Gabby’s lip rose as she snarled, “I don’t need the Crystals to kill you.”
I was yanked forward as my hands and neck were forced into some kind of wooden stock, and brought to my knees. I attempted to escape, but the bonds held me tight. I looked up. Horror severed through me as I realized Gabby had forced me into a guillotine.
There was a rumbling sound as the blade came swooshing down, and I knew I had seconds to live if I didn’t do something. I felt the blade touch my neck. I closed my eyes and burst my magic out of me just before the blade severed my spine.
The blade turned to feathers, and they created a pile around my neck as I asked my Seelie power to break the guillotine apart. The mechanism crumbled into pieces, and I staggered out of it. I put a hand to the back of my neck and realized there was a slight cut below my hairline.
Two could play at that game. I formed a metal coffin around Gabby, containing her within a sarcophagus of metal spikes. The spiked door went swinging shut to end her, but Gabby exploded the lid off the sarcophagus and stepped out. In frustration, I shot off a sapphire killing curse at her heart.
Gabby ended my spell with a flick of her fingers. As she brought her other hand slashing down, ropes formed around my wrists and ankles. I was yanked onto my back, and the air was forced out of my lungs.
Before I had time to gasp, my arms and legs were pulled in four different directions. I looked to the side, and my heartbeat began to race as I realized that the ropes were tied to skeleton alicorns, who were pulling the ropes tight.
This bitch was trying to have me drawn and quartered! And it wouldn’t take but a moment. Once those alicorns leapt into a gallop, my body would be torn apart. I felt the ropes tugging at me, cutting into my skin, and my limbs began to burn with tremendous pain. I gave a wretched scream of pain and effort as my Seelie magic burst out through my limbs. Blue magic rippled up the ropes and severed them, setting me free. The blue magic continued racing up the ropes, until it met the alicorns that they’d been harnessed to. My blue magic ate away at the skeleton horses, until they crumbled into a pile of discarded bones on the floor. I was left on my back, rasping for breath and feeling a few inches taller in all directions.
That had been a close one. I didn’t give Gabby time to cast another spell, and responded with a counter-illusion. As I got up, I attempted to take over her sight, and make her see a terrifying vision.
I made an awful miscalculation, because my spell rebounded on me the moment it touched her consciousness, throwing me back onto my ass. The armory around me began to melt, bleeding into black like a melting ink painting. Gabby ran toward me withLodburzanheld overhead, intent on driving my own sword into my heart.
I canceled out my illusion, and the room came rushing back into focus. I had enough time to throw up the sword Desmona had given me to halt Gabby’s attack. My arm shook with the effort of holding her back, and as she drew away for another blow, I rolled away and back onto my feet. We began sword-fighting, forgoing all spells as her blade met mine in equal strength.
Gabby made a miscounter, and it gave me time to slash the sword at her throat. She batted my sword away, but not before the tip of it made a small dash below her eye. The tiny cut began to bleed, a droplet dripping down her cheek like a tear. I took a few steps backward, and understood.
Gabby was a goddess now, but she’d ascended when she still had a mortal body. Her form was an incarnation of her goddess power, like Lady Magdalina had been. Therefore, I could kill her.
Didn’t know what she’d do to us from the afterlife once I sent her there, but might as well take this one step at a time.
“You want the Crystals?” Gabby hissed. “Come and get them!”
Gabby’s wings appeared behind her, and she spread them wide to take off. I sheathed my sword and summoned my own wings to give chase, flying after Gabby through the open roof and into the rain. I had to dodge lightning bolts, and the rapturous thunder nearly shook me out of the skies as I chased after Gabby. She tossed killing spells behind her as she flew, dodging around the towers of Arcanea University and soaring behind gargoyles.
One of her rogue killing curses hit a nearby tower. Against the noise of the storm, I heard the dying cries of Lord Zlodia and Steward Solomon as it crumbled upon them, crushing them beneath the stone. Bits of Arcanea University were blown apart by her curses, her hexes acting like bombs as she exploded classrooms and stained glass windows to slow me up. I sent spells racing after her, but to no avail.
We soon left campus and were flying over the woodlands outside the university. She was directing me away from the city. The forest ended, and below us spanned a large flat area, the campsite that we’d come from. It’d been flattened by Droga’s army, and now, the rebel forces were attempting to retreat from the army of the dead.
On the horizon, I could see a large shape moving against the gray clouds, though his form was so cloaked in the darkness of the storm I couldn’t see him properly. The Black Stag of Wrath. As the lightning flashed, his shadow flickered against the clouds, and there was a deep laugh that struck terror into the deepest parts of my soul.
I realized she was taking me to the battlefield. She wanted me to face Droga, and fight with him side by side.
I could only take on one god at a time. I had to tilt in the air in order to wrench back my arm to take aim. I sent a blue battle orb spiraling at Gabby, and though it missed her torso, she didn’t have time to steer out of the way completely. I watched with graim satisfaction as my spell severed her right wing from her shoulder.
Gabby let out a wretched scream of agony that even made me feel sorry for her. The pain of losing your fae wings was insurmountable torture. Immediately, Gabby began spiraling downward. I tucked my wings to my side and dove after her as her body crash-landed onto the battlefield, spraying up dirt. She landed hard, on her left side.
Her screams were tortured wails as she peeled herself off the ground. She looked deranged, blood streaked across her face, one wing completely torn off while the other was crooked. I landed, holding my sword with two hands and wondering if I’d made a mistake as I watched her dark eyes take on something sinister.
Walls immediately formed around me, and I began to sweat. Blisters and burns formed on my skin, and I let out a cry of immense pain as I turned in place, caught by the cursed metal.
Gabby had put me in an iron box. She’d left only a small square slit for the eyes, so she could watch me die. Glee formed in her gaze as she came close.
“Get out of that one,” Gabby taunted. She tightened her fingers, and the iron box began closing in on me. The walls inched inward, making the space tighter and leaving no room to move.
Gabby laid a hand on the side of the iron box and did not flinch away. Lady Magdalina hadn’t been affected by iron, either. She had me on this one.
I attempted to cast a spell, but nothing happened. The iron rendered my magic useless. But if I didn’t get out of here, I’d be squished. The iron walls began pressing on my arms, and I whimpered in agony as burns formed through my armor, sizzling my skin.
I had to think. What had Ethan said about iron? We were able to use it in our swords and armor, because our intention turned it into something else… our words had power. We could use steel swords becausesteelwasn’t the same thing asiron.
If I was going to escape, I had to change the iron into a different compound. But how could I do that without magic? I couldn’t change the iron into steel without my abilities.
