“I’m going to come at you a few times,” I say. “One of those times, I’m not going to hold back. I won’t tell you which one, but I want you to only draw on magic to truly defend against me once. Your choice which attack it is. Keep your eyes shut.”
He settles deeper into a fighting stance. This way, he’ll have to be more intentional about how he uses my magic, not merely drawing on it in a continuous stream. It’s the best training exercise I can come up with at the moment.
“Ready,” he tells me. “Go.”
I scoff.
Otto cracks open an eye at me.
“When have you ever been in charge, jäger?”
He smiles. Scheisse, it’s nice to see. Will never not be nice to see, the way his lips lift and his eyes glisten.
“My apologies,” he says. He closes his eyes again and holds, silent now, but his cheeks are pink, and his lips are still crooked.
I come at him, a punch that barrels through the air. He senses it and ducks, but I’m hardly going for true power with that one. I swing to the other side, throw another punch; he rolls away smoothly.
We continue like that, easy punches coming and going, until I can see his humor fade, his focus sharpen.
The grip he has on my magic tugs. Not him drawing on it yet, just him becoming aware of it in the fight, that hecoulddraw on it.
I aim a kick at his thigh and barely brush the fabric of his trousers before rearing back and slamming my fist into the center of his chest, the only true blow I’ve thrown. It connects, and Otto stumbles back a beatbefore he reacts, too late to stop me, and I hear the wind go out of him as he grabs at my magic andpulls.
Three things happen at once.
Otto realizes he drew too hard, and his eyes fly open with a cry of “Fritzi, I’m sorry—”
I stagger toward him, knocked off course by the absence of magic in my body. Not drained completely, but down to barest dregs, specks only, the incoming trickle mocking, almost, in the way it slows down.
And then a voice.
A caress at the edge of my mind, coiling fingers that brush the brink of my thoughts and lean in close and purr,Hallo again, Fritzichen. Let down your defenses, did you?
I rear back, back, trying to get away from the voice, white-hot panic lancing sweat across my body as I stumble to the ground and grab my head. I think Otto says something, the rumble of his voice like thunder in the distance, but I’m all internal now, scrambling through my reserves, so low,so low; why did I let myself get so low? I knew I had less magic after the tomb, I knew I was weaker, but I had Cornelia’s pendant, and Dieter hadn’t been able to get in my head in so long—
Holda! Holda—
But even that connection is brittle. Not enough magic. Not enough strength.
Dieter doesn’t speak again. But I canfeelhim here, poking and stretching in my mind, in my body, like a drop of ink spooling out in clear water, tainting everything gray and sickly. I scratch at what little magic I have left and throw it into shielding myself from him, but he’s everywhere, there and gone again, I can’t chase him, can’t catch him.
Leave. I pour all of my will into that one word.Leave, leave, please leave—
Shh, Fritzichen, he murmurs.Just relax.
I want to fight back. I don’twantto sleep, not with himhere, but I’m so tired…so very tired…
My teeth clack against each other, hard.
Coppery blood swims in my mouth, and I spit it out, gagging, and it’s only then that I realize Otto is shaking me.
I open my eyes blearily, and he stops, just holding my shoulders, his body wound to spring into action, but what action? Why? What—
Behind him, faces bent in the same look of withheld action and concern, are Brigitta, Alois, and Cornelia.
“What…happened?” I ask, wincing. My tongue is sore; I’ve bitten it, hard, and while I think the bleeding has stopped, it’s swollen.
I ease back from Otto to sit on my own. My chest and shoulder are on fire. I’d loosened my kirtle before to wash, but it’s all the way unlaced now.
