Embers of the Lost

“What?” Lily breathed.

The image of herself was blurred at the edges and the eyes were a darker grey compared to her silver, it’s expression harsh and judgmental. But, it was definitely her.

Reaching out a hand, she found that her arm moved straight through the image and it dispersed into thin air.

“What was that?” Lily frowned. Shaking her head, she glanced up to the sky to determine which way they were travelling. Now she had to get Oscar and Kiki back along with Tanith and Xalina.

Struggling with the metal cuffs, Lily grumbled at them before sealing ice around them and freezing them until the joints cracked and broke.

“You’re so pathetic.”

Lily’s image was back, looking at her with disgust. Lily couldn’t describe just how unnerving it was to be watched by your own eyes, but it wasn’t something she enjoyed at all. Waving her arm through the image it vanished again. Had one of the witches cast some spell on her when she had been falling? Perhaps one that made her see things? Shrugging it off, she had more important things to worry about than images that weren’t real.

Taking a step in the direction the witches had been carrying them, another image appeared.

“I’m so disappointed in you.” Her mother looked at her with betrayal in her eyes. “How could you choose witches over your own family?”

Another wave of her arm made that vanish too.

It wasn’t true, she hadn’t chosen anyone over anyone else. She was just trying to help. Just trying to save those she loved.

“I should never have helped you escape…” her father’s voice made her spin around to face his image.

“You’d never say that.” Lily stated firmly before dismissing that image as well.

Was this really a spell? Surely the caster would need to be close to keep it going.

Stepping over a larger crack in the ground, her face appeared again. Every step, another face, another comment, another criticism. They cycled through faces who had always criticised her.

“Useless.”

“Freak.”

“Abomination.”

They also started to provide unwanted advice and conclusions.

“Just give up.”

“Nobody wants you.”

“Accept your death.”

“No one will help you.”

“No one will save you.”

“No one could love you.”

Dealing with those faces was achievable, Lily had been doing it all her life. Even if she believed them, it did not stop her from taking the next step.

It was whenever her parents’ images appeared that she faltered. When Jared appeared with a sneer telling her how much just being nice to her had ruined his life. He told her of all the consequences he faced from his mother and how it was all Lily’s fault. Her parents told her how they were outcasted by their kind as well and it was Lily’s fault.

The only time the images stopped showing up was when Lily’s movements stopped.

Lying on the ground, hours after first steps over the cracked ground, she found silence… but it wasn’t the peaceful silence everyone wanted. The world around her was silent, but the phrases and the echoes of the images repeated in her mind over and over.

“It’s not real,” she muttered to no one as she covered her head in her arms and curled up into a tight foetal position as if that would protect her.

The images and voices continued for days.

Lily wasn’t sure how many, but she knew she had slept at least twenty times by the time she really started to feel grated by the words.

Every time she grew some food or drew water from the ground to survive, she was plagued by a barrage of voices telling her not to bother, or that the food was poison, or that she should just turn around and lock herself up for good. Every step she took she was reminded of her failures, of how pathetic she was and how unwanted she was by every fairy in her past.

“Shut up,” she whimpered after her mother had told her just how terrible it had been birthing an abomination. “I’m a good person.”

“Liar.” The new voice caused Lily to freeze in her steps forward, steps which had steadily gotten more shaken and considerably slower. Dia scowled at her on her left. “Because of you, I have my failure etched onto my skin.

“You’ve destroyed our lives!” Xalina appeared to the right. “We’re all going to die and it’s because of you.”

“We were supposed to be your friends.” Tanith appeared beside Xalina. All of them were scratched up and beat down, bruised and bloodied by the effects Lily had brought into their lives.

“No…” Lily shook her head, stumbling backwards and drawing up the images and voices of her parents again.

“Stop. I’m not…” Not what? She was a failure. She was the reason Dia had been hurt. She was the reason Xalina and her people had been raided and captured. She was the reason Oscar and Kiki were now locked up. How could she know that her parents weren’t suffering punishment because of Lily’s escape? Perhaps they too would come to hate her for the pain she had caused.

“I just want to help…” tears brimmed her eyes and clung to her pale eyelashes.

“Stupid.”

“Idiot.”

“Fool.”

Lily stopped her movements to make the voices vanish. Only when silence hit her ears and ringing echoed in her mind did she allow those tears to fall to her cheeks. She didn’t want to take another step. She didn’t want to hear anymore. Every day the scenery stayed the same. It was a barren, cracked wasteland that she was stuck in. It seemed endless.

Sitting on the ground and glancing up at the fading light of the day’s sky, Lily attempted to calm the tears. She didn’t even know if she was still going in the right direction. How could you see as far as the horizon and yet feel completely trapped? The moment she stood up and took another step those voices would be back. Though who would it be next? Herself, her friends, her family… all options were enough to make her curl up on the floor in the attempt to rest again.

Every time period between sleep was getting shorter. Each day she could cope with less. After several more sunsets, she walked with a stumble, arms waving in front of her with every step to try and counter the ghosts of her anxiety.

“You can’t succeed.”

“You’re just a child.”

“You’ve abandoned us.”

“I hate you.”

“You’ll never be loved.”

“Shut up… shut up!” Lily mumbled breathlessly. Her tears had dried up. How many days had gone by since that had happened? When had her tears given way to hopelessness in her silver eyes? The voices were right. They had to be. They echoed even when they weren’t there. They etched themselves onto her mind and brain. She had failed.

