“I don’t—” Ellene never finished. Vi watched as Jayme hoisted the girl into her arms. Her powerful legs bulged against her trousers, arms shifting the bundle of weight. Ellene stared in anger, already beginning to thrash. “I’m not going!”
Vi was distracted with them; Jayme was distracted with Ellene and Ellene with her. Andru used his long legs to get several steps ahead. Her friends were almost out and that meant—
They’d all taken their eyes off the column for far too long.
It exploded outward with molten stone and interconnecting cracks of red lightning.
“Mysst xieh!” Vi screamed, raising her arms. A glyph appeared before her, hasty and half-formed. It withstood the brunt of the blast, but fractured with every bolder and stone that pelted against it. When the shield broke, Vi was cast backward, confetti of rubble pelting her body.
She groaned, rolling onto her stomach. She didn’t want to see the state of her friends… but she had to. Vi heard the scream before she lifted her eyes.
Ellene was on the ground, rolling several feet away from where Jayme lay. Stones scattered off of her shoulders, and small fires that ignited from the molten rock coming into contact with her clothes were snuffed. Vi’s mouth dropped open, trying to find a word. Not a word of power. Not a word to summon her magic.
A word to call out to her chillingly immobile friend.
Jayme was on her side. There was a giant, steaming gash in her back, where a stone had pummeled her spine. Blood poured out from her. Vi had seen hunters bleeding kills… but those were animals. She never thought a person would have so much blood in them.
“No,” Vi whispered.
“Jayme!” Tears were already streaming down Ellene’s cheeks as she half-crawled, half-ran toward their friend. “You idiot!”
“There is no escaping,” the man with the red eyes spoke. “Champion of Yargen, this is your fate.”
“What?” Andru groaned, sitting up as well.
“Return with me to Salvidia, a willing sacrifice, and I will allow your friends to live.”
The body on the altar in her vision. Was this how she got there?
“If you were letting us live you wouldn’t have… you… you wouldn’t have!” Ellene sobbed over Jayme. Her magic was moving on instinct, vines and mosses curling around the prone woman. Vi made note of it. If there was one thing she could—and would need to—count on, it was Ellene’s powers having a mind of their own in times of stress.
“Andru, get to Ellene and Jayme.” Vi pushed herself to her feet, ignoring every fiery pain in her limbs. She didn’t care if the man heard her plot to keep her friends safe. He’d made it clear she was his quarry. But she also didn’t believe for a single moment that he’d let her friends go if she offered herself up as a sacrificial lamb.
“Last chance.” The man unsheathed his dagger once more—no doubt a vessel of sorts to bring her blood back if he could not acquire her whole body.
“Ellene, protect yourself,” Vi ordered simply.
Vi lifted her arm slowly as she heard the groans of stone lifting upward into what she hoped was a protective shell over Ellene and Jayme.
She dipped into the well of power that had always lived in her. It had been her enigma, her bane, as she’d struggled to control it and make sense of it. But now, however limited her knowledge still was, she had the circular pathways to channel it through. She had the words she’d read over and over in Sehra’s book, locked in her mind.
She had the knowledge Taavin had imparted to her.
“Do you think you can burn me with your pathetic flames?” he sneered.
“I am Vi Solaris. Anything burns if I will it.”
“You are—”
“Juth starys hoolo.” It was the perfect combination. The perfect pronunciation. The words resonated with her magic in a way Vi had never imagined possible and clicked together to form a glyph unlike any she had made before.
The circles spun wider, consuming the whole room. They ran over Ellene’s cocoon of stone and lapped against the walls, white hot, leaving singe marks in their wake. The second the final word finished echoing through the space, her power exploded.
Destruction. Destroy it all. Burn everything and let nothing remain.
Those were the singular thoughts in her mind as Vi watched the world erupt into white flames. Red lightning arced through it, pushing against her power. But unlike every other time she’d evokedjuth, the circles did not disappear after the initial explosion. They sustained, burning brighter and hotter with each passing second.
Magic poured from her, filling every nook and cranny of the room with fire. From the outside, the ruins must have looked like a furnace, filled to the brim with coal and burning out of every orifice.
