Trinity (39 page)

“
You can’t
miss this, Kia! It’s amazing. The most beautiful thing I’ve ever
seen.” Marcas grinned at her and winked. “Except you, of
course.”

Kiana should
have blushed at his comment but didn’t. She didn’t even feel the
urge to smile.
Something is
wrong.

Fight, Kiana! Please!

Kiana glanced around, but there
was no one else in the room.

“
Come on,
Kia.”

Kiana staggered backwards,
staring at Marcas with wide eyes. “You’re dead!”

Her Guardian’s smile faded as
he stared at her sadly.

If I go with
you, I’ll die too!
Memories flooded back
into Kiana’s mind. She collapsed to the floor as she drowned in the
tide of joy and pain, laughter and sadness, safety and fear. The
warm embrace of eternity shone even brighter. It would all stop if
she went with Marcas. All the pain Kiana had felt and the tears she
had shed would fade into obscurity.
No.

She got to her feet slowly,
turned her back on Marcas and walked towards the door that led out
of her chambers. It was a door that had always been locked: the
door that had marked the boundary of her small world. Kiana
expected Marcas to stop her, but when she glanced back he was gone.
She breathed in deeply and placed her hand on the handle. It turned
easily and the door swung open, revealing nothing but empty
blackness.

Fear coiled in the pit of
Kiana’s stomach as she stepped through the door.

*

Nidan desperately wanted to
move, but pain shackled him to the cold stone floor and his life
force was ebbing away from him. Berend paced back and forth like a
starved beast whilst he waited for Skaric and Kiana to step back
into the physical world.

“
Come back
here, coward!” Berend’s voice tore through the silence, but if
Skaric heard, he made no effort to respond. “I will kill you! No
matter how long you hide for, traitor! I will kill you
both.”

Nidan struggled to breathe. Why
couldn’t Berend understand that Ysia was still alive? Why couldn’t
he let go of his hatred and let Skaric and Kiana live?

Above Nidan, a faint light
reflected on the ceiling, bathing him in its radiance. A silver
ring and a green glow spiralled around one another as the golden
spark of Miale’s soul rose up to meet them. Berend looked up too,
and for a moment, his sword hand shook.

They did
it
.

Nidan gritted his teeth
together. Was he really just going to let death take him? He closed
his eyes tightly and concentrated. He balled the agony that gripped
him tightly so that he could seal it away into the imaginary wooden
box. There was a design carved into the lid: the combined symbol of
the trinity of gods.

Pios’ power flowed through
Nidan instantly. His wounds were close to killing him, but he took
Pios’ power and used it to repair the hideous damage. Pain burned
in his body as the warm magic tickled its way around his injuries,
repairing arteries and knitting skin.

As Nidan worked, Miale’s light
joined that of her sister and brother. For a moment, all three
lights swirled together. With a blinding flash, they were gone.

Berend stared at the ceiling of
the hall for several heartbeats. Then the war leader turned his
attention back to his quarry. Still hidden in the pathways, Kiana
and Skaric remained motionless save for the shuddering of Skaric’s
shoulders.

Nidan balled
his hands into fists.
We didn’t come here
to die!

His wounds were not fully
healed, but he was no longer in danger of dying.

Nidan stood,
careful not to make a sound. He closed his hand around the hilt of
his sword. He crept towards Berend.
I
never thought I’d stab a man in the back
.
But he did so without hesitation.

Chapter
Twenty-Seven

The twin vortexes called to
Kiana, tugging her in two separate directions. But she had
survived. Miale was gone and she was still there: body, mind and
soul. She pushed herself into Skaric’s chest, snuggling into his
warm embrace as she stared up into his clear blue eyes. His brow
crumpled.

“
What’s
wrong?”

“
Your eyes…”
Skaric said. “…They’re hazel now.” The creases vanished from his
brow. He began to stroke her face. “You did it.” Then he leant down
and gently kissed her lips.

Kiana felt weak and drained as
her heart fluttered in her chest, making her breathless. She
pressed her lips against Skaric’s, returning his kiss with all the
energy that was left in her body.

