It surged up around her like a tidal wave of fog. Soft and slow, yet impossibly fast. It wasn’t just surrounding her—it was seeping in.
She could feel her molecules stretch. Scatter. Shift.
No. No, no?—
She wasn’t doing this.
At least—she didn’t think she was.
The mist wrapped around her like silk, cocooning her, cradling her body, and pulling her away. It wasn’t teleportation—not hers. This was different. Older. Wilder. Something other was moving her.
She gasped, trying to resist, to pull herself back together—but her limbs didn’t respond.
Her body shimmered, dissolving into a haze of light and energy. She couldn’t feel her fingers. Her feet. Just a rush of heat and starlight, her thoughts spiraling.
Her breath hitched.
“I don’t know how to stop it,” she whispered, tears blurring her vision.
The world turned white.
All light.
All sound.
All everything.
“Please…” her voice cracked as the light consumed her. “Please… please don’t let me disappear.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Isle of Magic:
* * *
Phoenix sat cross-legged on the velvet-cushioned bench just outside the ornate throne room, absently flicking a spark of golden fire between her fingers. The enchanted corridor shimmered with ever-shifting colors—walls of crystal and magic humming in time with the heartbeat of the Isle itself—but none of it could distract her from the impatient thrum of nerves rattling her spine.
Inside, Queen Magika and King Oray were in a very important meeting with Drago and Orion.
She and Zohar? They were told to wait.
Like children.
Phoenix scowled at the carved double doors in front of them.
“We’re not even that young,” she muttered under her breath. “I mean, we’re practically adults.”
Zohar, sprawled beside her with his arms behind his head and one foot bouncing off the edge of the bench, cracked an eye open and smirked. “Says the girl who complained last semester about having to dissect a virtual tubular worm.”
“It was gross—even if it wasn’t a real one,” she grumbled.
He snorted. “And what about when you were supposed to clean out the classroom fish tank and refused because you didn’t want to touch the slimy stuff on the inside?”
“Again… gross!” She tossed her braid and glared at him. “Besides, I paid Amber and Jade to do it, and they turned around and paid James. They were happy because they needed the credits for some new tool they had been drooling over, and James was happy because he had something to study under his microscope. It was a win-win.”
Zohar opened his mouth to point out another of her moments of weakness before he shut it when she lifted a finger in warning. He muttered something she missed under his breath, released a loud sigh, and dropped his head back to rest against the wall.
Phoenix groaned less than two minutes later when her boredom reached a peak again.
