When Night Breaks

by Janella Angeles

  Magic makes the magician.

  The fire flew faster, closer.

  She had to duck away. She couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t do anything, for there was nothing in her. Just a shattering pulse.

  The heat spun toward her, but her bones were solid stone. She braced herself for the pain—waiting and waiting and waiting—but the hit never arrived.

  “What the hell was that?”

  Kallia opened her eyes, expecting the full burn of Vain’s wrath.

  But Jack was already there, nose to nose with the Diamond Ring as he sent the burning spikes to the ground

  “Interference.” A muscle corded in his neck. “Didn’t realize all of the headliners were sadistic little cheaters.”

  “You got me. Sadistic to the core.” Vain smirked right in his face. The only touch of nerves that rose to the surface was in the twitch of her eye at their proximity. “Call off your brute, mortal. He’s not needed in this capacity. How are you supposed to duel if he won’t even let you?”

  Kallia’s pulse still raced. The brightness of the flames blazed before her every time she blinked, but something gripped her—she didn’t know what it was, why she froze.

  She wasted no time roughly pulling Jack back and shoving him off to the side. “Don’t you ever do that again.”

  Jack frowned, but he said nothing. He was better at this than she was. The whole ruse was all such a front in her head, the shock of him playing the part felt like a punch to the throat. There was no pretend to her rage, but it fed their story well. The charade.

  Nothing more than her acting like she had any semblance of control and power, when she had so little of either.

  “Now, care to explain why you didn’t even try to react?” Vain squared Kallia with a sharp look. “What, were you scared? Don’t be—”

  “I’m not scared of you.” Kallia didn’t need it shoved back in her face. She wanted to reach for anger. For fury. For all the emotions that were easier to hold than this thing, rotting her from the inside.

  Magic wasn’t easy, but it was also something she’d never hesitated at. She never felt more in her element than during a trick, the moment when the music of magic swept ease and adrenaline over her. That second of freefall, before flying. Kallia only knew she was great because of the greatness magic made her feel—not just in terms of power, but in harmony with herself and everything around her.

  Without that, Kallia was lost. And that was even worse than being in the dark.

  “Not of me. Of messing up.” Vain let out a snort. “I mean you. Don’t be scared of getting it wrong or looking bad when you try—that’s the point of practice. The more you fall, the less it hurts,” she said. “And if you don’t fall even once, you’ll always be scared of it.”

  “You don’t know me,” Kallia bit out. “I’m not some fragile, careful—”

  “Then prove it.”

  In a blink, the burning wooden spikes flared up between them again.

  They darted at Kallia without warning.

  Don’t freeze.

  She breathed.

  Don’t freeze.

  She raised her hands at the tug inside, pulling back.

  Don’t—

  At the small explosion, Kallia lowered her hands and looked down. No more spikes, just splinters blown everywhere by her feet.

  No sight had ever been more beautiful; she could’ve cried from the triumph alone.

  “See, they’re still there. Not entirely useless,” Vain muttered with a smug tilt of her head. “Oh, and I won.”

  Heat prickled beneath Kallia’s skin. “What?”

  The Diamond Ring’s downward nod, not at the splintered burnt wood, was only victorious once her gaze reached Kallia’s feet. She’d edged slightly just out of circle.

  “Stay in your circle,” she repeated. “Now, try to keep the illusion going this time.”

  A jagged fist-sized rock floated between them.

  And they began again.

  22

  It was like walking out of a dream, when he exited the hospital building. And the first to wake him up the moment he stepped over the threshold was Lottie and the chaos that still wrapped around Glorian.

  “Daron?” Lottie prompted. As if she’d asked him multiple times, with no response. “Where are you going? What happened?”

