, backing away from Kilian and he signalled his head for me to run to him.

Roto studied him almost with curiosity. “Maybe I’ll keep you, godling. You’re strange for a human.”

“Not human, an Aura,” Kilian growled and unleashed a wave of darkness over the lands of Roto. Gold turned grey and dull, diamonds no longer clear but murking with shadows, rubies turned burgundy, and the creatures screeched and blasted to dust.

Roto hid under a shield of water and raised a hand toward the portal. “Maybe I’ll keep you both since you are so reluctant to leave one another.”

Our escape began shrinking and Kilian rose another hand toward it. Holding Roto back and keeping the portal from closing. “Run!” he shouted. A vortex of night swirling around him and coating the surroundings. Tentacles of darkness clung to the portal, pulling and tugging on its circumference to hold it open.

“Come,” I said, extending a hand as I brushed past him, but he didn’t take it.

He kneeled to the ground, arms spread wide, his body shaking as he poured gales of magic onto our surroundings to hold the gates open while keeping Roto back. “Go!”

“Not without you,” I shouted back, slowing my steps as darkness blistering around us, making everything hard to see, his figure blurring too.

“I will be right behind, I promise.”