The shadows that had been seconds away from consuming him were seemingly…gone.
“What is this?” Edith spat out, chest rising and falling with panicked breaths. She fell to her knees. “What’s happening?!”
Wren lifted a shaking hand, tracing the edge of August’s jaw. He turned to look at her and saw her blue eyes beaming up at him. She blinked, sluggish and slow, as if she were using all the strength she had left to stay awake.
“Your face…” She laughed, a brilliant and airy sound. “The shadows…they’ve vanished.”
Edith let out an animalistic howl. She writhed and screamed, tearing at her hair, nails digging into her scalp. August gently rested Wren against the closest wall and tentatively approached his sister.
He knelt beside her.
“Edith.”
But his sister had seemingly lost control. She looked crazed—eyes wide, wretched sobs bursting out of her as she gripped her hair tightly, pulling and tugging as if she were trying to claw her way through her skull. Tears streamed down her face. A torrential downpour of bottled-up emotions exploding out of her.
“Make it stop!” she bellowed, frantic. “MAKE IT FUCKING STOP!”
August cupped his sister’s face in his hands.
“Makewhatstop?”
Edith stared up at him, lips quivering.
“I feel it.” She splayed a palm across her chest, fingers clawing at her skin. “All of it.”
Understanding washed over August.
Her emotions.
Somehow, by some miracle, their shadows had vanished. Which could only mean that their link to shadow magic had beensevered. All those feelings Edith had kept hidden inside her, all the emotions she’d numbed with the help of her shadows, had come rushing back in. There was no more running. No more hiding.
Thiswas her eternal punishment.
“We can figure this out,” August whispered encouragingly. “We can—” But his words were cut short when Edith threw a lightning streak of corporeal magic at him, a hoarse scream tearing from her throat.
August dodged it at the last second, sighing in relief when he saw that the spell had barely missed Wren. He whirled back to face his sister, gripping her wrists before she could attempt another spell.
“Stop,”August pleaded. “Don’t do this.”
But Edith wasn’t listening. She screamed and screamed, kicking August in the stomach, sending him flying backward. He sensed her next attack—a surge of flames bursting from her palms—and threw his hands up in defense, a shimmering golden shield sprouting from his palms, the light of his shield and Edith’s flames meeting in a thunderous crash.
“You did this!” she bellowed. “It’syourfault! You took the shadows from me! You betrayed me! You—” Somewhere to the left of them, a sudden gust of wind sent Edith flying backward, her words dying in her throat. She hit the wall hard, her flames vanishing as she lost her footing and smacked against the window.
August blinked in confusion, and then Quinn was stumbling into view. Blood stained her pink hair, a streak of it carved against her jaw. She flicked her wrist and a nearby curtain fluttered and moved under her control, jolting toward Edith as it wrapped itself tightly around her torso, pinning her arms by her side.
“I’LL KILL YOU!” Edith screamed, writhing helplessly, legs kicking as she tried to break free. “I SWEAR I’LL—” And thenQuinn snapped her fingers and a strip of the curtain snaked around Edith’s mouth, snuffing out her voice.
Quinn let out a weak laugh.
“Much better.”
She dusted off her hands and approached August, placing a hand against his shoulder.
“You okay there?”
August shrugged numbly.
“Uh…fine. Fine, I think. But—” He sucked in a sharp breath, glancing over his shoulder at Wren. She was still slumped against the wall, shoulders hunched, her eyelids fluttering open and closed as she fought to stay upright.
