Chapter 70 Devora
Devora
“I’ve never been happier to see you,” Arowyn said.
“I get that a lot. Is this all of them?” Tessa took in the dozen people behind us.
Elynor stepped forward. “Should be. The only hallway left leads to Mortep’s laboratory.”
Mae and the boy ran back up to me and clutched my waist. I patted their backs as I said, “Tessa, can you get them to safety? Arowyn and I should check out the main lab.”
Mae clung to me, looking up with wide, scared eyes. “It’s okay, sweet girl,” I said, smoothing her hair. “Tessa will take care of you, and I’ll see you soon. I promise.”
Her gray eyes shifted to orange again, and her body heated with her lightbending powers before she blinked it away and extricated herself from me. I hated leaving them when they were still so traumatized, but the important thing was getting them out of the Hollow.
Tessa, Theo, and Elynor took the lead and helped the younger ones back down the way we came. I watched until their footsteps receded and Arowyn and I were left alone.
“This way,” I said, following the directions Elynor gave us to the final tunnel with Mortep’s lab. It was eerily silent without the heavy breaths and footsteps of the others. I could hear every tiny creature scurrying along the tunnels, every echo of dripping water, every distant rumble.
We turned down the last hallway. Torches lit the path, showing a few empty cells along the walls. All the way down the long, narrow tunnel, I could see the faint pinprick of light coming from Mortep’s laboratory.
As we walked, there was a slight shift in the air.
My breath caught, awareness prickling at my skin.
Everything felt…heavier. Darker. Thicker.
My shadows responded, but they were slower than usual.
It was like they were trying to wade through molasses.
They moved in lazy circles inside my chest and around my hands, instead of their usual lively dance.
“Do you feel that?” I whispered.
Arowyn nodded solemnly. We kept walking, my shadows resting across the tips of my fingers.
But as we got closer to the door, they flickered. Gone one moment and back the next.
I could feel my magic straining, pushing against some invisible force attempting to snuff it out. Alarm flooded me. I tried to send my shadows ahead of us, but they barely moved. Only a faint wisp stretched its little fingers into the darkness beyond.
We were almost at the door. I shuddered as the wrongness of the air got even heavier.
Dark energy rolled over us, and no matter how hard I tried to summon my shadows, they were a fraction of their normal strength.
I met resistance with every step forward, as if the tunnel itself was exhaling and pushing us back.
The torch at the end of the hall hissed and sputtered low, casting strange, flickering shadows over the floor. I grabbed the handle to the lab’s door and twisted.
It flew open with a bang.
At the table in the center stood Malek Mortep, with his mane of dark hair and those pure white eyes staring back at us with sadistic glee.
But he wasn’t what made my heart leap in fear.
In front of his outstretched hands, amid the shattered glass vials and pools of blood, was a huge sphere of black and red shadows.
Shadows wasn’t the right word—it was more like energy, a tight ball of flickering magic, lightning, and darkness.
The air crackled with power as black and red tendrils twisted over each other like a den of snakes.
Dark magic permeated the room. The sensation of my magic being sucked out of me was overwhelming, an infectious curse spreading through the lab and into my veins.
“Welcome back to the Hollow, Miss Nyte,” Mortep jeered. “You were a bit earlier than we expected.”
“What are you doing?” I shouted at the mad Alchemist, watching his lips move soundlessly as he held the sphere between his gnarled fingers.
“Me? Oh, I’m simply the decoy.” His white eyes met mine, and he cocked his head with a sinister grin. “It’s too bad you’ll miss the show.”
With a powerful thrust of his arms, he threw the ball of magic at Arowyn and me.
It collided with us, instantly obliterating our magic and sending us flying backward out of the lab. I crashed into the stone wall and slumped to the ground. Everything went gray as a throbbing pain exploded in my head.
When the spots in my vision cleared, I saw the swirling ball of dark magic hurtle past us and down the hall, leaving shadowy wisps of black-and-red energy in its wake. A dark fog descended over the entire corridor, pulsing and suctioning all magic from the air.
“Arowyn?” I called.
“Right here,” she answered with a groan to my right. “Where’d he go?”
I scrambled to my feet as quickly as my head would allow and staggered toward the lab, only to find it empty. The opposite door was swung ajar.
“Gone,” I said, rubbing the back of my head. “What just happened?”
Arowyn limped to me and dusted off her leathers. Several scrapes marked up her cheeks and neck, but other than that, she appeared unharmed. “I don’t know, but I draw the line at some freaky ball of death.”
“Can you stride at all?”
She shook her head. “No. I can’t do anything. My magic is gone.”
“Mine too.” I slowly swept my eyes over the lab, taking in the cloud still billowing around us, with its flickering red and black shadows.
Broken glass vials were strewn all over the floor.
Tufts of shredded green leaves littered the space.
When I opened one of the enormous cabinet doors, I found box after box overflowing with fatesprig leaves.
“This is where they keep the fatesprig,” I said. “I wonder if the rest of the weapons are down in these tunnels too—”
Before I could finish my thought, a resounding boom echoed from somewhere above, shaking the ceiling and sending rocks flying to the ground. Arowyn and I both looked up.
“Well, that doesn’t sound good,” she said.
“Mortep did say this was just the decoy.” I tried to summon my shadows again, but that well inside me where my magic rested was still empty.
Something inside the cabinet caught my attention before I turned away. One of the only syringes left unshattered in the mess of the laboratory, filled with a dark green serum.
It looked…familiar.
I quickly swiped the syringe and shoved it in my pocket as more high-pitched, animalistic screeches drifted down the hall.
“Come on,” I said with a shiver. “Let’s get out of here.”