Chapter XXIII
XXIII
For the middling practitioner, ritual is a necessary hindrance. Only exceptional witches are able to draw power without the aid of ritual and spellwork. And a rare few among the strong are able to do so reliably, without fail, and without endangering themselves.
Vic knew the castle well enough to know she stood directly above the training wing. She crossed her arms over her chest, ignoring how the movement tugged at the cuts.
After an afternoon spent waiting and brooding and kicking the events of the last few days around in her mind, Vic had slipped out of the apartment and wandered until she found herself staring at the stained-glass window she’d discovered her first night there.
She’d since learned the legend it depicted, having heard it in the slow monotone of Elder Thompson’s lectures on the history of the Order.
A woman clutching an open jar, unleashing chaos upon the world.
Pandora and her box, or the Order’s malformed version of it.
The Order had no tolerance for mythology, but they couldn’t resist the symbolism of the tale.
They believed in no god, or gods, or any righteous path whatsoever, but they believed in mistake.
Human failure, above all else, had the power to shape the world.
Someone slipped, at some point, somewhere, and the Order arose to pick up the pieces.
Now Vic wondered if Pandora had enjoyed what she’d done.
When she cracked open the lid to humanity’s sins, did it feel like freedom?
Did she feel a rush of pleasure at the knowledge that she had confounded every expectation anyone dared have of her?
Did she look back on her choice with pride or self-loathing?
As she studied the glass, Vic half expected to see a shadow wrench itself toward the castle, as she had the last time she stood in this spot. Though she knew now it wasn’t a shadow at all—not a monster, just a man.
“What are you doing?”
Speak of the devil, and he shall appear. Right on time.
“I was just thinking about you,” Vic said without turning around.
Though she didn’t jump at Xan’s sudden appearance, her heart raced behind her breastbone.
Vic felt untethered from herself. All the strangeness of the castle had crept in around her corners—the wildness gripped her insides, twisting her into a state of transcendent fury she hardly recognized.
She felt wild in a far-off way, like all her strings had been cut.
“What are you doing out this late?”
“I saw you the first time I came here.” Vic pointed out the window. “Right there. Streaking through the grounds.”
“Are you listening to me?” An edge cut his voice.
“Scared the shit out of me. I thought you were an Orcan.” Vic huffed an angry laugh. “Until last night, I thought you were an Orcan.”
“You thought there was an Orcan loose in the castle, and you…didn’t mention that to anyone?” Xan asked, his voice low and vexed.
Vic shrugged and cast an apathetic glance over her shoulder. Xan stood with his arms crossed, scowling. “Shows how little I know, I guess.”
Xan made an impatient sound and once again demanded to know what she was doing.
“I was looking for you, actually,” Vic said. “I had the sneakiest suspicion you would show up here.”
She turned away from the window and walked down the hallway. Heavy footfalls followed.
“Can you tell me why, after what happened to you last night, you decided to wander around the castle after dark? Alone?”
“I’m not alone,” she said as she found a staircase and began to descend. “My little shadow is following me.”
“Where are you going?”
“You are, aren’t you?” Vic asked. “Following me, I mean. You have been for quite a while. I wonder—was your goal to keep me safe, or to keep others safe from me? Do you even know the answer to that question?”
Behind her, Xan said nothing. Even to her own ears, Vic sounded distant, flat. Rage circled her spine like a spinning coin just about to topple. Anger filled the void inside of her, the empty space where her mind usually sat.
“Surely you noticed I sleep in my underwear,” Vic said. “Were you in my room on business or pleasure?”
A hanging candle on the wall nearby flicked out, and Vic ignored it. She turned toward the training hallway and into a Level Eight room the Sentinels sometimes used.
She stopped when Xan followed her into the empty classroom and the door slammed shut behind him. High, arching windows cast the room in dim moonlight, and Vic squared her shoulders as she faced him.
Xan had the oddest expression on his face. Wary, worried almost, with his fists at his sides. But he was not angry with her. Not yet.
“Talk to me,” he said, taking a cautious step toward Vic. “What’s going on?”
She stepped away from him.
“Hit me,” she said.
He shook his head. “I don’t want to hit you. I want to talk.”
“Please,” Vic said with a saccharine smile.
“You’re upset,” he said. He held his hands palms-out toward her, but he didn’t try to approach her again.
“Am I?” Vic asked. “I can’t tell.”
