Chapter 31 Nyx
NYX
“You’re fucking nothing,” Luther growls.
His words reopen the scars on my heart I’ve tried so hard to bury over the years.
The ones left by disinterested case workers, resentful foster homes, power-tripping teachers.
By other kids on the playground who saw my tattered clothes and worn shoes and laughed in my face.
But I’m not that small, broken girl I used to be.
I’m smart.
I’m strong.
“I am not nothing,” I say to him almost as much to myself, making it real. Breathing life into my declaration to the universe.
“You.” He strikes out, but I block him. “Are.” Strike. Block. Again. “Nothing.”
Among the circle of jeering students surrounding us, I hear Calanthe shout, “It’s time you learned this lesson, witchling. You only have yourself to blame.”
I glance at her cruel smile before giving Luther a hard stare. “Enough. I’m not going to stand here and take this shit.” I throw my padded mitts into the mud. “You’re not worth it.”
But that’s the wrong thing to say.
Before I can turn and fight my way through the crowd, he launches himself at me.
I roll just in time to avoid being tackled, but trip when he grabs my ankle, realizing too late when I land hard in the mud that we’re no longer just sparring.
I writhe in his grasp trying to get free, but when my back arches and my ass brushes against his crotch, I notice—
“Are you fucking hard right now?” I hiss, digging my fingernails into his arm when our hips meet as I struggle against him, to both our shock. “What the fuck—”
My elbow catches him by surprise, knocking his head back, but his unforgiving grip keeps my arms pinned as he rolls us over until he’s straddling my stomach, lowering his weight onto my chest and knocking the breath of me.
“Shut up. Shut up!” he hisses, wrenching my wrists above my head and pinning them when I try to hit him, squeezing hard enough to make my bones grate.
“Get the fuck off me!” I shout, but there’s not enough air in my lungs to be heard over the roar of the crowd around us. He shakes me in response, and I finally understand. He’s not just pissed about his friends and lashing out at the easiest target.
His wide, glassy eyes look right through me, frozen in a manic stare.
Whatever he’s seeing, it’s not me.
He’s breaking apart.
And no one’s going to stop him.
No one’s going to save me.
Time slows as the realization washes over me. My ears ring and my head pounds, starved for oxygen. Despite everything, my heart aches trying to pump blood through my body.
In the next instant, deep within my chest, a spark ignites.
I barely notice it at first.
It expands, growing hotter, radiating outward until the mounting pressure behind it threatens to break my ribs.
But it’s not my bones that splinter and snap.
It’s something deeper.
Something darker.
Something that wants out.
From this new gaping maw in my chest, searing heat pours out of the depths.
It floods my veins.
It drowns my mind.
I sink beneath the surface of this new red haze, unable to do anything but watch as everything I was, is replaced by everything I could become.
The weight pressing me into the ground falls away, and I take my first breath as something new, rising to greet the stars.
The world is different beneath this red-hued haze.
I don’t see people.
I see power.
So much power before me, tasting of air and water and fire and earth and light and darkness.
Not on my tongue, but in my mind.
The winged demon lying at my feet draws a ragged breath, breaking the stunned silence around me.
Yes, I know him.
But I want more.
When I tilt my head back and close my eyes, the world doesn’t darken. It shines.
In my mind’s eye, the world is laid bare as I reach farther, searching.
The impenetrable walls of Dreadhurst mean nothing as I scour the halls.
The four sisters, eating together.
The watchful dragon in the library.
The necromancer’s black shadow as he walks home for the night.
When I follow his path, I find the other demons: the one with black fire simmering beneath his skin. The sleeping snake. The hungry werewolf.
The Priestess leaving her temple, shrouded in an aura of white light.
The Professor in his study, brimming with so much power that it calls out to me. When I reach for it, a whisper rises from the depths of my mind.
“Not him.”
Instead, I look to the horizon, and chase the dying light.
That is, until a dome of shimmering, glassy magic stops me.
No matter. Glass is easily broken.
Following the threads of power winding through the earth to their nexus, the Foundation Stone, I can taste four centuries worth of residual magic, saturating the soil with blood and power from thousands of wielders who’ve reinforced the wards over the years.
It is nothing to call upon it.
I summon the power from the earth and release it into the sky. When the wards shatter, fragments of iridescent light rain down from the heavens, like the stars themselves are falling.
