AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Braxton is trying to pull it out, but he doesn’t look exactly steady on his feet. Braxton’s pale blue eyes are filled with desperation, and for a minute, I can picture him out on the battlefield. He’s already seen some terrible things. He doesn’t deserve to see this too.
They’re family. If I don’t help, they’ll lose each other. As much as it pains me to turn away from my brother, it’s not forever. Something inside of me tells me I’ll see him again. That this isn’t over. But that right now, these men need me more.
I rush to Max’s side and let instinct guide me again. Placing my hand on Braxton’s arm gets him to stop tugging on the severed tentacle. I wrap both hands around it and feel an almost painful tingling sensation, like my fingers reawakening after having fallen asleep. A silver light emits from my touch and as it glows, it steadily shrivels the tentacle. The oily limb fades, becoming ashen as it shrinks and finally dies.
I pull it from the wound. It becomes ashen as it shrinks and dies, turning into a shriveled, useless thing. I toss it on the ground before grinding it with my boot. Looking back, I study the bloody hole in Max’s shoulder. It’s deep, gushing, and his blood is black. Then, he seems to stop breathing.
For a split second, I fear I’m too late, but then his eyes flit open and his chest inflates with a deep breath. He’s pale and sickly looking, but he’s alive. This cursed magic the Blood Mages created within me seems to have done something good, for once.
Smiling, I glance up at Braxton, but a strange look crosses his face. It’s almost an accusation. A silent fear whispers through my thoughts,Did he see you let Simon go?Did he see me give up in that moment of darkness? Did he know I was willing to die?
I hope he doesn’t ask me questions I don’t know the answers to. Like what that silver power was that banished the darkness. Whatever that was scared me too, and felt like no magic I’ve used before. It didn’t call the darkness to me. It didn’t make me feel like I was paying for it with my soul.
But more than that, more than anything, I hope he didn’t see my moment of weakness and know what it was. Because I’m ashamed. There’s a fight I have to finish, but I was weak. I gave up.
I can’t be weak again. Not until my work is done.
TWO
Unknown
That bitch.That weak bitch. She claimed to be someone I knew, but now I can’t remember who. All I know is that I could sense a deep well of powerful magic within her, the same powerful magic that has made me stronger and more powerful than ever before.
And what did she want to do with it? Nothing. She wanted to throw that away.
Pain radiates through me for a moment, and I stagger, grasping onto a tree trunk. The magic that encases me pulls at something within me. Some small point of heat and life, draining it just a little more, and my pain vanishes. I stand straight and keep going, keep running. It’s the only way I can avoid her and the rest of the Enforcers.
Although I don’t fear them. She… the power she used against me brought pain unlike anything imaginable.
I stop short as a memory nags at me. “N-no, have felt pain like that before.”
There is an image of a man strapped to a table. Another man smiles down at me while he takes a hammer and cracks my bones. In my legs. In my arms. My fingers. Even my face. That man on the table, me, I’m screaming. Blood in my mouth. Blood everywhere, and then they inserted the IVs with the black liquid. The power.
“Being mortal means pain.”
I keep going, moving faster. Trying to forget the memory of the man on the table and the pain. I don’t like memories. I like when my head is silent except for the whispers of the magic. Their instructions are simple. Their instructions make sense. They are always what I want and nothing else. That’s logical.
Caring. Loving. Remembering. Allowing the world to break me again, that’s illogical. A fool’s mission. That mysterious woman’s mission.
I come out of the trees and find myself at some kind of farm. The sunlight hurts my flesh, just a little, enough to be uncomfortable, so I step back into the shadows. I hear the laughter of children. A woman’s voice. I see cows, horses, chickens, and a dog.
Grasping my head, I gasp and bite back a scream. More memories. Of a town. Of people. This flesh suit cared for this place and these people. He wanted to protect them, but the Blood Mages, and Pack Raven came. They killed, they broke, burned, and kidnapped.
They hurt this flesh suit.
I roll my neck hearing it pop and snap as the magic that oozes over my body struggles to swallow this flesh suit once more. It needs to be fed. Death and destruction are the only things that fuel it, that strengthen it, but my memories have sharpened its focus.
We shall feed it. The family on the farm. Then, anyone else I come across. We have a goal now. A purpose to our feeding.
The girl reminded us.
We shall feed and feed until we’re stronger than ever.
Then we shall handle the girl.
THREE
Asha
