Chapter 30
Chapter
Thirty
FINLEY
Entering the astral realm felt like stepping into silence. Like the quiet between heartbeats. Everything here shimmered with a stillness that wasn’t quite still. Threads of magic drifted in the air, unseen by anyone who didn’t possess death magic.
It was beautiful, like stars streaking across the night sky.
Brenton stood beside me, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, sinewy muscles coiled tight. Veins traced along his forearm, pulsing with our magic that he wielded with care. The dim light here made him appear as if he were carved from shadow and strength.
The red threads of my magic twined with his smoke around his wrists.
Eiran’s voice carried like breaking thunder. “You’ve toyed with me long enough.” He grinned. “Pull on my threads.”
Brenton glanced at me, a hint of mischief and challenge in his eyes. “Ready?”
“I still don’t feel the blasted threads,” I muttered, annoyance braiding around each word.
“You don’t have to.” His tone was soft as he stepped closer to me. “Just follow me. We’ve got this.”
His faith nestled its way inside me. When Brenton reached out with our magic, it wasn’t forceful but an extension of himself that slid around mine, and I followed the way his smoke threaded through the drifting astral magic.
“You’re still playing,” Eiran said, his words a scold while his eyes shone with amusement.
But then, a tug. I shivered.
Eiran’s magic flared in response. Ancient and cold and vast. His eyes narrowed, but not in warning. Approval.
“Good.” He pressed his palm against his chest. “I felt that. Again.”
This time, Brenton didn’t lead with any hesitation. He reached deeper, braiding our magic as I continued to follow only a breath behind. Something different thrummed, and when my magic brushed over it, I knew.
“I feel it.” Faint but real.
Brenton’s answering grin was beautiful. “Then let’s do this.”
My smile grew as we tugged together. Magic stretched taut between Eiran and us. A single thread of smoke and death and something far older. Something that hummed in my bones.
The air thinned around us, dipping colder until my breath came out in little puffs of mist, curling and fading into the shimmering dark.
Eiran’s gaze sharpened, and I felt it, like a shift in the current of our threads. He not only pushed us back but pulled on our magic. Testing us.
“Figures you’d play dirty,” Brenton said, his tone filled with humor.
Sweat collected at my forehead, sliding down my temple while I focused on our magic, our bond. When I felt the faintest thread start to pull apart, instinct took over. I bound us even tighter, sealing the crack before it could widen.
Eiran’s mouth twitched with the smallest lift at the corner of his mouth before he dipped his head in approval. The warmth that spread at that single gesture startled me. It wasn’t just that I’d held Brenton and me together, but that Eiran had noticed and acknowledged my tiny feat.
“Keep us together,” Brenton said, pride spilling through his tone. “I want to keep tugging and see what else I can unravel.”
Eiran’s laugh rang through the astral realm, deep and boisterous. It shocked a quiet laugh from me.
We continued. Push, pull, a silent war neither of us intended to lose. Magic stretched and snapped between us like a living thing that refused to yield.
“Let’s try something different.” Eiran lowered himself onto the ground, pushing his cloak back with one fluid movement. His shadows, that had been absent until now, glided around him. One slipped close, brushing against my boot and around my ankle.
I didn’t pull away this time. I hadn’t the last few times he’d done it, because the sensation was cool but now familiar. Safe.
I reeled my magic in, drawing it back inside my chest. Brenton immediately chased it, nipping at the edges of mine. Playful. Flirty. A hint of him that no amount of training could change.
“Brenton, I want you to search for Zaicha,” Eiran said.
The name came like a punch to my gut, and I jolted.
“When you find her,” he continued as if I weren’t suddenly desperate for breath I couldn’t drag in, “tug as you did to me. Finley, keep your magic bound tight around your bond. Do not let her in while Brenton tests her.”
“I don’t know . . .” I peered back at Brenton, at the certainty of his expression.
He was ready to do this. He wanted to.
It was the reason we’d come here, but it felt too fast, too soon. Or was I simply a coward, prepared to cower rather than fight?
“I will be here the entire time, Finley,” Eiran said, his eyes asking me to trust him. “I will not let her harm you.”
“How?” I asked.
“I have certain . . . abilities I’m not allowed to use,” he said, measuring each word with slow precision. “But if I must, I will.”
But when the time came, would he allow us to hurt her? Zaicha was his daughter, too. Maybe more so.
“I love my daughter,” Eiran said, replying to my unspoken question. His voice didn’t soften but deepened. “No, I will not permit either of you to harm or kill her. I want her stopped, not destroyed. Then I can bring her into the astral realm on my terms, not hers.”
My chest eased at his words, because he wasn’t seeking mercy but control. A promise that whatever plans Zaicha brewed would be wrenched from her hands.
“So, what?” I asked, my tone too sharp with wariness. “You want us to test her now?”
He nodded. “A test, not a battle.”
My pulse skipped. “And if she wages war on us back in Vistos or Niev? What will you choose then?”
Eiran didn’t hesitate. “You and Brenton will stop that from happening.”
He said it with such certainty, as if this future was already paved before us.
I scoffed. “How could you possibly know that?”
“This is what you’re training for,” Eiran replied.
Brenton brushed his knuckles over mine before taking my hand. “It’s up to you, Lolli. Do you want to try this?”
I worried my bottom lip. “What do you think?”
“I think if we can learn how to do this, you keep us bound while I unravel the threads of her magic, it’ll give us an advantage we didn’t have before.”
He was right, and I was being a coward.
“Fine.” I nodded.
Brenton pulled me to him, his arms wrapping around me while his magic swam inside me, seeking mine out. They threaded together without my direction, instinctively knowing that was how it was always meant to be.
I stilled in his arms while he searched for Zaicha. The moment our magic touched Zaicha’s, heat slammed through my veins. Darkness poured through the connection, heavy and choking as it curled around my ribs as if her magic meant to swallow me whole.
Brenton jerked against me, a small flicker, but I felt it . . . that instinct to pull back.
“Do not retreat,” Eiran commanded, his order slicing through my mounting fear. “Push back, Brenton.”
Brenton grunted, and I felt the way his magic trembled inside me. Zaicha struck. The slash of her power ripped across my chest. Not my skin, but deeper, through the threads of who I was. Pain burst behind my ribs, and my knees buckled.
Brenton’s arms locked around me, holding me up while his magic shoved forward, refusing to give her an inch.
I snarled a breath through clenched teeth and wound our threads tighter, binding them thickly with smoke and death so that even her jagged magic couldn’t pry them apart. She clawed at us anyway, and the astral realm seemed to pulse with the force of it.
Brenton pushed her harder, relentless and methodical, probing until he found the smallest weakness in her threads. The moment he pulled, fire roared through my veins. Zaicha’s fury lashed back at us, wrapping around me and squeezing until my lungs burned.
Then Eiran struck. His magic tore through us, intercepting hers before it could crush me. The shock of it sent a violent shudder through the connection. Zaicha screamed, more in rage than pain, and the force of it made my vision blur.
She wasn’t down, though. Not with all the magic she’d stolen and siphoned into the orb.
Her magic reared again, this time twisting our own threads against us. The strike came fast and whipped at Eiran before any of us knew what she was doing. He turned his head just in time, but a thin line of blood cut across his cheek before vanishing a beat later.
My heart hammered against Brenton’s chest. Zaicha had found a way to turn us into her weapon. This time, it was Eiran’s eyes that flickered with caution and uncertainty.