15. Sakura #2
“The nexus point is this way.” He pauses, head tilting as he listens to sounds I can’t hear. “Quarter mile, maybe less. I hear it. It’s... humming.”
“Humming?”
“Building power. Getting ready to discharge.” His jaw tightens. “We need to move faster.”
We push through the undergrowth, and the Overgrowth pushes back. Branches snag at our clothes. Roots shift beneath our feet. The path twists and doubles back, fighting our progress with every step.
“It’s the wild magic.” I reach for my power, letting elemental awareness extend around us. “The siphon is corrupting it. Making the forest even more hostile.”
“Can you counter it?”
“Maybe, with Grandmother Peach’s charm.” My fingers grasp the charm around my neck.
I close my eyes, feeling for the threads of elemental energy that run through this place.
The wild magic is chaotic—unpredictable in ways that make my own power seem tame by comparison.
But underneath the chaos, I can sense patterns.
Currents. The natural flow of energy that the siphon is disrupting.
I push my awareness into those currents. Not controlling—guiding. Asking rather than demanding.
Let us pass. We’re trying to help you.
The forest hesitates. Then, slowly, the resistance eases. The path straightens. The branches pull back.
“How did you do that?”
“I asked nicely.” I open my eyes. “The wild magic isn’t evil. It’s just... wild. The siphon is hurting it. I think the forest wants us to stop it.”
“You think?”
“Elemental communication isn’t exactly precise.” I start forward again. “But the path is clear now. Let’s not waste it.”
We move faster, the forest parting before us like we’ve been given permission. The humming grows louder—a bass vibration I feel in my bones. And with it, another sensation: wrongness. The same distortion I felt at the other siphon sites, but amplified a hundredfold.
My magic screams in response. Pressure builds in my chest, electricity crackling at my fingertips. The elements surge toward the surface, desperate to strike at the thing causing such pain.
Hold it together. Hold it.
Torin’s hand finds mine. Squeezes.
The electricity subsides. Not gone—just contained. Waiting.
“When we get there,” he says quietly, “stay behind me until we assess the situation.”
“Torin—”
“Please.” His voice is rough. Vulnerable. “I know you can handle yourself. I know you’re powerful. But I need—” He stops. Starts again. “I need to know you’re safe before I can fight. If I’m worried about you, I can’t focus. My bear won’t let me.”
I should argue. Should insist on equality, on not being protected like a fragile thing.
Instead, I squeeze his hand back. “Okay. Until we assess. Then I fight with you.”
“Deal.”
We reach the clearing.
The nexus point is beautiful and terrible.
Wild magic concentrates here like light through a lens—visible as shimmer in the air, as colors that don’t quite exist, as a pressure that makes my ears pop and my heart race. The trees form a perfect circle around the space, their branches woven overhead into a living cathedral.
And at the center, the siphon.
It’s larger than the others—a crystalline structure nearly as tall as I am, pulsing with stolen power. Light spirals up from its core, reaching toward the canopy, toward the sky, toward the Warding Line that it’s slowly, inexorably draining.
Valesh stands beside it. Behind her, three other figures in dark clothing—her cell, her believers, her soldiers.
“Predictable.” Valesh’s voice carries across the clearing. Calm. Almost amused. “Every witch with mate potential is the same. So eager to run toward danger. So convinced that love conquers all.”
“Turn off the siphon.” I step forward despite Torin’s grip on my arm. “It’s over, Valesh. We have the evidence. The Network knows. The coven knows. Whatever you’re trying to accomplish—”
“What I’m trying to accomplish is already in motion.
” She gestures at the siphon, which pulses brighter in response.
“In less than an hour, this device reaches full power. When it discharges, it will collapse every ward within five miles. The Warding Line protecting Mistvale will fall. And everything the Preservers have worked for—everything the Severing accomplished—will be preserved for another generation.”
“People will die.”
“Some, perhaps. A small price for maintaining the natural order.” Her eyes find mine, cold and certain. “You could have avoided this, you know. If you’d just left when we warned you. If you’d stopped pursuing the bear and accepted that your kind and his kind were never meant to mix.”
“My kind?” Anger sparks in my chest, and lightning answers—crackling across my knuckles, illuminating the clearing in sharp white light. “What exactly is ‘my kind’?”
“Abominations.” Valesh’s lip curls. “Witches with mate potential. Freaks of magical nature who could form claiming ties with shifters if left unchecked.” She steps closer to the siphon, her hand resting on its pulsing surface.
“Centuries ago, before the Severing, your kind nearly destroyed the magical world. Witch-shifter pairings grew so powerful that they threatened the balance. The Preservers stopped it. Cut the ties. Ensured that such unnatural unions could never happen again.”
“But they are happening again.”
“A temporary setback. One we’re correcting.” She glances at Torin, contempt clear on her face. “The bear should never have pursued you. His instincts are corrupted, twisted by the remnants of old magic that should have been eradicated. When you’re both dead, perhaps the lesson will finally stick.”
Torin growls—low and dangerous, his bear rising to the surface. I feel the change rippling through him, the shift from man to predator barely contained.
“You’re not killing anyone tonight.” My voice comes out flat. Cold. The calm before the storm. “Turn off the siphon, Valesh. Last chance.”
“No.” She smiles. “I don’t think I will.”
She raises her hand.
The Preservers attack without warning.
Magic erupts from the woods in every direction—binding spells, energy blasts, a dark and corrosive force that sizzles through the air toward my face. I throw up a shield of wind, deflecting the assault, but the impact drives me backward.
“Sakura!” Torin’s voice, already deeper, already shifting.
“I’m fine! Deal with them!”
He shifts.
The transformation is violent—bones cracking, muscles reforming, fur erupting across skin.
His clothes, spelled like every shifter’s to weather the change instead of shredding, fold into the shift and vanish with it.
In seconds, the man is gone and a massive Kodiak bear stands in his place.
Bigger than any natural bear, with intelligent eyes that still hold a spark of the man I care about.
He roars.
The sound shakes the trees. The Preservers hesitate, just for a moment, and Torin charges.
He crashes into the nearest attacker with the force of an avalanche. The man goes down, screaming, and Torin is already spinning toward the next threat. Claws flash. Blood sprays. The clearing becomes a chaos of combat and magic.
I can’t watch. Can’t help him. Because Valesh is moving toward the siphon, hands weaving patterns that make the device pulse faster. Brighter.
Stop her.
I unleash my elements.