“No.” The tip of my fusion blade drooped to the ground. The more I understood about the world, the more I hated it.
“You see it now,” the woman said, her voice low and calm.
The Lost in my cottage had insisted I’d guided them back when I’d healed my core and become the first of a new generation of Eclipse Warriors. If that was true, then they’d planned for that to happen.
Somehow, the Lost had crippled me before I was born. They’d forced me into the misery I’d suffered. That’s why my core was veiled. They didn’t want anyone to know what I was.
“Tycho did this,” I snarled. He was the veil’s creator. Zephyr had told me as much.
“He helped, but he was not the architect of this plan,” First said dismissively. “His veil hid you, and the others, from discovery. And, of course, he pushed you harder than the rest. Perhaps that is why you were the first to manifest.”
The first...
There were other people out there, kids like me with broken cores and ruined lives. And none of them had gotten as far as me. Their lives must be horror shows.
“The Empyreals killed your people,” I said. “But what you did to me was worse. You stole my life and gave me pain. You turned me into a slave before I was even born.”
“Pain is the crucible of greatness,” First said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “You are better for what you have experienced. And, now, you will be a king. A truly perfect warrior with the power of an Eclipse warrior and the soul of a pure Empyreal. We will, of course, have to cull the others, but that is a detail you will not have to concern yourself with.”
“You’re lying,” I shouted at her. My mother would never have agreed to this insanity. She wouldn’t have let her own child be turned into a monster. She was kind and good. She’d sheltered me through my life, she’d taught me how to fight. “I’m not like you.”
“I know what you are,” First insisted. “When your mother’s husband told us of our betrayal, I knew what had to be done.”
The spirits started restlessly behind the warriors, and the woman’s companions watched her with nervous eyes. It was clear they didn’t want her to tell me this part of the story, and even clearer that she didn’t care. She wanted me to join her, and this was her chance to convince me that I should.
“There was no way to save all of our people,” First continued. “They’d already rounded up most of us. The only ones who survived the first wave were stationed beyond the Far Horizon. The Lost.”
A trace of sorrow flickered across the woman’s face.
“The Lost knew we wouldn’t be safe on Earth,” she said. “We fled deeper into the world of the Locust Court. We learned how to survive here, how to control our environment well enough to avoid our enemies. It was a terrible life.”
“Then why did you keep fighting?” I asked.
“Because someone had to keep the foolish Empyreals safe, Jace. We had to hold back the darkness.”
“But you’ve brought that darkness back,” I shouted. “You went to all this trouble, only to destroy what you swore to save.”
I had to keep her talking. Soon, the Portal Defense Force would close this gate, and then none of this would matter. We’d be sealed up on this side of the portal, and Earth would be safe.
Unless someone else manifested.
My thoughts raced. I had to get word back to the others that Tycho had to be questioned. He could have a list of the other children with hollow cores. They had to be found, rounded up before they could manifest, because...
That was the kind of thinking that had started all this. I shuddered and hung my head. I didn’t know how I’d gotten here or what I was supposed to do next. If the Empyrean Flame had put me on the board to do something, it should have told me what that something was.
“I never wanted any of this,” I said. “I didn’t want to be an Eclipse Warrior. I just wanted to be normal.”
“Oh, Jace,” she said. “You were never meant to be normal. Your mother will be so proud when she sees what she and I created.”
“You’re lying,” I spat. “My mother didn’t make me like this.”
“This is precisely what your mother wanted,” the woman said. “She’s the one who reverse engineered the Eclipse Theory, Jace. Her husband sacrificed his core so her child could be made.”
Memories from the Manual flooded my thoughts. The New Moon clan, the first Eclipse warriors, were created through a mystical union of a Resplendent Sun and a Thunder’s Children. Two cores made into one.
“He went through the gate alone,” I said. “That’s what was wrong with me. I only had half of his core.”
“Yes,” First agreed. “Now you see. He hated the Empyreals for what they’d done, Jace. He sacrificed himself so you could be made. He gave up his life in service to our vengeance. It took so very long for our plan to come to fruition. Your mother spent so many years hiding to conceal her agelessness while she searched for the answer to save us and a suitable host to bring you into being. You have no idea how hard she fought for all of this. For you.”
My mind ached, and my heart shattered. All the pain, all the suffering I’d gone through, just to bring these monsters back to destroy the world? I couldn’t accept that.
“That isn’t what I am,” I roared. “I’m more than a tool.”
“Of course you are,” First said, her voice soft and strangely comforting. “You are our champion, the first of your kind. You are more powerful than you know. You have only
