The Connelly Curse

by Lily Velez

  I cast another glance to the sky. The triple moons had crossed the vastness of its terrain, dipping toward the horizon. I pictured Scarlet fighting for her life as demon venom coursed through her veins. I knew how vehemently she’d protest against this, even if it was to save her.

  But she meant too much. To witch-kind, as the last of a lost bloodline and as a Daughter of Brigid.

  To me, as something more…

  I made my decision.

  I made a sound to beckon the guard. He twisted slightly in my direction, frowning at my audacity to summon him as I might a dog. Under his watchful gaze, I wrapped my hands around two bars, gritting my teeth against the immediate, searing pain. It might’ve hurt less to hold my palms within a raging fire.

  The guard bristled. More often than not, Marauders were tasked with bringing in their bounties alive and unharmed. Obviously the Dark Lord’s orders would be no different. While I could still practice magic with burnt hands, it would displease him greatly that a Marauder had allowed me to mutilate myself. After all, I was his property, and the gods and other creatures of the Otherworld were extremely possessive when it came to things (or beings) that they believed they owned.

  The guard unsheathed his sword. I imagined he meant to slap the flat of the blade against my knuckles to stop me.

  He didn’t get the chance.

  When he was close enough, my hand shot out and grabbed the front of his shirt. I yanked him toward me hard. His head thwacked the bars. Stunned and disoriented, he could barely react as I relieved him of his dagger and shoved the blade deep into his neck.

  I maintained my grip on the weapon as he slumped to the ground, dark blood staining the blade. The searing pain on my palms muted as the familiar and seductive fragrance of demon blood filled my nose, instantly beguiling me.

  With everything on the line, still, I hesitated. I had abstained for a considerable amount of time. Nothing long by any stretch of the imagination, but it was progress nonetheless. If I partook now, would I be able to find my way out again?

  Or was what I’d seen in the Cave of Nightmares a destiny I truly couldn’t avoid?

  Shouts came from the direction of the roast. Someone had noticed the fallen guard. A dozen Marauders sprinted straight for me. My time was up.

  I slid my fingers across the blade, collecting as much of the blood as I could.

  Different species of demon resulted in different tastes when it came to their blood. It turned out Marauder blood possessed an earthy flavor, the kind you might expect from a dish of mushrooms. I swallowed down every last drop, the dark magic shooting through my system and flooding my veins instantaneously.

  Unfathomable power swelled in my chest, ready for release. I yielded to it, and it built further, a mounting surge of magic that was ready to detonate.

  So the Dark Lord had sent Marauders to retrieve me. A fair play admittedly. But I would send a message back in return.

  With a wave of my hand, the bars of the cage fell back like a house of cards toppling over. The bars’ runes had only cut off my communication with Kai. Presumably, the Marauders had thought that was the only precaution they needed to take, not thinking I’d have the opportunity to slay one of their own.

  The Marauders approaching me momentarily stalled, taken aback by my display of power. Baring their teeth, they tightened their grips on their weapons and continued forward.

  I met them with a series of illusions. Each Marauder began to combat with a version of myself that wasn’t really there, and I strode right past their numbers with them none the wiser. The next line of Marauders I handled differently. I sharply pulled my hand back, and when I did, an invisible force yanked the weapons from their grips. I twisted my hand, and the weapons rotated with the movement, their sharp ends pointing to the demons. A simple thrust of my hand, and the Marauders were dispatched.

  I pulled a knife free from someone’s arm, licked the blade, and then hurled the weapon at an approaching Marauder, who went down in the next instant. Wave after wave of Marauders came at me, but I was untouchable, a wild animal set loose in the camp.

  My pulse pounded at my neck, my heart slamming in rapturous, ecstatic beats. I wasn’t myself, and I was more myself than I’d ever been. It was strange, because one might assume that I’d be well acquainted with the rush by this point, but every fix of dark magic was ten times more intoxicating than the last, so that the sudden storm of power always felt new. And euphoric.

