Page 92 of The Ordeals
This time when I push, my magic explodes.
An endless stream of light, of stars and heat roars into it, this prowling shadow, poised to devour me whole. I change it. I change it into light. I wield my magic and reshape it. And the shadow unravels, ribbons of dark and absence unspooling around me, leaving nothing behind but a glitter of stars.
Leaving nothing but my magic.
I get to my feet, staring at my hands, feeling this wonderful,endless power coursing through me, like a dam has burst, like I’ve unlocked it, like I’ve finally found it.
It’s like molten silver, like warm sunlight, like I’m dipped in toquay, charged and electric.
‘Alchemist,’ I say in wonder. ‘I’m analchemist.’
All the times I’ve struggled, fighting for even a glimmer of my magic, to raise even a singlethreadof illusion, the headaches, the nose bleeds, the dizziness, striving these past months to strengthen it to a point when I could possiblyjustscrape through, all because it was my lesser magic. Always my weakest form of wielding. And the Collector, an alchemist, forever training me, always pushing me, forcing me to the very brink, the very edge of what I could survive.
Alchemy. My dominant magic. And now I’m here, now it’s my life,myfuture, when there is nothing between me and the end, it’s sparked. On the edge of a blade, staring into the very eyes of death, I’ve cut through to my true self, to what’s buried inside me. To what’s always been there, waiting for me to find.
I laugh, breathless, drunk on the raw magic suffusing my veins. I crook a single finger and the flames at my side, the flames that nearly scorched me, crackle to ice. I can reach that portal. I can cross it, complete the final Ordeal. The place as a scholar is mine. Glancing around, I note how few portals are left, only a handful that have not yet been claimed. I leap onto the podium, scrambling along it, eyeing that glimmering rent in the air, just at the top, so close, just a few feet away.
Then a guttural cry shifts my attention, away from that shimmering alchemist-made portal and I look over to find Alden, across the arena.
Surrounded by shadow and flame.
Chapter 33
Magnificent
Igasp as Alden is engulfed, a roar ripping from his throat. It’s not even a decision, not even a choice as I watch the man I love disappear in a cloud of flame and death. I wrench myself up, launching my body through a bed of twisting, snaking vines, willing my legs to pump harder, faster, desperate to reach him before the thing that I refuse to imagine happens.
‘Sophia, no!’ His arm shoots out and the vines leaping for me blast outwards, leaving a path directly to him. The seconds slow to treacle as I catch his eyes, his features, contorting with pain.
I reach for him, knowing I’m calling his name, knowing I won’t get there in time.
Not again. Not this, not another life I cannot save. Not another person I care for, who I love unravelling before me. I take all I have, this molten power in my veins, and throw out my right hand, into the flame and shadow surrounding him. It’s clumsy and I stumble, willing the nightmares to reshape, to become something other, to become nothing more than smoke.
And suddenly, he’s shrouded in ash. I careen into the smog, coughing and searching for him, not wanting to think that I’m too late or that it didn’t work.
But I find him. Collapsed to his knees, shirt burned away up one arm to the shoulder, revealing charred flesh, twisting with glints ofmagic. I choke again, falling to my knees before him as his body slumps against mine.
‘You … should have … gone through … I waited to make sure you found … a portal,’ he manages, voice like shards of glass.
A small sob builds in my throat as I pull him into my arms, dipping my face to his. Our argument, my need to be strong, to not be his weakness, to not weakenhim… it feels so redundant now. Swept away by the horrors of the Ordeal. He waited for me to find a portal, and yet when I saw him engulfed, when I was sure he wouldn’t make it … it was barely a thought. I leaped for him. To save him. His face creases in concern as I lean into him, all that rush of energy and magic seeping away, leaving me shaking and cold. ‘You should have gone. You shouldn’t have waited for me.’
My breath hitches as he presses a final kiss to my lips, and it feels like an ending. Like he’s saying goodbye. But I’m not ready to give him up.
‘I love you,’ I whisper. ‘When we make it to the other side, which wewill… you can have my entire heart.’ Then I pull in a breath, drawing on the strength I didn’t know I had left. The very last of it. ‘Now get up on your feet, Alden Locke. We’ve got a portal to get to.’
I clutch his good arm, swinging it around my shoulders and grunt as I lift, feeling the burn in my thighs. He sways, but stays upright and I look around.
Chaos.
Flame and dark and vine and ice …
But no hopefuls. Only us, only me and Alden left. And as I glance up, finding the platform Alden was aiming for, there’s only one portal remaining. I release a breath, then gather myself. Gather all my strength, all this power inside me, every stubborn fibre of my being and I shove him towards the platform. I’m not leaving here without him. I refuse. At every step he’s been there with me, inthe Crucible, in the Ordeals, and now we’re at the final moment, I will not see him consumed by death. After Dolly I believe it would break me. To be loved by someone so wholly and completely is too precious to ever leave behind.
The only hopefuls I can see are corpses. Unmoving, charred or twisted in vines. Blood spatters the ground, the smoke so thick, I can no longer see to the ocean, or on the other side, to the gathered crowd on the seating cut into the cliff face. It’s just me and Alden, alone at the very end.
‘You’re infuriating …’ I push up on his leg as he scrambles up the granite, hissing as his charred arm catches and scrapes. ‘Stubborn …’ I clasp my hands together and force his foot inside my hands, levering him up so he can get his knees on the platform. ‘Cocky …’ I jump up behind him, shoving him forward. ‘And for all those reasons and many more, I am in love with you. I cannot let you go.’
He turns his face to mine, features still pained, arm hanging limp and useless at his side. He’s spent. He’s done. I see it in him, like he’s teetering on that precipice of giving up. ‘And you’re … magnificent.’
