by Ella Summers
“I guess I don’t really care about her,” Kai said, glancing sidelong at Sera. His magic tickled hers.
She struggled to keep a straight face as she looked up at Kai and replied, “I knew it all along. You only agreed to help me so I’d have to kill monsters for you.”
“No one decapitates monsters like you do, baby.”
Sera choked down a snort—mostly.
“Oh, yes. How amusing,” Blackbrooke said drily.
Kai nodded toward the door to the backstage area. “Sera, let’s go.”
Blackbrooke pushed out his hands, blocking him.
“Move,” Kai said, giving him a look that could have frozen lava.
“You’re not allowed back there.”
“I’m going.” He pushed his phone in Blackbrooke’s face. “Look at this.”
Sera looked too. A slideshow with all of Finn’s messages to her was playing on Kai’s screen. Of course he’d copied them to his phone.
Blackbrooke’s eyes went wide as he watched the slideshow. “Finn sent all of these?” He glanced over at Sera. “To her?”
“Yes, your lost prisoner is coming for Sera.” He paused, and the room grew so silent that time stood still. “I’m not going to let that happen.”
“Well, Kai, to be fair…” Blackbrooke’s nose scrunched up, repulsed yet embarrassed, like he’d vomited in his own beard. “Finn wasn’t really my prisoner per se.”
“I delivered him to Atlantis.” Kai stepped forward, his massive figure casting a dragon-sized shadow over Blackbrooke. “Gift-wrapped.” He took another step, practically running him over. “You were the one they called in to rehabilitate him. Now, I ask you this.” Pointing at the photos, his voice dropped to a near-savage growl, “Is he rehabilitated?”
Blackbrooke buckled before the dragon’s ire, his muscles twitching, his cool and calm demeanor scrambled. “Go. Just go with her.” He stepped aside, waving Kai through. “Keep her safe. She’s obviously an asset.”
Kai set his hand on her shoulder, nudging her toward the entrance.
“Just one thing, Kai,” Blackbrooke’s voice called out before they disappeared through the door.
They looked back at him.
“You are not to interfere with the testing,” he said, his tone more confident now that Kai wasn’t breathing fire down his neck.
Kai nodded, then swung the door shut behind them. They headed down the long corridor. A melody of thumps and roars, peppered with pain, groaned through the open door of the fighting pit at the end, echoing down the hall.
“It sounds like someone is setting off bombs in there,” Sera commented.
Kai made a noncommittal noise.
“So Blackbrooke is an ass, but it turns out he’s not completely unreasonable,” she said.
“Mmm.”
Sera tried again. “I’m thinking of fighting the next match topless. What do you think about that idea?”
This time, he stopped—and turned his angry dragon eyes on her. “That would be unadvisable. You do not need to pick up any more stalkers.”
She smirked at him. “I was just checking to see if you were listening to me.”
“I always listen to you, Sera. I just don’t always have something to say. I haven’t got your gift.”
“You mean my mouth.”
“Oh, I’ve got that, sweetheart.”
He did a quick visual scan of the hall to make sure they were alone, then turned toward her. He kissed her once, slow and easy, his hand lingering on her chin long after the kiss had ended. Her skin tingled from his caress; her blood surged with magic.
“You’re distracting me,” she managed to croak out.
He stepped back, shaking out his shoulders. Apparently, she hadn’t been the only one distracted. She liked that. She liked it a lot.
“Your opponent is called Weather Wizard,” Kai said, his momentary distraction over.
Sera made a concentrated effort not to comment on the mage’s name, even though it was practically begging to be mocked.
“He’s a first tier mage, his elemental magic ranked number twelve in the world,” he continued, an added edge in his voice. He’d probably guessed what she was thinking. “Fighting him will not be easy. It will require some extra finesse. Most elementals can only control one element. Some can control two. Only a select few can manage more than that. Even most first tier elemental mages cannot summon all the elements.”
“I know this already,” she said, motioning for him to fast forward. “Get to the good stuff. Tell me how to defeat him.”
