I send out a pulse of magic and break free of the tether, rolling into a crouch. My pulse explodes out from me and hits my attacker. The feminine yelp that follows gives me a direction for my counterattack.
I call on my connection with the Hallowind property and request aid.
Aunt Aggie and her elk answer my call.
Gone is the woman's usual benign expression as she gathers cuttings in the forest. With an intruder on the property, she ridesImperial straight into the bushes, and he lances my attacker with the pointed spears of his rack.
"Ow! What the fuck?" The indignant scream brings Amber Draven rushing out of the shadows.
I release my call for help and send my thanks to Aggie and Imperial before they do any serious damage. "Speaking of what the fuck… What the fuck, Amber?"
Another of the Emberwood Elites, Amber Draven has been a mean girl bully in my life since junior high. Tonight she's in fine form, her bright hazel eyes blazing with multiple affinities as her Barbie blonde hair whips around her face. "Did you really think you could spread lies about my family? You upset my aunt! Stirred up all that horrible stuff about Davina again!"
"Amber—" I start to explain, but she's already casting.
A rope of pure light lashes toward my chest. I throw up a shield, the magic crackling violet-blue as it deflects the attack.
Her rope shatters into sparks.
"Davina died ten years ago!" Amber's voice cracks. "She was a sweet nine-year-old little girl, and shedied. You have no right?—"
"She didn't die." I widen my stance and keep my hands raised and at the ready. "Her ghost came to me. She wasn't nine, Amber. Laurel kept her alive. Tortured her?—"
"Liar!"
The next attack comes faster—three spheres of spinning blades whistle through the air and close in fast. I catch one with a burst of spirit fire, dodge left to avoid the second, but the third one clips my shoulder and sends me spinning.
Pain blooms hot across my arm.
Fine.If she wants a fight, she gets one.
I pull on my magic, letting it flood through my veins. The demon mark pulses to awareness, but I shove that darkness down hard.
This is about defense, not destruction.
"I'm telling the truth, Amber." I weave a ward between us. "Davina's ghost was muzzled by magic so powerful that she couldn't speak. Someone did terrible things to her, and they're probably doing terrible things to other kids, too. Laurel is doing something horrible?—"
"Stop badmouthing Laurel!" Amber screams.
She throws an elemental attack at me—light and air with what feels like a thread of fire magic lacing it together. I block and deflect, my boots digging furrows in the lawn as I'm forced backward.
Amber has talent—she's an Elite, after all—but so am I.
And while she's been living the pampered life of a celebrity witch, I've been training to take on a greater demon.
I wait for a weakness in her attack and drop my shield, rolling forward instead of dropping back. Her next attack sails over my head. I come up inside her guard and release a pulse of raw spirit fire that knocks her flat on her ass.
"I don't want to fight you," I pant, holding my ground. "I want to find out what happened to your cousin. Don't you?"
Amber's face twists. For a second, I think she might actually listen. Then her gaze hardens, and she launches herself at me, magic and fists both swinging.
We go down in a tangle of limbs and power. Grass tears beneath us. My elbow connects with something soft, and she yelps. Her knee finds my ribs. and air whooshes from my lungs.
Magic sparks between us in chaotic bursts—mine electric-blue, hers golden-white.
"Get off my lawn!" I gasp, shoving against her shoulder.
"Make me!"
