Chapter One

"Where will you go?" Angelica asked quietly from the doorway. I felt her magic as she approached, but refused to turn around and greet her.

I focused on my backpack, packing what essentials I thought I would need and trying to keep the bag as light as possible. I had a long journey ahead of me and I couldn't be weighed down with those things that weren't absolute necessities.

But that wasn't why I refused to turn around and greet the old woman that offered me sanctuary after my grandfather had been murdered, my brother stolen for evil intentions and my friends captured in the name of a depraved justice. After innocent blood was shed and my life ripped into hopeless shreds of misery, she was the only one left to give me a place to stay and help my body heal.

I took a breath, a long inhale of oxygen, closing my eyes and clasping my trembling hands together to steady them. Those miserable thoughts had become my constant companions, the fuel that fed my purpose. But they were dangerous, the burning passion to find justice for those that I loved teetered too closely to the depths of despair that threatened to swallow me whole.

And, that was why I refused to look at the ancient woman standing in the doorway behind me, radiating with concern and emitting the faintest hint of a magic almost completely lost. She was a reminder of a different life, of the family that I held so dearly, destroyed. She was the talisman of a promised hope gone forever, a symbol of the deepest kind of betrayal.

"To see Silas, to find out what he knows." I shook my head quickly, banishing the thought train before the forbidden name, the source of my betrayal, resurfaced.

"And then what?" Angelica pressed, her voice shaky.

When I found Angelica, weeks earlier, half-buried in bloodied snow, and nearly torn to pieces, I thought I would be saying another goodbye. She was left for dead; the Titans had not even bothered to load her old and broken body onto the prison trucks. And, I was too weak from applying the mark of the Resistance on my neck to be of any use. But then, something happened.

Something I still couldn't explain.

The blue smoke appeared from nowhere. The magical wind from India that fused with my magic months earlier was unexpectedly there, wrapping the near-death woman in its wispy, cobalt folds and lifting her off the ground. I watched on, stunned, but somehow unknowingly in control. When Angelica returned to the cold slush that covered the ground, she was healed.

She was weak, and she lost a significant amount of magic during the battle that night, but she returned from the brink of death by the power of the blue smoke.

"And then I will find my parents," I answered firmly, deciding my course of action exactly at the same time I voiced it aloud.

"Do you think he will know where they are?" Angelica took a careful step into the room, and then walked over to the window looking out towards a wooded area that spread out across the backyard. The trees were still bare, and the remnants of icicles still clung to the stark branches.

When Angelica was finally ready, she suggested we move into Amory's house. I agreed, feeling as though there weren't many other options. But now, with him gone, the house felt more like a ghost town, filled with lost memories and a side of my grandfather I never knew.

I was still recovering from the painful magical ceremony I conducted on myself the night of that fateful battle. I touched my fingers absentmindedly to the still sore imprint on the space of my neck where my jawbone and earlobe met. The imprint had not faded like the other members of the Resistance. Unlike theirs, mine still burned brightly in the sapphire blue that colored my magic.

"I don't know," I replied truthfully. "But it's a start." I turned to her, watching her silently as she stared out into the distance as if waiting patiently for someone to come home.

They weren't coming home.

"It's a place to go," I whispered more to myself than to her. She was nothing but gracious to me, nothing but hospitable in the wake of our shared tragedy. But she had always been kind, even before I betrayed her people.

"And do you know how to find Silas?" she inclined her head to me. The once vibrant violet eyes, now dulled to a deep, purple that burned with heart-wrenching sorrow. I looked away, unable to bear both her pain and my own.

"I'll start at the ruins of Machu Picchu," I cleared my throat, trying to banish the pain that wanted so badly to resurface. I was following Avalon's directions, my lost twin, taken away to be sacrificed. Remembering his name alone was enough to send me over the cliffs of sanity into the abyss of anguish.

"And follow the magic...." Angelica whispered the directions more to herself than to me, as if remembering a conversation held in a different time, a different life. "I will watch after Sylvia." She came back to herself and back to the present.

"Thank you," I said simply, not allowing myself to dwell on my human guardian for a second longer than necessary. I swallowed the anxiety that warned me not to leave her alone, unprotected and vulnerable.

I had begged her to come with me, or at the very least to go somewhere else, somewhere where they couldn't find her, somewhere she would be safe. But she wouldn't listen to me.

Sylvia had been broken with grief at the news of Amory's death and Avalon's capture. She had changed. Something had snapped inside of her that warned me she could take care of herself. A dangerous anger had risen inside of her and I was afraid that she was waiting for them to come find her.

A wave of panic washed over me as I weighed the consequences of leaving her behind, but she insisted. She refused to slow me down on my journey or uproot her life in Omaha. We both knew that this part of my journey must be taken alone, but that did not make doing it any easier.

I was glad that Angelica offered to look after her. The happiness that my Aunt would not be completely alone felt foreign and disturbing. Only two weeks earlier, I almost burst with happiness and now the emotion was altogether banned from my body.

"Do you think they'll come after her?" I asked, my voice shaking in part from fear, the other part unadulterated anger.

"No," Angelica assured firmly, turning to look back out the window.

I knew she was lying, she was offering a false truth to comfort me during the task ahead. I took it, accepted it. I didn't have any other choice but to believe her. I let the lie wash over me and bath me in false comfort. Without it, I wouldn't be able to leave. I wouldn't be able to walk forward.

"I have something for you," Angelica confessed, coming out of deep thought. She left the room for a moment and returned with a stack of papers.

