Page 125 of Secrets of Graves and Gold

How do I stop?

My hand swims into view, pale against the trampled soil and patchy grass.

I’m here. Not out there. Not ravaging all those people.

An urge grips me, and I follow it. I snatch the knife from my boot and stab it into the back of my hand.

I keep good enough aim that the blade passes between the bones, severing muscle and sinew with an explosion of pain. Pain that reminds me of exactly where and what I am.

“Ivy!” someone cries out.

I haul at my raging magic, and it hurtles back into me. I can’t prevent it from flinging the knife out of my flesh and sealing the wound, but the thought of who else might be bleeding in my place comes with a smack of horror that grounds me even more.

I clamp down tight on my power, picturing ivy coiling tight around me, sealing every gap. Caging the magic inside my body yet again.

Arms wrap around my middle. “I’ve got her!” Rheave says, and then, softer by my ear, “I’ve got you. They won’t hurt you anymore.”

Doesn’t he see that I’m the one who hurt me?

My thoughts are still too scrambled for me to figure out how to speak.

The daimon-man hefts me against him and runs. As my head settles beneath his chin, I recognize the rustle of branches we race past, crackles of twigs underfoot.

We’re back in the forest.

Am I still keeping my men hidden? I yanked all my magic back to me. I have to…

I try to extend just a tendril, and the frantic surge that jerks at my innards has me shutting down again.

Fuck. I don’t know how to do this anymore.

“Here!” someone hollers. A large equine body pushes in front of us, and Rheave is lifting me onto Toast’s back before hauling himself up behind me.

There are other horses around us. We careen on through the underbrush, dusk falling in our wake.

My thoughts float in spirals and gradually settle into some kind of order.

Rheave thought he was ruining everything, but I really just did. I could have torn even the men I love apart, and I’d hardly even have noticed.

Tears prick at the backs of my eyes. I squeeze the lids shut.

Sulla was right. It’s too much. I don’t know enough.

Maybe I never will. She’s stayed on that mountainside her whole life to avoid a catastrophe like I almost unleashed.

“This way,” a voice says, one I now recognize as Stavros’s.

When I force myself to lift my head, I make out the former general on the other stallion just ahead of us. Alek and Casimir are sharing another horse, cantering along a few paces away through the trees.

They must have stolen it from the camp in the chaos.

Well, now we can all ride, as long as the horses are capable of carrying two. One small gain.

A hysterical giggle bubbles in my throat. I clench my jaw against it.

Stavros draws to a stop and dismounts. As Rheave helps me down off the horse, I make out a stone wall mostly swallowed up by moss and vines.

The former general waves us inside. “It’s an old outpost, abandoned since well before my time. But at least it’ll keep us completely out of sight for the time being.”

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