Page 35 of Wild Ivy
I launch myself forward as magick tears through the space where I’d been. The darkness shifts and warps around me, but that humming grows stronger. Like a heartbeat.
“Remember how you killed me, Poison?” A new voice now, Rachel Storm, a necromancer who’d been raising children as her personal army. “Slipped into my house like a shadow. Poisoned my tea with dried vampire blood. The agony lasted days.”
“You deserved worse,” I spit, ducking under a ghostly tendril that tries to snag my arm.
The words give me a burst of energy, reminding me why I became who I am. These weren’t innocent souls. They were monsters. And I refuse to let monsters win.
I sprint forward, letting my assassin’s training take over. In the living world, I’d learned to move through shadows. Here, in the void, everything is shadow. Instead of fighting it, I let it envelop me, become part of it.
Their enraged screams echo behind me as I weave through the darkness, changing direction randomly. My eyes are adjusting to the gloom, and I spot a wall to my right. I use it to propel myself forward, staying low, staying quiet. Just like hunting in the real world, except now I’m the prey.
Something whistles past my ear—a ghostly weapon of some kind. I don’t stop to analyse it. Can’t stop. Have to keep moving.
I sense the souls trying to surround me, but they’re spreading too thin. They might know this place better, but I know pursuit. Know how hunters think, and right now, they’re making the biggest mistake a hunter can make. They’re letting their anger control them.
I see a crevice in the void’s fabric and squeeze into it, making myself as small as possible. The souls rush past, their fury making them careless. Making them miss what’s right in front of them.
As their voices fade into the distance, I finally let myself breathe. I need to think. Need to plan. The void may be their domain, but it’s changing. The pulsing in the darkness has a life of its own.
Life trapped me here for a reason. She’s using me as leverage, yes, but there’s more to it. Something about this place scares her, and anything that scares a primordial force is worth understanding.
I press my hand against the wall of my hiding spot, feeling that steady thrum. Maybe getting out of here isn’t about fighting or running.
Maybe it’s about understanding what the void is becoming.
I stay perfectly still in my hiding spot, controlling my breathing like I learned during my first years of training. The souls are still out there, their rage vibrating through the void like a twisted heartbeat, but they’ve lost my trail for now.
The wall beneath my fingers ripples. It’s almost like the void is trying to communicate, if I could just understand its language. I close my eyes, though it makes no difference in this darkness, and focus on the sensation.
It changes pitch slightly. There’s a pattern to it, something almost familiar. It’s like the pulse of my chaos magick, but darker. Older.
“Think, Ivy,” I mutter to myself. “Life wouldn’t trap you here without a way out. She needs something from them, which means...”
A ghostly hand suddenly plunges through the wall next to my head. I roll away, deeper into the darkness, heart pounding.
“Found a trace!” Andrew’s voice rings out. “This way!”
No time left to hide. I sprint through the void, letting instinct guide me. The thrumming becomes a beat, and it grows stronger with each step, almost like it’s leading me somewhere. But can I trust it? Can I trust anything in this place?
18
BRAM
MistHallow Academy looms before us,surrounded by mist, unsurprisingly. It’s a beautiful Gothic masterpiece of dark stone and twisted spires that pierce the misty sky. Magick radiates from every brick, every gargoyle, every shadow—old magick, wild magick, the kind that makes the foreign power inside me stir restlessly.
Morrigan’s magick. Though calling it hers feels wrong now. It’s changed since inhabiting my body, grown wilder, more feral. And it’s refusing to leave.
“You okay?” Tate asks, noticing my discomfort. “Your aura’s flickering.”
“The magick here,” I gesture vaguely at the academy, “it’s making Morrigan’s power restless.Morerestless.”
Torin eyes me warily. “Restless, how?”
Before I can answer, the massive iron gates swing open with a sound like thunder. A familiar figure strolls out, all casual grace and calculated nonchalance.
“Well, well,” Vex drawls, his eyes gleaming with amusement. “Look what the apocalypse dragged in.”
He looks different from the last time I saw him. Less stud, more academic. It’s disturbing. Some things should never change, and Vex’s arrogant attitude is one of them. Is this another fuck up? Please don’t let it be another fuck up.
