Sol handed a string of the beads to the chaos magic user.
“I can draw the chaos out,” Ezra said. “But it still has to go somewhere.”
“The small flashes of lightning from the two I did were harmless,” Sol responded.
“That was two beads,” Ezra responded. She gestured to the rest of the room. “To do the same with the rest at a faster speed would collapse the entire cliff side.”
Sol nodded.
Meena bumped her fist against her forehead, recalling the little she knew about the magic.
“Let me siphon this out,” Ezra said. “At the very least, we can see how much chaos there is.” As she spoke, Ezra held the string of beads in one hand, dropping it slowly into the other. She moved the string in a circular motion until sat in a comfortable spiral in the palm of her hand.
Tensing her fingers around it without fully closing her hand, she inhaled and dropped her head forward.
Meena could see Ezra’s hand start to tremble and the tendons on her forearm stood in stark relief to the rest of her arm.
Ezra then held out her empty hand, opening the palm out flat. A purple orb began to gather in the space above her palm.
Meena instinctively shrank away from it. The glowing sphere reminded her of the curse that the mage had used to attack Aden.
Ezra opened her eyes. Her face was calm, but her closed fist and opened palm still trembled slightly. “That’s all of it.” Her voice was tense, but not strained. Since she had drawn the chaos from the orb, she did not have to put herself through pain, only concentration.
“Now what?” Meena asked.
“We have to channel it into something to disburse it,” Sol replied.
Aden’s curse had been cured when Isa kissed him, offering him a life-giving love. She’d unknowingly used the power of harmony to cancel the chaos.
“Can you use your harmony magic to cancel the chaos magic?” Meena asked Sol.
“I don’t have enough magic to replace,” he replied. “I’m already almost out.”
“And there’s no way we could just carry it out here?” Meena asked. “And disburse in the middle of the sea?”
Sol shook his head. “We wouldn’t make it halfway to the boat before they captured us all.”
“We have to do something with it,” Ezra replied.
“And quickly,” Meena added.
“Maybe the wind could carry it away?” Sol said.
“How?” Ezra asked.
Keeping his eyes on the purple orb of power, Sol intoned a note in his throat. His face looked both purposeful and peaceful.
A fluttering wind whispered through the enclosed cavern room. It circled around Meena, picking up speed.
The hanging glass beads around her clinked lightly as the wind swept by them. As it passed Ezra’s outstretched hand, the wind picked up strands of the purple orb, carrying them with it out the open door.
Within moments, the orb was entirely depleted.
The wind left the room.
“That was incredible,” Meena said. “I’ll handle the beads, Ezra can withdraw the magic, and Sol can summon the wind.”
She didn’t wait for confirmation before she scooped up an armful of beaded strands.