I moved my backpack off the bed and onto the floor, and we sat down together on the single bed that was the only piece of furniture in the room. Her hands were shaking as she shuffled the papers about, looking for the one she wanted to start with.

"This is just," she started, holding the papers up for me to inspect, "some legal documents for you to sign, and an ID, passport and a few credit cards. Amory gave these to me a few weeks ago and asked me to pass them along should anything.... should anything happen to him." A tear fell silently from the corner of her eye onto her wrinkled, ashen cheek.

"Thank you," I muttered, trying not to let her grief affect me. I had to be strong. I took the papers from her and looked at the ID and passport, both listing my age as twenty-one. I turned seventeen yesterday, but barely remembered that it was my birthday. Avalon's, and mine if he was still alive. Trying to stay focused, I cleared my throat, "And what is the rest of this?"

"Bank papers mostly. Amory named you and your brother as the sole heirs to his estate. There is quite a bit in there, it should be plenty to travel with." She pulled a piece of paper from the bottom of the stack.

I sat back on the bed, stunned while staring at the balance to one of Amory's bank accounts. I rifled through the rest of the papers finding numerous accounts to banks all over the world, holding obscene amounts of money and stockholder slips to hundreds of different stocks on all of the big markets.

"What is all of this?" I asked, turning my attention to the different plastic cards that had my name imprinted on the bottom.

"Amory was a very wealthy man," Angelica said softly, as if having to call up courage just to say his name, or speak of his memory. "Most of us are wealthy, I should say, but Amory.... well, he had the advantage of longevity and a knack for investing well. You will not need to worry about money again, my dear. This one," she held up a black key card absent of writing or symbols, "will get you into the Swiss vault. That's where the paintings and artifacts are held. The rest, I think, are just different credit or debit cards. If you use a credit card, the balance is automatically paid at the end of the month, so there is no worrying about that."

I wanted to ask her what would happen if I exceeded the balance of the account, but couldn't even wrap my head around the amount of money at my disposal. I couldn't comprehend spending the total amount in ten lifetimes, let alone in the next few months.

I pulled out my wallet and slipped the cards into the empty slots that only ever housed the one credit card Aunt Syl gave me when I got my driver's license, then tucked my passport inside, as well. After replacing the wallet in my backpack and zipping it closed, there was nothing left to pack. I was ready to go.

"I can hold on to those for you, dear," Angelica took the loose papers back from me and straightened them. "Eden, if you should ever need a place to go, or an ear to listen, I will always be here for you. Always." She turned to me, reaching out for one of my hands with gnarled fingers that were cold to the touch. Her eyes flickered for a moment and I saw the sparkling violet that had once been the light in her eyes, but then it was gone and they settled back into the deep purple of mourning.

"Thank you," I replied with the deepest sincerity, and then braced myself for the conversation I had to have before I could go. "Angelica...." I faltered for a moment, "Angelica, I am truly sorry for.... for everything that happened. I wish that I could.... I hate that.... You were right...." I couldn't even finish a thought, let alone a sentence and then suddenly I was a broken child in front of the ancient woman that had seen a full cup of suffering in her lifetime.

I let the grief consume me, filling my lungs and then my soul with the breaths only breathed in moments of deep lamentations. I leaned over, resting my head in her lap. She ran her fingers through my hair, comforting me absently, while her own tears stained the back of my head.

"Eden, I don't blame you," she insisted firmly, but still I could not sit up and look at her. "No one blames you. And you shouldn't blame yourself either. What happened was a tragedy of the worst kind, but it was not your fault. That man," her voice broke from barely concealed rage, "that king, has done this before and he will do it again. He has no regard for the sanctity of life or for his people. What you need to do now is not cry over circumstances that cannot be changed, but succeed. Go on, child, and win this war. The future of your people is left in your hands and you alone hold the keys to a kingdom without the scars of this life. You can save us. You can vindicate your grandfather's death and restore the magic. But no more tears, no more wallowing in self pity. Move forward; find the strength to carry on."

I sat up and looked at her. The tears stopped flowing and my cheeks started to dry. She was right. I must remember the importance of this mission.

"You're going to want to keep this covered though," she touched the glowing tattoo of the snake curled around and eating its own tail. It was the symbol of the Resistance, of the rebellion that was reduced to this old woman and me.

"I did it wrong, didn't I?" I moved my fingers through my long, black, tangled curls, pulling them over my shoulder and into a side ponytail, covering the blue ink.

"Well, yes." she smiled, the hint of humor playing in her dark eyes. "I still don't understand how you were able to mark yourself. You must have been quite determined," she mused, referring to the painful process of administering the mark. Resistance inductees were always strapped down and unable to move so the process could be completed without them lashing out due to the severe pain the process caused. I was not like the other inductees; I did it to myself, all by myself.

"I was," I agreed. "I still am."

"Good." She kept her smile, but her eyes turned hard again. "Remember, if you need anything, I am only a phone call away."

"Thank you Angelica, thank you for everything," I whispered, genuinely.

"Be careful." She ignored my gratitude and walked me to the front door of Amory's house.

I nodded in response and walked through her door, across the porch and out into the warm sunlight of a cold February day. There was still snow on the ground at the beginning of February, but the days were getting warmer. Soon, Omaha would be embracing spring, a season I wouldn't experience. I was off to South America, off to find a lost colony of Shape-shifters, off to search out my parents, and off to avenge the injustices not only my family suffered, but my people.

I was going to fulfill a promise I made and burn this kingdom to the ground.