Page 71 of A Lost Light

I was only one person. I could only be in one place at one time. And I could only warp time for seconds…not even an entire minute.

It wasn't enough. I knew it from the moment that blast came hurtling toward the rebel leader and her reluctantly recruited sister and friends. And yet, I had to try. I couldn't stand by and watch this happen.

Of all the times I had cursed the limitations of the amazing power I had been gifted, this was one of the absolute worst.

Dead. Again, and again, they were alldead.

My legs shook and the magic burned as I grasped it again. I had to keep trying.

This time I only made it worse. I moved Aahil closer, hoping he could phase Andy and Hasumi out faster than the water weaver could. He couldn't.

I hit my knees as the blast hit the group, my vision wavering and the air burning as I forced my tired body to continue to suck in oxygen. As I forced my exhausted synapses to fire. One more. I thought I might have one more time skip left in me, though I had never pushed myself this far before.

I felt tears trickle down my cheeks. My body was burning hot and icy cold by turns as I forced it to keep doing things that went against the natural order. I pushed myself to my feet, swaying when dizziness swept over me. I had to movenow,or I'd lose too much time. I could only set things back so far from the present. I had to try again.

I had to choose.

“I'm sorry,” I whispered as I grabbed the slippery, burning threads of time in one final attempt. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

Chapter 44

Andy

The cultist's killing spell was hurtling toward us as I tried to re-build the shield they had just destroyed. But I knew I wouldn't be fast enough. And even if I was, there was no guarantee it would hold. I felt Dyre and Sunshine's magic surge to me through our bond. Maybe together we could--

I hit my knees hard, quite a distance from where I had just been standing. Strong arms banded around my waist when I reflexively tried to stand, tried to get to my family, who were all now standing in the path of killing magic while I was somehow just out of blast range.

It all happened so fast that my mind had trouble keeping up. It seemed like I only blinked, and the horrific scene unfolded before me. Hasumi was standing awkwardly, a watery shield up as they tried to shelter the place where I had been standing just a second before. JunaidthrewBella away from him… and the spell hit.

I screamed, clawing at the ground as I tried to crawl toward the place where my family were now lying scattered on the ground. Toward the place where Hasumi had just been standing.

I couldn't stop screaming. The arms around me shook, and a deep, broken voice reached my ears through the white noise that was taking over. “Sorry,” he whispered, over and over. “So sorry, Oleander. I'mso sorry.”

I glanced aside long enough to see that it was River who was holding me back. Something was wrong with the shifter. He was shaking. His coppery skin had lost its luster, and there were dark circles under his eyes. But I couldn't focus on that. I could barelybreathe.

Struggling free of his grip, I scrambled to my feet and ran. But I was too late. I knew that. And I knew what I had just witnessed would haunt me forever. “Hasumi!” I shouted as I reached the place where the water weaver had just stood seconds before.

Where they had beenvaporizedby the enemy spell. Steam filled the air, and I whipped my head around, expecting Hasumi to simply reform from the ether and give me one of their unconcerned little smiles.

Bella was sobbing. Holding Junaid's mangled body in her lap. He wasn’t moving and no aura surrounded his body. Dead.

Ambrose was helping a bloodied and stumbling Zhong carry Niamh to the shade of a large oak. She was alive, judging from the state of her aura, but there was alotof blood. They were both badly hurt. I took all of this in between blinks. Like still frames in an old family slide show. Flat. Emotionless. As if nothing around me was real. It couldn’t be.

Dyre stood in the middle of it all, wearing a truly terrifying expression, his eyes completely black and his gauntly handsome face twisted in bitter rage while his dark aura flared around him like the waving arms of a hungry shadow. His army of corpses had frozen in place, but with a wave of his hand, they rushed forward, moving faster than any undead should move.

They fell on the remaining cultists like hungry super-powered zombies, screams and wet crunches filling the air.

No more spells came at us. Not that I would have cared if they did. I was too busy trying to breathe around the painful vise that crushed my chest. “Hasumi!” I yelled again, spinning in a circle. “Where are you?”

Aahil appeared at my side in a shower of sparks. His eyes were wild and filled with jinn fire, and his graceful motions were sharp and so fast it was hard for my eye to follow. “Weaver!” he demanded in his best impatient, no-nonsense tone. “Show yourself. This isn’t humorous.”

“I can feel their magic,” I said, though I knew I was only trying to convince myself at that point. “They just have to… re-form.”

The mist that had hung in the air around us was beginning to dissipate. I tried not to think about what that mist was. And what it might mean that it was disappearing without leaving a gorgeous water weaver behind. I started shaking uncontrollably and my voice cracked. “Hasumi?”

Dyre came to stand closer, pulling his attention away from the ravenous horde he had created. His black eyes flashed to violet and he lifted a hand to touch my shoulder, then his gaze went black again as Sunshine took over. “The water weaver is dead, my witch,” the wraith said evenly. “There is no use calling their name.”

I slapped his hand away. “No! Hasumi isn'tdead.They're just… water molecules right now. They'll be back.” My voice broke as tears spilled from my eyes. “Hasumi…” The name was just a whisper on my tongue.

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