Page 44 of Immortal Burden

But I also couldn’t seem to bring myself to step forward either.

“Jesus Christ,” I muttered under my breath, as I rose to my feet, ready to head back home.

I’d take comfort in the peaceful walk back, rather than heading there in the blink of an eye through jarring teleportation.

“You’ve proven yourself a great disappointment, Ryker,” a frustratingly familiar voice rang out, echoing through the still forest with an ominous rumble.

I spun around, quickly locating the source.

Immediately, I wished I hadn’t.

I should’ve just brushed it off and teleported the hell away.

Because, much to my chagrin, there stood Cornelius, the most unwelcome intruder ever.

“That from a guy who committed such a grievous sin that he had his almighty angel status ripped from him?” I clapped back, unable and unwilling to hold off after the recent bullshit he’d pulled with me. “So, tell me again, who’s the real disappointment here?”

He moved so quickly that I didn’t see it coming until it was too late.

A silver ball of fire slammed into my chest.

The brutality of the immense power behind it sent me careening backward twenty feet into the trunk of an old oak tree.

I choked as my back jarred painfully against it, knocking the wind out of me, and making me ricochet off it and stumble forward, only just managing to catch my balance.

“That was only a fraction of the punishment you deserve.”

“For talking back to the almighty Head of the Guardian Movement?”

“No,” he seethed, his eyes narrowing dangerously at my continued show of disrespect.

Like he deserved anything more from me after the callous and unjustified way he’d always treated me.

He strode forward menacingly. “You shirked your Guardian duty earlier, setting in motion a chain of dire events that I was forced to take distasteful action to halt.”

Distasteful action? What had he done? And, to whom?

“I am finished with cleaning up after the mess caused by continued complacence and unending stubbornness from too many. The stakes are too high with Draco’s return for me to allow things to progress naturally. Unfortunately, I must violate my own rules to protect the innocent, to save us all.”

He summoned a ball of raging silver fire.

It swirled rapidly, violently.

I jolted in shock as it began to spin, then shoot off deadly sparks of lightning.

They fired into the clear blue sky, turning it dark within moments, thunder rumbling.

The guy had summoned a fucking storm!

The ball continued to fire off the electrifying strikes more rapidly with every passing second and with every menacing step he took toward me.

Darkness descended until I could barely see, fighting to adjust my eyes to it as quickly as possible.

“I will mold you into what you must become, convince you undoubtedly of what you must do.”

Flipping my palms up, I called my green fire forth, readying myself as he neared, standing my ground.

I didn’t care who the hell he was, I didn’t balk in the face of any sort of threat.

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