Page 61 of Midnight Star

The root barely seems to notice.

From there, Riven and I fall into a rhythm—him using his ice to slow the roots down, me using my air and water magic to push them back. But the more we fight, the more the tree fights back. The roots move faster,stronger, their magic pulsing through the ground with an intensity that makes my head spin.

I put every bit of my training into the fight, but the roots are too big. Too fast.

“Riven, your left!” I scream as a massive root surges behind him.

He spins, blade ready, but he’s not fast enough.

The root catches his sword arm, yanking it back, and his weapon clatters to the ground as more roots wrap around his legs, his waist, and his chest. He struggles against it, trying to free himself, but any attempts at trying to freeze it with his ice magic are futile.

“No!” I blast the roots with a combination of water and air, controlling my magic enough to hit the tree and not Riven.

But they’re unstoppable.

Then, something tightens around my ankle.

A root’s coiling up my leg like a snake, its grip firm and unyielding. I slash at it with my dagger, but before I can land a second strike, another root seizes my wrist, twisting hard enough to make my fingers go numb.

My dagger falls.

More roots surge forward, wrapping around me, pulling me in, squeezing until my breath comes in short, panicked gasps.

I thrash, summoning my magic. But the roots presstighter, their magic sinking into me, like they’re trying to drain the fight from my bones.

I can’t move. Can’t win.

I’m trapped.

But I don’t have tostaytrapped.

I can project. The roots won’t be able to get their grips on me when I’m in my astral form.

My star magic hums in response.

Then, in a heartbeat, I’m standing across the way—out of reach of the roots—watching as my body goes limp in the tree’s grasp.

Sapphire

The roots are everywhere.

Even if I had my dagger, I’d have no chance.

Still, I look around, trying to figure something out. There has to be a gap somewhere. A place where I can use my air magic to pull Riven and me out of the roots and drop us off so we can hightail it out of here and brainstorm another way to get the sap.

“Sapphire!” Riven’s voice is sharp and commanding, startling me enough to stop searching for an escape. “Look at your body.”

I glance down.

“Yourrealbody,” he corrects, rolling his eyes even though he’s currently entangled in roots.

“Right.” I chuckle and look over to my unconscious body across from him.

The roots coiled around it are shifting, their grip softening.

“They’re responding to resistance,” he says. “The more we fight?—”

“The harder they fight back,” I finish as another root shoots through my projected form, the sensation bizarre and disorienting.

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