Page 61 of Shadowed Spirits

Levi was unphased until Lua mentioned me. He snarls, “You’re no mother of mine, and Isabel is not a curse. She’s the best thing to ever happen to me, so watch your mouth, LuaMater.”

She makes an exaggerated gagging sound. “Ugh. You’re so adorable, I’m going to puke.” She bends over like she’s throwing up over the side of the ledge and tumbles forward. I gasp as she plummets head over feet toward the ground, wondering if it’llreally be that easy to take her out. Unfortunately, she lands on her sandal-clad feet with a crazed giggle.

Wandering over to our group, Lua pokes Levi’s shield curiously. He clenches his jaw, and the tendons in his neck stand out as he struggles to keep it up under her prodding.

Well, that doesn’t bode well for our ability to stop her. If Levi can barely maintain a shield when all she does is poke at it, how in the hell are we supposed to overpower her?

She slowly circles the six of us, tapping her chin thoughtfully. I look around at my mates and see all of them warily watching her like I am.

When she’s finished her inspection, Lua claps her hands excitedly. “So, here’s how it’s gonna go, sport. You’re going to hand yourself over, and I’ll kill you, with only a little light torture first. Then I’ll kill your mates and absorb all your powers. It’s a win-win for everyone. I save time because I have people to kill, things to destroy, worlds to take over, and you get to contribute to a cause bigger than anything your pathetic mortal self could ever hope to be.”

I roll my eyes. Like Doyle, she’s horrible at persuading me to do what she wants. “Hmm, how ’bout you go fuck yourself instead? How did you even know we were going to be here?”

Lua lets out a long-suffering sigh. “How did I know? Because I know everything!” she screams, the shrieking sound hurting my eardrums. Her chest heaves as her bloodred eyes dart around before she closes her lids and composes herself. “I knew the moment you killed the mage and shattered my protection charms that you had finally womaned up and decided to meet your destiny. It was adorable watching you scour the six caves. I thought for sure the pesky jaguar shifters were going to kill you, but alas, they took you to their cave to, what, drink tea? Hunt rodents? Play charades?”

My eyebrows raise as I realize she couldn’t see what we did in the cave, so she doesn’t know that we talked with Angerona. I wonder why she couldn’t watch us inLa Esperanza. I don’t know what advantage it could possibly give us, but I feel a tiny bit smug that she doesn’t know quite as much as she thinks she does. “Why were you working with Doyle, anyway?”

She stares at me blankly. “Who?”

I snort. Doyle wasn’t nearly as important to his “partner” as he thought he was if she doesn’t even know his name. “The mage you were working with.”

“Oh, yes, him. Nasty little critter, wasn’t he? And why? Power, of course.”

“What did he do that gave you more power?” I ask.

“Really? You’re the best the fates could send against me? Fine. I’ll hold your tiny, useless mortal hand, since you’re incapable of putting the pieces together.” I would be offended if Lua weren’t an awful person and completely off her rocker. As it stands, her insults don’t rile me the way she hoped they would, if her frown is any indication.

Huffing, Lua continues. “The previous mage head councilor usedcuratools I managed to pilfer when I escaped Tartarus to figure out how to siphon magic from other mages. The only side effect is death for the drained, but we were both fine with that. The mage you killed took it a step further and found a way to steal the innate magic of other species. Shifters, vampires, fae, anyone he could get his hands on was fair game. Thanks to those two, I’ve nearly doubled my power in the last couple hundred years.”

Well, that’s… really not good. She was already almost impossible to stop before, and now she has twice as much power. I also had no idea mages had figured out how to drain other species of their magic. That partially explains all the peoplein cages at council HQ we found, but I think the mages were running additional experiments on the other species.

Even if we can defeat Lua, we still have the colossal problem of the mage council. I don’t believe for a single second that Doyle was acting alone. I’m guessing most of the council was in on it and will continue his experiments even with him gone. We have to stop the rest of the council from getting any more powerful and destroy the knowledge of how to siphon magic. I don’t trust anyone with that knowledge.

That’s not even mentioning the fact that, if any of the other species found out what was happening, we’d have an all-out supernatural war on our hands. While supernaturals aren’t as numerous as regular humans, all of us fighting each other would definitely destroy the planet, no help from Lua needed.

I can feel the panic trying to consume me at the thought of everything we have to fix, but I shove it down. I need all of my focus on Lua right now. “Why did the mages help you? They had to know you’d eventually double-cross them.”

“Hmm, so there is a brain behind that pretty face, after all. Why else? They thought they were getting the majority of the power, only giving the scraps to me at our meets. Unknown to them, I was siphoning the power as they collected it, taking nearly everything the pathetic mages, shifters, vampires, and others had to offer. While each individual’s magic was paltry compared to my innate magic, after four hundred years and tens of thousands of earthlings drained, my power has grown immensely. My sons and their father and the othercuraecan try to imprison me again, but they won’t be able to.” Her voice ends on a growl as I feel magic electrify the air.

Lua’s hair starts whipping around her and her eyes glow an eerie neon red as she starts floating. She hovers there, staring at us with her creepy, sightless gaze for a moment. Her back arches unnaturally as multicolored magic surrounds her untilshe straightens with an audible snap. I wince because there’s no way that was comfortable.

“I’m growing tired of the stalling, sport.” Lua’s voice vibrates with power and echoes around the cave, making shivers crawl up my spine. “You have until three to hand yourself over. After, I won’t be so nice. I’ll kill you after a lot of torture. It matters not to me which you choose, however. One… two… three.”

After she says one, Lua sends a punch of multicolored magic at our shield. I expect it to bounce off or leave a few cracks. What I don’t expect is for it to shatter the defensive dome and knock Levi unconscious. I don’t have time to focus on Levi on the floor, because Lua darts toward me with superhuman speed, so fast I can barely even see her.

I throw up a dome, hoping against hope it will go up before she grabs me. As much as I enjoy getting tortured by an insanecura,I really don’t. Squeezing my eyes shut, I brace for the collision. Instead of being hit straight on, I’m shoved to the side. I snap my eyes open right as my shield flickers into place.

I look around, trying to figure out what happened when I hear Lua cackling above.

“Archer!” I scream when I see him dangling from her grip. She’s holding him on the ledge she was first perched on. Her hands are now tipped with bloody claws that she digs into his throat. Crimson droplets run down his tanned skin to soak his teal shirt. He must’ve pushed me aside right as she came for me, saving me but sacrificing himself.

Without any thought, I’m lunging forward, trying to get to my sunny boy. Strong hands grab both of my arms, holding me back. I struggle against the iron grips until I’m breathless. “Let me go,” I growl.

“She’ll kill him as soon as she has you, wildcat,” Luca rasps in my ear.

As his words sink in, I stop struggling. He’s right. I’m the one she wants. She’ll just kill Archer as soon as she gets her hands on me. Luca and Cain reluctantly release me when it’s clear I’m not going to try to charge at Lua, but the two of them and Bishop huddle around me. Levi is still unconscious, so getting Archer free is really up to me. I’m the only one withcuramagic that has any chance of going against Lua.

“Let him go,” I call. “I’m the one you want.”

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