“Then let’s hope your actions live up to your bragging,” Amelia said, grabbing two full handles of vodka off the banquet table. “Just give me a second to get ready.”
Before Marci could ask what she meant, Amelia had ripped the cap off the first bottle with her teeth and downed it in three swallows. She did the same to the second, making both Marci and Svena wince.
“What are you doing?” Marci asked when she stopped for breath at last.
“Liquid courage,” Amelia wheezed, wiping her mouth. “My soul’s about to get split in two. You don’t expect me to go through that sober, do you?”
“You haven’t gone through anything sober in your life,” Svena growled, smacking the third handle of liquor off the table before Amelia could reach for it. “I can’t do this if you’re too drunk to help. Now go stand by the mortal.”
To Marci’s amazement, Amelia obeyed, walking over to stand beside Marci. “Wheneber’r ready,” she slurred.
The jumbled words were barely out of her mouth when Svena struck. One moment, they were standing face to face on the sunny balcony. The next, Svena’s hand wasinsideAmelia’s chest. Gruesome as it looked, though, there was no blood. Amelia’s tank top didn’t even look damaged despite Svena’s arm passing right through the seam of its V-neck. But while the rest of her didn’t seem to mind the invasion, Amelia’s face told another story.
“Ow,” she said through clenched teeth.
“You asked for this,” Svena reminded her, scowling in concentration. “Now.Don’t move.”
The command landed like a thousand-ton press as Svena’s hand began to dig around inside Amelia’s chest.
“OW,” Amelia said again.
Svena didn’t comment this time. She just kept digging, closing her eyes in concentration as beads of sweat began to drip down her pale face. “Almost there,” she whispered. “Almost…got it!”
Amelia made a choking sound, and then her pained gasp turned into a roar as Svena ripped her hand free, bringing a ball of fire out with it.
Now it was Marci’s turn to gasp. She wasn’t sure why, but she’d expected the dragon’s life fire to be small, like the little flame Amelia had demonstrated on her palm, but the fire roaring in Svena’s hand was a white-hot inferno the size of a small car. It was still coming, too, spiraling out of Amelia’s chest toward Svena’s fingers like a sun being sucked into a black hole. It was so huge, Svena was actually forced to take several steps back to make room, raising the enormous, spinning orb of fire high above her head until, at last, the line of flame connecting it to Amelia snapped, and the dragon collapsed.
“Amelia!” Marci cried.
“Don’t touch her!” Svena roared, her blond hair flying in the burning wind that was rolling off the fire in her hands. “Her magic is unstable. We need to finish this quickly.”
“It looks like you’re finishing her!” Marci yelled, pointing at the massive specter of fire hanging over their heads. “You said you were only taking half!”
“Thisishalf,” Svena said, her voice straining as she fought to keep the flames under control. “When will you understand? Amelia ispowerful. I wouldn’t bother with her if she wasn’t.”
Marci stared at the roaring fire with new respect. She’d never seen so much pure, concentrated magic in her life. Not even when she’d pulled off Vann Jeger. “And that’s supposed to go intome?”
Rather than answering, Svena shoved the fire down on Marci’s head. She barely got a chance to brace before it landed, closing her eyes as she hoped against hope that this was going to be one of those “burns without pain” kind of magical experiences.
No dice. It hurt exactly as much as it looked like it was going to. Like an actual giant ball of fire was consuming her from head to foot.
“Draw it in!”
Marci could barely make out Svena’s shout through the pain. It was hard to focus on anything when you were on fire other thannot being on fire. Fortunately for Marci, while she was overwhelmed by mortal fear, Ghost was already dead, and he didn’t have a body to burn.
Ignore it,he ordered, gripping Marci’s mind in an icy grasp that banished the burning.Take the magic. Quickly, before it really does consume us.
Marci didn’t have to be told twice. Now that Ghost’s grave-like chill was protecting her from the pain, she could finally feel the white-hot thrumming of Amelia’s magic under the literal burn of the fire, and she reached for it desperately, grabbing the flames as she began to yank down handful after handful of the purest, strongest, most concentrated magic she’d ever touched.
If drawing off Julius had felt like plugging into the sun, this was like becoming a star herself. Amelia’s magic roared into her so fast and strong, she couldn’t hope to control it. All she could do was pull it in, winding the wild power up like a wire until the fire around her finally began to die down. It still wasn’t enough, though, so she forced the fire smaller still, folding and compressing the magic she’d already wound up into a tiny, white-hot mass, cursing herself the entire time for not thinking to draw a circle before this started.
You don’t need a circle,Ghost said, his deep voice as loud and clear as real sound in her head.A circle is just a tool. A construct to help you visualize what you’re trying to do. Chalk can’t actually hold in magic. It was always you. But don’t be afraid. I’m here. I’ll help you. You can hold it, and together we will be stronger than they could ever imagine.
Marci scowled. He was doing it again, talking like a villain, but it was too late to doubt now. The magic was already in her, and if she didn’t get it stable, it was going to blow them both apart. So, with no way back, Marci did as her spirit said, closing her eyes and focusing inward on the wadded-up mass of pure dragon magic pulsing in her chest.
Handling this much power without a circle felt like driving a race car at full speed with no mirrors or brakes. It was terrifying, but every time Marci felt she was about to fly out of control, Ghost nudged her back into place. She still wasn’t quite sure how it happened. Every decision took up the whole of her attention, leaving nothing to spare for how the final construction would fit together, but somehow, it worked. They kept it together, pressing and folding Amelia’s blazing furnace of magic inch by inch, smaller and smaller, denser and denser, until, at last, it was nothing but a flame in Marci’s own chest, dancing and flickering behind the wall of internal wards she’d just built freehand inside her own magic.
When she opened her eyes again, she was lying in Svena’s lounge chair. The white dragoness herself was nowhere to be seen, and the sun, which had been nearly overhead when they’d started, was now touching the horizon. She was still staring at it in confusion when a shadow fell over her face.
