Chapter 28 #2
The next wave slams into me before I can finish the thought. Panic sharp enough to turn my vision into spots of light and shadow. My familiar rises to manifest, but breaks apart before forming, black feathers fading to mist as my depleted power fails to sustain even that basic working.
“How long will this last?” Mira crouches beside me, voice tight with concern.
“I don’t know.” My jaw clenches as another surge builds.
Shadows pulse in rhythm with my heartbeat, responding to emotions that aren’t mine. Years of discipline reduced to nothing by the simple fact that somewhere, Ellie is terrified and I can feel every spike tearing through my consciousness.
“Can you cut the connection?” she asks. “Block it for now?”
“No. And I wouldn’t if I could.” The words come out harsh. “If I sever it and she—”
Another emotional tsunami builds. I sense it gathering strength before it hits. When it crashes over me, it’s edged with something I haven’t felt from her before. Something sharp, focused … and absolutely lethal.
The realization cuts through the chaos clouding my thoughts. Whatever threatens her, she’s stopped running from it.
The forest tilts sideways. My shadows collapse inward, unable to maintain even basic cohesion. I try to push myself upright, instinct demanding I move, act, do something to help her, but my body refuses to obey.
“Easy.” Varam’s voice comes from somewhere above me. “Try to breathe through it.”
Breathe through it. A broken laugh escapes me. As if this is something that can be managed through breathing exercises. As if the dread bleeding through our connection isn’t evidence that Ellie is in mortal danger.
Her adrenaline peaks and crashes, leaving me gasping. My nervous system is being flayed raw. Each breath tastes of copper and bile.
Before I can say anything, it’s back again.
Whatever she’s facing, she’s not backing down from it.
My familiar stirs again, trying to respond to my need. This time it holds form for almost five heartbeats before dissolving.
“I need to see what’s happening to her.” The words come out as little more than a whisper.
“Your magic is too unstable. Look at the shadows.” Mira points toward the trees.
I follow her gaze. The darkness around us is writhing, twisting, lashing out and fading before they make contact.
Another surge builds. This one carries layers I can’t easily define. Anger mixed with fear, determination with desperation. When it hits, the force sends me retching again, dry heaves that accomplish nothing except adding physical misery to the emotional assault.
“This is getting worse,” Mira says. “Each wave is stronger than the last.”
And then something changes. For the first time since this onslaught began, it isn’t fear that reaches me. It’s fury. Pure, focused wrath that burns like silver fire.
The sky splits apart above our heads.
Lightning forks across the heavens in brilliant branches of white-hot power. The bolts come again and again, each one big enough to illuminate the entire forest. Thunder follows, shaking the earth beneath us hard enough to rattle my teeth.
Again. And again. A relentless barrage of light hammering down toward Ashenvale.
“Shadows preserve us,” Varam breathes, staring at the continuous display of raw power splitting the sky.
The air tastes of metal and ozone and something else. Something that makes my shadows rise in recognition.
“It’s Ellie.” I know it as well as I know my own reflection. I’ve seen how her power manifests when her emotions peak, but never like this.
This isn’t the wild, uncontrolled discharge I’ve witnessed. This is Ellie weaponizing that power deliberately.
“She’s not just defending herself anymore. She’s attacking.”
Whatever threatened her has pushed too far.
The thought should comfort me. She’s fighting back, she’s not helpless.
Instead, it adds new layers of concern. Her abilities remain largely untrained and unpredictable.
If she’s using them in some kind of combat, without proper control, the backlash could destroy her as surely as any enemy …
Then everything changes again. The chaotic storm of emotions falls back. In the sudden quiet, something new takes its place. A presence brushing against the inside of my mind with the gentleness of a lover’s touch.
Across our connection comes a request that transcends words. She’s reaching out, asking for something that could burn us both to ash if handled wrong.
She wants my power. She wants to merge it with her own.
The intimacy of the request steals what little breath I have left.
To open myself that completely, to let her draw directly from the source of what makes me who I am … It’s an act of trust that could destroy me, if she betrays it. More than trust, it’s a vulnerability so complete that even thinking about it makes my shadows recoil.
But she may be fighting for her life. And I would give her anything.
“Take it. Take whatever you need.”
The bond transforms between one heartbeat and the next. What was once a bridge becomes a torrent as I willingly tear down every barrier between us. The sensation defies description. It’s like having someone reach into your soul and become part of what makes you uniquely … you.
My shadows pour across the distance, guided by her will, shaped by her need. They don’t just flow to her, they merge with her power. Darkness and silver fire, unified into something new. Something prophesied.
Shadow and storm.
The feedback hits me like lightning. Every nerve ending ignites at once. My pulse stops, stutters, then races so fast individual beats blur together. And through it all, I can feel her power building.
Shadow-touched lightning fills the sky. A display of will made manifest, determination given deadly form.
Fear transforms into triumph. Desperation becomes grim satisfaction. Whatever she faced, whatever threatened her, it stands no chance against this new force we’ve created together.
My familiar manifests one final time, drawn by the surge of power flowing through me. This time it holds its shape long enough to spread phantom wings in fierce pride before the magical feedback tears it apart again.
The effort costs me everything I have left. Sound fades to a distant roar, as my hearing gives way to the thunder in my own blood. Light becomes dark as my vision fails. And the last thing I remember is Ellie’s presence, exhausted but victorious. Alive, deadly, and utterly magnificent.
Then darkness claims me entirely.
When consciousness returns, the first thing I notice isn’t the pounding in my skull or the taste of blood in my mouth.
It’s the silence.
The bond, which has hummed with constant awareness since it formed, lies quiet as death.
No flutter of emotion, no sense of her presence, no indication that Ellie exists anywhere in this world or any other.
The absence is more devastating than the magical backlash, more painful than broken ribs or drained reserves.
For one crushing moment, I wonder if sharing my power killed her. If I poured too much across the distance and burned out her life’s essence.
I can’t believe that. I won’t.
I force my eyes open despite the agony that threatens to split my skull in half. The world swims in and out of focus, trees and sky blurring together in nauseating waves.
“How long?” My voice is a rough croak, throat raw from the retching of earlier.
“Four hours.” Varam replies from somewhere to my left, relief evident in his tone. “We were starting to worry you wouldn’t wake up.”
Four hours. Four hours during which anything could have happened to Ellie. Four hours of silence where there should be a constant, subtle awareness of her presence.
I struggle to sit up, fighting through waves of dizziness that make the world tilt sickeningly. Every movement sends fresh spikes of pain through my head and ribs, but I force myself upright through sheer will.
“The bond … I can’t feel her anymore.”
“Is that good or bad?” Mira crouches beside me, and hands me a waterskin.
The water is cool against my throat, but it does nothing to ease the hollow ache in my chest where Ellie's presence should be. “I don’t know. I lost the connection when we first returned to Meridian, but it came back. We need to reach Ashenvale.”
“You can barely sit up without falling over. You won’t be able to walk to the city in your condition.”
“I don’t care.” The words come out edged with desperation I can’t conceal.
“Rushing to Ashenvale will help no one,” Varam argues, unmoved by my glare. “You’ll collapse before we’re halfway there, and then we’ll have to carry you the rest of the way. That’s not how we get into Ashenvale without being seen.”
I want to argue, to insist that every moment we delay could be crucial, but unfortunately, he’s right. My legs feel like water, my vision still swims with exhaustion. In my current state, I’m more liability than asset.
“At first light then,” I concede, hating every word. “We leave at dawn.”