  At one point, strengthened by the dark magic, my fist plunged into the chest of a Marauder, my fingers closing in around his still-beating heart. I tore it out.

  Every last Marauder who dared contend with me met their end within seconds.

  I was covered in their blood, my arms sleeved with it, my face freckled with it. They continued to attack in a swarm of defiance, but I was always faster, always stronger. And my mercy was long gone. I operated under the unwavering determination that nothing would stop me from retrieving The Violet Jewel or from returning to Scarlet.

  Finally, I came to the last of the Marauders, the remaining warriors standing around their chieftain to protect him. The fire from the roast continued to dance, the boar at its center long blackened.

  Three Marauders charged for me. With a swipe of my hand, the roast spat out three large fireballs. They consumed the Marauders completely, who shrieked and threw themselves to the ground, thrashing about to put out the flames. The flames fought back, raging on, until one by one, the Marauders stilled, the stench of their burning flesh filling the air.

  Another trio of Marauders approached, though they stopped to look up when thunder roared, branches of lightning stretching across the sky. Three furious bolts of it charged at them, striking them dead at once.

  I strode on. The final warriors let out fearsome battle cries and sprinted for me. Their cries died in the back of their throats. With wisps of dark magic, I grabbed each one by the throat in a crushing grip. The magic squeezed tighter and tighter until they stopped struggling entirely.

  Now the only remaining member of his tribe, the chieftain roared, unsheathing a curved blade as he barreled for me.

  I made a fist in the air. He stopped short, choking. He clawed at his chest and tried to gulp for breath. I tightened my fist, feeling every straining beat as his heart struggled against the dark magic.

  In the end, I, as I’d been every other time, was stronger.

  The chieftain dropped to the earth unmoving.

  I picked up his staff, recovering The Violet Jewel.

  Without so much of a look at the carnage around me, I made my way back to Scarlet.

  37

  Jack

  “You look like death.”

  By the time I navigated The Everwoods and located the cave where I’d left Scarlet and Kai, daybreak was no more than an hour away.

  Kai took a whiff of my scent as I passed him. “You smell like it too.”

  I could feel his scrutinizing gaze comb over my disheveled appearance, snagging on The Violet Jewel and then the blood that covered me. I met his eyes and saw the realization in them.

  “I had no choice,” I told him. The confession bruised me as it left my lips.

  On my way back through The Everwoods, I’d already gone through the terrible throes of my kickback. In the beginning, kickbacks could last several days. The more you used dark magic, however, the quicker it passed through your system, leaving you continuously chasing after the next high.

  That in-between was the difficult part. Now out of the dark magic’s grips, I wanted nothing more than to return to it. My body felt weak without the demon blood surging through me, my mind heavy and my movements sluggish.

  I knew it was all psychosomatic, but that did nothing to lessen the craving. Or the self-loathing. I held no regrets for my decision because it’d been the only way to save Scarlet. What I hated was the pleasure I’d felt at destroying every last Marauder, at completely decimating their camp.

  Yes, they’d been demons, and
I’d fought plenty of their kind before. But never with such relish. Never with such savagery. I’d been more animal than witch.

  Admit it. You savor the way dark magic feels as it courses through your body. You love the power that thrums in your veins with every drop of demon blood you consume. You love how invincible you become, how the entire universe seems yours to command when dark magic sparks at your fingertips.

  My shadow self’s words.

  They cut through me with burning precision, and it shamed me.

  “How is she?” I asked, pushing those thoughts aside. I’d have more than enough time later to turn my deeds over in my mind. What mattered now was Scarlet.

  “I’ll say this: the little witch is a survivor. She’s clinging to life even now.”

  Within seconds, I was at her side. She was so pale her sweat-drenched skin was practically translucent, those sinister veins of black crisscrossing her body like Lichtenberg scars. I quickly grabbed her wrist to measure her pulse. A faint thud finally tapped against my fingertip after what seemed an eternity. Her heart beat dangerously slow, but it beat. Kai was right. She was a survivor. Though I’d never doubted it.

