As a bulky man with a deep black cloak and an elite mask stepped through the shadows, I stepped around Altair and pictured a beam of pure, burning light escaping my fingers. I willed my magic to the surface, demanding it listen, ordering it to attack. And attack it did. As soon as my fingers lifted towards the man, a shock of magic escaped me.
The elite dove, smashing into the cobblestone and barely avoiding the hit. Altair’s hand reached out, latching onto my hip and tugging me back. I shook him off, growling like a beast.
“Nova?” Just like that, I was back in my family home, the only person other than my parents and sister that I had dared to trust begging me to understand. To forgive him. To stay with him.
When had I stopped being able to feel him? To recognize him by presence alone?
Talon stood, tearing off his mask and revealing a perfectly healed face. His hair was pulled back beneath his hood, his undereyes stained black and blue from what I assumed was little sleep. Had it truly only been days since I’d seen him last?
“You came back? What—” Altair stepped up to my side, his towering frame heavy and imposing. Talon’s amber eyes flickedtowards Altair, thick brows furrowing as he took in his once best friend. Could he tell? Did he realize who was at my side? “Who isthat?”
His voice was a hiss. A furious rasp. He was so rarely angry, I almost missed his easy smile, the painfully unapologetic way he laughed. Then I pictured him cutting off Dad’s head.
“You bitch!” I screamed, grabbing one of my knives and running at him. Talon ducked away from my strike, the blade not so much as knocking his skin. I dodged his grasp, his large hand attempting to secure around my wrist, to hold me captive. I would not be a prisoner.
“You have to understand!” My chains appeared, my magic buzzing and the stars giggling within my mind as I began relentlessly swinging at Talon.
Footsteps echoed off the cobblestone, the shadows disappearing to reveal a group of masked elites running our way.
Altair charged forward, bending backwards to avoid Talon’s swing and then whipping back up and latching a hand around Talon’s neck. I watched with wide eyes as he lifted Talon and slammed him to the ground, turning to face the oncoming elites.
Capitalizing on the moment, I dove down and shoved off Altair, wrapping my own hands around Talon’s throat and squeezing with violent desperation. Talon’s eyes bulged, his fingers preventing mine from truly cutting off his airway.
“Just die, stars dammit!” I sounded crazed, a whine to my voice then scratched my throat.
“Please don’t make me hurt you, Supernova,” he whispered below me, bucking his hips and flipping us. But I was through with giving up. Each of them deserved to die. Talon leaned down, his eyes on my lips and his thumb caressing my cheek.Hedeserved to die.
“There’s our catalyst. Finally coming out to play?”
With the haunting echo of voices ringing in my mind, I shoved my head into his, hearing the snap of his nose as he screamed in agony. Suddenly, his weight was off of me, and there was Altair, his dark and thick brows knitted together and his full lips in a sneer as he threw Talon to the side like a rag doll.
“Behind you!” I screamed, catching sight of a smaller elite swinging a shadow sword towards his head. Just as quickly as his sneer had come, it vanished, a sort of wicked smirk taking its place. One dimple made itself known before Altair ducked again, reaching out and grabbing the elite’s ankle. He ripped their foot out from under them, sending the elite toppling backwards.
Talon was up and growling like a true bear, his head low as he shoved his shoulder into Altair’s back. The two of them slammed into the cobblestone just as I rose to my feet. I tried to remember all I had learned the last year—to access even a semblance of sanity—but I felt like a rabid dog. Like a creature succumbing to bloodlust.
I ran at the smallest elite, swinging my leg out. They quickly shoved their elbow down into my shin, their fist barreling into my face. Pressure exploded across my right cheek, but I didn’t slow as I willed magic into my palm and slammed it into the elite’s shoulder. Blood slipped into my mouth just as the elite hit the ground. I felt the way my skin began to burn, the feel of the stars’ essence flooding me.
Reaching my hands out to my sides, keeping them down at hip level, I summoned everything I had. I pictured light and dark coagulating in my blood, willed both to blend and merge. In my mind, I pictured blasts of it burning through each of the elite’s chests.
Kill them all.
Altair caught my eye, his nose bleeding and crooked as he took on two of the larger elites and Talon, the three of them beginning to overtake him. The elite I had knocked down rippedoff their mask just as the swell of magic peaked, and I was forced to watch Priya Otarn’s face contort in horror just before I spared one last glance at Altair. Talon came up behind Altair, his stony face unfeeling as he took a small blade and shoved it into Altair’s back. At the last moment—my gaze locked on the snake’s as he fell to his knees—I attempted to reign in the power, magic practically bleeding off of me.
A ground-shaking boom emanated from below my feet, and then a wave of pure magic escaped my body. My head flew back, nausea rolling up my stomach and into my throat. Screams came from all around me, pain momentarily uniting the group of us. Control was a far away thought, an impossibility in the midst of the might the stars held. I was a lifeless toy, an obedient hound, an agent of chaos in their arsenal. They laughed in my mind, my body seizing as they willed endless amounts of scalding magic out of me.
“Tell us, Nova Tershetta, is there anything worth fighting for? Anything left we might consider before we grant you the death you so desperately crave?”
As if they wanted a particular answer, they willed images of Altair to the front of my mind. I was invaded with the smell of him, bombarded with the deep rasp of his voice, held hostage by the tug of my hair as his fingers wrapped around it.
You aren’t making any sense!
“Save Azazel Altair and we will help you fulfill your wish.”
Abruptly, the magic ceased flowing out of me, the release of pressure forcing me to my knees. I hit the cobblestone painfully hard, my wrists stinging as I caught my upper half. Breaths heavy and eyes burning from the rain, I looked up just in time to see Talon rolling over, Altair unmoving a few feet from him. Groaning, I willed my shadows to envelop me, to take me where I wanted to go.
No, where the stars wanted me to go.
I was beside Altair in a moment, my hand gripping his freckled cheek and my gaze meeting Talon’s. He was shoving himself up, his eyes a blazing fire. “Don’t you dare leave me again, Nova!”
