The Usurper's Throne

19

"Are you sure you will be okay?" Elijah asked after we were finished training.

"I'll be okay. Thank you. It's always easier when I'm around someone who...cares about me," I admitted. "Speaking of, I should go back to Damien."

Elijah handed me my water bottle. I grabbed it and turned to walk out of a portal, but Elijah didn't make one.

"Elijah?"

"Damien doesn't care about you," he blurted out. He took a deep breath. "He doesn't care. He is obsessed. He loves you like an alcoholic loves brandy."

"Flattering," I retorted, turning back to him.

I could see Elijah doing calculations in his head. "What has Damien told you about the elementals?"

I shifted on my feet. This is what I wanted to know about all along. I had focused so much on my training, reveling in my newfound strength, I had forgotten my original mission: finding out what Damien was hiding from me. "The gods? He's trying to free them."

"Ah, so Damien has shared the propaganda story. They are not gods. They are just elementals. A couple hundred years ago, the elemental of darkness, perhaps my great-great-great-great grandfather, imprisoned the other elementals. Eventually, they grew old and weak. Their bones settled into their prisons and fell asleep. All except the line of my father.

"However, the gift did not pass to my father. He felt so betrayed that he cast out the old magic. If he could not wield it, no one could. My father never received the gift. His little brother, my uncle, did. Both my father and my uncle were impotent in different ways. My uncle could not have a child, so he passed the gift along to me. He trained me in the old magic for years, but only recently passed it along. It has come in handy numerous times. There are many times it is best not to be seen."

"So, what does Damien want?" I asked. "He can use the old magic, but he can't be an elemental. Or, at least, that's what he told me."

Elijah sighed. "Damien found the elemental of light. He has been feeding off him, stealing his magic of illusion. Damien has old magic and has the gift to stop werewolves from shifting. My father does not stand a chance."

"He wouldn't," I said quickly."Feed off an elemental? That would be wrong." I thought back to Leviathan.

When I looked at Elijah, his eyebrows were raised skeptically. "He's been feeding off of you," Elijah said. "Surely you've noticed that?"

I ignored him.

"You haven't?" he asked in shock. "Can you not see the magic escaping you? I see the golden trails coming off your arms whenever he is around you. How can you not see—?" A realization dawned on him. "Illusions. He is hiding the magic with an illusion. He must be taking more from the light elemental than I thought."

I shook my head. "Even if he were, the elementals have been unfairly trapped for hundreds of years. So, if he is using one to help free them...could it just be means to an end?" I faded off. This was all too confusing.

"Damien will kill the light elemental as well as my father. Because the light elemental's children have all passed into death, Damien will claim the right to the magic as Wereking. He will become the light elemental. Then, he will free the others."

"Why is that bad?" I asked.

"Naomi, why do you think my however-many-greats-grandfather trapped the other elementals?"

"Power."

Elijah shook his head. "The elementals were planning to kill humanity. They thought them unfit to share space on this planet. To save the humans, my ancestor bound them up and killed himself. He thought he would end it all. The only problem was that his wife was newly pregnant, so the gift continued. Damien intends to become an elemental and kill all of humanity."

My jaw went slack. "No," I said, stumbling backward. "You're lying. Why would he do that?"Damien was strange. He had problems for sure. But...a murderer? A mass killer?

Elijah just looked at me. "You only see the version of Damien that he wants you to see. He is stealing magic from the greatest illusionist in the universe. What you saw of Leviathan was only the tip of the iceberg of the chaos and evil Damien intends. Don't get me wrong; Damien will not let you be harmed; marking you has only added to his obsession, but you will carry the blood of billions on your hands."

My heart was pounding in my chest.

"You will be free from danger, but you will never be free from him."

I shook my head, trying to understand. "Damien said that your father killed his parents."

Elijah winced. "I wish I could deny that outright, but my father is likely not worth defending."

Then, I began to piece together several fragments. "You are the elemental of darkness. Damien is stealing the elemental of light magic. Did any of the others ever...escape?"

Elijah sighed.

"Elijah, what am I? Really? Why am I the focus of Damien's...obsession?"

He glanced up. "When my uncle was younger...before my father had me, my uncle was far more idealistic. He thought my father was being too harsh. He thought if he showed him how kind another elementals could be, maybe my father would change his mind and allow the old magic. So, he found the god of sky. Aerie held the deepest magic; if anyone were to still be awake, it would have been him. Aerie was chained deep in the crevasse of a mountain. My uncle spent a year warming his up with his magic. Finally, my uncle broke him free."

A shadow of shame crossed his face.

"Aerie was—mad. Angry and insane. He nearly killed my uncle and flew away with his golden wings. He was the only werewolf who did not shift into a wolf. Almost a year later, my uncle was traveling through the forest and caught the scent of his winged friend. He chased the scent down only to find Aerie dead just outside an old cabin. He heard crying inside, so he went in. He found a young woman dead on the ground. She had been cuffed to the floor. Aerie...was desperate for an heir. He needed an heir so he could finally pass his gift and rest. So, he found the nearest woman and...made an heir. He kept her trapped, but when he died, she couldn't get any food or water. She had tried to tear her leg off to escape. She was desperate, but she lost too much blood—" Elijah realized that he was sharing too many details.

"The cries he heard were from a baby. A baby girl. She should have been dead, but her mom fed her as long as she could. Until death. My uncle took the baby and dropped her off at the nearest pack. No one was the wiser."

I took a deep breath.

A fluttering sensation began in my chest.

"What pack?"

For a few seconds, I thought he was going to ignore me.

"What pack?" I asked again.

He glanced up at me sadly. "Redwood."

My mother was dead. I felt tears well up. I had always dreamed that somehow my mother was alive and had made a mistake, that she would come from me. There was no chance.

I was an elemental.

"Naomi," Elijah said. "I'm so sorry."

With that, I sobbed into his arms.