  He could’ve asked the same of her, from her disheveled appearance. The dark knot of her hair flew apart in wild tendrils. Her prim tweed jacket, now dirtied and soot-smudged as her face. Somehow, she’d even managed to lose a shoe in the fray. No blood at least, which was about all he needed to see. “He told me nonsense.”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  The mayor’s drawings scratched in the back of his mind. If she knew where he was heading, she would stop him. Or worse, she would follow. “I don’t know when I’m coming back, Lottie.”

  Lottie stared at him long and hard, and as another firework burst into the night, he thought he saw a glimmer of a tear at the edge of her eyes. “Be the one who comes back, please.”

  His throat knotted, and before he knew it, he had pulled her into a hug. Weeks ago, this seemed impossible. But now, he finally understood why Eva had befriended her.

  Daron drew away without saying goodbye, because it was easier that way. Because at least that wasn’t the last word said between them.

  As he ventured through the town center, he marveled at what a battlefield it had become. Smoke rising, sparks flying. Flashes of white Patrons still being chased by fireworks, screams pitching high into the air. Daron covered his mouth with his sleeve against the swirling smoke. He knew this town well enough by now to walk through it with a blindfold and amused himself with the idea that when he’d first walked these streets, they didn’t make sense to him. No street signs, no signs at all. Just buildings of different shapes sharing roads that only those who’d lived long enough in Glorian would know them.

  It didn’t take him long to quietly slink over to the entry gate of Glorian, the long stretch of road leading to the outside world.

  “Daron?”

  His heart clenched. He wondered if the Dire Woods had reached him already, before Aunt Cata limped into view a brief distance away. Between him and the gate, she somehow remained steadfast as ever in her pristine white uniform, marred with scorch marks and streaked with blood.

  When she charged toward him, Daron ran.

  It killed him, her crying out his name behind.

  He did not look back. Not once.

  His first steps out into the Dire Woods were hesitant, tentative.

  He’d heard stories of what this forest could do to those alone and on foot. The only time he ever traveled through here was by horse carriage, and even that was enough to make him uneasy. The whispers still found him, even through the window.

  They wrapped around him now like a snake coils around prey it intends to keep.

  He didn’t know where he was going, just walked forward. The mayor had given him no instructions or directions, just to go to the woods. And something about devils—

  “Dare?”

  His blood chilled at the figure approaching in the shadows passing. She wore her show costume, what she’d worn last time. “Eva?”

  Her hands trailed from the trunk of one tree to the next as she moved. “Why haven’t you found me yet, Dare?” she asked. “Are you lost, now?”

  He turned around and could’ve sworn he’d taken just three steps from the gates of Glorian. But now, there was only a thick of dark trees behind him, Glorian nowhere in sight. As if he’d moved farther into the woods than he thought, or perhaps the woods had moved around him.

  “Follow me,” she said in the shadows.

  “Why?” he asked, firm in the belief that this was not Eva. He was not so easily fooled. “Why should I?”

  She didn’t answer, but she got what she wanted because he followed either way. Afraid to lose sight of her for she was so obscured in the forest. A vision, a dream, leading him into the heart o
f a nightmare.

  “Why did you stop looking for me?” she called over her shoulder. “Too busy looking for someone else, now?”

  He was not answering it. He was not giving it the satisfaction of how deep the question sliced at his gut.

  “You never tried this hard for me. I’m hurt.” She sighed. “And I’m still lost. All because of you.”

  Daron couldn’t even shut his eyes, so he stared down hard at his feet. “Shut up.”

  “You were supposed to find me,” she whispered, the words touching his ears in a breeze. “And now you’re too busy looking for her. It’s like I’m nothing—”

  “Stop it,” he yelled, and she gave no reply. The entire woods quieted, in fact. Too quiet. Save for the splitting groan and crack of branches beyond him.

  “DARON!”

  His entire body seized. Aunt Cata.

  Zarose, she’d followed him. Right into the Dire Woods. He took off running in the opposite direction, for she couldn’t have been that far behind him. He heard her curse sharply, more branches breaking in the distance as though she were struggling to break free from them. “Get away from me!”

