Heart [ON HOLD]

Chapter 11: Familiar Stranger

We were like strangers who knew each other very well.
- Unknown

She woke with a gasp to a stranger standing over her, using a familiar name.

"Cora."

Cora screamed. The stranger yelled as he was thrown backwards by an invisible wave.

She scrambled onto her knees, whipping her head around. She was still inside the circle of stones inside the ruins of the castle, but now it was daylight. And now there were more things trying to kill her. Cora's fingers fumbled for the knife. She found out on the ground and brandished it out in front of her, holding on with both hands.

Cora jumped to her feet.

"Stay away!"

Her voice was magnified by an unseen power and her heartbeat slammed through the air, vibrating the ground beneath her feet.

She rocked on her feet, a buzz in her head and her blood cold. Her vision darkened from standing up so fast. The ground boomed with each beat of her heart.

"What's going on? What's happening?"

"Cora!"

More voices. Cora blinked away the haziness and found more strangers on the edge of the circle, but none of them daring to cross into the stones. They were all short, only waist height on Cora. One stood in front of the others wielding gleaming battle axe. The one who had been thrown out of the circle was on hands and knees. It was this one who was saying her name.

"Cora, you need to calm down."

Cora pointed the knife at him, keeping one eye on the others at the same time.

"Who are you? How do you know who I am?"

The dwarf got to his knees and slowly raised his hands into the air.

"Cora, I need you to step out of the circle."

"I'm not going anywhere until you tell me who you are and how you know me."

Her voice was echoing louder and louder. A wind picked up, buffeting her hair into her eyes and slamming into the dwarves. Lines on the ground beneath her began to glow white and she gasped.

The dwarf looked panicked now.

"Cora, get out of the circle!"

The runes on the knife seared orange and it tugged at her arm of its own volition.

Screaming images flashed at lightning speed across her mind. Red hair, a sword, a beating heart, a wave of shadows. A mirror, a scream, roses dripping blood, a fairy, a dwarf, the Wolf, the Queen, and four words echoing over and over: The Ace of Hearts, the Ace of Hearts, the Ace, the Ace, the Ace, the-

A vice closed around her wrist and a burst of light tore her out of the visions. Cora's mouth was frozen open, lilac eyes staring into ones consumed by glaring white. The dwarf's lips were moving at the speed of light. Blue runes flashed across his palm a faster than lightning. Cora couldn't move, couldn't speak, couldn't even breathe or blink. And then the dwarf was dragging her out of the circle, the spell broken.

The second Cora fell out of the circle everything slammed into silence. She collapsed back to the dirt, panting for air. The dwarf released her arm and put his hands on his knees, breathing even heavier than Cora.

"Valkryn, are you alright?"

"Move, Savar. Move. Let me see my apprentice. Valkryn, what happened?"

"I- just- just give me...a minute."

"Roto, go get his stone for him."

"Yes sir."