“Best him at his own game.”
“Best him at his own game?” she repeated. “But I don’t even know what I’m doing. And he’s apparently the grandfather of the elements.”
“You can summon all the elements,” he said.
“And? So can you.”
“Remember what I said about mages with the ability to summon every element.”
“That they’re all first tier mages.”
“Precisely.”
She didn’t know what to say to that, so she settled for nothing.
“You’re a first tier elemental,” he told her. “A very strong first tier elemental.”
“I figured as much after I blew those vampires to bits last night.”
“I have never seen anything like that.”
She winked at him. “That’s because you dozed through that part of the fight.”
“Sera.”
“Sorry, I’ll be good now,” she promised, folding her hands together in front of her.
“You can do this,” he told her. “Weather Wizard can summon all the elements, but so can you. You can counter him. Remember how we practiced stringing spells together?”
“Vaguely. Kai, my head is mush.” She raised her hand to her forehead. “I’m not sure I can fight him with magic.”
“You have fought me with magic many times before.”
“Yes, but…well, I still have so little control over it.”
“You did fine last night against the vampires,” he reminded her.
“That was a matter of life or death.” Though, come to think of it, so was this. “When the vampires swarmed you, I panicked. And you helped me in that fight too.”
“I’m here now.” He took her hand, giving it a squeeze.
“I’m afraid,” she admitted. “Afraid to use my magic. Afraid to let my guard down.”
“Just use a little magic. You don’t have to blast every bit of magic you have. And there’s no need to make your opponent explode. In fact, it’s probably better if you don’t.”
“My gauge is broken. My magic is basically on or off.”
“I know you can do it,” he said, squeezing her hand again.
A mage stepped out of the pit, his steps wobbling as he passed through the door into the hallway. His clothes looked even more trashed than Sera’s had yesterday. He limped down the hall toward the locker rooms, trailing crimson drops.
The guard waved Sera forward. Kai gave her a stiff—presumably comforting—nod as she turned to face her fate.
She entered the pit, looking up. The stands were packed full, the audience jumping and shouting in excitement. She could see them. She just couldn’t hear them through the magic barrier. A wall of thick, solid ice magic, it was thick enough to block out all sound, yet transparent enough for the audience to see everything that went on in the pit. Blackbrooke must have been expecting powerful magic to fly in this match. Sera tried not to feel too daunted by that. Fear would only make it easier for him to crack her mind.
She walked across the sandy ground, her footsteps echoing against the magic barrier. Her opponent, Weather Wizard, was at the other end of the pit, standing posed like a Greek hero of old. A cluster of teenage girls sat in the stands close by, giggling and fanning themselves with every ripple of his golden mane in the magically-charged wind. Oh, boy.
Despite his pretty boy appearance, Weather Wizard was dangerous. She could feel it in the magic t
hat crackled in the pit, the magic of a first-tier elemental mage with an appetite for destruction and the power to sate it. But he wasn’t even the biggest threat in there.
Twin lines of fairies stood along two facing sides of the pit, a web of their magic linking them together, allowing them to work as one. As Sera neared her opponent, the fairies began to chant. Their magic flared up, curling around her. Suddenly, between one blink and the next, the fighting pit was gone. Instead, Sera was standing in a field, high up on a mountain.
20
Weather Wizard
Long, frost-crusted grass glistened in the pink-orange light of the setting sun. A frigid breeze whistled across the grass and bit at Sera’s cheeks, pecking her fingertips with frozen kisses. She couldn’t see the fairies anymore. She could, however, see Weather Wizard—and he was smirking at her.
“Lost lamb, lost lamb, run along home,” he taunted in a sing-song voice. He was hoarding crazy like it was going out of style.
Sera sighed. Couldn’t she—just for once—fight someone who still had all his marbles?
Behind Weather Wacko, funnels of twirling snow flurries spun like icy cyclones. Coils of magical blue-white light glowed against his skin, the living tattoos slithering across his arms. His magic tasted like dry ice and felt like brain freeze.
