Chapter Twenty-Five #2
Speaking of kids, I attempted to focus on the finale.
Jamius and Caleb, like many students who shared the same homeroom, grouped together to eliminate others first. Not encouraged but not against the rules of an all-out royale.
Jamius had five copies standing at the ready, guarding them from Kenzo, who each boy warily eyed, convinced he’d target them first. Kenzo had mockingly suggested he’d destroy everyone from his homeroom if they dared to place in the showcase, yet he’d gone out of his way to assist them in the first round.
He didn’t bother with Caleb or Jamius, leaving them to the fates of other students.
“ Try lasting long enough for me, branchless. ” Kenzo bolted ahead, ducking and weaving past magics while conserving his branch. “ If anyone gets to knock you out of this competition, it’s me. But first…those fuckers! ”
It appeared, despite weaseling his way back into the finale, Jamie had made a glaring error. He’d goaded Kenzo during lunch, mocking Gael and our entire homeroom.
“ It’s quite the travesty, ” Jamie’s words echoed along the infuriated surface of Kenzo’s mind as he sprinted faster.
“ Your entire homeroom coven landed in the showcase, yet only three made it into the finale. It’s not unsurprising, though.
Given your classes lackluster branches or lacking branches. ”
“ He thinks they’re so great, I’ll knock all six of those Whitehurst Washouts from the arena first. ” Kenzo popped static at Tiffany Sparks’ familiar and Harrison Heywood’s vials.
“Not Tiffany,” Gael shouted beside me.
It didn’t matter if the others hadn’t said a word to Kenzo. In his mind, a war had been waged, and he wouldn’t let anyone talk down to him or his coven. Mostly him, though. Every time he pictured the disappointment on his classmates’ faces, he quickly buried it.
“Looks like we’ve lost our first two competitors. Knocked out simultaneously by Kenzo Ito,” Chanelle announced, resisting a desire to sulk. “ Great, at this rate, he’ll knock my entire homeroom out before they have a chance to show off their talents. ”
“ Screw them. If they can’t hold their own against one pathetic hex witch , they don’t deserve my help . ” Jamie sneered, opening a whirlpool portal and abandoning his homeroom that Kenzo quickly eviscerated. He didn’t give any of Chanelle’s students an opportunity to think, strategize, or cast.
Across the arena, Jamius and Caleb worked in tandem to knock another pair of witches out of the arena.
“Five minutes in, and we’ve gone from twenty-four to twelve,” Chanelle announced, a bit depressed only one of her homeroom coven students remained.
One I didn’t want to participate after the way he’d attacked Tara.
“ Over my dead body will this branchless fuck earn a top place during the showcase. ” Jamie’s mind boomed as a portal opened behind Caleb. “ After what he pulled. I should kill him . ”
I flinched, resisting the urge to intervene when Jamie began the same assault on Caleb he’d used against Tara.
His sporadic rage bordered on psychotic tendencies.
I’d seen this behavior from both ends of the spectrum.
Some teens outgrew it as their minds and bodies developed; others, like, too many people, sank into that enraged hatred, and it became too suffocating to linger in their minds.
The proctors’ minds all buzzed with caution, at the ready. Most of the enchanters in the arena either held little concern—having faced worse themselves—or boredom by how the Novak kid held back against some no name. I ground my teeth.
Jamius sent two clones to help Caleb, but they ended up sucked into a whirlpool and knocked back into Jamius by Jamie.
He had no time for any of the other competitors until he’d thoroughly proven how insignificant Caleb was.
He wanted Caleb to understand the insurmountable difference in their abilities, by class, branch, and ranking.
Each strike knocked Caleb closer and closer to the edge of the arena .
His footing slipped, and my stomach twisted, filled with guilt at how desperately I wished he’d tumble out of bounds so the beating would end.
Caleb didn’t, though. Between his determination to change the tides of combat and Jamie’s craving to indulge in the sanctioned mayhem, Caleb remained in bounds, taking so many strikes I’d lost count.
Another Jamius copy ran full force, ready to land a surprise strike but ended up transported out of the arena and thrown into the audience, where he splattered.
“ Scaredy-Copycat is putting up a good fight, but he’s at fifteen duplicates and doesn’t have a branch or the root proficiency to handle those whirlpools.
” Kenzo stood at the other end of the arena, studying the battle between Jamie and Caleb while contending with four other competitors who’d grouped together.
