by Nicole Hall
Torix’s eerie green gaze took in the clearing and landed on Sera. He smiled, and Sera felt truly afraid for the first time that night. She didn’t miss the disdain in his look or the way his lip curled in disgust when he looked past her at Jake. She knew it was Jake because somehow, even with her shields most of the way back up, she could still sense him behind her. Only faintly, a general sense of warmth and direction, but it was there. Maddie got unsteadily to her feet in her half-erased circle, but Sera knew that because she could see her. The sense of knowing applied solely to Jake. She’d broken the bond, it shouldn’t be possible.
She wasn’t sure if it was a benefit or not, since at this point her plan veered off into wishful thinking.
“Well this was unexpected. What a treasure you are, my little half-breed,” said Torix. His voice sounded like he looked, traditional bad guy, deep, with a slight British accent. Totally unbidden, an image of him dressed as Loki from the Avengers movie popped into her head. A moment later, he laughed and his form changed. The brown cloak became black and green leather over pants and a tunic with gold highlights and enormous shoulder pads. Full Loki armor without the silly helmet. “Is this how you prefer me?”
“I preferred you as a tree.” Sera raised her shields the rest of the way. A movement at her legs had her glance down, and to her surprise, golden dragon scales replaced her clothing, locking into place up to her neck.
“Strange, since you’re the one who released me.” He took a step toward her, and Sera stepped back. At some point while she was armoring herself, she’d lost track of Jake. He wasn’t behind her anymore, but somewhere in the woods to her left getting further away.
Sera took a second step back, and Torix’s smile widened. “Afraid? I do love the taste of fear.”
“Cautious and prudent.” She tilted her head to the side. “What does that taste like?”
He shrugged nonchalantly, and raised his hand, but not at her. She hadn’t noticed he’d moved within reach of Maddie until his arm wrapped around her waist.
“Sorry, dear, I’ll be needing this back.” He pulled her against him and took her mouth in a surprisingly chaste kiss. Maddie didn’t move, but her skin paled in the few seconds they had contact. Sera shifted to stop him, but he’d already drawn back. The oily blue sheen that had coated Maddie was nowhere to be seen, and as she watched, Maddie’s eyes rolled back and her knees gave out. Torix caught her weight, then tossed her into the trees like she was an apple core.
Sera heard a thud as Maddie’s body hit the ground, but she didn’t dare take her eyes off of Torix. They were alone in the clearing lit only by her power. She couldn’t see Evie, Jake was gone, and even the sprites had abandoned her. “Everyone was right. Maddie didn’t have any power.”
Torix dropped his chin in a single nod. “I allowed her the use of my power to work in my interests. Why do you lock yourself away from me?”
It took her a moment to figure out he meant the shields. “I’m particular about who I let into my mind. Can’t have any old riff raff bumbling around in there.”
He lifted a hand to his heart and mocked being affronted. “And here I thought we had something special, but I suppose it’s busy in there sharing it with your mate.”
The words hit her hard. She’d lost the chance to share herself with Jake. Removing the bond had left an empty spot inside her, a space her superficial sense of Jake couldn’t replace. He’d held the shields, and she’d been the one to break everything. No wonder he’d left her to deal with Torix herself.
“No answer for that?” Torix picked up the knife that Maddie had placed near the inner torches and examined it. “No denials or excuses? Ah, but I can feel your pain. Let’s explore that, shall we?”
He whipped the knife at her, so fast it was a blur. Sera jerked to the side, but it still slammed into her left shoulder. She stumbled back with a grunt, but it didn’t penetrate her scales. Her armor protected from punctures, but not blunt force. Good to know. Pain blossomed down her arm as if she’d been punched. Torix licked his lips like he could taste it.
“Tell me, which hurts more, your shoulder or knowing your mate has left you?”
Sera bent down and picked up the knife at her feet. She didn’t know how to throw it, but she knew the pointy end went in the bad guy. “Have you always been this weak?”
The insult must have hit its mark because Torix lost his lazy grin and a flick of his wrist shot out a stream of iridescent blue magic. Sera ducked as it streaked past her face. He pulled the magic toward him, and she quickly looked over her shoulder. A rustle and crash preceded a large log, about half her size, flying through the air in her direction. She threw herself sideways, narrowly avoiding it. Torix released his magic and tossed it in the same direction as Maddie. It looked like all her shielding concerns about blocking trees were spot on.
She jumped up and blew her hair out of her face. “You missed.”
“Perhaps, but I’m not ready to kill you yet, that would ruin all the fun. Incapacitating you and toying with your prone body will be much better.”
“I’ve had worse first dates.” Sera barely dodged the small boulder he tossed at her, again wrapped in dark blue magic. At least he didn’t have telekinetic abilities.
Where the crap were the Fae? Wasn’t this part of their forest? She was defending it all alone, and it was going about as well as she’d thought it might. Her shoulder throbbed, she’d finally pushed Jake all the way away, Torix was playing a one-sided version of dodgeball, which was terrifying, and her plan for winning involved draining herself or possibly exploding. The end result was unclear. She desperately wished Jake was there, but in the end, she was glad he’d left. Him dying at the hands of Torix was worse than anything that could happen to her.
