Page 50 of Iridian

Even so he winked to try to calm me down.

I love you,I thought.“Through summer breezes,” I said.

“Through fucking hurricanes, baby,” he said.

Then we began to chant at the same time.

We knew very well who we were up against. We knew that the chances of us making it out of this fight alive were slimmer than ever before, but we still tried with our everything. Just like in the Iris Roe and in the Regah chamber, we fought with every ounce of strength we had, and the magic coming out of us spread around the entire landing, wrapped us in a cocoon.

Hill didn’t spare himself, either. He pushed back the Blackfire magic and the colorful one that came out of me constantly, then hit us with his Whitefire as many times as he could. I called up a new ward on Taland and me first, just as an added layer of protection while Taland attacked Hill, but that didn’t hold for long, and I didn’t get the chance to call for another. Hill was relentless, and he still managed to push us back until we almost reached the side of the mountain again, even though we never stopped chanting. I threw at him every possible spell I knew, short and long, third- and fourth-degree—whatever I had the time to summon. And I wasn’t tired, couldn’t even tell you if my body was weak, because my magic was still buzzing, far from spent, but I thought it wouldn’t be enough. I thought we wouldn’t be able to even put a dent in Hill’s ward.

We did more than that, though.

When he hit us with his magic and slammed us against the rocks, and then to the ground, I had been chanting a spell on the longer side, a magic blast almost as powerful as that with which I’d ruined the Regah screen. There was simply no time to do the same, but I unleashed this one at him when I was still on the ground, and he was on his way to us.

Maybe I finally caught him by surprise because my magic slammed onto his ward and Iheardit when it cracked open, fell to pieces all around him, invisible to the eye. The magic vanished into thin air, and Hill hit the smooth rock on one knee.

Our eyes locked. Blood trickled from his nostrils. His jaws were locked tightly as he held it in—the pain. He had to be in pain.

A tiny bit of that hope I lost came back to me in that moment, and it never left my side again. I stood up, already chanting, and when his magic came at me, Taland’s blocked it by slamming onto him.

It worked. The Blackfire almost knocked him down all the way, something it wasn’t able to do at all until now. Hill’s wards were gone, all of them, and this was our chance.

Taland and I exchanged a quick look, but we both knew what to do next. My bracelet, my magic through it would make the biggest difference here, and if we had a chance against Hill, as crazy as that sounded, we needed to hit him with that magic. So Taland jumped forward and he kept calling for second- and third-degree spells because they were faster, giving me enough time to chant a proper fourth-degree blast like the one I’d used in the Regah chamber.

It didn’t work right away. Hill overthrew Taland’s spells and hit us both with his own, and I ended up on my back another two times. I had to start the spell over for the fourth, and now I was getting pissed off. My magic was getting pissed off, too.

Except the spell was really long—longer still when we were fighting face-to-face with someone who kept throwing magic at us like he didn’t even need to chant at all. And Taland was tired, too. Even though he never stopped moving, never stopped whispering, I could tell he’d gotten just a bit slower, his Blackfire just a bit weaker.

And when I was almost ready to finish that spell for the fourth time, Hill dodged Taland’s spell and was able to hit us both, again, with his own magic.

I ended up on the ground on my side, ready to fucking scream my guts out at the world.

Instead, I forced myself to continue chanting because even though Hill was coming, Taland could keep him away for another moment. Just until I was done chanting. Just until I was fucking done.

Taland did jump in front of him when he aimed his Whitefire at me, with a shield that was so fresh black flames were still dancing on the transparent surface, but the Whitefire shattered it at once. And when Taland fell to his knees for a second, I did make it to my feet as I continued to whisper under my breath, and I ran for him, too.

Maybe I’d lost my fucking mind, and maybe being thrown against rocks had already gotten the last of my patience. Or maybe it was just because he was looking at Taland as he whispered. I had no clue, but I ran for Hill, knowing I still had two whole sentences of my spell to whisper with these jaws that seemed more reluctant to move by the second.

But I was already operating on instinct, and my body knew how to move even if I sometimes forgot that I could fight. That I’d been trained by the best of the IDD. That I’d worked on missions for a year and a half. By some miracle, before Hill could finish whatever spell he had coming next, I managed to spin around with my leg raised and catch him on the jaw with the heel of my boot.

Maybe it was luck. Or maybe Hill didn’t see it coming. Or maybe he was tired—finally—from using all that magic for Goddess knew how long, but he moved to the side and lost his footing and fell on one knee again.

“Move!” Taland called from behind me, and I stepped aside just as his Blackfire flew past me and slammed onto Hill’s chest, taking his breath away.

My bracelet heated, and colorful magic started to slowly appear on my skin. Hill launched himself toward me, and this timeIwas too slow to stop him, too surprised.

His fingers were on my bracelet, trying to pry it from my wrist.

The last word of my spell left my lips in a whisper. I put my hand on his shoulder and screamed.

Colors burst out of me so fast that the energy threw me back. I hit the ragged edges of the rocks at the mountain’s side once more, then slid to the ground on my back. The blast had thrown me at least five feet in the air, and it had done the same to Taland. He was on the ground right next to me, and he was breathing just as heavily, face a mess of blood and bruises, probably similar to mine.

But we were both still alive and aware.

We raised our heads as well as we could to see Hill, moaning in pain, clothes torn and bloody and dirty as he tried to make it to his feet.

He was going to make it if we gave him enough time.

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