Immediately, an answer presented itself: Alex had unbound me once, I was sure he could do it again. As for the pain . . . that was worth it.
We really need this insurance against the black witch.
I nodded. “I’m willing.”
“Then you two should try,” Merlin said.
Eva held my gaze for a long second. “If you’re sure.”
“Positive.”
I hiked up my pant leg, and my friend crouched. The burning sensation had died down, but when Eva’s fingers landed on my scar, it flared up again.
She gasped and glanced up at me. I was glad that I hadn’t let the pain show on my face.
“I’m fine,” I told her.
She gulped and held one hand out in front of her. Merlin and I waited, me holding my breath for any pain to come.
Finally, after what felt like days, Eva spoke.
“Itoarazicus.”
I gritted my teeth as a searing pain shot up my leg. Eva let out a yelp, and yanked her hand from my scar to cover her mark, which apparently had reacted too. But, instinctively or not, she’d kept her other hand out in front of her.
And black smoke was trickling from her fingertips.
I gasped. “Eva! Look!”
I pointed to the smoke, which wasn’t going anywhere, though it certainly wouldn’t have been strong enough to take on a demon.
But it wasthere, irrefutably proving that she could work with the dark magic inside of her. Command it, even.
Now I needed to learn how to do the same.
CHAPTERNINE
After we began using our scars as launching points, our demon magic started flowing. A little. We spent the hours practicing the demon spell in the book, trying to get it to spring from our hands like our own magic.
It never happened, and by the end of the day, I was wiped. Working with demon magic was far more draining than practicing with my witch power. Merlin hypothesized that was because the demon power didn’t belong to us. We’d harnessed it, yes, but we were basically using Lucifer and Ishtar’s magic.
As far as I was concerned, they’d given it to us, so they’d have to suck it up.
After the dark magic drained us so much that only thin tendrils of smoke flew from our hands, we switched to practicing druid spells with the rest of our group. We trained like this for three long days before Morgan returned.
She reappeared right in the center of her home, her arms so laden with dresses that she almost toppled over. “Help, please!” she cried, and everyone jumped up from what they’d been doing.
I pulled a few of the garments off the top of the pile, revealing her smiling face.
“Pretty, aren’t they?”
I glanced down at the deeply colored red and blue gowns, plush, velvety soft, and extremely intricate in their embellishments. “Beautiful. Where are these from?”
“You’ll soon find out! Actually, that one’s yours!” She pointed to a crimson dress, the exact same color as Alex’s magic, with tiny birds embroidered on the bodice. Morgan’s eyes were shining in a way that I rarely saw when we timewalked together.
Once again, a pang of hurt shot through me. We didn’t timewalk for entertainment, but was I holding her back so much that she wasn’t having any fun? I hoped not.
“And this one is yours!” Morgan plucked another gown from the stash and handed it to Eva. “See if it fits. If not, I have something else that might work, but it will be a wee bit out of fashion.”