Torix began to circle, and Sera moved with him. The amount of power pulsing through her made her nervous. She needed to release it somehow, so why not try some of Torix’s moves. Her pack was lying practically at his feet, and she could see a wooden handle sticking out of the top of it.
Sera started by using what she knew. She shifted the knife into her left hand and flexed her fingers a few times to be sure they’d work when she needed them, then she squeezed her eyes closed. A giant ball of golden light blazed into existence; she could see the flash behind her lids. If it was enough to rock Will’s car, it might at least knock Torix around a little. She shoved the magic at him as she opened her eyes, careful to keep her gaze averted.
She closed the distance to Torix behind the magic ball. It slammed into him, and he didn’t budge. Before the light had faded, Sera sliced at his abdomen with the knife. Like she’d thought, he didn’t block the knife. Like she’d feared, it bounced off a thin blue shield. Torix grabbed her wrist above the knife and squeezed. Pain shot up her arm in the opposite direction from earlier, and she cried out. She dropped the knife. Torix watched it fall, and Sera grabbed the bat out of her pack with her free hand. The knife embedded itself in the ground point first, and Sera swung at his face as hard as she could.
Without looking, he blocked with his arm and yanked her forward. Sera fell against him, off balance. The bat joined the knife on the ground. Torix snaked an arm around her waist, holding her upright, and the other clenched around her wrist painfully. Cold radiated from every place he touched her, freezing down her fingers and up her back. Sera tightened her shields, and the cold retreated a bit.
Torix raised his head and met her eyes. “Interesting choice, but useless, I’m afraid.” A lustrous blue coating began covering her wrist where they touched, oozing toward the rest of her. “Perhaps this will be more effective.”
Sera called on her power to give her a boost. She shoved him hard enough to break his hold and force him back a few steps, but his blue goo kept creeping up her arm. It was cold, like all his magic had been, and she wasn’t willing to find out what it was supposed to do. She flexed her fingers again, and relaxed her shields enough to pull the magic inside of her. The blue soaked into her armor and
disappeared.
Sera rubbed her shoulder, then her arm. Her left side was really taking a beating. Getting within physical distance of Torix was proving problematic. She’d used as much power as she could, and it had barely phased him.
Torix raised a brow. “Interesting skill you have there. It appears I chose the wrong child all those years ago.”
“What do you mean years ago?”
“Surely you don’t think this was a recent development. I’ve had centuries, what’s a few more years to mold a creature to my will.”
“That night in the woods…”
“It was unfortunate that your grandmother found you when she did. Your mind was already half twisted. I would have had to do little work. The other was adequate, but always held back by her kind heart.” He spit the last two words as if they were poison. “I had to take more and more control over her as the years passed.”
“Jake knew it wasn’t her.” Sera’s triumph was short-lived.
“Ah, but you. You would have provided me with such power. You had so much darkness in you already, a simple nudge, and you would have been mine.”
A ghostly touch flitted across her lips, much like the first time they’d spoken, and Sera shivered. He was right. She’d been in a dark place when she’d first come to Mulligan as a teen, and it wouldn’t have taken much for her to follow a path that gave her gobs of power. But he was wrong too. She’d met Jake, and spent time with Evie, and even Maddie pushed past her defenses. That kind heart again. They’d helped her find joy and lightness, and even though she’d run, that light had always been there.
It still burned in her, and no matter how hard she’d tried to break that bond with Jake, it endured. Torix was going to have to find someone else to manipulate.
“Yeah, that’s a no from me.”
“A pity you don’t have a choice.”
One second they were circling each other in the clearing, the next he was in front of her. Sera tried to back away, but he grabbed both arms and wrenched them behind her back. He held her with one hand, despite her attempts to break free with her super strength. She brought a knee up, but he side-stepped then pulled her fully against him. It was like falling into snow.
With all her power, she couldn’t get him to let go, and the terror started to rise as her body temperature dropped.
“Ah, there’s the fear I wanted.”
Sera’s panicked brain told her to tighten her shields, to force him away, to throw all her power at him even if it drained her completely. She bucked and writhed, but his hold on her never wavered. His hand was a vice on her jaw as he lifted her face to his. He leaned down, and Sera could feel his cold breath across her lips.
A pulse of warmth from the connection with Jake, closer than she expected, spread out from her center. It reminded her that it wasn’t her power she had to use. It was Torix’s.
She stopped trying to pull away, and instead dug her fingers into his hand behind her back. “No means no, asshole.”
Sera dropped her shields and yanked at his magic with all her might. Pain and surprise flashed across his face. Her scale armor disappeared, and her body recoiled from the drenching cold, but she didn’t let go.
Torix clawed at her face with his other hand then pushed her head back, but his magic flowed into her. Swirling and churning in her belly, fighting for space in a place already full. Her mouth fell open as she gulped in air. In her mind, his strength shrank with every heartbeat. Collapsing in on itself and rushing into her.
Sera was full to bursting with contentious power, but Torix retained too much still. He sank to his knees, but he continued to fight her, picking at her mind, futilely trying to pull his hand away.
