Page 86 of The Shadow Wand

A tug emanating from the trees.

“The trees are pulling on my lines,” I tell Lukas.

“They can’t hurt you,” he reassures me, voice low. He throws a quick glance back at the trees. “I can feel their hostility as well, but it’s just an aura. Push it back with your fire.”

Outrage sparking, I dredge up affinity fire and blaze it in an invisible wave toward the trees.

The entire grove recoils. I can feel it, deep inside, as tension releases from my lines.

As if the trees have lost their grip on me, but I can feel them scrabbling to regain their hold.

Outrage spikes to fury and I throw out another blast of invisible flame.

Be my enemy, I seethe at the forest.Go ahead and try.What’s one more? You’re playing with fire if you try to come at me.

Even as I think this, I can sense my grandmother’s mounting power infusing my affinity lines.

Settling in.

Forming dark branches, a heightened fire, a stronger current of wind, and a steadier trickle of water.

I glance back down at the handle of Lukas’s wand, both caught up in and terrified by my burgeoning desire to take his wand in hand and unleash my power through it.

CHAPTER EIGHT

PORTAL

ELLOREN GARDNER

Sixth Month

Valgard, Gardneria

During the ride back to the Grey estate, Lukas is quiet, and so am I, both of us seemingly caught up in a silent struggle over how much to divulge to each other as I wrestle with a grief that threatens to tear me apart. Bars of light from a hanging lamp slide back and forth over Lukas’s sculpted face, the two of us sitting opposite each other in his family’s elegant carriage.

Lukas looks out the window as if lost in storming thoughts of his own, his brow deeply furrowed as the carriage makes its way through the vast farm fields that lie between the main city and his family’s estate.

There’s a grim weightiness to Lukas’s demeanor that trumps his usual cool arrogance. Every so often he looks over, his jaw set tight, and considers me as if trying to work out a particularly vexing puzzle. Then he looks away again as I scrutinize him in the same conflicted manner, gutted by unassuageable sorrow.

And overwhelmed by the knowledge of Vogel’s demonic power.

Power that’s growing and rapidly becoming unstoppable. Vogel’s forces are organized and aligned, whereas the forces that could stand against him are being pushed farther and farther east. And the Resistance seems intent on destroying one of its most powerful weapons.

Me.

I peer out the window and let my gaze wander across an expansive cornfield, the full moon casting a pallor over the small stalks, the scene as bleak as my emotions.

When I turn back to Lukas, he’s watching me with an unblinking focus that’s so intense it unnerves me. I drop my gaze and absentmindedly trace the swirling fastlines of one hand with the index finger of the other, considering the absolute permanence of the intricate, looping design.

They’re beautiful, these fastmarks. There’s no denying it.

A beautiful cage that would have kept me forever from Yvan.

Suddenly, the carriage jerks.

My hands splay against the carriage walls as I struggle to keep from pitching forward.

Before I have a chance to react, the carriage jerks again, hard, and I brace myself as the vehicle markedly speeds up and begins wobbling precariously from side to side. The movement of the lamplight bars is chaotic now, casting wildly about the carriage interior.

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