Beyond Hollow Echoes (Book Three)

⋆˖☽ ​​​​​​Chapter 11 ☾˖⋆

My grip tightened around my bow. It can talk? But—

CRACK.

Thunder reverberated off the frozen lake, rattling my teeth in my skull. A flash of violet lightning splintered across the bruised sky, illuminating the creature. She possessed six wings, feathered like a Chitterwing, casting an iridescent glow into the heart of the storm. The creature drifted downward, toward the swirling black miasma at the center of the lake.

She looked similar to a human woman, though the white, flowing clothing she wore was shredded and tattered. Keeping my eyes locked on her, my trembling hand reached back to my quiver, pulling an arrow free.

As she descended, the strobing lightning caught the sharp angles of her long, pointed ears. Her bare, delicate feet touched the black water of the shattered ice, and a ripple danced outward from where she stepped. Beneath her pale, translucent skin, a searing glow of violet lightning pulsed through her veins like continuous, living spiderwebs.

Her pale lips continued to move, though no sound carried over the wind. What is your wish? she mouthed, over and over again. An unnatural sorrow pulled at my heart, an ache that belonged to her. Is this creature truly evil?

The black miasma thickened around her bare ankles. She took two graceful steps closer to the icy shore, the dark mist snaking out from her footprints and creeping across the frost toward us. Her eyes were a dead violet, staring through us rather than at us.

She halted. Her long white hair drifted around her face as if she were suspended deep underwater. A vibrating hum built up in my chest. An intoxicating warmth flooded my freezing veins.

I forced my boot to take a step back, but my physical body wanted to walk forward. I wanted to open my mouth and speak to her, to lay my soul bare. I clamped my jaw shut so hard the muscles ached.

The Siren's dead violet eyes snapped into focus, locking onto us. When she spoke, her voice was a melodic symphony in the dark. Peace rushed over my mind, nothing mattered but the beautiful voice echoing around me.

"Are you here to make a wish?"

Emeric's rough voice shattered the pull. He was breathless, but his tone remained unyielding. "We aren’t here for a wish."

"You're not?" The Siren's delicate hand fluttered up to cover her mouth, her head dropping. "They aren’t here for a wish," she mumbled to herself. A strange, childlike lilt of hope entered her voice. She lifted her head back up, a light flickering in her dead eyes. "Then perhaps... you wouldn’t be here to ask me mine, would you?"

Her loneliness leaked from her skin. I took a single step out in front of the others.

"Alanah, no!" Mikaeus's sharp warning rang out.

"Oh?" The creature's beautiful voice cracked at his shout.

"What is your wish?" The question left my mouth before I could stop it.

Above us, the ancient, snow-laden trees groaned in warning. The winter wind died, and the lightning in the sky faded to black. The only sound left was the Siren beginning to hum—a rising sorrowful tune of absolute despair.

"My wish," she repeated, savoring the words. Her pale hands clasped together over her glowing chest before dropping to her sides. "To be free."

A single, glowing crimson butterfly materialized from the darkness beside her, hovering for a fraction of a second before fading. Every muscle in my body pulled taut.

"Free from despicable desires." She took a slow step forward. The violet lightning beneath her translucent skin began to pulse faster. "Free from selfish people." She took another step, her voice rising in power. "But what I truly desire..." Her dead eyes ignited, burning with a catastrophic fire. "My deepest desire..."

BOOM.

The world tilted on its axis. A concussive shockwave of pure energy blasted us backward. My spine slammed into the frozen earth. I clamped my numb fingers around my bow, refusing to let it go. Nearby, Mira let out a harsh grunt of pain as she hit the ice.

I hauled my body upright just as the Siren's melodic voice morphed into a booming, storm-rattling roar that shook the heavens.

"The destruction of humanity!"

A hurricane-force gust of wind ripped across the lake, choking the air with the smell of scorched ozone and rotting flesh. The black miasma flared into a towering wall of twisting shadows. Heart hammering a frantic rhythm, I scrambled to my feet.

I nocked an arrow to my bowstring. The Siren was airborne, hovering high above the shattered lake. Swirling ribbons of black miasma trailed behind her, darkening my vision until her glowing features were unreadable. I exhaled a sharp plume of white breath and let my arrow fly.

She shifted her weight to the side, effortlessly letting the steel-tipped shaft whistle past her.

Ondina appeared at my shoulder, twin daggers drawn, as I pulled another arrow from my quiver and tracked the levitating monster through the escalating storm.

A crack of thunder tore the sky in half. Lightning struck the frozen ground just inches to my left, kicking up a shower of ice and dirt.

