Page 64 of Wild Ivy
“Well,” Torin says dryly, “I guess ‘rush through’ just got more complicated.”
A dozen versions of us circle like wolves, each one a different possibility.
But the others are facing their own reflections, too.
“Don’t let them separate us,” I call out. “That’s what they want.”
“Too late to run,” Bram says, his magick swirling around his hands. “Guess we’re fighting our demons literally today.”
The reflections attack as one. A darker self launches forward with street-fighting brutality, while a privileged version weaves complex spells I never had the chance to learn. A corrupted one just grins and releases waves of tainted power.
“Any brilliant ideas?” Ivy asks as she deflects a blast from her alternate self.
“Yeah,” I grunt, pulling her down as a spell whizzes overhead. “Stop thinking of them as us. They’re not us. They’re just shadows wearing our faces.”
“Easier said than done,” Torin replies, barely dodging his fear-driven counterpart.
He’s right. These versions of us know our moves and our weaknesses. They’re everything we could have become, everything we feared becoming. And they’re not pulling their punches.
I duck under a wild swing from streetfighter me, only to catch a blast of corrupted magick that sends me staggering. These versions of us aren’t just strong - they’re coordinating and working together in ways we haven’t figured out yet.
“Switch!” Ivy shouts suddenly. “Stop fighting yourselves!”
It takes me a second to get it, but she’s right. We’re too evenly matched against our own reflections. But against each other’s...
I spin away from my alternates and launch a blast at Ivy’s controlled reflection. She can’t counter my raw power. She dissolves into shadow with a shriek.
“They’re what we’re afraid of becoming, but we didn’t become them, and we won’t. Keep fighting,” I grit out as one of the Ivys unleashes a swarm of fucking bees in my direction. “What the fuck?” I growl as they buzz all around me. “Not cool.”
Real Ivy snickers, but it’s short-lived as one of Bram’s other selves launches at her, knocking her off her feet.
“Oh, fuck this,” she snarls, getting up and coiling a power that I know is going to blow the lid off this temple and probably us into a million pieces.
But I don’t stop her.
Instead, I yell to Bram and Torin, “Run!”
33
IVY
The power buildsinside me like a tsunami, feeding off every repressed emotion, every time I’ve held back. The guys run, and that’s good. That’s right. Because what’s coming isn’t precise or controlled, or safe.
The shadows wearing our faces seem to sense it. They start to retreat, but it’s too late.
I throw my head back and scream, letting everything out at once. The power explodes from me in waves of pure, wild magick. A magick that consists of death and life and rebirth. It tears through the temple chamber like a hurricane, shredding the shadow-copies into nothing, shattering the mirrors that birthed them.
Death’s essence surges forth first. Dark, cold, and absolute. It’s followed immediately by the spark of life, brilliant and warm, twining together with the void’s power. Between them pulses the energy of rebirth, a shifting violent force that binds the others together in perfect, terrible harmony.
The power explodes from me in concentric waves, each one carrying a different aspect of my new nature. The first wave is pure death. It slams into the shadow copies, their falseforms crumbling as their stolen life force is stripped away. The second wave carries life’s energy, and where it touches the chamber’s ancient stones, moss and vines burst forth, growing and dying in rapid succession. The third wave ripples with rebirth, transforming everything it touches. The mirrors don’t just shatter, they dissolve and reconstitute themselves as sheets of crystal that reflect all possible realities at once before they too crumble to dust.
Each wave builds on the last, gaining strength as they spiral outward. The temple’s foundation recognises the power of creation and destruction moving through it. The walls respond like a living thing, groaning in either ecstasy or agony. I’m not sure which. Ancient magick stored in the stones releases in a cascade of sparks and shadows.
The cracks across the ceiling are in intricate patterns, almost beautiful in their destruction. Where the cracks meet, chunks of stone rain down, but they dissolve into stardust before they can hit the floor. The dust itself swirls in impossible patterns, dying and being reborn as different forms of matter.
“Holy fucking shit!” I hear Bram swear behind me. “Take cover!”
The power pours out of me, wave after wave, until every false reflection, every shadow-copy, every might-have-been is torn apart and reconstructed and torn apart again. Their screams echo through dimensions as they’re caught in the cycle of death and rebirth, finally fading into nothing as my power cleanses the chamber of their twisted existence.