His pale eyes still locked on Sera, his aura still emanating insanity, he slid his tongue along his lower lip. The ground rumbled beneath Sera’s boots. She jumped aside just in time to avoid being impaled on the frozen stalagmite that burst from the grass. She hopped again, narrowly missing the second stalagmite. Then a third. A fourth. One after the other, they erupted. Sera broke into a run.
“You cannot run,” her opponent laughed. “Magic is the answer. The only answer.”
Blackbrooke had fed him that line. Hell, Mr. Sadistic had probably—no, make that definitely—told them all to do whatever it took to force her to use magic. Fine, then. If they wanted magic, she’d give them magic. She danced around an ice cone and ran at Weather Wizard. If she could just get a hold of him, she’d slam a bolt of lightning straight through his heart. If it had woken Kai from near death, it could take down this mage. And it wouldn’t even require much magic. Win-win.
Sera was nearly within grabbing distance when a beastly screech roared above her. A dragon. It swooped in, talons slashing. She dropped and rolled. The dragon took up position above the mage, its massive wings beating the air like a drum. It looked…real. It wasn’t one of those fiery forms of a dragon that some mages could summon, those illusions woven together by magic. The dragon felt like primeval earth, like forgotten magic and immortality. Its aura shook the very fabric of magic itself.
“It’s not real,” she told herself, even as she ducked to avoid the swipe of its mighty fist.
She was too slow. The dragon’s claws slashed her arm, sprinkling the ground with her blood. The frosty grass sizzled as the crimson drops hit it, her blood eating away at the ice—and then at the grass below. Sera could only stare at the blackened ground in shock.
“It’s just an illusion,” she said, less sure this time. She looked up at the dragon looping through the air. “All of it.”
Magic slammed into Sera, blasting her across the field. She smashed hard into a frozen stalagmite, then dropped. Ignoring the painful protests from pretty much every part of her body, she pushed off the ground.
Weather Wizard’s laughter echoed through the field, lingering in the air, heavy with magic and contempt. She couldn’t see him. She couldn’t see anything through that confounded blizzard he’d summoned. Nor could she see the dragon, but she could hear its dreadful, blood-curdling screeches. It sounded hungry.
Fear and anger blended inside of her, drawing her magic out of hiding. Her hand shot upward, and magic blasted out of her. Twirling as fast as a tornado, the funnel snapped out, cutting through the blizzard. Ropes of blue-green magic wrapped around the dragon’s legs, binding it. The beast roared and thrashed, but she held on. In one rough tug, she plucked it from the sky.
The ground shook as the dragon crashed down. Light flashed, blinding Sera. She blinked back the purple blotches and looked down. The dragon was gone.
In his place was Kai. He lay sprawled on the ground, wounded. Blood gushed out of his body, pouring out all around him. She rushed to him. She pressed her hands to the biggest gash on his chest, trying to stop the bleeding. But it wouldn’t stop. None of them would stop. He was dying.
Magic slammed her down to the ground. Weather Wizard stepped through the blizzard’s icy veil, his raised hands glistening with liquid crystals. He blasted her again, even before she could move. Ice poured through her body—ice and pain. She stumbled to her knees, but the hammer of his magic pounded her down again. She reached out, taking Kai’s hand. They were both drenched in blood. They were both dead.
Get up!
Can’t, she told the voice. Hurts.
Sissy.
I killed Kai.
It’s not real, the voice told her. Look at the fairies.
For a moment, Sera could see them. They stood on either side of the field, chanting and swaying. Then they faded out. She looked at Kai. He’d grown transparent, if only slightly.
Move, badass! Move!
Sera pushed off her hands. As her feet hit the ground, Kai faded completely. She looked around for Weather Wizard. She didn’t see him anywhere. She could hear his sinister laughs through the whistle of the whirling blizzard, but the sound was just echoing everywhere, bouncing off the magic of the snow spell.
You know what you have to do.