As Skaric’s lips parted from
hers everything shifted. Kiana’s legs pressed against the floor and
they felt like lead. She was still cold. Skaric was shivering as he
continued to hold her. His face was white, his eyes sunken
sapphires glittering within dark rings. They were both covered in a
thick layer of frost that weighed down their eyelashes and soaked
into their clothes. The pathways were gone. The vortex and eternity
were nothing more than a memory.

Nidan came to kneel beside
them. His shirt was slashed open and bloody. A jagged slash across
his chest was knitting shut. Kiana trembled, holding back tears.
She sat up slowly and threw her arms around both their necks. She
allowed herself to cry freely, her body shaking with happiness and
relief.

Kiana released her companions
and brushed her tears away with her fingertips. “Everyone needs to
know what we’ve done. Everyone needs to know the truth.” She stared
at Skaric and Nidan.

They both held her gaze. Nidan
was the first to nod.

“
People won’t
accept Ysia back that easily,” Skaric said.

Kiana grabbed his hand. “I
know. But we have to make them. Please, Skaric. Nidan and I can’t
do this alone.” Fear danced in his eyes. Kiana gestured at the
space where the pathways had been. “If we don’t, everything we’ve
done here will have been for nothing.”

Skaric
squeezed her hand.
“Yes, I’ll
help you.” He grinned mischievously. “It’s not like I’ve got
anything better to do.”

THE END

About the author:

Clare Davidson is a character
driven fantasy writer, teacher and mother, from the UK. Clare was
born in Northampton and lived in Malaysia for four and a half years
as a child, before returning to the UK to settle in Leeds with her
family. Whilst attending Lancaster University, Clare met her future
husband and never left. They now share their lives with their young
daughter and a cranky grey cat, called Ash. Clare juggles family
life with writing, teaching and a variety of fibre craft
hobbies.

Connect with me online:

My website:
http://www.claredavidson.com

Twitter:
https://twitter.com/ -
!/ClareMDavidson

Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/ClareMDavidson

Smashwords:

Acknowledgements:

Edited by Ruth Parlour

Copyedited by Megan Payne

Cover illustration by Bramasta Aji

Cover layout by Jonny Coole

Thank you to everyone who supported me
while I was writing 'Trinity': Joel for the plotting session; Mum
and Louise for reading the early draft; Tom for putting up with
being ignored for hours on end and Dad for all the technical
stuff.

Earth Angel

Ruth Ellen Parlour

Chapter One

Sand and Storm

‘Found anything yet?’ asked
Gabrielle. Sweat trickled slowly over her flaky brown skin. The
pungent stench attacked her senses in waves as the unyielding sun
burned the flesh off her neck and arms.

‘No,’ replied her brother
Ossoldo who was chained beside her. His lank brown fringe flopped
constantly over his almond shaped eyes and a rough beard grew
gristly like a hedgehog that clung to his jaw. A heavy chain linked
them all together. Rows of workers were hammering at either side of
them, in front, and behind; lined in deep trenches of crumbling
rock. The rutted surface shifted in and out of Gabrielle’s
consciousness like a mirage. The rhythmic thud mixed with the haze
of the sun was hypnotic and hallucinations came like a dream, the
colours intoxicating; dreams of things too far out of life.

A long metal trough sat behind
them, permanently waiting. Minute pieces of mixed grey and brown
rock sat in the rusting metal. They were digging for any valuable
metal or mineral. What happened to the metal was no body’s
business.

They fell quiet as a guard
strolled along the top of the trench, kicking up dust and granules
in little clouds. His hardened glass eyes in a gargoyle complexion
swore down on them. A whip and truncheon dangled from the belt of
each guard; owning the prisoners with fear. Gabrielle stabbed
harder at the rock, shooting the guard a hateful glare as he
strolled away.

Gabrielle swallowed the dry
air. She was always thirsty. Her mouth and lips were cracked and
her head pounded furiously to the sound of the pickaxes.