A pained grunt came from Mira.

"Despicable!" the Siren’s voice echoed from every direction at once, impossible to track. "You are selfish!" she roared. Her burning eyes locked onto Mira as another bolt of lightning crashed into the earth in front of her. Mira scrambled backward over the slick ice, narrowly avoiding the blast.

The hurricane winds pressed harder against us.

Digging my boots into the ground, I snapped my attention back to the sky, but the Siren was gone. She had disappeared into the churning clouds.

Massive clumps of snow began to fall, shading the entire world out into a white haze.

There. A faint, iridescent glint of feathered wings flashed through the gray. I drew my bowstring tight to my cheek and let the arrow fly, aiming just ahead of her trajectory. It vanished into the storm. I held my breath, waiting for the satisfying thud of a strike, but no sound followed.

Without warning, the creature materialized out of thin air, hovering inches in front of Emeric. He swung his greatsword in a horizontal arc, she drifted backward, leaving his steel to cleave through nothing but empty wind.

She drifted forward again, slipping inside his guard. A serene smile tugged at the corners of her pale lips. Refusing to back down, Emeric planted his boots and swung his sword in an upward arc.

The Siren drifted to the side and reached out her hand. Violet sparks of lightning crackled between her fingers. Emeric shifted the weight of his sword just in time; her sparking fingertips missed his armor by a fraction of an inch, the ozone burning the air between them.

Ondina charged in from the blind spot behind Emeric, her twin daggers slashing outward in a cross arc. But she was stopped mid-swing. A concussive blast of hurricane wind and snow slammed against her chest, throwing her backward across the ice.

I drew my bowstring to my cheek and let another desperate arrow fly. The Siren disappeared into thin air the exact second the shaft left my bow.

A heartbeat later, she materialized in front of me.

She's too close. Panic spiked in my chest as I scrambled backward, boots slipping, trying to create distance between us.

The Siren didn't pursue. Instead, she just hovered there. Her head tilted to the side, her eyes blazing into mine. "Why?" she whispered, her voice invading my mind, wrapping around my thoughts. "Is your whisper so quiet?"

Before I could react, the black miasma flared. The entire world was plunged into darkness. The only thing I could make out were shifting shadows.

My lungs seized. Not again. Please, not again. My numb fingers tightened into a death grip around my bow.

A smaller, human shadow darted through the dark, placing itself between me and the glowing monster.

"Move!" Mira's voice echoed over the howling wind.

Mira’s shadow charged forward. The Siren shot higher into the storm, evading the attack, and Mira’s momentum carried her sliding across the ice until the black miasma swallowed her from my vision.

I pulled another arrow from my quiver. A faint, iridescent glint caught my eye through the haze, and I released the string, having no idea if it would come anywhere close to the monster.

I tried to lift my boot, but an invisible weight forced it back to the ice. I tried again. My legs were ripped out from under me, slamming my face into the freezing snow.

The world spun. I dug my numb fingers into the slush, my breathing ragged. Somewhere in the dark void, steel clashed against ice.

I shoved my hands down, trying to push myself up onto my knees, but the pressure crushed against my spine, pinning my chest to the ice.

The miasma solidified around my legs like hands, pulling me backward. The jagged ice scraped across my cheek. I turned my head to the side, gasping for air as the world rushed past me. I clawed at the earth.

I dug harder, my nails catching the sharp edge of a buried stone. My other hand flew up, clamping over the rock. My body trembled, my muscles shrieking as I used every ounce of my remaining strength to fight the pull of the miasma. The stone groaned. It shook loose in the frozen dirt.

It ripped free.

I was yanked backward into the void. A strobing flash of lightning lit up the storm above me as the ice vanished from beneath my boots. My stomach plummeted into my throat.

Searing cold slammed into every nerve in my body. I gasped for air—only to feel my lungs flood with freezing water.

My muscles seized, locking tight as my body sank deeper and deeper into the abyss. I commanded my frozen, useless limbs to move, stretching my neck back toward the distant surface. My fingers curled into fists as my hands floated above my head, reaching for a sky I couldn't see.

The cursed miasma remained anchored around my ankles, dragging me further into the lightless depths. I curled my body into a tight ball, my unresponsive hands clawing at the dark miasma to free my trapped legs.

A glowing flash of crimson illuminated the pitch-black water. Even without seeing it, I knew exactly what it was. A butterfly.

For a split second, the miasma’s hold loosened just enough. Seizing the opening, I kicked my feet free from the shadows. I pressed my body upward, fighting the crushing weight of the lake, kicking higher and higher until I broke through the frozen surface of the water.

