Page 29 of Twisted Magic

“I’ll do no such thing. I never agreed to that.”

“Maman,” Jadren said with withering patience, “you seem to be unclear on your tenuous position in this negotiation. I have what I want; I have the power to keep it. There is nothing you can give me, nothing you can promise to entice me to give you further information. You are standing here on my sufferance, which is waning rapidly.”

“You can’t speak to me this way.” Katica El-Adrel’s face had gone ashen, pinched with strain, all pretense vanished, her magic so fierce in the air around them that Selly felt like her eyes would start watering, and she had to suppress the urge to cover her ears. “I won’t stand for it,” Katica continued, wizard-black eyes like pits in her sharp, white face. “I’m tempted to call you on your bluff, wizardling.”

“It’s no bluff.” Jadren faced his mother fully, placing Selly behind him, guiding her hand to his waist. Right, she needed to be the one keeping contact with him, ready to provide him with magic. Good thing she was full to bursting from their erotic play. “I’m willing to go to extremes to free myself of you, Maman,” he said without inflection, “but can you say the same—are you willing to risk losing your most successful experiment?

“I made you. I can make another like you.”

Jadren made a show of wincing. “Ooh, thank you for playing, but that’s not an option.”

“You don’t tell me, little boy,” Katica sneered. “I make the rules. I have others like you, very promising. Better, in fact, not such a disappointment in every way.”

Others? Did Jadren have younger siblings he didn’t know about? Fyrdo fixed his gaze on the floor, giving no sign he’d heard or understood.

“Upon my life,” Jadren replied steadily, “I vow you’ll never have the opportunity to warp anyone else’s life like you did mine.” Beside her, Jadren had slipped his hand beneath his leather vest, apparently in a gesture of putting his hand over his heart in solemn promise—or threat—but Selly knew he had the widget poised, inverted to channel death rather than healing. Through their physical connection and the bond, he drew on her magic. Not heavily, more to widen the channel between them, preparing to pull the power necessary for a devastating blow. Though she dreaded what might happen next, Selly obligingly opened her end, giving him whatever he needed.

If he needed to kill his mother, then so be it.

Katica, no fool, didn’t miss Jadren’s movement. “You think to use your new tricks on me? Something the Refoel healers taught you, no doubt. I have news for you, baby boy: you can’t heal someone to death.”

“What do you think I did to Ozana?”

That penetrated her cool confidence, giving her a moment’s pause. “You had to have used some sort of enchanted artifact. Your healing magic works only on yourself—and it can’t be weaponized.”

“Try me,” Jadren replied flatly. “Or are you afraid to?”

Fyrdo, still confused from being in alternate form, looked back and forth between the squared off wizards. “What is going on?” he asked, plaintive, not at all like his formerly robust and jolly self.

“Oh, you are going to regret challenging me,” Katica cooed to Jadren, ignoring Fyrdo. She raised her hands and her magic. Small darts peeled themselves out of the beaded lightning bolts of Lady El-Adrel’s glamourous pantsuit, swarming around her, transformed and elevated by her wizardry, pivoting midair to point directly at Selly, a glittering golden arrow of death by pain. Selly knew those darts well. Once they contacted flesh—her flesh—they burrowed in, spiraling to organs and bones, shredding everything in their path, killing her by agonizing increments. Katica met Selly’s gaze and smiled. “You remember these, don’t you, pet? They hurt. Then they kill you. And I won’t summon a healer for you this time. It’s in my best interests to let you die. Jadren has only gotten uppity since I gifted you to him.” Her lip curled. “I should have known he’d be ungrateful.”

“Stay behind me,” Jadren told her quietly. He didn’t need to tell her twice. Selly was happy to put the bulk of him between her and those awful darts.

Katica tracked the movement, naturally. “Don’t imagine he cares about you. He’s only using you. He’ll sacrifice you to get to me, drain you dry and discard you without a backward look. Hasn’t he proved that to you? Abandoned you, as no wizard ever does with their familiar. Failed to protect you. You might imagine you care about him, but that’s only the bond. Save yourself and step away from him. Remove yourself from the line of fire.”

