Page 28 of Torn Ivy
Pink energy explodes outward in a wave that freezes everything - the shadows, the tears in reality, even the mist. Time seems to stop, caught in my power.
The guys materialise beside me, drawn by the magick. Their own power adds to mine, supporting it and letting their energy merge with the chaos.
The pink energy pulses, and the shadow creatures dissolve into nothing. The tears in reality seal themselves, leaving only a faint pink aurora dancing in the air.
Death stands perfectly still, watching this display with what looks like satisfaction. “Very good. You’ve learned the most important lesson already - chaos isn’t meant to be controlled, only guided.”
“Why this test?” I demand, maintaining my hold on the magick. It hums through me, ready to unleash at a moment’s notice. “Why create a fake assignment?”
“To see what you would do, of course. To understand how your power has evolved.” He moves closer, unaffected by the toxic vines that snap at him. “You were meant to be my successor, but instead, you’ve become something else entirely. Something new.”
“Sorry to mess up your plans,” I say, not sorry at all.
He laughs again. “Oh, but you haven’t. Not really. You’ve just complicated them. In the most delightful way.” His empty eye sockets fix on the guys. “Your connection to these three is most fascinating. The way your magick interacts with their power is informative.”
“What do you really want?” Tate demands, black sparks flying from his fingertips.
“Want? I want to see how this plays out.” Death spreads his skeletal hands. “Chaos is change, and change is coming. The question is, will you be its harbinger or its victim?”
Before any of us can react, he vanishes, taking the oppressive atmosphere with him. The cemetery returns to normal, though my toxic vines remain, glowing softly in the moonlight.
“Well,” Bram says after a moment, “that was anti-climactic.”
“He’s playing a longer game than we thought,” Torin observes. “This wasn’t just about testing your powers.”
“No,” I agree, watching the pink energy still dancing through the air. “He wanted to see how we work together. How the chaos magick responds to your presence.”
“And?” Tate prompts.
I look at my hands, where pink energy still flows like liquid starlight. “And I think he got exactly what he wanted. He knows now that I’m stronger with you, that the chaos magick responds differently when we’re together.”
“Is that a bad thing?” Bram asks.
“I don’t know.” I meet their gazes one by one. “But I think we just showed our hand, and Death is definitely playing cards I can’t see yet.”
I’m pretty sure he has changed his mind about me killing the guys now. He can see it would be disadvantageous to whatever end game he has.
But the question is, what does Death plan to do with this knowledge?
What are we going to do about it?
This is just the beginning of something much bigger than any of us realise, but we need to get up to speed and fucking fast before Death comes for us all.
12
TORIN
The cemetery’ssacred ground still crackles with residual magick. Pink energy dances through the mist like the aurora borealis. Watching Ivy wield such power, I’m beginning to understand why I’m instinctively drawn to her. I grew up with law and order. It flew in the face of my vampire nature, which just wanted to rebel every chance it could. But for that, there were severe punishments from dear old Mum. Dad was more ‘don’t give a fuck’ than she was. Now that I’m out from under their thumbs, almost, and free to do whatever the fuck I want,thatside of me which wants to kick up chaos and see where the cards fall, has sought out this creature that can bring on the destruction. It’s not that I haven’t fallen for Ivy. I have. In a big way. But before I knew who she was, what she was, when I knew her only as Poison, it was instinct.
“Yeah, anticlimactic,” I murmur, but I’m not convinced. Something went down here; we just aren’t privy to it. Yet. We will be once we can figure out what the fuck is actually going on here. I feel like I’m missing something I should know, but trying to put my finger on it is like trying to pin down a single beam in a laser light show.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. With a frown, I pull it out and glare at it. The screen displays my mother’s name. Of course she’d call now. The timing is too perfect to be coincidental.
“I need to handle something,” I tell the others, moving away from them. Ivy watches me go, still in the guise of Poison. I can’t deny the pull. I want to slam her to the ground, rip her clothes off and impale her on my cock until there is nothing left inside me to dump in her pussy.
I answer once I’m out of earshot. “What?”
“Well, that’s rude.”
