Page 3 of Midnight Star

“You’re going to try to find Zoey?” I ask, since finding her has always been far less important to him than figuring out how to make the potion.

“We can’t give up this opportunity to learn what and where these winged creatures are,” he repeats. “But if we want this one to talk, you’ll need to control your magic. Okay?”

Unexpected warmth flashes through his eyes, and I take a few deep breaths, grounding myself. It’s gone a second later, but I know it was there.

Despite everything, he still cares.

If he doesn’t… I’m not sure I’ll ever recover from the shame burying itself in my soul.

“Okay,” I say, and I force my air magic down, although it fights me every step of the way.

It wants to be acknowledged. To be free. But I can’t release it. Not when Riven’s trust in me is already shattered, the pieces slipping through my fingers like melted ice.

He nods in approval. Then he kneels in front of the dark angel, reaches forward, and grabs her hand.

Ice creeps up her body like crystalline vines, encasing her body from toe to neck. The frozen prison glistens in the dim light, jagged and beautiful in its deadly precision, although her head remains free. Assumedly so she’ll still be able to talk.

She struggles against her bonds, but they hold firm.

“This will do.” Riven stands, gazing down at her as if she’s an animal in a cruel experiment. “Now, let’s see how far we’ll have to go to get her to reveal the truth.”

Sapphire

The dark angel’smidnight eyes glint with defiance as she gives up trying to free herself from the prison of ice.

“Go ahead,” she says, weak but taunting. “Do your worst.”

Riven draws his sword and lets the tip hover near her throat. “Is that a challenge?” he asks, calm and calculating.

Too calm. Too calculating.

I grip my dagger, my fingers trembling, a breeze brushing across my skin.

How far is Riven going to go? How far is hecapableof going? After all, he designed those three trials for me and Zoey—trials designed to break our bodies and minds.

Now, there’s something in the quiet precision of his movements that terrifies me.

“One of your kind took our human companion,” Riven says to the dark angel. “Zoey. Where is she?”

She tilts her head back, laughing softly. “Why waste your time on a human?” she asks. “She’s nothing. Less than nothing.”

“She’s not nothing,” I say, but the dark angel shakes her head and smiles, as if I’m a child talking back to my parent.

Anger rushes through me, and I pull water from the air, splashing it on her face.

Surprise flashes in her midnight eyes, and she laughs again, although she doesn’t use her magic to dry herself off. Which means she’s still weak, from both the blood loss and the relaxation potion.

Riven glances over at me, cool and detached. “Use your air magic,” he says. “Make it hard for her to breathe.”

“I don’t know how—” I start, but he cuts me off.

“Do it,” he presses. “Or do you not care about getting answers?”

The memory of Zoey being flown away by that dark angel plays through my mind—the terror in her eyes, and the pain that’s been eating at me about how she could be dead right now.

If she’s dead, it would be my fault.

Which means I have to step up. I have to do everything I can to find her, even if that means embracing themonster lingering under the surface.

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