Her stomach cramped, and sprites floated off her bare arms as if she was coated in them. The clearing was bright as day with her light, and Sera forced herself to take more. For Maddie. Her hand seized, but she didn’t let go. For Zee and all the Fae. Tiny blue cracks began to form on her fingers, then her hands. Torix’s magic trying to escape one way or another. For Ryan. Her breath emerged in frozen clouds. For Evie. Her legs shook until they were on the verge of giving out, and Sera tightened her grasp on Torix. If she was going down, he was coming with her. It looked like her plan was going to end the way she’d expected, and her big regret was that she wouldn’t get the chance to make a future worth of stupid mistakes with Jake.
Instead of falling to the forest floor, Sera was caught by a furnace of heat. Arms came around her, holding her tight and letting warmth seep into her from behind. A familiar strength circled her, offering support however she needed it. Their bond settled into place, stronger than before. Even with all her power, she hadn’t been able to sever it completely. Sera heard a voice in her mind.
Let me help you.
Relief filled her, and she knew what to do. For Jake.
She opened the floodgates and the excess magic rushed out of her and into him. His arms tightened, but didn’t pull her away. The membrane of her power kept the flow coming out of Torix and into Jake. Magical osmosis. The cracks in her hands closed, and the heat from their bond melted the ice in her body. Jake was open to her, and she could feel it all. His sadness, his pain, his fear, but also his hope, his trust, and his rock-solid faith in her ability to handle it. Underneath it all, she ultimately recognized the warmth for what it was… love.
Between them, they drained Torix until his power was barely a trickle. He lost his glamour and collapsed into the pine needles as a man in a tattered brown robe. His face was white, and his eyes were a boring green with no otherworldly glow.
Sera looked, but she could see no more magic in him. It was then she let Jake take her weight and finally let go.
15
SERA
Sera could have sworn she’d closed her eyes for only a second, but when she opened them, her face was tucked into Jake’s neck. He was sitting on the forest floor, with her curled up in his lap. She lifted her head, and Jake looked down at her. He wasn’t smiling, but the bond was going strong, and she could sense his relief mixing with hers.
“You’re not getting rid of me that easily,” she said.
Jake laughed and dropped his forehead to hers. “I’m sorry about your keys. I had a stupid moment and thought that taking away your choice meant you were safer. I promise never to do that again. I’ll make entirely new mistakes in the future.”
Sera sighed. “I’m sorry too. I didn’t give you a choice either when I tried to break the bond to protect you.”
“You scared the shit out of me. Next time we fight a super villain, maybe give me a heads up when you’re about to do something crazy.”
“Do you get a lot of super villains in Mulligan?”
“Only since you moved back.”
He hugged her, and she winced when he hit the sore spot on her left arm. She really wanted a long soak in the tub and three days of sleep, but it wasn’t even dawn yet, and they had bad guys to take care of.
When she lifted her head, the clearing was full to bursting with sprites. Sera caught her breath. It was beautiful, like a magical snow globe. The torches had been blown down and scattered, the small cauldron was on its side, the grocery bag’s contents were spilled out and scattered on the ground, and the goblet of water was broken and empty. Best of all, the area felt fresh. Even the air smelled a little different, a subtle rotting smell that she hadn’t noticed before was gone. Now it was all pine and sweat and dryer sheets.
Her magic had returned to normal levels, and the bond she’d broken had reformed. When she examined it with her senses, it felt different than before. Last time, Zee’s magic had formed a channel. This time, it was her and Jake alone. The magic wove through them both in complicated knots, and when she touched it, it welcomed her but didn’t bend. She couldn’t influence this one. It was already made of her magic, so she couldn’t absorb or break it. Even when she lifted all her shields, it was safe and snug inside.
Jake waited patiently while she explored, but when s
he raised her shields, he poked her side. “We have a lot to talk about, but there’s something more pressing you should probably know.”
Sera dropped the shields again and straightened so she was sitting in his lap instead of curled up in it. “What’s that?”
He nodded toward where the circle had been. “Torix is gone.”
Her head whipped around. Sure enough, the clearing was empty of Fae, evil or otherwise. “How is that possible? He should be a husk.”
Jake shrugged. “I may have been distracted trying to settle the last dregs of magic once you passed out.”
“I didn’t pass out. I was resting my eyes.”
“Uh huh. He must have crawled away while you were resting your eyes.”
Sera stood and groaned. “Physical battle sucks. He was empty. I’m sure of it. I checked.”
“Well then, I’m not sure there’s much we can do about it anyway.” Jake joined her on his feet and stretched his arms above his head. Sera watched his shirt ride up and remembered gliding her mouth down tight abs. A hot flush raced through her, and Jake grinned. “I’m liking this new bond. It’s a lot more responsive.”
Sera felt his amusement and his answering heat. She met his eyes and closed the distance between them. He didn’t move, but his pulse picked up. She wanted to touch him, and through the bond, he urged her on. Her hand flattened along his stomach and slid up his chest. The bond did interesting things when they touched. She could feel the trail of heat left behind by her hand and how much he enjoyed it. His eyes flashed, and he covered her hand over his heart.
