Chapter 34
Thirty-Four
Ivy
The power I’ve heaved out of me passes through the scourge sorcerers’ concealment spell like a horse bolting through fog. That’s not what I need.
I rein my magic in and will it to collide with the haze. Eat away at the opposing magic that’s hiding the Order of the Wild’s army. Reveal them to the world.
I don’t know what consequences my power would create when left to its own devices, so I turn to my usual technique, just in reverse.
When I make us invisible, I let an echo of our forms appear somewhere else.
When I’m taking away the cloud of invisibility around the march, I’ll send that invisibility someplace else.
As I push my magic against the thick barrier around us, I concentrate on the span of forest beyond the far edge of the camp as well. Quivers of sensation race through my soul as the haze starts to disintegrate—and at the same time, the trees at the edge of the forest fade from view.
I’m vaguely aware of the men moving around me. Rheave fires one arrow after another into the milling bodies; Alek and Casimir brace themselves in front of me.
I batter the concealing spell again, holding my focus tight against the shouts of alarm that are going up throughout the scourge sorcerers’ camp. Against the flickering images at the edge of my vision that send jolts through my nerves, as if someone is lunging at me.
No one’s there. If they were, my men would be fending them off.
I can’t fall for my mind’s tricks now.
The trees at the edge of the forest vanish completely. I can’t tell how much of the fog I’ve worn away while I’m standing inside it.
How close are Stavros and the soldiers he called in?
At least one of our enemies must realize what’s happening, because all at once, the haze of magic shoves back. It hits at me so suddenly I rock on my heels at the impact, unprepared.
The trees swim back into view. My magic contracts and writhes.
“Ivy?” Casimir asks, worry wound through his tone.
I gasp a breath. “I’m okay. Just—they’re fighting back with their sorcery. I haven’t been able to completely sweep away their magic yet.”
Clenching my hands at my sides, I whip my own power forward with more force.
An invisible pressure jabs at me from multiple angles. I have the sense of someone at the other end of that magic lashing out, not knowing where their opponent is but tracing my assault on their spell back to me.
I can do this. I have to be able to do this.
Scourge sorcery is limited by the sacrifices of their supporters. Riven sorcery can do anything.
As long as the person using it pays the price.
My teeth set on edge. A growl seeps through them as I push my will forward.
Tear down the magic that’s cloaking this field. Wash it away as if in a vast torrent.
I won’t be shaken. I won’t be stopped.
Julita’s voice quavers through my thoughts. Ivy, are you sure this isn’t too much? There’s so many of them working against you…
I tune her out too, narrowing my concentration even farther.
The concealing fog seems to lurch against my onslaught. It shifts and weaves, strands darting free from my attempt to dissolve it.
Alek stirs in front of me and belts out a name. “Ster. Torstem Dymasek of Florian—a scourge sorcerer, dead.” Another. “Wendos Hubarek of Nikodi—a scourge sorcerer, dead. How many of you are going to join them today?”
Whatever strategy he’s attempting, it might be worthwhile. A tremor passes through the magic pressing in on me, loosening its impact.
With a renewed surge of determination, I thrash the concealing fog with my own power.
Alek keeps hollering names—other people he suspects from his research were scourge sorcerers who’ve also died? The shouts around me merge into a warbling roar.
Just a little more. Strip away their defenses. Stop them. Stop them—
A new swell of magic crashes over us.
The thicker force punches me in the gut. I hiss and stumble, and my control slips.
The wave of magic I was casting out of me sweeps across the whole camp, toppling men and women, smashing wagon wheels, snapping horses’ leads, sending the animals running.
And there are more enemies—more coming. Voices everywhere, flashing swords. I have to crush them all before they—
My magic flings to the side before I’ve fully processed those thoughts. It slams into a cluster of blue-uniformed figures on horseback who’re racing down the road.
Bodies fly from their steeds. Someone cries out at the stomp of a misplaced hoof.
Yes, destroy them all. Destroy everyone who—
I clap my hand to the side of my head.
No. Those were the soldiers we wanted to fight the traitors with us, not more attackers.