  “Aunt Cata!” Daron yelled, both hands cupped around his mouth. “Keep talking, I’m—”

  Lightning flashed around him, as though a storm hovered right over their heads. It was so bright, he caught nothing but the shadows of the spindly tree branches on the dirt ground before him, swaying in the wind. With each flash of lightning, longer than the next, it was like they formed a picture before his eyes.

  “I told you not to, Daron,” she said, coughing. “I told you not to go.”

  He followed the sound of her voice, grateful she was at least talking. “I’m sorry, but you wouldn’t—”

  His steps froze as another bout of lightning flashed, and something caught his eye in the shadowed branches across the ground. Not just branches, but something trapped within them. Branches vined around her wrists, holding them up while another entrapped her ankles and held her up like an offering.

  Aunt Cata.

  “I wouldn’t listen?” Her form disappeared in the dark before another flash of lightning brought back her struggling form. “I’m trying to keep you safe.”

  “Where are you?” Daron shook his head, watching the shadows play against the ground. What was casting them? “Where are you?” he asked louder.

  “I’ve always been trying to keep you safe. You’re all I have left.”

  “Aunt Cata—” He tried running to the nearest trees, looking up to see if some illusion veiled what was really there.

  “I can’t lose you, too,” she said weakly. In the next flash of light, he saw her form no longer thrashing, but sagging limply against the holds. “I can’t—”

  Her entire form bowed back as a branch brutally pierced through her gut. Another, through her chest. And another, and another.

  The lightning was so blinding now, forcing him to see all of this. He fell to his knees and covered his eyes, the wet seeping between his fingers. Blurring images and sounds he could not get out of his head.

  Not real, he kept convincing himself. Not real, not real, not real.

  “It’s you.”

  Everything stilled at the voice. Her voice. The voice he’d been wanting to hear ever since she left. He almost didn’t want to look up, afraid that, like everything, it was all a trick. An illusion.

  A hand cupped his face and guided it up. His eyes devoured her as a breath broke from him. “Kallia.”

  “It’s you.” She smiled down at him sadly. “You found me.”

  She was all right. His heart pounded, taking her in. Every inch of her, moving, breathing, alive. Somehow the red of her lips shone brightly, matching a deep red gown that pooled behind her like scarlet moonlight. Like the jewels dripping off her neck, her gaze glittered. His heart was racing as he brought his hands to her waist, pressing his brow against her hip, unable to do more than just hold her tight. Keep her here with him.

  Here. The word beat in time with his heart. Here, with me.

  “But what if I didn’t want to be found?”

  One moment, he was holding her against him; and the next, there was nothing but air in his hands. His hands shook as his fingers curled into fists he pressed against the earth, anchoring himself to something, anything.

  Whatever came next, he didn’t know if he could take it. If what came next would be the thing to break him, entirely.

  “Please,” he whispered on a broken breath.

  “You’re wasting your time.” Her voice carried on the wind. “What if I don’t want you anymore, the way you still want me … the way you will always want me?”

  Daron kept his focus on the ground, watching his own tears drip between his fingers.

  “You did take my power, after all,” she continued. “Why would I want you back?”

  “He took mine, too.” Eva’s voice joined hers. “And he didn’t even know.”

  “They never know.” A collective disappointed sigh.

  The sound of Aunt Cata’s screams filled the air, of the wood breaking through her body and tearing her apart. Even as he covered his ears, he couldn’t stop the sounds. The voices. All the questions he’d asked himself countless times, buried deep down even more, finding their way to the surface in these ghosts of his.

  “Are you sure this is still what you want?”

  When he looked up, Kallia sat high up in the tree, in a grotesque throne formed from its dying, blackened branches. Her dress draped over the trunk like dripping blood, rippling as she crossed her bare legs and straightened. She wore no crown, though she looked every bit a fearsome queen looking down upon him, her kneeling subject. “Only the willing and the wanting may enter.”