  I produced The Goddess’s Pearl from my pocket. “Tell me how to make the antidote.”

  After scrubbing my hands clean of Marauder blood, it took mere minutes to prepare the nectar, the only ingredients the powder of the crushed pearl and a small portion of boiling water. The resulting mixture was thick like a paste and smelled like oatmeal.

  Once it cooled, I brought it to Scarlet, gently lifting her upright and supporting her against me. Kai had said only a few drops of the antidote would be necessary to counteract the venom. I dipped my fingertips into the nectar and slowly glossed it over Scarlet’s lips.

  Her eyes remained closed, but she stirred, perhaps roused by the nectar’s aromatics. She moaned slightly, moved her head from side to side with a furrowed brow, and then finally rolled her lips inward to taste what was on them.

  I heaved a relieved breath and immediately reached for more nectar, this time collecting a dollop of it. Scarlet’s head was resting against my shoulder, and I brought my fingertips to her mouth again, smearing the paste over her lips. She didn’t taste the nectar this time, so I slightly parted her lips, rubbing the nectar on the inside of them and onto her tongue.

  “Come on, Scarlet,” I urged, not sure if the first dose had been sufficient enough. I turned my head slightly and spoke into her satiny hair, whispering for her ears only. “I know you can do this. I know it because I’ve never met anyone stronger. Fight this, Scarlet. Please.”

  She started shivering. Seconds later, her entire body seized up, and she threw her head back against my shoulder as foam quickly filled her mouth.

  “What’s happening?” I exclaimed to Kai as Scarlet’s convulsions grew more violent. I rushed to lay her on her side to clear her airway. “Kai!”

  Kai appeared as shocked as I felt, his complexion paling considerably. “She may be rejecting the antidote. Or rather, the venom in her is rejecting it. Too much time has elapsed, meaning the venom has already fully taken over her body.”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head. I tried to put more nectar into Scarlet’s mouth once the foam cleared, but she only coughed it back up. Worse, the latticework of black on her skin darkened even further, a net of death quickly closing tightly around her.

  I pressed my palm to her chest just under the hollow of her throat and uttered a command.

  “Leave,” I ordered the venom in Irish. It didn’t leave.

  “Calm,” I tried next, hoping to soothe Scarlet’s convulsions. Her fingers were curling in on her palms in rigid movements, the veins in her neck straining.

  Once again, my command was ineffective, and Scarlet was fast becoming the color of a cadaver. I wracked my mind for any and all relevant words and spoke them all, but nothing I said would deliver her from the venom’s hold.

  “Give me your blood,” I told Kai. Dark magic had revived Connor all those years ago. Surely it could do the same now.

  “It won’t work,” Kai said. “Not against demon venom. The venom will only feed off the dark magic, worsening the problem.”

  Suddenly, Scarlet’s body stilled. Alarm jolted me as her lips blued, as her color became practically porcelain. This time, there wasn’t a pulse at her wrist. Ignoring that fact, I checked the one at her neck. Nothing. I brought my knuckles against her lips, waiting for her breath to coast along my skin. It never did.

  “Scarlet!” I took her face in my hands. “No, no, no. Come on.” I smoothed my thumbs over her cheekbones again and again and again, as if I could erase the venom trails, as if I could bring her back with a mere touch.

  All the while, a single thought struck me at my core: This is on you.

  However I wished to parse it, that was the decisive truth. Because though it was her father she fought for, it was Alistair who manipulated him like a puppet, and the only reason he did so was because of me. Because I’d been born, because a wicked, age-old prophecy had finally come true, because I was the chosen one through which the world would burn.

  I’d pulled everyone I cared for—Scarlet, my brothers, my mother, my father—into the mire of my misfortune. In unique and varied ways, it had broken them all. It had crushed them, wounded them, destroyed them.

  It was destroying Scarlet before my eyes.