A wet gasp tore from my lungs, followed by a violent fit of coughing that scraped the black water from my throat. The hurricane wind ripped at my face. Through the blur of the storm, a single crimson butterfly fluttered over the water. I followed it forward until my hand slapped against solid, frozen earth. My other hand followed, and I dragged my body out of the lake and onto the ice.

"Mikaeus!" Mira's scream tore through the chaos.

Freezing water stung my eyes as I forced myself up onto my trembling hands and knees. I blinked hard. A towering shadow was charging through the storm at me. I forced my weak legs into a staggering stance. The shadow slammed into me, knocking me backward across the ice.

Violet lightning lit up my vision in a blinding strobe, ripping down from the clouds. Time slowed to a crawl as the world stilled.

Mikaeus was standing in the exact spot I had occupied only a heartbeat ago.

The violet lightning snaked down, slamming into his chest. The frozen earth beneath him shattered. A guttural cry ripped from his lips as his armored body crumpled forward into the snow.

"No!" I screamed, tearing my throat raw, my frozen muscles refused to move.

Slowly, miraculously, he drove the butt of his spear into the fractured ice, using it to haul his body back up to a standing position. Dark blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. Then, the blinding flash vanished, plunging him back into a dark silhouette within the swirling miasma.

The Siren's voice echoed. "I hear your desires."

She materialized in front of Mikaeus. The iridescent glow of her wings illuminated the thick black mist around them. Adrenaline overriding my pain, my hand reached down and ripped my mother's dagger from its sheath. I forced myself to my feet.

"Your whisper is the loudest," she purred. Her pale hand shot forward, lightning crackling between her fingers as she clamped them around Mikaeus's throat.

I charged forward with a blood-curdling scream, my dagger raised to strike.

"Now, let me silence it."

With a concussive boom, the Siren shot straight up into the stormy sky, dragging Mikaeus into the dark clouds with her.

The sky flashed repeatedly with violet lightning. High in the churning clouds, Mikaeus still had his spear gripped in his hands. Then, the storm plunged the world back into darkness.

I held my breath, terror gripping my chest like a vice.

The sky lit up again. His spear plunged into the Siren's glowing chest. An unearthly scream pierced my ears, the frozen earth shook beneath my boots. The shadows swallowed them again.

The Siren's scream dragged on, tearing the sky apart, until another massive flash of lightning illuminated the heavens. Glowing violet blood dripped from her body, her six wings slowing. A crimson butterfly hovered right next to them.

They began to fall, drifting lower and lower, a tangle of armor and iridescent wings, until they were just above the treeline.

"You..." her broken voice echoed into the wind. Her body went limp.

The storm disappeared. The miasma receded, evaporating into the air, and the bruised world shifted into a golden light. The Siren released him as they both crashed into the deep snow, her body tumbling away across the ice.

I charged forward, throwing myself to my knees in the deep snow. My heart broke into pieces as his fading golden eyes found mine. A pool of dark blood was spreading underneath his shattered armor. I slammed my hands against his torn side, trying to hold him together, but his hot blood poured out, soaking through the leather of my gloves.

The air in his lungs crackled with a wheeze. I pressed down harder, my freezing hands slipping. “No, you're the leader. You don't get to die. Mikaeus…please.”

"I… I kept my promise," he choked out. The tiredness that had always haunted his gaze drew even deeper into his soul. His trembling, blood-stained hand reached up, his weak fingers grasping at my wrist.

My throat constricted—it made every breath a struggle. Realizing the fight was lost, I let my hands relax against his side. He understood what was coming, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

My fingers curled into a fist as his eyes held mine—a desperate gaze I had seen over and over again. The vibrant gold in his eyes faded away, bleeding out until they turned blue. The fiery red of his hair dissipated, lifting off him and fading like smoke into the winter sky, as his hair turned black. He still looked like the man I knew, but different. Is this the real him?

His fingers tightened around my wrist one last time. Above the treeline, a dragon's cry ripped through the air—an earth-shaking roar of despair that echoed my own heart.

The chaotic world fell into a sacred silence as the sun climbed higher over the horizon, painting the sky with a beautiful pink and orange glow. The warm rays of the rising dawn kissed our skin. A peaceful smile formed on his bloodied lips as he stared up into the light, the colors reflecting in his new, crystal blue eyes.

"It’s beautiful," he whispered. His eyes shifted back to mine and then the sunrise.

He took one last, strained breath, and his broad chest fell, never to rise again. His unblinking gaze remained locked onto the only sunrise he would ever see. His grip relaxed. His hand slipped from my wrist, dropping lifelessly into the snow.

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