“You are,” Xan said, and he had a hideously understanding look on his face. Vic hated it. “I think you get angry when you’re scared.”
“Hit. Me.”
“Vic, please calm down. You’re angry, and you’re hurt, and—”
“Not as badly as I should have been,” she pointed out, challenge in her tone.
“I’ve thought about it all day. Before the monster, before Max, before anything, the one thing I can’t stop thinking about is you.
The shadow that’s been following me since I got here.
The way you healed the cuts on my arms, and the bags under your eyes so heavy they look like bruises. ”
They were still there now, gleaming evidence of his expenditure. Xan had done serious magic to mend her.
He said nothing, but his eyes were searching, open.
“Max told me healing wounds was almost impossible,” Vic said. “Even the doctor only gave me medicine. Why did you do that?”
Still nothing but those kind, piercing eyes, like she wasn’t staring back at him with rage.
“We’re playing the quiet game, I see,” Vic said. “I was never any good at that.” She rolled out the muscles in her arms. Vic wore a sweatshirt and sweatpants, which allowed for movement even if the extra fabric was a risk. “Then I’ll hit you.”
And she jumped.
Vic went for his face, thinking that would entice him to fight back, but Xan edged out of the way, and Vic stumbled to the side.
“Let’s discuss this,” he said. It was so condescending that he wasn’t even afraid she might hurt him. And, Vic figured, he had no reason to fear her. Not when he had all the odds on his side. Size, magic, skill. She could bounce off him like a fly.
“Fight back,” Vic said, swinging at him. “This is boring.”
This time, he caught Vic by the wrist and pulled her against his chest to hold her still.
With her free hand, Vic reached to smooth the line between his brows with the pad of a finger. “You shouldn’t frown so hard,” she told him. “You’ll get wrinkles.”
Xan caught her other hand and held her wrists together in his fist. Vic smiled up at him before ripping out of his hold. As his balance shifted, Vic kicked him in the sternum.
He grunted and rounded on her.
Unlike the last time they fought, they had no weapons, and they were much closer to each other. The rush of proximity warmed Vic’s blood. She wanted to fight, to hurt, to vent some of her frustration on the world.
Xan tried to grab her again, and Vic spun away.
She lunged for his midsection, expecting him to fall. But he was solid as a rock, and she barely darted away as his hands closed over her arms.
Vic faced him again, breathing hard.
“Use your magic,” she said, and confusion flickered on his face. “I want to see it.”
His voice was gentle, like he spoke to a frightened animal. “Come on, sweetheart. Let’s talk about this.”
She saw red. “What did you call me?”
Vic kicked at him again, and he dodged it. Xan wasn’t fighting her, not really, not as well as he could. She could feel his energy mounting, but he wasn’t angry enough to go for it.
She could fix that.
“Fight me,” Vic growled.
She jerked to the side to unbalance him, and he took the bait. She tackled him.
They hit the ground hard, though he took the worst of it. Vic landed on a muscular chest and shoved away from him. Xan made an exasperated sound.
He still wasn’t taking her seriously.
Vic reached under the back of her hoodie and grasped the rubber handle of another hunting knife she’d stolen from his load-out room. With the blade in hand, she twisted toward him, aiming the point of the dagger at Xan’s throat.
His eyes flared with surprise in the instant it took Vic to send the blade home.
But right as the knife should have split his skin, Xan was gone, dissolved into darkness like ink in water, and Vic fell forward as the weight supporting her disappeared.
She would have sliced her chest as she fell—she should have—but a shadow-dipped hand grabbed her wrist from behind. Tendrils of dark pulled her fingers from the handle, and the blade flew across the room.
Vic twisted toward the form but it was gone again. She stood on shaking legs, looking for a patch of darkness she had just provoked to violence.
“There it is,” she said, half laughing, crazed with rage and frustration.
The shadow materialized in front of her in the massive form Vic had chased the other night. Xan’s anger was rough in the air like a shout.
She reached for him, and her fingers closed around empty air.
But then Xan was Xan again, solid and human and glowering at her.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” Darkness twitched in her periphery, and Vic watched in wonder. “Are you trying to get hurt?”
“I wanted to see.”
Xan was shaking his head in disbelief. “You are the most insane, infuriating person I have ever met. No wonder you’re so hard to keep alive.” He threw his hands up. “You keep wandering around, attacking things that can kill you in a heartbeat.”