“ They’re using Recheeta George’s strategy. Pathetic but also effective. Dammit. ”
Ugh. Him and his nicknames. Layla’s strategy had failed when Kenzo shocked everyone by collaborating, yet these four possessed perfect long-distance branches to catch and block his disruption hexes.
Each painful strike Jamie belted against Caleb drew my attention.
Light pelting hits against his face, sharp, precise jabs into his ribs, and heavy assaults against his calves meant to drop him.
Jamie didn’t want Caleb running. Fighting.
Jamie just wanted everyone to see where Caleb belonged, beneath him.
Jamie wanted Caleb on his knees, begging and broken.
I stood up, storming down the stadium steps because whether I was the only psychic with a clear understanding of what was happening or not, I wouldn’t endure another second.
I’d sooner see one of my students disqualified or have this entire showcase called into question before I allowed another second.
“ Telekinesis won’t move his whirlpools. ” Caleb wheezed. “ Sensory is an obvious no go. Levitation can’t escape when his portals chase me. I’ve got to think of something. ”
I leapt over the rail guard. Caleb didn’t need a plan.
I wouldn’t sit idle, hopeful and wishing and believing a second time.
I paused, lost in how I’d failed Tara during her fight.
If I’d intervened, shown my disgust for the tactics.
Maybe…maybe it’d have been enough to keep Jamie out of the finals, away from others.
“ Worthless. Piece. Of. Trash. ” Jamie continued his assault.
I flew closer, finding my pursuit held back.
“ Not yet, ” Milo thought, locking my stance with precise telekinesis. “ Give him the chance you’ve given others. Believe in your student. ”
“ You have no idea what you’re— ”
“ Enough. ” Caleb’s mind surged above everyone at the academy. His entire body vibrated, shattering my telepathy from linking anywhere in the arena. The proctors appeared frazzled, frozen, but remained where they were.
Every single whirlpool Jamie created vanished instantly.
Caleb pulsed telekinesis, which knocked Jamius and two others nearby out of bounds.
“ A perfected banishment. ”“ Impossible. ”
“ No way, from a branchless witch? ”
“ I’ve been refining my roots for years, and this child— ”
“ Hell of a showing. ” “ Might need him at our guild. ”
“ Told you to relax, Dorian. ”
With Caleb’s mind completely blank in a field of no magic, I watched him race toward Jamie.
“ That branchless bastard is actually trying to kill me . ” Jamie scrambled backward, genuine terror on his face, but it was misguided fear.
Banishment casting destroyed demonic energy. Sure, a perfected banishment nullified Jamie’s magics, but he was in no real danger. Still …
His thoughts turned feral, the sour notes piercing through the air and shredding all other inner voices. Beneath the rage lie a hollow calm attempting to claw its way forth. “ I’m not even sure going all out can counter a perfected banishment. ”
Caleb punched Jamie in the face, knocking him to the ground. The heavy right hook lacked telekinesis because Caleb had expunged all his energy with the tiny burst earlier and now fixated all his root magic into one perfected strike of banishment circling the air.
“ What the hell is this kid? ” Jamie lay motionless, thoughts stirring in a hundred fuzzy scenarios where he feared enchanter involvement—perhaps hesitating because of the last time he’d taken combat too far and had almost been disqualified.
Whatever his reason, Jamie drifted into the depths of his mind, surrendering to an unconscious state.
Caleb Huxley had done something I’d never witnessed firsthand. Not from a student. Not from an enchanter. Not from a single person in my lifetime.
He’d unleashed a perfected root magic. They were rare, difficult to attain or maintain.
Like all root magics, branches too, I supposed, they held different levels of skill set.
Basic banishment removed wisps and traces of demonic energy, enhanced understanding allowed the removal of fiends, and advanced proficiency eliminated demons.
But a perfected state could banish or nullify all magical energy in the atmosphere.
A perfected state of core power few focused on because training our branches was fundamentally ingrained in our heads for licensing or maintaining control of the flow of unique magic circulating inside us.
Jamie lay on the arena floor unconscious while Caleb wheezed heavily, his channeled magic waning and body trembling.
His knees shook, barely holding him upright.
Kenzo—having regained control over his magics—flew directly toward Caleb, his disruption at the ready and unwilling to take second place as they remained the only active competitors on the field.