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Audrey
Thegroundcontinuedtoshake as birds vaulted into the sky in the distance. My power flowed sure and strong through Wes, as his flowed into me. This didn’t feel like the last earthquake. There was no sense of anticipation to accompany the world-tilting feeling of being on the edge of something wonderous. Only cold, hard dread.
“Over there.” Wes pointed toward the rocky side of the island.
Rising over the tree line, a massive black cloud rolled over the forest, covering the far side of the island. It swallowed the morning sun. Plumes of smoke burst in the air like dark solar flares. A heavy gray fog coated the ground as the land continued to shake, breaking off pieces of the tallest cliffs and sending them tumbling into the ocean.
Without pause, I grabbed Wes’s hand and plunged us both into the dense part of the forest, where the trails were more suggestions than actual markers. The fog swirled around our ankles, hiding exposed roots and rocks to trip us up. A wall of black rose up in front of us.
“Make the net.” I sent a strong surge of power outward as Wes aimed his lightning at mine. Our bolts tangled together and pushed through the wall of darkness that blocked our way, breaking it apart and sending wisps of smoke into the surrounding overgrowth.
We pushed on, using our ice to cut down vines and branches that tore at my hair and clothes. The acidic scent of rotting lemons rose from thick bushes with prickly thorns that left sap and scratches on my arms. As we got deeper into the wilder part of the forest, it became drier. Lush leaves curled in on themselves, their tips blackened with rot. Pine needles littered the ground and snapped beneath our feet like tiny matchsticks.
Wes stopped short, pulling me back against him. “Do you see that?”
“See what?” I looked around, but aside from the diseased trees and fog that had been trailing us since we left the dead zone, nothing appeared out of the ordinary.
“That’s a no, then.” He shuddered and moved me behind him. “It’s another illusion. This one looks like you, but the bottom half of her jaw is missing, and a black snake is slithering around her neck and down her throat.”
“Am I still hot, though?”
“Not the time for jokes, baby.” He held out his hand and sent a funnel of water to a point twenty feet ahead of us and doused a fallen log. Next, he pushed his ice outward. The log rolled to the side and shattered like the Fake Wes had done.
I approached the log and stood over it with my hands on my hips. Steam rose off the broken shards as they began to melt into the ground. “You did say you wanted to see an icing.”
“Yours, not mine.” He pulled me against him and kissed my temple.
We forged ahead, the woods fighting us every step of the way. I had no doubt the curse had been weaving its influence back here for a while now. This side of the island didn’t get as much hiking traffic, but I grew up playing in these woods. It had never been this difficult to navigate. While the trails were thin and mostly unmarked, they still existed. Until now.
Leaves rustled up ahead, and Seth stepped out of the brush. A morbid, severely messed-up version of Seth, anyway. One of his eyes hung out of the socket, oozing with fuzzy gray mold. Half his skin had peeled away from his face. A black snake glided in and out of his exposed cheek. My stomach rolled. Just an illusion. Not real.
I put a hand on Wes’s arm to stop him. “You don’t see that, right?”
“No.” He moved behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. His steady hold calmed my nervous stomach as he pushed all of his energy into me. “Give it all you’ve got.”
Seth lumbered toward me with his fingerless hand outstretched. “How could you betray me with my own brother? You’re the reason why my family is torn apart. Is it because you barely have any of your own left, so you had to come for mine?”
I drew Wes’s power into me, building gray clouds that crackled with lightning over my head. “Unsurprisingly, Fake Seth is a bigger asshole than Fake you.”
Wes squeezed my middle. “Take him out.”
“Already way ahead of you.” I pushed my palm downward, drawing the lightning into the ground. Rain poured over Not-Seth as a bolt of electricity hit him from below. He flickered for a moment, hovering between a solid form and mist before bursting apart in a puff of ash.
The black clouds overhead rolled back, as if a great gust of wind had pushed the curse toward the ocean. Branches cracked and fell all around us as the treetops were blown off in the retreat. I glanced at Wes. A muscle ticked in his set jaw. I took his hand and blasted through the foliage and vines that blocked our way.
Up ahead, a boulder tumbled down the hillside and headed right for us. Wes shot his palm out and froze it while I hit it with lightning. It broke into pebbles that plinked against nearby tree trunks. We followed the newly created path up the hill, and pushed through a thick group of bushes, ending up in someone’s backyard.
“This is Cole’s house.” Wes peeked in the windows. “He’s not home.”
We went around to the front and out to the street, where sea salt and open air overpowered the earthy scent of the forest. The ground continued to rumble, though not hard enough to knock us off our feet. There were two cabins closer to the cliffs, but both of them were empty. The tourists renting them out had probably gone into town. The farther we made it up the narrow street, the fewer cabins we came across. There were maybe ten cottages on this side of the island, including the rentals.
I scanned the sky where the black clouds appeared thickest. My heart leapt to my throat as the curse hovered over the tallest cliff. “It’s right over my grandma’s house.”
Wes tightened his grip on my hand. “She’s at the shop with Ella. They’re okay.”
“I know.” I blew out a breath, trying not to panic. “I still want to check.”
We headed up the road that would take us to the highest point on the island, my anxiety mounting. For every step we took, the shaking ground and heavy winds tried to force us back. Debris blackened with soot whipped past us. The scent of burning rubber tinged the air as smoke rose over the sky-line. The sidewalk rolled, sending broken bits of concrete hurling in all directions. Wes grabbed a lamppost, holding me in front of him to keep us both from falling. The steep drop-off was only a few feet away.
