Empress of the Gods

Atarah

They approached Sabine’s territory, an exiled witch from Lhrastsha who was known for her gifts as a seer. Shadow-seer, as the mortals called her. If they had learned anything from Rhiannon, it was to always have a backup plan for everything, and that was the backup plan they created as soon as Rhiannon informed them about their assignments. That was the reason Atarah insisted so much on going with Sabine, because she would meet her friend there. If she had known she had been following her, then they would have gone sooner. It would have saved them time. Although, everything aligned in their favor despite the circumstances, so they would eventually end up in that place sooner than later.

Elysia had been on board with the plan since she heard about Rhiannon’s visit to Sabine, in which she left without answers. They thought that perhaps they would have more luck with it.

After she told her the Dimneas’ dagger fell into her hands, Elysia was sure they would receive answers about it. She thought Sabine could have a clearer vision since she touched the dagger. Even if it was for a brief moment.

Atarah was more optimistic than Elysia about the idea that Myrah had the dagger, so they had to hurry up to get to Ekkirah before anyone realized what her sister had in her hands.

Perhaps that’s why Rhiannon made Elysia promise to protect her in case something happened to her. She knew she would need someone with common sense to stop her, only she didn’t know that Atarah was the sanest of the two of them. Elysia was too curious, and she wouldn’t actually stop her, but she wouldn’t let her commit madness alone. That’s why the coven kept an eye on them. If one of them had a terrible idea, the other would follow all along.

“What is happening between you and the handsome hunter?” Elysia asked as they walked, taking her out of her thoughts. They didn’t take a horse because William would have noticed as soon as they left, and she didn’t want him to follow them. She knew they were heading into the lion’s den, and she wouldn’t forgive herself if something happened to him. She knew that as soon as he realized she wasn’t there, he would go insane.

Her question took Atarah by surprise. She didn’t answer it right away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she lied, knowing that her friend would realize it. Although, it was the truth. Nothing was happening.

“So, when you almost kissed? That was nothing?”

She forgot Elysia saw them. “Yes, it was nothing,” she replied, hearing the deception in her voice.

“Are you trying to convince me or yourself?”

Atarah only continued walking.

When they got close to the cabin, Elysia was starting to act strangely, as if she no longer liked the idea of going with Sabine. She was observing everything around them, as if she was expecting to find a hidden enemy. She kept looking behind them a couple of times, which was starting to make her nervous, as if she should be doing the same thing. It was rare to see Elysia frightened.

“Are you alright?” she asked in a tone loud enough that only her friend could hear in case something was lurking near them. In response, Elysia nodded her head before she looked at the cabin.

“Remind me why we are here,” she whispered.

“We need information about the dagger.”

“Couldn’t we look for it somewhere else?”

Atarah instantly stopped, and Elysia did the same.

“At least we need to confirm that Myrah is in Ekkirah and not in Drykahria.”

“What if …?”

“No,” she interrupted her before she could finish her question. Then they kept walking.

With each step they took, the noises in the woods started to fade away. She stared at the tree that seemed to have withered a long time ago as if it was burnt. She could still hear the noises of the insects that made everything look normal, but she also felt that they should not be in that place. She glanced at the crows in the trees that only stared at them, watching every move they made. There was a strange scent in the air that itched her nose. She could clearly detect burnt herbs, but there was another she couldn’t identify. They approached to the cabin that looked like it would fall apart at any moment. Someone seemed to be inside because she could see the smoke coming out of the small chimney’s crown on the roof.

“Why do you look like you’re going to face your worst nightmare?”

“Because as an exiled Witch I shouldn’t set foot in another witch’s territory,” she whispered to her. “Plus, the only one that knows about us being here is Robbie. We should have brought your hunter, or at least you should let Galad stay with us outside. Your hunter was right. It was the worst idea to come to this place,” Elysia said when she looked around them.

She was beginning to regret telling her what Will had told her. “Please stop saying your hunter. He is not my hunter. And as I recall, you were the one who had this idea, and you assured me that she would have the answers we were looking for and that we were the ones who could get those answers from her,” she whispered back to her.

“Sabine was in the ranks with Rhiannon, and she didn’t dare kill her after they exiled her. Not even the coven. She is not someone we should mess with. There’s nothing more dangerous than someone who doesn’t have anything to lose,” she explained to her. Elysia being scared was a bad sign.

Atarah bit her lip as she looked at an empty space. “What was the reason they exiled her?” she asked in a low tone of voice. When Elysia was about to answer, they heard a squeak coming from the door of the cabin, letting them see the light of the fireplace that reflected on the worn wood that was on the porch of the cabin.

Elysia placed both hands on the handle of her blade as if she expected someone was about to attack them. Her gaze changed as if she never doubted of coming to that place. As if she was welcoming danger. That was the gaze of Midnight whisper, and it was one she mirrored from the previous Silverclaw leader.

Atarah was about to suggest she wait there when they heard a voice coming from the cabin. “Come in,” said a female voice, inviting them to enter the cabin.

Something was clear to her. They would follow one another till the end.

Atarah didn’t know what to do. So, she started walking towards the cabin. “You too, last witch of the Silverclaw coven.”

