Eiridis screeched again, more insistently. His pointed talons came within grazing distance of Icarus' arm before he swooped back up, high in the sky, and drifted east toward the gardens and courtyard. He knew it was his familiar's way of signaling him to follow and, because Eiridis wasn't one to ask twice, promptly did so. His feet found the stone path that led to the high walls in hurried steps, picking up to a light jog when he spotted a flash of color, this time bright scorching silver that burst from the courtyard near the statue of Saint Sorath.
Curse the unending stone between them. By the time he rounded the high wall to a break of entry at the border, his heart was pounding like a war drum. Eiridis settled quietly into a young elderberry tree growing on the other side. His bright yellow gaze peered between him and the sound of shuffling taking place on the ground nearby.
Icarus reached subconsciously into the pocket of his slate gray vest. His fingers clutched the golden pocket watch that rested there and a sharp rush of power filled him. The augere glowed, concentrating his magic so that he could cast a spell in an instant if need be.
Creeping forward, he squinted into the night. The moon above basked the courtyard in a haunting glow, casting shadows along statues of prominent, time-lost Calami witches. He felt their solemn stone faces watching him, judging perhaps his next move as three figures came into view ahead.
“I want the truth, now.” a cold voice snarled. “I know you didn’t do this to Bella for the greater good.”
Closest to him, surrounded by a smoldering silver circle, was Arabella Marudas. A soft, ethereal white light gleamed off her skin, shone bright in her eyes. The wind picked up, whipping leaves and fallen twigs in the air around her. Her long blonde locks careened within it, flowing like milk and honey. The sight was unnerving. It unsettled something deep in Icarus’s bones, causing the short hairs on his arms to rise. When he heard the next voice, frigid and biting, his stomach lurched.
He watched Calder Darkmore hobble back and stumble over a low-growing bush. When he hit the ground, he cursed before hissing something at the looming figure ahead of him.
Icarus felt a sharp jolt run through his body when he realized it washer.Breeze-blown and coruscating, she advanced on the wizard with the promise of pain dancing in her dark eyes. Around her leg twined a black-scaled snake with fangs dripping beads of pearled venom that hissed off the grass below.
Fear lived in Calder’s expression, alive and wreathing despite his tough facade.
"Just wait a minute, Seren," Icarus heard him insist as he slid back across the ground, throwing anxious glances towards Arabella, who swayed on unsteady feet, "I’m telling the truth. And I promise you she's fine, okay? Your sister is fine. She’ll come back to herself shortly and—" his words died in his throat as Seren took another menacing step towards him.
Icarus could see the cold beauty that bled off of her, the eerie grace with which she moved, and it stirred something deep and primal inside of him. But then he remembered. Remembered what the wizard on the ground meant to him, and realized that the snake intended to do more than mere harm as it coiled back, preparing to take another strike.
From the sideways angle at which he approached, neither could see Icarus when he stepped out of the shadows. His grip tightened on the pocket watch augere as he withdrew it and murmured a quick spell.
Seren went rigid and then suddenly lax. Her eyelashes fluttered, kissing the high cheekbones that rested beneath, and she swayed sharply forward and then back toward the ground. Icarus lunged for her, surprised by the intensity of his own spell, and broke her fall not a second before she hit the hard earth. She was frozen, trapped in his temporary binding curse, staring up at the veiled sky, unable to move until he released her. Yet he could feel her power rallying against his like a wild animal caged. Fighting him. An unintended gasp tore between his lips at the sensation. Her magic slammed against his over and over, relentlessly searching for a weak point but finding none.
When an unnatural stillness followed, he thought the battle had been won. But then he felt it–like she had slithered around his careful mental barrier. The dark tendrils of her magic reached for his, binding with the stormy blue, wrestling for dominance in a perfect dance. Connection that magical philosophers from the dawn of witching and wizarding had tried and failed to explain. Icarus gritted his teeth against the lure of it, that soft beckoning that he could have fallen into. It took everything in him to release a blast of his smokey blue tendrils that exploded around them, hissing in the air as he finally dampened her obsidian to a faint, dark glow.
Gently, keeping hold of her power, he settled her onto the ground beside her familiar who'd gone as still as a tombstone, though its emerald gaze stayed fixed on him, ripe with accusation.
"Well,thatwas something." Calder released a low, rasping laugh. "And I couldn't have timed this better if I had planned it myself. Though you could have shown up before the godsdamned snake bit me."
Slowly, mournfully, Icarus unwound his fingers from the tangle of Seren's hair at the nape where he'd caught her. The potent, rising heat of fury filled him when he turned to face the wily young wizard leaning into an elbow as though they were out for a midnight picnic.
"Whathave you done, Calder?" The words shook with the weight of his anger as he rose and stormed toward Arabella, who still emitted that soft, ancient light like a warrior goddess of old. She was soundless, confused, but he felt her power in the air. Could taste it in the wind. A magic that called to everything around them. He worried nature itself might wake and rush to her aid.
From above, Eiridis shrieked before swooping down to settle on his shoulder as he inspected the young witch. She seemed there, but absent all at once. Eyes unseeing, even as he stood right before her. Her blonde hair spread out around her like a halo, rippling in the wind, he couldn't help but note the contrast between the dark beauty that was her sister. He could see hints of their resemblance—the timeless elegance and soft dip of their noses—but it was still a wonder that these two creatures shared blood when their very nature seemed at war with each other. And yet, in a way, hecouldunderstand.
The dark and the light.
A sudden gasp. A sharp crack. The light vanished, and Arabella fell to her knees. Icarus did what he could to soften the fall. When she regained her footing, he took a careful step back.
“Miss Marudas, are you all right?” He spoke in that slow, quiet way he’d used on the wolrpia to coax it into the briar maze.
She blinked, a flash of silver still coating the blue in her eyes. “I-I—what happened?”
Icarus stiffened as a sudden realization dawned on him. Not only was Calder up to something, but he, himself, was about to be caught up in it as well if he didn’t get Seren and Arabella off to bed. Flexing his fingers, his augure glowed with the counterspell that released Seren from the bind. It’d taken a significant amount of his power to keep her at bay, yet when their magic parted, something deep within him ached. She let out a sharp gasp and shot straight to her feet, fury dancing in the movement. Posed to strike once more at the young wizard still wounded on the ground, who was looking between them with a sense of amusement now.
“I wouldn’t.” Icarus’s voice rang coldly, and she instantly froze at the sound, as though he’d cast his spell all over again.
In a slow turn, she was peering at him through the darkened courtyard. A ball of flame came to life in his hand, not unlike the one they traded during the maze trial.
“You ladies have broken curfew. If you do not return to your rooms at once, you will have some explaining to do to the Headmistress. This is an expulsion-worthy offense. A second one for you, Miss Marudas.” He let his voice become steel as he stared Seren down, feeling a strange sense of broken trust.Why hadn’t she come to him? Why was she here at all after their agreement in the library?
Seren opened her mouth, but he lifted a finger to silence her, his smokey blue magic pulsing with the movement. “One word, and I will walk you to Sidonia Sinclair myself. I warn you, she doesn’t like being woken before dawn.”
He didn’t wait for her to comply before turning with Eiridis heavy on his shoulder to scowl down at Calder, who was inspecting the deep puncture holes riddling his calf. Icarus stepped towards him and crouched so that their eyes were level, storm blue meeting swirls of raw amber, and he asked again, "What have you done, Calder?"
Behind him, he heard Seren whisper. The sound of her feet pattering over the courtyard stone as she went to her sister, tugging her away. Together, they disappeared into the shadow towards Calami’s entrance.