My power leaps at them again, sending one of the horses staggering to its knees. I hurl myself backward, my mind reeling, my mouth gone ashy dry.
I have to stop. I have to stop… before I can’t.
The world has morphed into a chaotic whirl of color and shape. I wrench myself around and somehow end up on my hands and knees.
Fabric tears. Wood crunches. Someone screams.
How do I stop?
My hand swims into view, pale against the trampled soil and patchy grass.
I’m here. Not out there. Not ravaging all those people.
An urge grips me, and I follow it. I snatch the knife from my boot and stab it into the back of my hand.
I keep good enough aim that the blade passes between the bones, severing muscle and sinew with an explosion of pain. Pain that reminds me of exactly where and what I am.
“Ivy!” someone cries out.
I haul at my raging magic, and it hurtles back into me. I can’t prevent it from flinging the knife out of my flesh and sealing the wound, but the thought of who else might be bleeding in my place comes with a smack of horror that grounds me even more.
I clamp down tight on my power, picturing ivy coiling tight around me, sealing every gap. Caging the magic inside my body yet again.
Arms wrap around my middle. “I’ve got her!” Rheave says, and then, softer by my ear, “I’ve got you. They won’t hurt you anymore.”
Doesn’t he see that I’m the one who hurt me?
My thoughts are still too scrambled for me to figure out how to speak.
The daimon-man hefts me against him and runs. As my head settles beneath his chin, I recognize the rustle of branches we race past, crackles of twigs underfoot.
We’re back in the forest.
Am I still keeping my men hidden? I yanked all my magic back to me. I have to…
I try to extend just a tendril, and the frantic surge that jerks at my innards has me shutting down again.
Fuck. I don’t know how to do this anymore.
“Here!” someone hollers. A large equine body pushes in front of us, and Rheave is lifting me onto Toast’s back before hauling himself up behind me.
There are other horses around us. We careen on through the underbrush, dusk falling in our wake.
My thoughts float in spirals and gradually settle into some kind of order.
Rheave thought he was ruining everything, but I really just did. I could have torn even the men I love apart, and I’d hardly even have noticed.
Tears prick at the backs of my eyes. I squeeze the lids shut.
Sulla was right. It’s too much. I don’t know enough.
Maybe I never will. She’s stayed on that mountainside her whole life to avoid a catastrophe like I almost unleashed.
“This way,” a voice says, one I now recognize as Stavros’s.
When I force myself to lift my head, I make out the former general on the other stallion just ahead of us. Alek and Casimir are sharing another horse, cantering along a few paces away through the trees.
They must have stolen it from the camp in the chaos.
Well, now we can all ride, as long as the horses are capable of carrying two. One small gain.
A hysterical giggle bubbles in my throat. I clench my jaw against it.
Stavros draws to a stop and dismounts. As Rheave helps me down off the horse, I make out a stone wall mostly swallowed up by moss and vines.
The former general waves us inside. “It’s an old outpost, abandoned since well before my time. But at least it’ll keep us completely out of sight for the time being.”
We lead the horses inside, past clumps of rubble from the partly collapsed ceiling. A pungent earthy scent fills my nose.
I rest my hand against one of the gritty walls. A pang shoots through my palm where the place I stabbed it has sealed over.
Rheave touches my back more carefully than usual. “Ivy? Are you injured anywhere else?”
I turn to face him. The worry on his face breaks my heart.
My voice comes out hoarse. “No. You got me away before anyone could hurt me. You see? It’s a good thing you were there.”
He beams at me so brightly that an answering rush of affection wells up in my chest. “It was.” He tips his head toward the other men. “Casimir stabbed someone who tried to lunge at you. And Alek grabbed another horse so we could get away quickly.”
Giving them credit too. When I look around at the others, I’m met with smiles so tender I can’t doubt they’re genuine.
They really do accept our daimon-man. He’s become a vital part of our group so gradually I didn’t totally recognize it.
And maybe I can accept that this man who isn’t totally a man fits into a piece of my heart I didn’t know was still empty. But that’s hardly my biggest concern right now.
