“Don’t you fuckingdaretry to manipulate me with that shit, Chrome. I’ll never fucking join you!” she shouted, tears streaming down her gilded face as she fought against Slate to let her free. “I hate you for what you did! You should’ve let me fucking die, you coward! Now look at you! Look atus!” Gray sobbed, oblivious to the attacks that Slate fought off with his magic. At last, her body sagged in defeat in my cousin’s arms as she whimpered, “We’re shattered.”
Gray’s rejection cut deep. My shadows thrashed against my skin, wanting free, but I swallowed the hit to my heart. “I’d do it all again if it meant that your heart continued to beat.”
I turned to walk away when a cloud of obsidian mist dispersed, revealing the last person I ever expected to see, especially at the Hollow.
“Shadow.”
“Should’ve made sure I was dead before killing our mother,” Shadow said, his cloud of shadow materializing to attack me with his microwave shocks.
My own shadows curled around his, but each time, he absorbed mine, then went for a different angle. “My mistake.” I slammed my palm into his chest bone, feeling his clavicle caving in.
Chapter Nine
Cotton
“It was so lovely to meet you, Cotton,” Talitha said as we prepared to head back to the Celestial Castle. “At noon in a week’s time, we’ll arrange for you to return to work daily with Nell on telepathy and sign language. In the meantime,” she added, casting a wary and disparaging glance toward Valik, “try to avoid his bullshit. He’s a walking disaster.”
I scoffed, nodding my head in agreement with a look that said, “I’ve noticed.”
We stood outside in the city center where we had arrived. I’d had a better opportunity to take in the community and was surprised to see a flourishing society. Shops lined the cobbled streets on either side of the fountain. With businesses ranging from cafes and clothing stores to jewelers and market stands selling fresh produce and butchers, Mystics had somehow managed to survive. It wasn’t overly crowded or populated, but it was far from a ghost town. While there were men present, most of the Mystic population I’d seen so far were disproportionately women.
Talitha kissed both of my cheeks before moving along to Scarlett, wishing her well until next time.
The afternoon was well underway, and judging by the sun’s position, it was nearly four. My mind spun with the possibility of being able to communicate with others once again, making a surge of mixed emotions toil within me. Being vocally disabled had been my norm for so long. I’d accepted it years ago. Now, I had the opportunity to learn how to speak into others’ minds. The idea of the massive change was exciting, yet unsettling all the same.
My Kinetic magic worked here in Arcadia like it did back home, but it felt more enhanced. Valik had explained that aether—the substance that powered Arcadia’s magic—was prominent in this realm. A gift from the god, Etherea. Aether flowed through every living being here, including the plants.
The Tempests’ magic thrived on the vitality of others. The Syphon Bond, a dark curse that bound a living being’s essence to the Tempest who cast it, siphoned the victim’s magic and the aether pulsing through their blood. Due to the dark and twisted nature of the Syphon Bond, the living being—person, plant, or animal—essentially turned Endarkened. We’d seen it in the trees, which dripped a viscous black poison from their leaves and branches. Since the Tempests had nearly siphoned all the aether out of Arcadia, they’d recruited Forest to help expand their reach into Terraguard. Which didn’t make sense—why would she want Terraguard if we didn’t have any aether in our atmosphere?
Very few places were untouched by the Syphon Bond. The Celestial Castle, for example, only remained untouched due to extremely powerful wards that Valik himself reinforced every day. I wondered how the Mystics had kept themselves shielded from the Tempests for so long. Surely the Tempests must have come for them long ago.
Once Talitha finished her farewell to Scarlett, she turned to go back into the glass dome building that she’d exited when we first arrived. Valik stepped in her path, forcing her to halt and raise her hands as if she planned to attack him with her magic.
“Where’s my goodbye, Tali?” the oddbeingasked, puppy dog eyes on full display.
Talitha deadpanned. “I’m the High Priestess. I only see off those who matter.”
High Priestess?
I tapped into my Kinetic ability for the first time since arriving in the Mystic’s land, studying the heat signatures of Talitha and Valik. Valik’s beamed red all over. The heat coming from him indicated power at a level I’d never witnessed before—not even in Chrome or Gray.
Talitha didn’t appear to be as powerful, but her heat signature was significantly stronger than any Kinetic or Elemental I was aware of. Definitely stronger than Forest’s.
“We go way back, Tali. You’re really going to let an old grudge get in the way of our relationship?” Valik pressed.
“In case you’ve forgotten, there is no relationship between us, Valik. Now, please move before I make you,” Talitha challenged. I wondered if she knew how truly powerful Valik was.
I smiled at Talitha’s fearlessness. She reminded me so much of Scarlett. She was the type who would eat men alive with a mere glance.
Scarlett leaned closer to me, speaking through the side of her mouth. “I wanna bang her. You think Valik would kill me if I did?”
I suppressed a chuckle, biting my bottom lip and nudging her with my elbow.
Scarlett smiled widely at me, lighting her up in a way that would ordinarily make any member of the male species bow to her every whim. If I hadn’t known her since we were kids and gone through our awkward stages in life together, and if I weren’t gay, then I’d have been in love with her long ago. But our relationship surpassed anything sexual or romantic. When we were younger, we’d agreed that we were platonic soulmates. Where she went, I went; we’d go to war for one another.
“Any luck finding the stone?” Valik asked Tali as if she hadn’t justblatantly rejected him.
Talitha straightened, swiping her long chestnut hair from her shoulder. “You know where the stone is, Valik.”