Sera nodded. She stretched her hands out to her sides, slowly waving them upward until they met over her head. She clapped them together, then slapped them down against her thighs. Flames blasted out of her, swallowing the blizzard. The snowflakes fizzled away. Steam dripped from the air, thick and warm. Beneath her feet, the grass was black. Her spell had torched it.
The mage stepped through the mist, coils of magical purple-gold light slithering across his skin. Lightning tattoos. The wet air hissed and hummed. Magic buzzed against Sera’s skin. The mage’s magic was building to a crescendo.
Thunder boomed overhead, swirling the clouds into a thick stew. A storm was brewing. Weather Wizard reached up, extending his hands high into the air with dramatic flourish. Lightning shot down. As it hit his hands, he pushed them out, shooting the magic at Sera. She drew a circle in the air in front of her—a magic shield that sparkled like crushed pink diamonds. The mage’s lightning hit her shield, then bounced back, slamming hard into his chest. He flew back, tumbling head over heels in a crooked loop, then hit the ground with a magical, resounding thump. The impact knocked him out cold.
Sera lowered into her knees, reaching down. She dug her fingers into the blackened earth, reaching out with her magic-breaking power. The charred grass dissolved into black oil, the fairies’ magic fighting back. She pushed harder, ripping at the illusion without mercy. It let out a final, pitiful protest, then shattered, raining down all around her like the remains of a broken mirror.
Magic gurgled and hissed. The pit faded back in. Sera stood at one end; her opponent lay unconscious at the other. As the final strands of the illusion washed away, all the fairies fainted as one and fell to the ground.
21
Secrets and Fairy Dust
Sera walked out of the fighting pit, waiting until she was out of the cameras’ sight before allowing herself to limp. Her feet hurt. Her arms hurt. Every part of her hurt, most especially her head. The fairies’ illusion magic had given her a massive hangover that wouldn’t be going away anytime soon. Even the soft buzz of the hallway lamps drilled into her battered eardrums.
Kai was waiting in the hallway, a dark smudge against the brightly-lit background. Sera rubbed the Fairy Dust from her eyes. Her vision slowly cleared. The moment his face came into focus, she nearly ran right for him. But she held back.
She’d used magic in front of hundreds of people. In front of Blackb
rooke. Had it been enough to allow him a glimpse inside her head? Everything was just so messed up. She wanted nothing more than to throw her arms around Kai and allow him to soothe her worries away. All of her worries. But he didn’t know all of her worries—her secrets—and she couldn’t tell him. She choked back a pained laugh. This would never work. How could she be in a relationship with someone she was constantly lying to?
When she saw the look in his eyes, though, she forgot about all that. All the lies, the omissions, the gloom and doom—for this one moment they didn’t exist. He reached out to touch her shoulder, his caress gentle, his magic warm and soothing. She threw herself against him, squeezing him hard to make sure he was real.
“I thought I’d killed you,” she muttered against his chest. “Your blood was on my hands.” She glanced down at her palms. There was blood on them, but not his. It must have been her own.
He wrapped his arms around her, drawing her in close. “It was just an illusion,” he said, his soothing whispers melting against her ear. “This is what they do in the Games, try to break a mage’s mind. Twenty-six fairies. Duncan wasn’t holding back.” His smile was ferocious. “But you held up. You beat their magic. You beat Weather Wizard. And kept your mind together.”
“How do you know Blackbrooke didn’t crack my mind?”
“Oh, trust me, you’d know. And so would everyone else. If he’d cracked you, you wouldn’t have walked out of that pit without assistance.” He kissed her forehead. “And you wouldn’t have the wherewithal to come up with silly questions.”
“I’m not sure I have much wherewithal left in me,” she said. “And I forgot all about stringing spells together.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
He hugged her tightly to him, the hard ridges of his body as comforting as any soft and plushy teddybear. No, more comforting. A teddybear couldn’t fight monsters with her. A teddybear didn’t have her back. Kai did. He always had.
