The door slammed shut just as fast. She froze, eyes locked on the hand pressed against the door, fingers splayed out, arm trembling either from weakness or rage. A lump rose in her throat, and the back of her neck prickled with fear. She felt the heat of the body caging her in from behind more than she felt any emotional presence. She couldn’t turn around. Refused to. There was no way she could bring herself to look into the eyes of the man she loved and find Morkai’s hatred—or even his false affection—looking back at her.
“Do you want him to die?” The voice was too close, brushing against the shell of her ear. Worse, it was Teryn’s voice. His tone. Yet there was something wrong with it. Something she hadn’t heard when the sorcerer had been acting under pretense. He must know now that there was no use pretending anymore.
When she made no reply, Morkai spoke again. “Teryn may think he’s found a brilliant plan in getting you to take the crystal away from his body. Distance will certainly tear my soul from Teryn’s body and make it impossible for me to control it. But what the prince doesn’t understand is that the same goes for him. If I can’t reenter Teryn’s body due to physical distance, neither can he. Without a soul, the body will die. Teryn will have nothing to come back to even if you manage to break the crystal.”
Cora’s lungs constricted as she took in this new information. What was she supposed to do? Fight him off? Take the crystal and run, killing Teryn in the process? No answers came, only growing anxiety. She curled her hand so tightly around the crystal, it sent pain radiating up her arm.
Cora!Valorre’s voice cut through her fear.Danger. You’re in danger.
Yes, she sent back, unable to form anything more complex than that.
“Besides,” Morkai said, voice deepening as he pressed in closer behind her, “the crystal is unbreakable. You haven’t managed to sever a single one of the enchantments I’ve placed on the crystal, despite your best efforts. You will forget about the crystal as soon as your mind slips down a new train of thought. And when you next lay your eyes on it, it will take your soul instead.”
Run away, Valorre said.Please come here. Now.
An image shot through her mind, of the castle wall, blanketed in shadows and a sliver of moonlight. Valorre was showing her where he was, just outside the hidden crevice on the other side of the wall.
So badly she wanted to simplybethere. Without having to fight Morkai off. Without having to rely on running faster than him. Was there anything she could do to get through the wall before Morkai could catch her?
Her palms tingled in answer, not from the crystal she held, but from power surging from her chest, down her arms, and into her hands. It radiated down her legs, her feet. It was soft yet strong, yielding yet powerful.
Turn inward, her magic told her. It was the same feeling she’d gotten when she’d hidden herself and Teryn under the tree not long ago. Then again when she was locked in the dungeon, her magic smothered by her own resentment. And finally, she’d felt it on the battlefield when she’d been trapped under the horse.
Calm moved through her, stilling her thoughts. She focused on the strength of the stone floor beneath her feet, the air that flooded her nostrils, the warmth of the blood rushing through her veins.
“What will it be, Aveline? If you don’t play nice, I will make you. I’ve gone easy on you long enough. Do you recall when I offered you half my heart? I no longer have half to give, and I didn’t come this far just to be stopped by you again.”
She barely heard him. Barely let herself focus on anything but the elements moving through her, wrapping around her. On the Art that radiated through every inch of her body. Its presence was louder than Morkai’s. Stronger.
But what was it asking her to do?
Hide, it had said the first time.
Forgive, it had urged the second.
Stop fighting, it had told her the third. Her mind settled there, on the battlefield at Centerpointe Rock. She recalled how her Art had somehow transported her through space, past physical matter and across a short distance in the blink of an eye. She needed that now. Needed to get to Valorre. To safety.
But how could she repeat that feat? She’d tried to replicate it a few times since that singular incident, but each attempt had been futile. She knew it had to be some form of astral travel, the rare gift witches only talked about but never performed. She knew no one who could do more than astral project—the invisible form of the Art that allowed one to project their souls during meditative states—and it wasn’t something she’d ever trained in. So how had she traveled the once?
Feel, her magic told her.
She remembered then.
Emotion had driven her at Centerpointe Rock. She’d moved because she’d had to. Because Teryn’s life had been at stake. And then there’d been that time in the council room, where anger had made her feel certain she could take a single step and find herself on the other side of the table, confronting Lord Kevan in all her fiery rage. She’d stopped herself then, had written it off as simply a whim.
But she knew now it hadn’t been. It had been her Art.
Morkai gripped her shoulders and whirled her around to face him. “The longer you keep that crystal from me, the more it hurts Teryn’s body. The more it ages him. Kills him.”
She shuddered but refused to look him in the eye, refused to lose focus. Valorre called out to her again and she latched onto his presence, to his view of the castle wall, to the smell of the earth, to the sound of his hooves beating an anxious rhythm on the forest floor.
“Give me the crystal or I’ll take it from you.” His hand covered hers. From how feebly he struggled to pry her fingers from around the crystal, she could tell his strength was waning.
If she wanted, she could wrest it from him. She could take the crystal far away, just like Teryn had asked.
And kill him in the process.
Or…