“Bring her back!” The young female draconian whose mother died. “Why did you have to come here?!”

Lily wobbled as she moved past the girl. She had definitely failed that little girl in particular.

“And any other draconian who lost someone that day,” she reminded herself out loud.

“If you hadn’t come to us, we would still be safe.” The face of the Dregana hissed at her.

“I know.”

“Tanith will be tried as a traitor now they know she was with us.” Xalina spat. “It’ll be your fault if she dies!”

“I know.”

“We’ll die before the war because you couldn’t keep to yourself.”

“I’m sorry.”

Swaying on the spot, Lily glanced around at the empty world. Her head throbbed with pain from the continuous screaming in her mind. She was sorry. Maybe she should stop. If she laid down here and never got up again then no one else could be hurt by her actions. The voices would stay only inside her head until darkness finally came to take her. She would truly be able to find peace and perfect silence.

She would be free.

Free of criticism. Free of the pain. Free of the heartbreak.

“Breaking you really is too easy.”

Lily opened her eyes to look into the green ones which made her heart leap and seize at the same time. Finnigan smirked at her, his face so close to hers that their noses could almost touch. He whispered to her, his voice the quietest so far, and yet, they stabbed deeper still. “How you could ever think I could love you is beyond me? I mean, come on. You’re pathetic. You cry all the time. You are deformed. You fit in nowhere. You are weak, pathetic and frankly you look weird. As if someone like me could ever hold a flame for you…”

Lily sighed and hung her head where she stood. Finnigan still plagued her dreams, seeing him while awake as well was enough to make her stomach turn.

“Leave me alone.” She grumbled, waving her hand through his body and attempting to walk away. His body vanished for a moment and then reappeared in front of her again.

“I’ll always be with you, Lil.” His voice was venomously sweet. “I took your heart. I am the reason you know what it’s like to be bound and powerless. And I still have your heart, don’t I?” His hand reached out and moved through her chest where her heart was.

“No, you don’t.”

“Oh yes I do. Otherwise you wouldn’t have hope that I’m not that bad because I couldn’t kill you. You wouldn’t dream about me. My face and voice wouldn’t hurt you so much.”

“I don’t love you.”

“Yes… you do.” Finnigan vanished again as she slashed her arm through his body.

“No, I don’t. If anything, I hate you.” Lily snarled, anger and misery twisting together like an ugly parasite that wanted to control her body. She could feel the warmth of her blood rushing under her skin.

“No. You hate yourself.” He retorted, appearing behind her with a dark laugh. “You hate yourself because you know I’m always going to own part of you.”

“Shut up!” Lily yelled, stamping her foot through the legs of the image, creating a seismic shockwave as her foot hit the ground. Dust and rocks shook over the ground for as far as she could see and Finnigan’s image vanished. The ground continued to tremor, crevices altering in size at the movement of earth.

“Did I just…” Lily glanced to her foot with a degree of surprise mixing into the angry pain on her face. That was the Sokaruu spell, the same she had used to create the avalanche to escape Finnigan. This time though, she hadn’t uttered the spell.

Had she just managed witch magic without verbal command… Was that even possible?

“Right. That’s enough.” She growled to herself, taking a step forward and immediately banishing the figure that appeared with water pulled from the ground and moulded into three floating daggers of ice hovering around her body.

Each step was fuelled by anger, even the slightest of movement or sound triggered her hand flicking to guide an ice shard through the image. Prickled plants began to grow by her feet each time one connected to the floor, the growing anger in her mind fuelling them to grow larger and in unpredictable shapes. The orange grass she walked past became scorched while shadows grew around her despite the high sun.

“I will save them.” She commented to herself, slashing another image down that reminded her she was weak. She had to do something to prove to herself that all these voices weren’t right. Desperate for something to like about herself, she pushed on; her magic spilling over in the environment around her helping silence the voices and images quickly. “I have to save them.”

The new mantra kept her going until she finally caught sight of a large building in the distance.

“You’ll get them all killed.” Dia sighed before vanishing with a violent swipe of a thorny branch.

“Shut up.” Lily had no idea what her plan was, but she would not allow them to die. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t. Lily didn’t care how much her body was shaking from the effort of her journey, she would make her legs move whether they wanted to or not.

By the time she could see detail on the structure, the alarm had been sounded and she could see figures standing in windows and around the entrance to the right.

The voices had become constant whispers now, even without images to go with them.

There was so much noise.

Even without the cries of the witches yelling about defence, Lily felt deafened by the sensation.

Flicking her head and hair to try and get rid of the voices, she looked like she had gained a violent twitch.

Drawing water from the ground and the plants growing by her feet, Lily created an ice shielded to her right side and above as spells were sent her way. They chipped at the ice which just replenished itself.

“Pathetic.”

“Weak.”

Growling at the voices she reached the side of the building and slammed her hand against it. “I’ll show you weak.” Another shockwave rippled from her palm and through the structure, loosening the large stones which were stacked tight and secure.

Vines and ice took advantage of the gaps that were created, pulling the stones apart and filling them with windows of ice which Lily would be able to get through but others couldn’t destroy without threatening the stability of the enlarged structure. As if to prove this, Lily glanced at the witches who ran around the side of the structure to confront her and opened up a hole in the ice window in front of her, stepping through and sealing it behind her.