Behind the Lace and the Lies

4 - Broken Vows

She stood frozen, her hands betraying her as they failed to call forth fire. She swallowed, her throat shifting against the blade. She stepped back, but I followed her; she was trapped anyway.

My hand no longer trembled; the shakiness in my legs was gone. Finally, I was so close.

"There's crimson sand in the necklace, isn't there?" she asked. I could hear the challenge in her voice, but beneath that, a quiver revealed her fear.

"I have no interest in dying by phoenix fire. It's an easy way of repressing your magic," I replied.

Her eyes darted down to the knife. "You wouldn't. You wouldn't break your oath for this, whatever this is."

"I cannot break my oath if I have no magic." I didn't know if that was true – I could feel the pressure of what I was doing tugging at me, a heaviness in my arm that wanted to lower the knife, to shed no blood. But I wasn't going to hurt her, it was only a threat, an act fueled by desperation.

Althea's face hardened. "I don't know what you think Kieran did to you, but I can assure you that you're mistaken. Whatever's wrong with your magic has nothing to do with either of us."

"Sit," I demanded, guiding her to the chair behind her. Knife still pointed at her, I pulled ropes from my bag. "Tie yourself up."

"Karianne. This is ridiculous, Karianne," Althea said. "You won't kill me, you know what it would mean for the rest of the world. Without me, there isn't the seven, without the seven, there isn't the destined one, and without them, there won't be anyone to save us when the worlds collide. You can't do this. Not over something as stupid as revenge."

"Then don't make me. Tie yourself up." My voice was flat, hiding the emotions swirling within me. Althea reluctantly took the rope, restraining her first arm and I finished the second, checking to make sure they were tight. I lifted her hair aside to tighten and knot the necklace around her neck, ensuring that it would take forever to remove. I placed a second crimson sand necklace on a second chair beside the door.

"Kieran's going to come looking for me," Althea said.

I perched on the table behind her, knocking aside some war figurines on an elaborate map. "I plan on it," I replied. He would be here soon, Althea had already been gone for some time, and there's no way he wasn't tracking her.

The room plunged into an unsteady silence, only broken by Althea's erratic breathing and the ceaseless pounding of my heart. The lone candle flickered, plunging the room into darkness, only to restore it to light.

I heard him coming far before he ever arrived, the distant rhythmic thump of footsteps against the ground. Althea heard not long after me, I could see it in the way she straightened her back and anxiously peered at the door. I shifted closer to Althea, knife at her neck once again.

The door swung open and Kieran stepped in.

War. Light. The battlefield stretching endlessly onwards. He abruptly stopped, his dark cloak billowing around him. The shock on his face quickly transformed to a quiet, thoughtfully contained rage.

"Don't use your magic. If I, even for the briefest moment, sense anything, I will not hesitate to kill her. Put on the necklace sitting on that chair there," I demanded. I could feel the pounding of my heart in my neck, my head, my fingertips.

I could see the spilt second in which he completely assessed the situation, but it didn't matter how much he thought about it. He couldn't, and he wouldn't risk Althea, the last phoenix. His lips pressed into a firm line and eyes simmering with hatred, he placed the necklace around his neck.