“This is going to be fun,” Elysia said, placing a half-smile on her face in the same way Rhiannon would have done. That was what worried her. That her friend couldn’t help but enjoy facing danger.

As soon as they reached the porch of the cabin, they heard the wood creaking under each one of their steps. The strange scent began to become stronger and stronger. Elysia did not look away from the entrance, while Atarah looked down to see the holes on the wooden floor, trying not to fall into one of them. Inside the cabin was one table with three chairs in the center of the room without any other furniture around. The place seemed to be spotless and there was not a single broken window around, making her think it was strange that the outside of the cabin looked different.

Atarah was beginning to understand Elysia’s fear because she could feel that something wasn’t right and that it had been a mistake to come without an exit strategy. She knew Elysia was planning it as they crossed the threshold of the cabin.

A tall woman with wine-red hair and eyes to match, slightly long nails, and who appeared to be in her fiftieth winter, had a hand on one of the chairs. She didn’t seem to be the same age as Rhiannon.

“Please, take a seat,” Sabine said, pointing at the two chairs on the other side of the table. She and Elysia hesitated for a moment to sit down, but the woman was patient, and Atarah tried to hide her fear as best she could, moving to sit in one of those chairs. “Wow,” the shadow-seer added with wide eyes and a smile on her face when she sat in her chair. “I wonder what I did to have a driadae, and an exiled Silverclaw in my humble cabin.” Sabine had a feline wicked smile. “Sorry, the new Silverclaw leader,” she corrected herself as she rested a hand on the table.

Elysia held Sabine’s gaze.

“We come …”

“I know why you are here,” Sabine interrupted her, moving her gaze to her. “I have been waiting for this visit for a long time, but if you want answers, then you will have to give me something in return.”

Elysia didn’t move, while Atarah moved uncomfortably in her chair, avoiding looking the place around her.

“We don’t have time for games, Atarah. We’d better leave,” Elysia said before she got up from her seat, waiting for her to do the same.

Sabine was slowly drumming her nails on the table as the fire in the fireplace increased. “Elysia, daughter of the clan Xiomara. One of the noble families of Lhrastsha and now leader of the Silverclaw clan.”

Elysia stopped walking. She had a hand on the door, while Sabine looked at her nails.

“Wouldn’t you be interested in knowing if there is a way to return to Lhrastsha and take your place as the clan leader? Because I doubt they will accept an exiled witch as the leader of a clan that has been led for so many years by a witch who was once the favorite of the king. Don’t you want to know how to get out of Rhiannon’s shadow to take your rightful place?” A smile spread on Sabine’s face when she realized she had struck a nerve the moment Elysia let go the doorknob. “Or maybe you’re not ready to assume that title that was given to you. Maybe you never will.”

Elysia sat back in the chair next to her.

“That’s what I thought.” Sabine looked at her nails before she looked at Atarah again. “What do you really want to know?” she asked to her, but before she could answer, she continued. “You want to know the reason why your mother left you in that forest or if your father and brother are still alive? And if they are, are they looking for you? What are you willing to pay to know everything you don’t remember?” Sabine slowly approached the edge of the table. She was playing with them. “What would you give to know the real reason you are being chased, or maybe you want to know what the hunter whose life is linked to yours feels? Does he want to be with you just as much as you want to be with him?”

She froze. They needed to be smarter than her, otherwise they would never leave that place alive, because something told her the answers to those questions came at a higher price.

“Why not do it as a favor from an old friend of yours?” she asked, thinking that she could use Rhiannon when Sabine’s gaze changed from an amused one to a serious one with tight-lipped.

Sabine leaned back in the back of her seat, pouting. “My dear Rhiannon. She felt she ruled the world.” She chuckled. “She was the only one I allowed to enter this place without paying a price for it because, for a long time, she never got into my business, and I didn’t get into hers. I didn’t think I would hear that name again. And this I can hardly call it not to get into my business,” she replied as she drummed her nails on the table a little faster.

“Then it’s a good thing we didn’t come on her behalf,” Elysia rapidly added, which stopped Sabine’s nails drumming.

Yet she still wanted answers to those questions. “What don’t I remember?” she whispered. The witch smiled, showing her teeth. She could feel Elysia’s gaze on her.

Atarah forgot what Rhiannon had once told them about the words they said to another creature. And more if those creatures were faes and seers, but she hadn’t been able to stop her curiosity about it.

“You wonder why you feel so strange, as if a piece of your life is missing that you can’t seem to remember. As if you had lived longer than the age you have and how each one of your nightmares feels so real, as if you have lived them in the flesh. It’s like if they erased a part of your life that you desperately try to remember. You wonder who the male is that you saw in your last breath. Not the one that seems to be your father, or the one that looks like you, but the one with deep green eyes.”

The noises in the room seemed to fade away while she heard her heartbeats and her own breathing. She’d never told anyone about that. She remembered every single detail of those deep green irises with silver details in them.

Last breath she said? wondered Atarah.

“Time to leave,” Elysia said, taking Atarah’s arm so she could move, only she couldn’t stop thinking what Sabine said.

The moment she moved, Sabine stuck a knife in the table that made the two of them sit down again.

