Page 76 of The Cursed Sebastian Storm

The shade was saved from the onslaught by a swarm of tendrils rising to intercept Sebastian’s blast. The air filled with their shrieks. Sebastian tried again, only to be met with more expendable tendrils. He couldn’t get his power to reach the shade.

“Leave Moonlight Falls,” Sebastian shouted. His head pounded. He searched the power within him until he came to that cold patch, clinging to the vein like a parasite. He directed all his concentration and energy toward it, burning it.

The shade in front of him screamed. Sebastian’s ears popped and his concentration broke as pain stabbed through his head. He retched bile onto the ground and swayed, legs almost giving out. He felt nauseated and broken and was surprised his head hadn’t literally split open. His vision went spotty, and he barely managed to stay standing.

The chanting sounds he’d heard earlier began once more. Sebastian looked up in time to see the stone knife swinging downward, aimed straight at James’s neck.

He screamed, and it felt like his head exploded as he sent a stream of blue power at the knife. It hit with a clap like thunder, and the stone dagger shattered into a million small pieces that fell harmlessly onto James like dust.

It was only a momentary relief. The shade growled and tossed James to the ground. It glided over him toward Sebastian, who sent another head-splitting burst of power at the beast only to be intercepted by more tendrils.

Sebastian dry heaved, his vision blacking out for a second. He might never run out of energy with the veins at his disposal, but that didn’t mean his body could do this forever.

He blinked away the fog of unconsciousness threatening him and lunged out of the way just in time as the shade tried to grab him. He needed to end this soon. James needed to be taken care of. Sebastian couldn’t waste any more time. He concentrated on the tendrils of shadow writhing on the ground. There seemed to be a dark center that didn’t move. He aimed for it, sending power into its depths.

As the blow struck, the shade grabbed Sebastian around the middle with both limbs and squeezed. The air whooshed out of Sebastian’s lungs, but his hit had found its mark. All the tendrils burst, unable to break away from the center and save any one piece.

But it was too late. The shade was crushing him.

Sebastian dug his fingers into the dark limbs constricting him, sending power hurtling through his body and into the beast. The shade jolted. Its eerie yell pierced Sebastian’s eardrums as it released him. Sebastian found his feet and turned to face the shade, wobbling and sucking air into his aching chest. He sent another jolt of magic at the shade, and without the tendrils to take the blow, it hit.

The shade staggered but didn’t burst.

Sebastian growled in frustration and growing exhaustion. “Leave,” he grunted and struck again.

The shade’s yell sounded weaker this time as it staggered back farther. “I will come back. Beyond is not for the living. You can’t kill me.”

Fear gripped Sebastian, but he couldn’t let it stop him. “How did you even get here?” he rasped as he gathered power, hoping to hit the shade with a ball of power larger than anything he’d cast so far.

The shade cocked its blank head. “You already know the answer to that, Gatekeeper.”

Dread filled Sebastian, but there was no time to stop and think about it. He pulled as much power to him as he could and let it loose. Raw magic burst from his fingertips and hit the shade straight in the chest. There was no scream this time. The beast seemed oddly frozen as the power ran from Sebastian into its dark form. Then, it exploded in a burst of light.

The smaller shades crowding around hissed and shrank back. Sebastian’s knees hit the grass, his legs no longer able to hold him up. Sebastian only had eyes for James. His James. The light of his life slumped on the ground.

He crawled forward. “James, babe, oh, James.” He rolled James over and cradled his slack face. “James,” Sebastian sobbed.

He needed to pull it together. James needed warmth, rest, and food. An IV would be ideal, but there was no hospital in this damn town.

An increasingly loud hissing sound broke through his worried thoughts. He looked up to see the shades all around him closing in. The ones farther back in the crowd had floated up, forming a domed wall of wispy bodies, claws, and onyx eyes. All Sebastian could see was shades in every direction save for the grass beneath him.

Sebastian clutched James to his chest. Even with the vein’s power, there were too many shades. His body was wrecked from the magic he’d already done. He had power, but his head was throbbing so badly that it was getting harder and harder to see. He couldn’t blast all these shades back to Beyond. It would kill him.

He needed light. Even the light-resistant shades hadn’t been seen in direct sunlight. He needed to banish the darkness and bring back the sun, or else he’d never be able to get past these beasts and get James to safety.

He rested his head on James’s leather-clad chest and breathed in his scent. It calmed him. James was who he was doing this for. He would do anything for James, no matter how hard or how much it hurt.

Sebastian found the cold darkness clinging to the veins and focused all the energy he had access to on that one point. Pressure built inside him, in his head, more and more, making him fear it would never end. Right when he couldn’t take it, the power exploded, burning inside him and making him scream.

The air around him dropped to a bone-chattering cold. The burning power and the frosty air warred in a battle that seemed to go on forever. Sebastian felt his breaths growing shallow. He couldn’t do it. The darkness’s hold was too strong.

But the darkness wasn’t part of Sebastian. It wasn’t part of Moonlight Falls and needed to leave, and Sebastian didn’t think he could stop trying to banish it if he even tried, not now that he’d started. He was stuck. He’d either succeed or die.

Blinding light burst in front of Sebastian’s closed eyes. The power he wielded overwhelmed the darkness at last, and the thing clinging to the veins let go. He forced his eyes open and looked up, his whole body shaking as the stone turned white, light radiating from it in all directions.

The shades shrank back, and just when Sebastian feared it wasn’t enough, the stone seemed to burst and daylight erupted around them.

A blindingly bright, clear blue sky shone above his head. Shades hissed and screeched, hundreds of them bursting into smoke instantly. Any that remained fled, seeking shadows or dark crevasses to escape the sun. Soon, the street was clear.

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