“It’s all a matter of perception, really. You’ve made me your villain only because I had the will to do what needed to be done to stop what you have become.”
I kept careful attention on him as he stopped, facing off with me. He didn’t retrieve a blade and neither did I.
“Like you said, a matter of perception.”
I moved first, not in attack toward him, but around us. As I aimed my hand down, my magick cracked through the ground, digging deep; it took reaching for a touch of Lightsdeath to conjure the strength to shift back my legs and push down with everything I had. A flare of light broke in a jagged line, creating a large serrated circle around us. With a battle cry, I gripped the stone with my magick and lifted my palms as if I held it in my physical grasp. I floated us high on the platform now suspended above the gathered people.
“Impressive,” Auster remarked.
“I won’t let you hurt my people.”
It took constant focus to keep the platform floating, but this was only between Auster and me, and if he reacted with his own magick against me, it would be catastrophic on the ground with so many innocents nearby.
“If you hadn’t run from me when you came back five years ago, things would have been so much different,” he said.
The bastard had the audacity to seempained.
“I’m glad I did. Had you captured me after my memories were taken, being forced to live a life by your side would have been worse than what I’d suffered with Goldfell.”
When I fell back to land, I’d awoken with my memories for a brief time. Auster had been waiting for me in the temple of Alisus; he knew it was where I’d be. I remembered he was the one who killed me, and I’d run from him, barefoot and freezing through the woods by Goldfell manor. The next person to find me was Drystan, who made sure I got away, letting me run into the arms of Goldfell, who kept me hidden in his manor for five years.
Despite Goldfell’s cruel hand and spending years alone and hidden, the alternative that could have been had Auster found me without my memories—unwittingly in the arms of my killer—made me terribly nauseous to imagine.
“I mourned you long before I killed you, Astraea,” he said, a slipped confession.
I gritted my teeth, turning the pain within me into something I could wield, and my hand cast out with a gale of violet light toward him. Auster’s blue lightning collided with my magick just in time. Unlike when I battled with Nyte’s power, there was no desire that ran through the currents of energy between us, only pure, dark loathing.
I couldn’t die this way, but he could.
Though if I managed to kill Auster now it would solidify every evil he’d painted about me to those below. Reversing what he’d done was not going to be as easy as getting rid of him.
“Was I really that terrible of an option for you?” he yelled when our blast ceased.
We mirrored each other in our pacing around the perimeter.
“I never wanted this. It was you who couldn’t stand that I chose Nyte.”
“You never told me why.”
“I did. It just wasn’t to your ego’s liking.”
I struck again, and he ducked out of the way before sending a bolt my way. Pivoting, I threw out a light dart, and we parried like that for some time, exerting our heartache and vengeance on each other.
“You were my friend and Itrustedyou!” I shouted.
The tears that gathered in my eyes burned my skin as they fell, and I was glad for it. I didn’t want to hurt inside because of him. He didn’t deserve my heart.
For just a second, we locked stares and his brow furrowed in a way that haunted me. That flicker of regret turned to detached resentment so fast, but I’d let it weaken my guard enough that his sudden strike of lightning hit my chest. Cast off my feet, I had no choice but to release my wings, which caught me in the air.
I surveyed the courtyard below where everyone was staring. Some covered their mouths in shock, clutching each other with fear.
Fear of my black wings.
A mark of death, as the people believed. As the High Celestials hadmadethem believe.
“I’m glad your arrogance in thinking you could win against me brought you here,” Auster taunted from the platform. “You make it too easy. All I have are words, and you give them the full display of proof.”
I dragged my lethal stare back to him, shaking with a dangerous need to wipe the gleam of triumph from his face. Permanently.