  It wasn’t Kallia, he knew that now. Though his blood still scorched with hope every time he looked at her, painful as it was. “Enter where?”

  She smiled, her red lips glaring. “The other side. It is a place below the surface, a place no one talks about,” she said. “You’re already halfway there.”

  That couldn’t be. He hadn’t walked more than a few yards, hadn’t even been out here for that long. Though maybe that was the illusion. Maybe what had been mere steps to him had been miles, what had been seconds turned to hours.

  The edges of his vision began to blacken from exhaustion, and he kept his hands against the ground to steady him. “Take me there.”

  “Even if she doesn’t want you to come for her?” Her head cocked to the other side. “What could you do, anyway? Hardly any power, no friends, no idea what awaits you … those are not winning odds, Daron Demarco.”

  The Devils card in Ira’s hand flashed in his mind.

  He finally looked up at her, the false Kallia. “Please.”

  “Well.” Her eyes gleamed. “Since you asked so nicely.”

  As his vision flickered and darkened, in and out, what he thought was exhaustion was actually shadows creeping in from the sides. They slithered in, eating the trees surrounding him and the moonlit sky above. Anything that marked this place to be the Dire Woods, for it didn’t feel like the woods anymore. In fact, it didn’t feel like a place he’d ever been in, where he was going now.

  He tried to stand, but some invisible force kept him down, wary to let him go now that he’d given them so much.

  Was this death, he wondered, as even the darkness began to darken, as he lost sight of everything but the vision before him.

  The last thing that remained in his sight was Kallia, watching him from her throne without mercy in her eyes. Her lips held the barest hints of a smile, like watching a caged animal to see what it would do next.

  The illusion collapsed as the edges of her vibrant red dress darkened to ash, the ground swallowing him up.

  And with her name on his lips, everything went to black.

  23

  Vain had two rules when it came to dueling. In those few brutal hours, she drilled them into Kallia.

  The first was to know the rules
.

  The second, to outsmart them.

  And there were many ways to outsmart, as many as there were combinations of hands in a card game. The premise of the duel was so simple, but all the trappings around turned it into a complicated dance that demanded quick thinking.

  The easiest rule was to stay in your circle. The tricky side came when determining which illusion came next, depending on the rule established at the start of the match.

  “Let’s go over another rule…” Jack was perched outside the window, legs hanging over the ledge. His voice, miraculously, clear as ever despite the street music that never ended. The ledge was now all the free space left in her room, since they returned to find it bursting with flowers and gift baskets and tokens for good luck. It turned the common room into a jungle of oddities and beauties and best wishes from the people of the city who would be watching tonight, knowing she had no chance of winning.

  “Nothing airborne,” Jack continued. “What can you do?”

  “Water,” Kallia readily answered from behind the changing screen.

  “I turn that to ice.”

  “Then I make ice into iron.”

  “And if I melt that iron—”

  “Burning tar.” Kallia could see why Vain enjoyed that part of the duel the most. It was as much an exercise in concentration as it was a sharp mind game. Rules have ranged from nothing metal to everything must be the color yellow. Nothing repeated. And nothing was slow.

  Vain barely pushed Kallia to use any power during their brief session, if only to save what she could for whichever Red Death Duke she’d soon be facing. Judging by her observation of them at their earlier meal, the fight would most likely resemble going up against a drunken bear.

  Even then, according to Vain, those odds were still far better than hers.

  “Just remember, they’ll play by your rule but probably only on a technicality,” Jack continued, the most focused she’d ever seen him. “Be ready for them to strike.”

  Once Vain had left them after training, Jack hadn’t stopped quizzing her. And Kallia kept answering. She couldn’t tell if it was cruel or kind of him to treat her like she stood any chance. But regardless of who he was, his advice was always valuable. It was just one of a few reasons why she could stand to let him into her room now while she prepared, in the first place.