Page 53 of When Storms Ruin

“I want to try again,” I insisted.

After everything I had been through, I wasn’t about to let this magic get the better of me. My mother was a powerfulStormshade, and so was I. I would not give up after one storm gone wrong.

“Where is she?” Liss’ panicked voice sounded from the doorway.

“Over here,” Nik called over his shoulder before turning back to me. “We will talk more about this later.”

He stood, my cheek instantly cold where his hand had been. I already missed the sensation of his skin against mine, his steady presence at my side.

Liss took his place, kneeling by my bedside and taking out a medical bag. Instead of being full of bandages and ointments as a typical kit would be, this was filled with herbs and spices. She rested her hands against my good arm, reciting a spell under her breath.

When she removed her hands, my skin was marked with the dark ink of a skin spell, the color already fading from a stark black to a charcoal as it went to work healing my shoulder.

“Can one of you put a kettle on for me? I’ll need it for the tea,” Liss spoke, not bothering to glance their way.

Liss was stoic, but the way her hand shook as she ground the herbs with the pestle told me she was shaken.

They all were.

Nik glanced at Isaac when he didn’t move. “I will not leave her side.”

Isaac groaned, reluctantly getting up to find wherever the kitchen was in this new safe house.

The skin spell took the immediate sting out of the wound, but the deep, throbbing pain remained. Liss created a pastewith the herbs and packed them against the wound, a hiss escaping through my lips. She slathered the poultice on liberally before sitting me up, wrapping the wound with gauze to keep the poultice in place.

I wasn’t sure how long I had slept before, but exhaustion was taking over now. My body needed rest, as did my mind. The amount of magic I had to wield to contain the storm again left me weary.

“She will need to rest,” Liss called over her shoulder, speaking to Nik.

“I’m not leaving. I will let her rest, but I will be by the door.”

He reluctantly pushed off the wall across from me, making his way towards the door as it opened. Isaac shuffled back in with a mug full of hot, steaming water. Liss stirred in a different mixture of herbs and handed me the mug of dark liquid.

“You need to drinkallof this, despite it tasting like dirt,” she instructed, closing up her healing bag.

The first sip almost landed me flat on my back. I think dirt would actually tastebetter, this tasted like…licorice gone bad. I did as she said, draining the mug of hot tea as she propped me up with more pillows.

There must have been another sedative in the tea to help me sleep, because it wasn’t long before I found myself dozing off again.

It was the first time I had met a dreamless, restful sleep in a long, long time.

Ihad spent days healing my shoulder wound in the safety of the townhouse in Dragon’s Hollow, Tess never leaving my side. Zion had come to visit, and I was finally well enough to move around on my own and to touch my magic again. Isaac had insisted we move to the new safe house permanently, but Nik had fought him tooth and nail, not wanting me to be around the other Shades.

We didn’t want anyone else to know my storm had turned on me. The resistance was relying on my storm magic to turn the tides of this war, and if I couldn’t control it, we had no hope of defeating Donika. Fletcher had been spotted near the training field as Isaac suspected. My blast of storm magic had sent out a magical signature so strong it broke the wards and had Donika’s Nightshade soldiers coming for us.

“What do you know about the Noctani?” I asked Zion, sitting up in bed and taking a sip from the mug Tess handed me.More healing remedies from Liss. “It’s only a matter of time before she sends them after us, too.”

“I have to admit I don’t know as much as I would like, I had to leave before I was able to gain too much information. Her mad scientist was onto me, whispering in her ear. Donika had already turned her trust away from me.”

Her mad scientist…that must have been Corian, the man I saw when I was dream walking. The man whoalsosaw me. Had he told Donika what he saw?

“Whatexactlyare they?” Tess asked, gathering her knees up against her chest as she sat next to me on the bed.

Nik and Puck were out scouting a new training area for when I was well enough to work with Warrick again. Isaac had meant it when he said we wouldn’t be training my storm magic again, not until we had some answers.

“They are human. Donika has corrupted them with her dark magic, creating a monster similar to the Araneoch. Those aren’t the only creatures she has been busy creating.”

“But they have fangs, and claws,” I pointed out. “Even if they were once human, they aren’t anymore.”

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