“What is the rush, Elysia? Don’t you want to know what I said to the last Silverclaw leader when she was here for the same reason as you? I saw you on her path.”

Elysia had been close to unsheathing her dagger when something in those words stopped her. She didn’t even want to move because she knew it was only a matter of time before someone threw the first punch.

“Fate can be cruel, but I wonder on which side you will be when he returns.” Sabine closed her hand on the blade of the knife as she slowly lowered her hand to the edge of the blade, letting her blood drip onto the steel.

“It’s definitely not going to be on yours,” hissed Elysia, throwing one of her daggers that barely touched Sabine, who in response laughed and changed everything around her. The sparks of the fire flew around them, and the flame of the fireplace changed its color, forcing her to close her eyes. When she opened them again, she realized that she was in a completely different place than the one they had entered, and Elysia was nowhere to be seen.

Atarah was at her home in Khrysaor and for a moment she started to believe it when she saw Rhiannon in front of her as if it all had been a dream. If she hadn’t witnessed what had happened to her, perhaps she would have believed the illusion. She felt a lump in her throat as she began to walk backwards to get away from her.

“She should have taught you better,” Sabine said with Rhiannon’s voice, but she knew that wasn’t real. “Maybe you prefer this one?” she asked before she instantly changed to someone she remembered so well that had the same hair color as Myrah. Her mother had the same sweet smile until her gaze somber. “Arethusa seems to have an effect on everyone who knows her. I wonder if you inherit that from her,” she added in her mother’s voice.

Atarah was starting to have a hard time differentiating reality from hallucinations. For a moment, she wanted her mother to be there in front of her. She tried to get away from her by slowly surrounding the table without taking her eyes off the witch. Then Sabine switched again as her laugh echoed in the room. She knew well whose eyes were in front of her. She wanted to get lost in them forever. Deep inside, though, she knew it wasn’t Will. “The night flame of Dimneas’ firepit,” she said with William’s voice as she played with her knife. Those last words made Will’s eyes darkened even more. “Your destiny will follow you wherever you go, no matter what you do, no matter how much you hide, because sooner than later you will be facing darkness. It is written in the stars that both destinies will intersect. You won’t be able to avoid what is to come,” Sabine said in a prophetic voice, as if her gift had taken her hostage and she couldn’t stop those words that came out of her mouth. “The lost heiress will return to her rightful place,” she ended up saying when her eyes stopped darkening.

Atarah looked for a weapon around her so she could take advantage of that moment, but she didn’t find one.

“You see, I doubt it will come true, because you will not leave this place. Time to pay the price.” Sabine let her see her teeth when she smiled. “I heard that driadae blood can do wonders for others and I suspect it will help me remove a few wrinkles from my face,” she added when she touched her wrinkles that were closer to her eyes. “Not to mention, the power that hides within you must be exquisite.” She sneered.

“I doubt you have a chance to try it today,” she said when she saw Elysia burying her blade in Sabine’s shoulder.

“Is that all you can do?” Sabine blurted when she put a hand on top of her wound after she took the blade from her shoulder.

Elysia began to use the old tongue when she started fighting.

Atarah crouched down when she saw a blade coming towards her and tried to pull it out of the wood. As soon as she got it out, she prepared to get into the fight.

The new Silverclaw leader began to move nimbly. Only that Sabine predicted each one of the punches, blocking some of her attacks with her blade.

Atarah felt her gifts at her fingertips, so she tried to throw fireballs to distract Sabine, but at the same time she dodged them, Sabine also dodged Elysia’s blade. All that training they had received with the coven, plus the one Elysia received in Blackfall, seemed to be useless against that witch. She tried to use the wind to throw Sabine but ended up throwing Elysia and herself to the ground. She thought she was going to faint the moment Sabine buried her nails into her back.

In that moment, Elysia used the wind to throw Sabine away from them. Her friend broke the glass of the window before she took her by the elbow to get her out of the cabin, but Sabine quickly stood up and scratched Elysia’s arm to stop her, but Elysia managed to get them out.

Then Atarah put her hands on top of Sabine’s, burning to the oracle so she’d let go of Elysia, making Sabine scream in anger when she let her go.

Once they got out of the witch’s territory, they slowed their steps so they could calm their heartbeats and their breathing.

Elysia walked two steps toward the cabin and conjured a spell to create a barrier around the cabin to prevent Sabine from following them.

They ended up in another part of the forest and not where they had entered.

Elysia was limping on one leg, while Atarah could barely move because of the pain in her back.

“I hope the answers were worth it,” Elysia said, panting for air. If she hadn’t been there with her, she wouldn’t have been able to escape.

She hadn’t seen the scratch that Sabine left on Elysia’s neck besides the cut on her leg.

They heard a noise in the bushes, which made both get ready for whatever appeared.

A pair of wolves came out from the bushes as Galad appeared in the middle of the two of them, watching over the wolves that surrounded them as he growled at them. Atarah didn’t have much strength to fight if it came to that. She felt the wounds on her back, but she was ready to give a pretty good fight.

“Driadaes,” she said bluntly.

“No, shapeshifters,” Elysia corrected her.