“You won’t get to try that trick again.” Click. Another spark fell uselessly into the snow. He was playing with me now, confident that he’d found my weakness even if I could not so much as twitch an eye to prove him right or wrong.
Stupid or desperate. Not the latter; he was well rounded, if unkempt. A man used to doing unconscionable things to keep his belly full. The smaller one was gaining confidence as well, his shifty eyes no longer searching out an escape route, though he still hovered a few steps behind.
They wanted to kill me.
But you cannot kill what is already dead.
“How will you set her alight without touching her?” the other man asked.
Click. Spark. Fall.
“Rip a piece of wood off of that boarded-up building.”
Click.
Spark.
Fall.
Each spark that disappeared into the snow brought the brute closer, his confidence growing. The tiny pinpricks of fire disappeared almost instantly, no match for the layers of ice and snow that completely covered the ground.
The second man trotted through the snow with newfound determination. But he lacked the other’s brute strength—his muscles were weakened by lack of nutrients and years spent in the bitter cold, like most residents of Velora. He tried to pry off one of the boards covering the general store’s doorway, cursing beneath his breath as it refused to give way. He pulled a knife from his pocket and shoved it between the plank and the doorframe, using the blade as a lever.
Click.
“Have you started counting the seconds that remain to you?”
Spark.
The crow cawed again from the rooftop.
“My fingers will heal.”No, they won’t.“But you’ll burn until there is nothing left of you but a pile of ashes in the snow.”No, I won’t.
Fall.
He was in my face now, hovering just outside of the ring of salt. He wouldn’t broach it again. Even if he could not see the power pulsing within, he felt it. He believed he was smarter than me.
He was wrong.
“I have it!” Footsteps crashed through the snow, but my eyes were fixed on the device.
Another spark fell on the exact spot as the one before it. It disappeared as quickly as every one that came before.
Right on the line of salt.
Salt did not burn. But snow melted.
Click.
“Say your prayers to the Dark God.” The lines at the corners of his eyes deepened with his smile.
Spark.
He stretched out one hand to his compatriot, his beady dark eyes never leaving mine. The wood landed in his hand. “Oh wait… you cannot speak at all.”
Fall.
A narrow stream of melted snow rolled away in the direction of the messy footsteps they’d made while leaving my circle undisturbed. It disappeared in an icy furrow, swallowed by the power of the cold.