But when I look to the horizon once more, a net of energy ensnares me as it blankets the grounds.
No matter. Nets are easily cut.
This time, I pull the power from the people.
Not too much.
Just enough to cut a hole through the net.
The rest of it can stay.
A scream cuts through the silence as I begin to siphon their power, drawing my gaze to the bright, white light coming closer.
Yes, I know her.
“Come back,” the whisper rises from the depths again. “Come back to me.”
It’s nothing to release the power in my grasp.
I sink down, down, down, until I can feel the cold rain and mud coating my skin. Until the scent of petrichor fills my lungs.
And then I’m nothing.
I want to stay in the nothingness of my dream, but awareness assaults my senses as I rise from the depths of sleep.
There’s a rhythmic beeping coming from behind me.
A lightweight blanket covering me.
A warm weight in my lap.
When my eyelids finally crack open, it takes a few moments before I recognize the ceiling of the Medical Center.
Why am I in the Medical Center?
Why is there a fucking cat on my lap?
The thing looks like it’s recently lost a fight or twelve, but despite the scars and dents on its white fur, it starts purring when I jostle it trying to sit up. A nurse opens the door to my room as the beeping behind me picks up, illuminating the cat’s eyes.
One blue, one green.
Huh.
“Oh, you’re awake. I’ll get Dr. Mercer.”
“Wait—” but she’s gone. I lean back on the bed, and the cat lays its head on its paws, kneading the thin fabric. I take inventory while I wait: no broken bones. No cuts. I’m not feeling nauseous or sick.
I’m… fine?
The cat’s still staring at me when Dr. Mercer knocks and walks in. She frowns at the animal in my lap as she shuts off whatever’s beeping behind me and helps sit the bed up.
“Nyx,” she says with a tight smile as she starts taking my vitals. “How do you feel?”
“Uh, fine.”
“No headache, dizziness, anything like that?”
“No?”
“Okay, great.”
“Why am I here?”
“I’ll let the Headmaster explain once we clear you for visitors.”
“Okay?”
She checks my temperature, blood pressure, heart rate, shines a light in my eyes, listens to my breathing, asks me about any pain or symptoms of note, asks me if I know what day it is. Other than being thirsty—
“I feel fine,” I insist for the third time. The cat watches as she examines me, refusing to move even when she palpates my stomach, hissing when she gets too close. She backs away quickly.
“What’s with the cat, by the way?”
“… I’ll let the Headmaster explain. He should be down shortly.” With that, she closes the door behind her, leaving me alone with the furry menace.
“You’re kind of a butthead,” I mutter, reaching out to let it sniff my hand. It rubs its cheek on my fingers and tilts its head back for chin scritches, and I scoff.
“Fine, maybe you’re not so bad.” It stands on all fours and stretches, reaching up my stomach and kneading the fabric hard enough for me to feel the prick of its claws.
It’s not long before I hear another knock on the door, and then the Headmaster and Professor Brandt come in followed by Esmé, who closes the door behind her and takes a seat in the corner of the room.
“Ms. Byrke,” Headmaster Church starts, “how are you feeling?”
“Like I told Dr. Mercer, I’m fine. So… why am I here?”
Church looks over to Brandt, who sighs and smiles at me.
“What’s the last thing you remember, Nyx?”
I frown, but try to recall like he asked as the scenes play out in my head.
“I had Taxonomy Studies. And then Physical Training. We were on the field.”
“Anything else?”
Memories start to trickle in. Memories of sparring with Luther. Of his blank, panicked stare. Of being pinned beneath him.
“Luther attacked me while we were sparring. But he was—there was something wrong. He just… lost it. Is he okay? Did something happen to him?”
“You could say that. Based on witness accounts,” he nods to Esmé, “it appears that during the incident yesterday—”
I crook my eyebrow and interrupt with a deadpan voice, “You mean the part where he was moments from killing me in front of dozens of other students who were cheering him on.” I turn to Church with a glare, “And Coach Carrick was nowhere to be found? That incident?”
Church hangs his head and sighs before meeting my eyes again. “Yes, Ms. Byrke. I have spoken with Coach Carrick at length, and on behalf of the school would like to offer you my apologies for this lapse in judgment.”
“With all due respect, Headmaster, given that I’m waking up in a hospital bed because your employee fucked off when he was supposed to be teaching, your apologies don’t mean jack shit.”
“Nyx—” Brandt starts, but I ignore him.