Amber & Ashes

*** This is the conclusion, told from Kye’s POV, to the Kye & Rose saga I started back in “Brown Eyes.” There is more to what’s written here, but I figured it was an appropriate moment to wrap this up here as the full novel has finally been published!! Some fragments have been stylized to fit our weekly prompts, so if anyone is particularly interested in seeing this story through, please find my Discovery page here: https://reedsy.com/discovery/book/vision-through-my-brown-eyes-martha-kowalski .

Thank you to everyone who has followed Kye & Rose’s journey over the last few weeks and for your helpful feedback along the way – much appreciated!! ***

“Whoa!”

I skid to a halt at the last second, stopped by survival instincts and a wall of heat. Behind me, I hear the monster still barreling through the tunnel, blocking off my exit and cornering me in what seems like the inside of a very evil volcano. The stream abruptly takes a near vertical drop, like a waterfall cascading down until it pours into a pool of — fire.

Holy hell, a tar pit ablaze in literal hellfire. Three spires rise out of the boiling magma and form the bare bones of a door.

The Hellgate.

“Oh my God.”

I’m stunned speechless.

A new sheen of sweat drenches me then instantly dries up in the scorching heat, leaving my skin itchy. I crouch down as close to the brink of the ledge as I dare, peeking down. Swatting away the plumes of acrid smoke curling up from the pit, I glance around. Summoning a beam of light, I try to point it through the smog like a flashlight but end up pulling back when the sting coats my throat, inhaling too much ash. Eyes watering, I cough dryly as I start to back up and give myself some space and fresher air to think, well aware I’m running out of time and escape routes when the arid, crumbly rocks chip under me as a heavy thump smacks into the ground near me. I leap out of the way as I feel my foot slip and almost crash right into the source of the rumble.

“Oh f-”

The hulking, scaly demon looms over me, catching up to me faster than I expected.

I begin to tap into my magic but need to dart out of the way as the monster veers straight at me. I lose my concentration and aim, the blast ricocheting off the rock walls, sending more chunks of stone plummeting into the pit, sending up embers and tar when they splash in.

The foolish glance over my shoulder is enough distraction for the monster to gain the upper hand. It sweeps my feet out from under me with its reptilian tail, and I land hard on my stomach. Horror freezes the blood in my veins despite the heat as flashbacks to the demon that possessed me before overwhelm me.

The dirt under my fingernails I can’t summon the strength out of.

The weight of the monster on my chest.

Rose’s voice crying to me.

The utter helplessness and certainty of death before it turned me into something equally bad.

I’m not leaving you alone, ever.

The power of that promise propels me up.

Rolling out of the way, I spring back to my feet and deliver a kick to the monster’s back, causing it to stumble as I snatch up the wand I dropped in the struggle, planting it in the monster’s shoulder. The demon dissolves into dust, but not before getting in one last swing at me while still corporeal, and that hit knocks me back uncontrollably. I slam against a wall, smacking my head so hard that I lose contact with my body as I tumble down a sharp, rugged slope. Nothing to break my fall or catch myself on, I barrel into the hellpit.

By some miracle, I manage to snag an arm around a better-defined rock, stopping my descent where I can already feel the lick of the flames singeing the edges of my clothes.

With the last ounce of my strength, I haul myself up to the flatter part of the rock, my muscles screaming in pain as my voice joins them. My arms give out the moment I’m up. Blood trickles from my elbow, and my jeans are shredded at the knee. My entire body is battered from the fall, my head throbbing.

Panting hard, I let my face fall into the dirt and ash, exhausted.

No amount of time will help me recover so after only a few more moments, I push myself up, slicking my sooty hair back and taking in my surroundings. I seem to have fallen down a sort of very rudimentary staircase, the steps uneven and eroded but I’d unmistakably landed on a … landing.

“Well, I’ve heard of Stairway to Heaven,” I mutter to myself, frowning at its evil counterpart. Guess it makes sense if not all demons can fly out.

Using the wall for support, I stand up with a sway, figuring it’s a concussion sending my vision into a carousel but nope, the ground under my feet does, in fact, start rippling and crumbling, rumbling violently. Rocks break off from the ledges, fire and tar and magma sloshing from the pit and onto the lower stairs.

My feet fly off the stairs barely before the slabs of stone plummet into the pit. The last step starts giving way under my weight, and I feel the ground pulled out from under my feet right before I can get a good grip, dangling on the ledge.

