I don’t hesitate because I’m imagining joining Selene, but because I’m wondering if Alaric and Marcus have had enough time to get into position.
“I will never side with you on this, Selene,” I say. “I won’t make slaves of those without magic, and I won’t stand by while you slaughter people to gain power.”
Selene shrugs. “So be it. Sacrifices were always going to be necessary in this great change within Aetheria. You can be the first of them.”
She raises her hand again, her power growing, ready to blast me from existence. I’ve set myself against her, made it clear I’ll never join her. Now, I must either fight her, or die.
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
I dive to the side as the first bolt of power comes from Selene, slamming into a statue behind me and reducing it to rubble. More power is already coming, forcing me to twist and move aside.
I reach for the animals the resistance brought with them, taking what I can, making myself faster and stronger, so that I avoid the next bolt of power and the one after that. There’s nothing restrained about them, none of the careful precision Selene showed in the colosseum. One blasts through the wall of the temple space, while another blasts away part of the roof, sending rubble tumbling down to almost crush several guests.
I realize now just how much she was holding back before. Either her dampener isn’t working at all, or her power is so monstrous that even a trickle of Selene’s full strength is enough to give her almost godlike magical strength.
The speed and grace I’ve taken from the animals lets me continue to dodge, and I draw my knives now, determined to fight back in any way I can. Selene’s eyes widen.
“How? I had the animals cleared from here.”
“Maybe my reach is greater than you think,” I say, lunging at her. Selene spins aside from me, and I feel her psychomancy pushing at the people around us.
“Grab her! Hold her!”
People start to reach for me, but I let my own powers pulse out in conflict with Selene’s. She controls their minds, but I reach for their feelings, for the primal aspects that can override even such powers. The same way I did with Olivia, I summon their needs and desires to the surface.
Some of them howl with anger. Some cower in fear, or fall upon one another in lust. A few still grab for me, but the strengthI’ve borrowed from the crocodile lets me wrench free before Selene’s magic can strike me. A wash of it cuts through the space behind me, and I see someone die. I wince at that sight, but Selene doesn’t seem to care. She throws more magic at me.
“Guards!” Selene yells. “Guards!”
People start to pour into the room. Guards come first, weapons drawn. Selene snatches a sword from one of them, but sends the others towards me.
That’s when the resistance bursts into the room after them. They slam into the guards, fighting hard, determined to take them down. I see a guard brought down with a club, another with his feet kicked from under him. One swings a sword at Thalia, only for her to duck under the attack and thrust a dagger into his ribs.
The melee is tightly packed, with people fighting on every side. The room is too small for this fight, with nowhere for anyone to hide to avoid blows. A sword stroke strikes a statue next to me, striking sparks. Magic fills the air, because Selene and I aren’t the only ones with power. Thalia is kneeling by a wounded resistance fighter, healing him. Lightning crackles, and I know Marcus is out there somewhere.
I need to get the fight out of this confined space, where life and death are little more than a matter of luck. I reach for the emotions of the combatants, and send a pulsing wave of fear through them.
It’s nothing more than a burst of emotion, nothing that will last, but it’s enough to set people running, enough to have them hurrying to clear the room. I wish I could send the guards running all the way back to Aetheria, but I don’t have that much control over them, especially not when Selene’s psychomancy is pushing against my magic in turn.
Selene advances on me, throwing blasts of power. I dodge each one, then lash out with my daggers. She parries withsurprising skill, but my borrowed speed and power let me open up a cut across her forearm. Selene curses, and then hurries to one of the holes she’s blown in the wall of the fortress, looking out onto one of its training courtyards beyond.
Selene leaps down, magic wrapping around her so that she floats to the ground smoothly. I don’t hesitate, but follow her out through the hole, drawing more and more from the animals outside Ironhold so that I can climb down with the speed and grace of a lizard. I come down near a set of practice posts. A rack of training weapons is set near one of them, and I snatch up a staff, spinning it to get the weight of it.
Selene has the sword she took from the guard, leaf bladed and as long as my forearm.
“You should have taken my offer, Lyra,” she says. “We could have done so much to help Aetheria together.”
“If you want to help Aetheria, give in,” I say.
Instead, she lashes out with bursts of magic that force me to dodge one way, then another. I have speed and strength, but there are no birds flying overhead, so I can’t view our conflict through a hundred sets of eyes, seeing every attack coming. One of Selene’s blasts of power disintegrates the practice post as I dodge, and then I have to throw myself into a roll to avoid her next attack.
Selene slashes at me with her blade, my staff cracking against her weapon in a staccato music of violence.
“I’ll kill you,” she promises, punctuating her words with blows of her weapon and darts of purple magic, “and the resistance, and anyone else I need to. But then, maybe once you’re dead, I won’t have to. I’ll be able to slip into their thoughts again. I wonder… what would it take to make your precious Senator Marcus mine? You’ve used the prospect of marriage to him to advance yourself, so maybe I should too.”
Selene’s words make anger flash through me and I lash out again and again with the staff. I over-extend, though, and Selene’s blade slashes across my abdomen, making pain flash through me as she draws blood. She kicks me back and I go stumbling to the ground, forced to roll to the side as her magic strikes the spot where I’m lying.
I come back to my feet, swinging the staff low and forcing Selene to leap over it. I reverse the weapon while she’s still midair, jabbing the end of it into her solar plexus with all the strength I can muster, sending her flying backwards as the air whooshes from her lungs. It’s Selene’s turn to fall to the ground, and she deflects my next blow with a hasty shield of magical force.
