Page 78 of The Discovered
With a motion from my fingers a deafening crack erupted as a tree to our right split at its base, falling toward Lucius and breaking his link to my body. As it toppled over, he rolled out of the way just in time, a cloud of snow and the ripe scent of pine billowing out from the crash. My eyes darted around, losing sight of where he ended up.
I swallowed, backing up. I inhaled sharply as I stumbled back into a body, and when a hand closed over my throat, I knew it wasn’t Daelon joining the fight. Lucius’s skin was like ice, and he squeezed around my airway. I could feel an insidious magick beginning to slide through my barriers, seeping into my skin like suffocating black ooze.
I grabbed at his hand, channeling fire and attempting to force Lucius to loosen his hold.
“Ow,” he muttered, releasing his grip and the curse along with it. “That actually sort of hurt,” he marveled, as if surprised by something unexpectedly delightful. His ambivalence was unnerving. Was he normally immune to pain?
I took hold of a current of power reaching out for me, and in a rush, I was transported to the other side of the fallen tree. I coughed, glaring at Lucius as he shook out his singed hand. I could feel his red-hot anger, and it only mixed with and inflamed my own.
“You’re less erratic now,” he said. “More focused.” He narrowed his eyes as if he were asking a question.
I opened my mouth to say something about Daelon but thought better of it. Lucius had told me Daelon would betray me. He wanted me to believe it so I’d lose control, and I would not provide him with that ammunition. Whatever magick he’d worked on Daelon could be broken. I just needed to find it within myself to pull the trigger.
“You think you’re going to kill me, don’t you? I can see it in your eyes.” He seemed amused by this, not an ounce of fear in his aura. “You will never be strong enough for that, little witch.”
I didn’t answer, focusing on raising energy. I thought back to Daelon’s teachings about invocations, intent, and aggressive magick. I knew that the power I had at my disposal wanted Lucius dead as much as I did. I recited silent prayers like my mothers had done before me.
Momma Celeste, Momma Jane, I call upon you and our people for protection for Daelon and me. I call upon your strength so that I may defeat this evil and be free to discover my purpose.
I homed in on the currents of power reaching to me from all directions, my mind flashing to all of those swims in the ocean, where I was connected to all of the energies of nature, uninhibited and unweighted by the fabric of physical reality.
Time halted as flashes of visions ran through my mind’s eye like memories that didn’t belong to me—of Lucius and men tied to him committing atrocities, murders, and torture in the name of power, in the name of supremacy, and in the name of cruelty. I saw Lucius on that altar in the forest, convulsing as he inhaled dark shadows, his eyes completely white. I saw my mothers murdered from their perspective. I saw Daelon running through the street as a young boy, buildings and homes crumbling into ash all around him. I saw myself murdered by men who saw me as a threat over and over again in different ways in different places. It wasn’tme, but I took the place of the fallen as I relived their last moments.
I was seeing the darkest part of the story, and though it was more fragmented than seamless, with no clear context, I knew that these images were what made Lucius’s energy so dark. He was empowered by the pain of others.
I lost myself, my ego stripping away until I was no longer separate from my power. Iwaspower. With a scream that felt detached and foreign even as it left my own lips, I let go. I was vaguely aware that my feet were no longer planted on the ground, my vision overwhelmed with a white light emanating and pouring down from my palms.
Lucius braced himself back on the ground below, raising his hands above his head as the brightest, most fiery energy I’d ever seen collided with him. It crashed into an invisible shield he’d constructed around his body, and I heard him strain and fight as it permeated, then broke through his defenses.
Paralyze.
I may have gotten something useful out of our run-in with the mysterious Nathaniel after all. As Lucius convulsed in the snow, my spell took over his body, and I dropped from the air back to my feet. I took my time making my way over the fallen tree, still riding my power high. I watched as Lucius reacted to my energy in the same way I reacted to his, shivering and shuddering in the moonlight.
He glared up at me, and in his aura, I finally detected fear. It looked like the defensive paranoia of a cornered animal.
I knelt down beside his body. “What was that about showing me my place?” I asked sweetly, my voice strong as I reacclimated with my own ego again. “I’m going to need some answers while I think about whether or not to kill you.”I was definitely going to kill him.
I ran through all of the mysteries I so desperately needed solved, but the only question that sprung to mind for several moments was: Where was Daelon? Shouldn’t he be here by now?
“Who am I? Why are you so afraid of me?”
I compelled him to speak, admittedly reveling in his helplessness after all of his attempts to make me feel the same.
“I’m not afraid ofyou,” he spat. “I don’t know who you are any more than you do, though I suspect that your existence is mostly to annoy me.”
I pursed my lips, feeling the anger turn over in my stomach. He wasn’t being honest with me even as he faced death. “You killed my mothers, didn’t you?”
He smiled, no doubt hoping to provoke my weaknesses to get him out of this situation. I was prepared for that, thanks to Daelon. Nothing he could say would make me falter.
“Not personally.” His eyes flashed disdain. “They were working against their new king. They were traitors and heretics.”
Yes, I was going to kill him. But not yet. I channeled my anger into my paralytic hold over him. “What were your plans for Daelon and me?”
“My plans were, and still are, to take you back to mycreepycastle, as you put it. It’s the only way I can figure out what to do with you. Although, a part of me sort of wants to end you now,” he spat. “As for Daelon, he’ll be free to go back to doing whatever he wants.”
I faltered. There was a glint in Lucius’s eyes now that ran contrary to his current predicament—even as he lay at my complete disposal, he looked at me as if he’d won the fight. I felt my power slipping as he pushed against it, and I knew I was running out of time. Daelon was right. Ultimately, Lucius was stronger than me… which meant I needed to kill him soon.
“What do you mean whatever he wants? You’re not going to kill him?”