  And I couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t stand that so much suffering and heartache could be ultimately traced back to my very birth and what it heralded.

  Shame filled me. Then anger. Then rage.

  The type of rage that could split the world in two.

  It tore through me in waves of white-hot fury—fury I’d held back for so long, that I’d tried to control in the face of so many shocking revelations. It burned from the innermost part of me and blasted out in reverberating shockwaves.

  Thunder bellowed in a deafening explosion outside, the sound so loud I might’ve thought the mountain had imploded. Bayonets of lightning charged at the ground, the small opening of the cave glowing white with every strike. Then the earth trembled and the rock-hewn walls along with it.

  I was the storm, and the storm was me.

  Large fissures cracked along the ground, raced up the walls, covered the cavernous ceiling above us. The nearby fire rushed upward in a tempest of spitting flames, the cave becoming an inferno.

  “Jack,” Kai warned. “Control it.”

  He assumed this was the last of the dark magic. It wasn’t. It was only me.

  Since the time I’d been able to summon the four Quarters, since the time my many Masteries had begun to emerge, my people had called me the most powerful witch to ever be born into one of the seven clans of Ireland. This without even knowing the true extent of my power. This without ever having truly witnessed it. I hadn’t even fully witnessed it myself. Not until now.

  I crossed one hand over the other and pressed them over Scarlet’s heart, as if I meant to resuscitate her. Instead, I summoned all that power, all the magic within me and around me, collecting every last scrap of it until I thought I might break apart. When I could contain no more, I channeled it all into Scarlet in a powerful rush.

  I went along with the magic, pushing my consciousness into hers. I felt the looming presence of the Wargling venom. It manifested in Scarlet’s soul like scores of thorny vines seeking to choke out her existence. The vines closed in around me, but I met them with equal measure, emanating magic in searing shots of light that cut through them like blades and ripped them to shreds.

  The venom and I clashed upon the terrain of Scarlet’s soul. I would not be cowed into submission. I would not back down. I would not retreat from this battlefield without her.

  The power filling me was unlike anything I’d ever experienced before. It was…raw. The energy of the universe in its most natural state, pouring into me like a waterfall and rushing out of my hands in potent tidal waves of magic. I harnessed everything it could give me, sending i
t into Scarlet until sparks of her own magic began to blink back into existence like the first stars appearing after dusk.

  Those sparks remained behind the bars of Alistair’s prison, and try as I did, I couldn’t free them. But I slipped through the bars to at least kindle them with my magic until more and more woke, an entire constellation coming into form. I fed them the purifying energy they needed, and strengthened, they glowed brighter still.

  I pulled back, prepared to resume my fight with the venom, but Scarlet’s magic stopped me. It started to weave around my own magic. I hesitated, drawing back at once. The last thing I wanted was to somehow contaminate its essence. Though the darkness had left my body, who was to know for sure if some wicked residue remained behind even now?

  Scarlet’s magic insisted, unafraid. At its core, it was pure love, the way I imagined the Land of Youth to feel the moment you stepped upon its plains. In the end, I couldn’t help but yield to it, to her.

  Together, her magic and my magic wove together, matching fibers forming a glowing cord that drew me closer to her, until I was almost certain our souls were merging. Her hopes, her dreams, her passions. I felt them. Her fears, her troubles, her worries. I felt them too. They belonged just as much to me as they did to her, as if I’d carried them with me my entire life.

  Above all, I felt…alive.

  More alive than I ever thought was possible.

  The love that served as the foundation for Scarlet’s magic summoned the love in mine, the one that had been buried under so much loss and strife. Excavated from its grave, it soared to meet its twin, and when the two collided, there was a breathtaking detonation of magic that canceled out all else, incinerating the venom in an instant.

  My eyes snapped open. A globe of blinding white light surrounded us, crackling with energy. Scarlet shone as bright as a star, light glowing from underneath her skin—skin that was no longer marred by veins of black. My own skin matched hers, channels of magic still coursing down my arms and pooling into my hands.