How many people did I injure in the past hour? How horrible a fate did I consign my lovers to?
My legs wobble. I drop to a crouch, and Casimir is there, wrapping his arm around me from the other side.
“It’ll be all right, Kindness,” he says.
The gentleness of his voice that I don’t deserve cracks through the dam inside me. I sob, and tears flood my eyes.
“Ivy!” Alek drops to his knees in front of me. Rheave makes an anguished sound and tightens his own grip on my body.
All I can do is gasp and press my hands against my face in a futile attempt to stem the deluge of tears.
Have they ever seen me cry before? I can’t remember the last time I did—really wept, like this—since even before I met them.
My chest hitches, and more tears gush out.
Julita squirms in the back of my skull. Oh, Ivy. Whatever’s gone wrong, I’m sure we’ll work out a new plan. We’ll still stop the scourge sorcerers. They haven’t won yet.
They haven’t, no. But I’ve already lost.
I gulp a few breaths and manage to get a hold of myself. Stavros looms over us, peering down at me, his mouth twisted at an agonized angle.
“Tell us what you need, Ivy,” he demands. “Tell me whose blood I need to spill for what happened to you back there.”
Gods smite me. They all still think I was the one in trouble when the truth is, I was the cause of it.
I push my hands against my closed eyes as if I can force back the next wave of tears that way. When I’m sure they’re not going to burst out of me just yet, I lower my arms and gaze blankly at my knees, encircled by the men I’ve failed.
The words fall dully from my lips. “Mine. I needed to spill mine. But I didn’t do it soon enough.”
I can hear Rheave’s frown in his voice. “What do you mean?”
“It was me.” My voice breaks.
I close my eyes again, and shadows waver past my eyelids. Distant voices no one else can hear screech in fury.
I gird myself and make myself keep going.
“I thought I could do something good with my magic. I thought as long as I balanced everything out, no one had to get hurt, and it would all work out. But… I’m going mad.
I’m seeing things, hearing things. It was small enough that I thought I could push through until we’d dealt with the scourge sorcerers; I had to.
Except I can’t. It almost took me over tonight. ”
Casimir and Rheave press closer in their combined embrace. Alek’s hand comes to rest on my cheek.
The scholar’s voice turns rough. “That’s why you stabbed your hand.”
Rheave lets out a growl at the reminder.
My head dips lower. “The pain brought me back, just barely. I’m the one who bowled over the soldiers Stavros brought. That wasn’t the scourge sorcerers. When the magic gets right into my head, I start thinking I have to lash out at everyone…”
I choke up for a second before I drag my gaze upward to meet Stavros’s dark eyes. “Part of me wanted to tear apart every soldier in the fortress this morning after the one put his knife to my throat. Like the riven sorcerer slaughtered your best friend. That’s why I let Julita step in.”
Oh, Ivy, Julita murmurs, sounding choked up herself.
“And why you stabbed yourself tonight.” Stavros inhales sharply. “Curse it all, Ivy, I knew you’d fall on your knife before you let yourself go too far, but I never wanted it to actually happen.”
Casimir strokes my hair. “You’re clearly not insane now. You came out of it.”
I let out a strained guffaw. “Not really. Just the worst parts. I’m still… not quite right. I don’t even know if I ever will be again or if I’ve wrecked my mind permanently.”
Alek touches his forehead to mine. “You’ll rest, and you’ll get better again. It isn’t your fault. You never wanted this magic. You were only trying to help.”
The hopeless sensation that’s been building inside me since we rode away rises up so swiftly I could drown in it. “I didn’t even take down the scourge sorcerers, not really, did I? They’re still going to attack.”
Stavros shifts his weight. “Not right away. Quite a few of them were injured, and their horses scattered. I didn’t see what happened to the soldiers I led that way, but even if the Order of the Wild fell on them, the scourge sorcerers will want to move and regroup in case others are going to investigate. ”
“But they’ll find another place to hide and get organized. And they won’t wait long. Tomorrow or the next day, they’ll go to slaughter the entire royal family.”
I swallow thickly. “And I won’t be able to help at all, because I can’t risk using my magic again.”