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27
ASHTON
We’ve been trying to break out of this file-room-turned-prison-cell all damn day. Jason tried to break through the floor, through the walls, make the bricks move, the cement shift, but couldn’t. I tried to use the moisture in the ground to bring the goddamn place down, but nothing. Emrys pulled on every spark of life to try and melt the door down but he didn’t manage. And Sindri tried to bring great gusts of wind to knock the door down but failed, too.
I told him it sounded too much like the story of the three little piglets and the wolf. He didn’t find it funny.
Our elemental magic is depleted, much like our demonblood. Ophelia sucked so much from us that she left us almost human, weak and vulnerable and empty.
We’re all sprawled on the floor, panting, lying in pools of sweat. Who would have thought that trying to draw on your last drops of magic could be so exhausting? Yeah, so totally unexpected.
Ha.
We started out with hope, though. Thought we could circumvent the demonblood spell by breaking the door, the walls, the floor. We hadn’t realized how much power we’d already lost. If she’s sucked us almost dry already, what is she going to do at the final ritual, kill us?
… oh right, that’s her plan.
Awesomesauce.
Just when I’ve decided that there’s nothing we can do except wait for Ophelia to come pick us up for the killing, I hear sounds from outside the door. Voices.
Many damn voices.
It’s hard to tell time—none of us are wearing watches or have our phones and there’s no clock inside the file room—but it feels like nighttime. The usual office noise has long since stopped.
I sit up with a groan. “Guys? Are you hearing this or am I hallucinating?”
“You often hallucinate things?” Emrys mutters, lifting his head from the floor. “You pose the question so damn casually.”
I snort. “You don’t wanna know.”
“I hear them, too,” Jason says, only rolling his head to the side to stare at the door. “Voices. Familiar voices.”
“That’s Anala’s voice.” Sindri sits up and gets to his feet with a grunt. “What’s going on? And that’s…”
I’m on my feet now too. “That’s Mia’s voice.”
We glance at each other. Her presence could be a good thing—or not.
“Did she bring our people to lynch us?” Jason mutters.
“Yeah, that has crossed my mind.” I approach the door. “But what if it’s not that? Let’s not jump to conclusions.”
After yesterday, it’s hard not to. She caught us by surprise, a swift punch to the heart and left for dead. Did she even realize what she did to us—not the rumor-spreading thing but the betrayal? If she did, then did she care?
And despite all doubt, the need to see her is turning me inside out.
“What the hell are they doing?” Jason climbs to his feet and presses a hand to the steel door. “Feels like magic.”
There’s a chanting and a metallic scent that feels all too familiar.
“Demonblood magic,” I whisper.
We all step back from the door as it rattles in its hinges like a living thing, the steel run through with veins of black and silver.
“They’re lifting the spell,” Emrys says. “They’re here to free us.”
I’m wary even as the door finally swings open. All four of us are. I can see it in the cautious movements of the others.