She slammed the blunt
instrument into the wall unnecessarily hard to satisfy her anger.
Dust and rock crumbled down like a little waterfall. From within
the wound a little glimmer caught her eye. Something was there and
it wasn’t what they were looking for. She pecked at it again until
a thin silver chain dangled out of the rock. Gabrielle touched it
with her pulsing fingers; the chain was cold, bringing relief to
her hot skin.

‘What’s that?’ asked Oz. She
didn’t reply. He watched his sister as she chipped the rock, then
brushed it with her fingers, before chipping it again. When a
substantial groove was created she clasped the chain in her hand
and pulled. The strain turned her scrunched-up face red. She put a
foot on the wall for extra force as the chain dug into her
fists.

‘Be careful or you’ll break
it,’ Oz looked out for the guards before gently knocking the wall
around the chain with his pickaxe to loosen it. With one last
strain it gave way. Gabrielle fell on her backside with a thud as a
spray of dry rock spurted from the wall. Ignoring the pain, she
examined her prize. Oz crouched over her. Gabrielle dusted the cold
item cupped in her hands and brought it closer. Dangling from the
end of the silver chain sat a teardrop shaped gemstone; shimmering
the colour of sand. As Gabrielle moved it in her hands, the rays of
light from the sun revealed an hourglass, accurately carved by a
skilled eye. The polished stone bore no scratches and the chain was
in perfect condition albeit clogged with dirt.

‘What is it?’ he asked. Before
she could look more closely a guard began to wander over, his gaze
swept over them as Oz and Gabrielle scrambled swiftly to their feet
and retrieved their pickaxes. The pendant sat firmly clamped in
Gabrielle’s damaged hand.

When the sun was in its decline
the guards began filing people back in. Oz and Gabrielle were led,
still clamped together, onto a raised walkway that ran down the
centre of hundreds of trenches identical to theirs. The channels
stretched far into the wasteland until they disappeared in a
wavering line of heat. Stones and grit dug into the thickened soles
of her bare feet.

A thick spiral of black clouds
heaved and swelled around an epicentre rumbling endlessly over a
giant fortress. Its thick walls were scorched black, towering over
the people below. The main building was a wide tower that cast a
lengthy shadow across the desert. A giant stonewall surrounded the
buildings, topped with metal spikes, daring someone to challenge
it.

A growl of thunder swept the
sky overhead. The two beasts; lightning and thunder raged a
persistent battle within the dense clouds.

‘It looks like another
lightning storm,’ he announced. Gabrielle observed the burnt sky.
The storms rarely ventured out of its comfortable cloud blanket,
but no matter how violent the storm was - it never rained. People
said that the cloud above the prison was filled with the angry
souls of those who died within those dark walls, or those who were
lost outside of it. Khartaz prison never failed to make Gabrielle
feel insignificant in a Godless land.

She once prayed for rain to
come and sooth her aching muscles and moisten the air. Gabrielle
once prayed that the Gods were listening. But the rain never
came.

It was feeding time.

Jess and two others were in the
cage. They were people she hated. None of them spoke. They sat in a
triangle, gazing out of the rusted iron bars preparing themselves
mentally. Would the cage protect them? Claw and teeth marks dusted
the rust.

They were submerged in
darkness. Jess did not want to close her eyes; she needed to see
what was coming. It smelled of blood, thick in puddles, and of
damp, and of death.

Somewhere in the room a door
opened, maybe two, screeching metal on metal and the room was
filled with bottomless rumbling. They didn’t need eyes to see the
snarling teeth and the bared claws. Jess shot back as one of them
hammered into the cage. Faint light glinted on its hungry eyes and
teeth. It fixed a gaze on the convict.

The creatures circled the cage,
their bodies were thin and starved but powerful. They would kill
anything put in front of them. Their ribcages heaved in and out,
their orange eyes gazed in at the fresh meat and their mouths
dripped with thick saliva.

Jess could hear her pounding
heart and feel it heavy against her chest as they waited in the
dark. She tried to convince herself that the cage would hold and
that they wouldn’t open the door.