Oh God, panic jolts through my fingers, making them spasm and lose my hold as I feel the smolder of the hellpit directly below me. An incredibly sharp piece of rock from the ledge pierces into my abdomen, making me writhe in pain, and my grip falters even more. I bite the inside of my cheek to try to push through the sting, clinging for dear life.

Desperately kicking and clawing, through excruciating pain, I heave myself up and over the ledge. Once up, I flop on my back, trying to hit pause on my life playing out before my eyes as my breath comes in short, sooty wheezes. Each muscle of my body feels shredded as I force myself to my feet.

I want to take at least a second to recover, but the quaking still hasn’t stopped, and now shadowy figures begin manifesting out of thin air — actually, very thick, dense, smoky air.

Demons.

Oh great.

A deep fissure splits the ground in two, separating the exit and me and knocking me off my feet with its force. I end up stumbling into the oily creek, the water-like substance definitely an acidic poison, soaking through the denim of my pant leg and eating away at my flesh. Biting down on my lip so hard I taste metal and blood, I fight through the agonizing pain, glad it didn’t splash onto my face instead. It’s a very dim bright side, but I’ll take every silver lining I can get, not allowing myself to get distracted by the crippling limp as I drag myself onto solid rock. I spring into action, ignoring the pain in my leg as it joins the rest of my body, kicking a creature back into the crevice and punching out another, creating a clear path for me to reach the tunnel exit.

Another violent quake rattles the ground, the worst one yet. Debris pours from above, a chunk of stone smashing into my shoulder that I glance over when I hear a piercing screech.

A birdlike creature rises up from the hellpit, made of tarred feathers, soot, and ash — like a wretched version of a phoenix.

It opens its beak.

Oh, yep. Yep, yep, of course it spits fire.

I dive down, the fireball exploding against the rocks above me. Blazing chunks of stone that are now on freakin’ fire rain down, and I cover my head. A razor-sharp ember scrapes and sears my cheek. The sting is nearly unbearable, the skin sensitive and the scratch severe, making tears well up in my eyes. Quickly, I blink them away and I hurl back my own light at the creature, buying me the time I need to reach the cave exit. But before I can duck into the tunnels, literally all hell breaks loose.

The primordial power of all these monsters — including the pyromaniac phoenix — charges forward, like a fiery tidal wave, reducing everything to ash, sensing escape like a shark smells blood in the water. The force knocks me off my feet, sending me flying into a wall, nearly bashing my head in. I nearly crack my skull a second time when I can’t get my brain to connect with my arms to reach out and break my fall, and I slam into the rocky ground facefirst. The darkness filming over my vision isn’t one from the lightless and dusty tunnel but one that would definitely concern a neurologist.

Battered, bruised, nearly broken — probably broken in multiple places, actually — I can barely move, can barely see straight. It hurts to breathe.

Darkness swims and swirls in my vision, punctured only by flares of fire that all merge together in smoke. I can’t find oxygen in the smoke … so I think I don’t breathe at all.

I can feel myself slipping away.

It’s over. I’m so tired. It’s a totaled type of tired.

With my last ounce of existence, I press my palms into the Earth.

From dust, to dust. From dirt, to dirt. The Earth and I become one, I feel the energy fuse between my skin and the soil.

All I am conscious of are streaks of amber light like halos flitting across my vision, bursting in my eyes like supernovas, tearing apart everything in their paths, making a path for me.

And suddenly-

The Earth moves.

It shifts and bends and molds to my will, shattering apart and fusing together at my command.

Power beyond what the Earth can handle.

I feel the familiar amber ribbon of light and power unravel within me, rushing through my broken bones and bloodstream with a hushed, coaxing whisper.

Don’t you remember me? it murmurs to me, its silky voice like a caress inside my bruised brain and spent soul. Don’t you remember yourself? I’ve been with you this whole time, waiting for you to recognize me, waiting for you to recognize yourself and the power you have.

That’s what’s inside me.

That’s what makes the walls cave in, the ground fracture, the landslide trigger, ruining and recreating everything I touch.

That’s what finally shuts and seals off the Hellgate.

My hands tremble and slacken, losing my grip on reality, but I feel the comforting embrace of the amber magic holding on to me in a limbo in a place where the walls between magic and materiality break down, where tales become truth, and where fantasy is fact, a place between amber and ashes.

Stay with me? I say, ask, plead, beg – I don’t know, all I know is that I don’t want it to ever leave me.

With a fierce conviction, the amber voice answers reassuringly, You never even have to doubt that.