He punched both fists together, and it erupted in a beam of milky radiance. The shadows around him flailed together, screeching—a horrid sound that reverberated in his bones.
Marina’s pronounced aura materialized behind him.
He spun around, already anticipating her attack, jutting out his palm and catching the needle in between his index and middle finger. He shoved the syringe back against Marina’s enclosed hand.
She locked her stance and hooked her leg around the crook of his knee. With a forceful jolt, his knee folded, and he crumpled down like a puddle at her feet.
His back hit the ground with her heel above his face. He rolled before it could stab through his skull.
Up to his knees, he slung his arm towards her. The crescent scythe of white magic threw her backwards.
In mid-air, she vanished in a blurred plume.
Finnian heaved himself upright. Magic crystalized in his palms. He sent two dagger-like gleams sailing through the air, following the ripples in the blackness.
She fabricated in front of him and thrusted the syringe again.
He swerved the needle by a hair's breadth and threw out his arm. The heel of his palm made contact with her clavicle. “Sanguis ardeat.”
She stumbled backwards, crying out.
Finnian watched the skin of her arms, the patches exposed in her neckline, her cheeks, all bubble like plastic in a bonfire. The spell boiled the blood of the victim.
He took the opportunity to lunge for the syringe.
She was swallowed up by her divine power again, leaving him to fight the wispy spirals.
The muscles in his neck went rigid. “Marina!”
The itch in his brain prodded deeper, deeper, deeper.
He rolled his shoulders, clenching his jaws against the clamor of urges filling his thoughts.
Kill her.
Use the blood on her.
She deserves it.
Finnian slapped a hand over his chest where the curse mark throbbed on his pec.
No, you must use it on Ruelle.
Bloodlust surged in his veins and pulsed in his eyes.
Marina killed Kaleo.
He could taste the chemical of the curse like a film on his tongue.
But think about how satisfying it will feel to watch the light leave Marina’s eyes?—
A small, black mass latched its teeth into the flesh of his arm.
He growled and slung his arm to knock it off, but the creature burrowed its fangs in even deeper.
Another bit into his calf. He stomped his leg. It clung to him.
Hundreds of contorting shadows, the size of ravens, swarmed and stuck to him.
