Page 48 of Torn Ivy
The air grows thick with the stench of decay as Grave approaches. Rotting vegetation sprouts from the ground with each step he takes.
“Impressive,” he rasps. “But can you take two of us at once?”
I step back as Whisper moves into view, and I smile coldly as they approach. “Two against one? Hardly seems fair.” My power crackles around me, reality warping in its wake. “For you.”
Grave’s eyes narrow. “Arrogant little bitch. Let’s see how cocky you are when your flesh is rotting off your bones.”
He raises his hands, dark energy swirling around them. The greenery around campus withers and decays. But before the effect can reach me, I twist reality around myself, creating a bubble where his power can’t touch me.
“Impossible,” Grave snarls.
“If by that you meanpossible, then yes.”
Whisper doesn’t waste time with words. I feel the pressure of his power trying to invade my mind, to trap me in a loop of my worst fears. But my evolved magick shrugs it off like water off a duck’s back.
I lash out with twin tendrils of power, one for each of them. Grave tries to counter with a wave of decay, but my magick simply absorbs it, growing stronger. Whisper attempts to retreat into the shadows, but I’m there waiting for him. I flood his system with pure chaos, overloading his ability to manipulate fears.
Grave roars in frustration as his power fails to affect me. He charges forward, hands outstretched to touch me directly. But I’m no longer there. I blink behind him, my power coalescing into a physical form.
“You want decay?” I snarl. “I’ll show you decay.”
With a single slash, I sever Grave’s connection to his power. He screams as his own abilities turn inward, his body beginning to rot from the inside out.
Whisper, realising he’s outmatched, turns to flee. But my power is everywhere now, infused into the fabric of reality around us. There’s nowhere for him to run.
I reach out with my mind, grasping the threads of his consciousness. With a vicious twist, I shred his psyche, leaving him a drooling husk.
The campus below carries on as if nothing has happened while I stand on the rooftop in the centre of destruction. My power hums contentedly, having feasted on their abilities. I can feel their stolen magick integrating with my own, making me stronger.
“Still want to ask me to kill my aunt?” I call out. “If the answer is ‘yes’, then you’re next in line. Choose wisely.”
I run and leap off the top of the building. Holding my arms out as I plummet to the ground, for a moment, lost in the beauty of flight, my feet hit the ground, knees bent, and the earth cracks under the pressure. I straighten up with a wicked smile.
In the moment that follows, I know I’ve lost myself. I’ve been torn apart, and I don’t know if I can ever be put back together again.
But maybe I don’t want to be.
22
BRAM
The Dark Faemagick in my blood screams a warning seconds before the attack comes. I drop and roll as a blade of pure shadow slices through the space where my head had been.
“Getting sloppy, Prince Bram,” Draxon’s voice whispers from behind me. “Or is she making you weak?”
I pull darkness around me like a cloak, my shadow magick responding to the threat. The university courtyard is packed at this hour, and that’s probably why my family’s political enforcer has come to pay me a visit.
“Jealous?” I ask the shadows. “That she’s beyond your reach?”
A laugh like breaking glass cracks the concrete under my feet. “Beyond our reach? Look around you. Everything’s within our reach.”
He’s not wrong. Every dark corner holds potential threats. Every whispered conversation carries hidden meanings.
Draxon materialises from the darkness; his form is more suggestion than substance. “The Dark Court sends its regards,” he says, wielding shadow-blades like extensions of himself.“They’re very interested in your association with Death’s Heir and wonder why you haven’t informed them.”
Of course they are.
“Tell them to get in line,” I growl, meeting his attack with my own shadow constructs. “Everyone seems to have an opinion lately.”