“So you can kill me anyway?” Selly replied, her voice surprisingly steady.

“Kill you?” Katica shook that off, giving Selly a very serious look. “Not if I don’t have to. With my son dead, you’ll be unbonded. You’re a valuable familiar, a precious asset to House El-Adrel. Come with me and I’ll find you a better wizard. Someone whole, not crippled with self-doubt. Someone with real magic. Someone educated, who knows how to give you what you crave as a familiar. You need discipline, a firm hand, and I can see to it that you have it. Now is your opportunity to show your loyalty to the house of your bonding.”

“Loyalty?” Selly repeated incredulously. She moved closer against Jadren’s back, putting them into more physical contact, trying to show him without words that she didn’t believe any of it. “Such a dry word. But then, you don’t understand love, do you? Well, I do, because I come from a normal, healthy family. People who actually know the meaning of the word. Even before we were bonded, I loved Jadren. I would die for him.” This close to Jadren, she felt his intake of breath, the brightening of his magic. She didn’t understand his surprise at her declaration, however. He’d known how she felt.

Katica sniffed in disdain. “Oh, dear. You really aren’t terribly bright. I hadn’t realized until this moment the true depths of your idiocy. You’ve backed a losing horse. You’re ignorant of the Convocation, so you don’t understand how powerful a high-house wizard truly is. Jadren is barely capable of the basics. He can’t protect you from me, even if he manages to pull his head out of his ass long enough to even try. He’s never been able to stand up to me.”

“You forget, Maman,” Jadren put in quietly, “that I’ve made no promise this time to allow you to use your wizardry on us. I have us both warded.”

“Your pitiful wards can’t hold up against me,” she replied, shaking her head in mock sorrow. “But it’s precious that you’re trying.” Without warning, the golden darts shot forward, a blur of motion, fast as lightning. Selly flinched, unable to prevent the reflexive need to duck. She managed to hold firm, however, just as Nic and then Liat had taught her. That repetitive training worked, it turned out, force of habit overriding her instinctive terror.

Jadren hadn’t bluffed, though Selly hadn’t sensed his wards going up. The darts collided with the invisible, curved surface in a flurry of eye-blinding gold sparks before glancing off. She wanted to jump in triumph, perhaps throw a rude gesture at the wizard woman, but Jadren’s intensity didn’t lessen an iota. By this, she understood this duel was far from over. Confirming it, the darts assembled again in a lethal aura around Katica, nearly vibrating in the wedge formation as they adjusted slightly mid-air, all pointing at Selly. With the open balcony at her back, she had nowhere to go, and Jadren’s lanky body could shield her only so much.

“So, you’ve learned a few tricks, after all,” Katica breathed on a disdainful laugh. “But it will take more than a midlevel wizard’s wards to withstand me. Or have you forgotten who I am?”

Jadren laughed in the same way, humorless, shimmering with similar power. “Oh, dear Maman, I’ve forgotten nothing. Do your worst. Nothing can eclipse what you’ve already done. I have literally nothing to lose.” Though Jadren came by his coloring from Fyrdo, for the first time Selly clearly saw his mother’s stamp on him. The same clean-boned intensity, the bow of their finely carved lips and their wizard-black eyes, alike in shape and magic. The way Jadren always said a monster lurked inside him; the monster so obviously inside Katica. Maybe it had nothing to do with magic and everything to do with ruthless use of power.

“My worst it is. Fyrdo, to me,” Katica snapped out.

Fyrdo wavered, looking back and forth between his wizard and son. He rubbed his forehead, in the spots where those little horns had been. “Jadren? Are you really here? I told you to run, to never come back, when I—”

“Father,” Jadren interrupted, preventing Fyrdo from confessing his role in their previous escape, just in case Katica didn’t already know everything. “Are you all right? We’re here to help you.”

---