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“It’s in the air, screwing with your vision. With your sense of reality! It will pass, but we need to ride it out. Close your eyes!” I implored, breathless. Never had I felt as helpless as I did now, watching powerlessly as my friends raced away, their weapons drawn and battle cries on their lips.
Patrick was roaring right alongside a wrathful Nic. The kindhearted boy I knew was nowhere in sight as he waved his weapon high and lurched ahead.
“Kiara!” Jude called from his horse. His mismatched eyes were open but glazed, though I didn’t mistake how he narrowed them into slits, determined to overpower the sickly influence of the fog.
My mouth gaped as he swung a leg over his steed, instantly bolting off in a blurred sprint. “No!” I heard him shout, his long limbs struggling to catch up to the boys he was sworn to protect. “Close your eyes! Fight it!”
I cursed as I took off in a dash behind Jude, my legs nowhere near as quick as his. But I had to reach him. Had to stop them all from committing whatever heinous actions the Mist coaxed them into.
As I sprinted the distance to the tree, the others having just arrived beneath its curving branches, I quickly thought of what I could do to stop them. If Icoulddo anything at all at this point. Maybe it was already too late.
When I approached, Nic was shouting, his words filled with uncharacteristic venom. “You!” He pointed to Alec, the black of his pupils flaring. “You scared it off!”
Alec sneered, his lips curling back against his teeth as he growled. “What are you talking about, you heavy-footed oaf? You’re the one who screamed like some prepubescent youngling, and now it’ll come back and kill us in our sleep!” He waved a hand in the air, motioning to the deadened forest.
None of what they were spewing made sense. Wisps of darkened clouds limned their dilated pupils, thewrongnessof their gazes both otherworldly and chilling.
“Great. Now you two are fighting. You all justloveto find anything and everything to bicker about. You’re just vile, petty children. I cannot believe I am being subjected to this pathetic lot.” My mouth fell as Patrick joined in the quarrel.
This was going to get out of hand. Fast.
Sputtering a curse that would have my mother fainting, I darted to Jude’s side and grabbed hold of his muscled biceps. His gaze flashed to me, his brown eye flickering with contempt. But it was the other eye, the one swirling with snow and frost, that unsettled me, had me eager to step back.
He looked at me as though I were a stranger, and when my fingers tightened around him, Jude reacted. In a motion too quick for me to comprehend, he grabbed at my gloved right hand, his grip harsh.
“Get away from me,” he seethed. With a grunt, he kicked my stomach with his boot, knocking the air from my lungs. My balance was lost, but the grip he had on my glove didn’t waver.
It slipped off…
The blue of my scars shimmered in the dense shroud of white, iridescent onyx threads gleaming from the vein-like wounds. I hissed, clutching it to my chest, trying to hide what I’d kept from the world for over a decade.
Jude didn’t stop his assault. His right eye blazed with fire, and he moved—gods, he moved so quickly. His looming form was on mine in the time it took me to blink, and instinctively, I brought my ungloved hand to his chest, trying to shove him off, to stop him from killing me.
“You’re poison,” he murmured, fighting to hold me down. I stayed strong, moving my other hand to block him from crushing me. “Vile, vile darkness. Poison.”
Tears prickled behind my eyes, hot and angry ones.
How many times had I ignored the whispers of Cila’s villagers? They’d look at my little hands, clutched in my parents’, and balk, making the sign of the Sun Goddess across their chests. They thought I was evil, touched by the cursed lands.
“It’s me!” I cried, my scarred hand flying to Jude’s neck, to his cheek. The sight of my hand made me sick, the reminder of the accident causing black shadows to swarm my vision. Jude stilled, froze so suddenly that I jerked, my back digging into the rocky ground.
With my hand on his cheek, he ceased his assault, his eyes clearing, growing sharper. For a moment, he leaned into my palm as if it were a lifeline, but then horror twisted his features.
“K-Kiara?” He reared back, his mouth falling open, those wide eyes searching me for injuries—ones he might’ve caused.
The Mist had released him.
“It’s all right,” I whispered, climbing to my feet. Shock rippled down my spine, rendering me a mess of wobbly knees and trembling breaths. Without my glove, he’d know, he’d see.
His stare shifted to my hand.
I was going to be sick, was going to—
A thud sounded, a body landing on the ground as it was shoved by a livid Nic, his hair flowing wildly around his determined face like some sort of demonic halo. “I told you to stay away from me!” Thick beads of sweat dripped profusely down his forehead. “Stay back!” he warned Alec as his fellow recruit inched closer, a blade at the ready.
“Dammit!” Without time to hesitate, I snatched Jude’s hand and dragged him over to where Alec lurked, ready to lunge at Nic and deliver a deadly blow. My bare fingers intertwined with his, and I swore a jolt of electricity shot between us.
Before Alec could act on whatever sordid intentions swirled about his tainted thoughts, I released Jude and took hold of Alec’s arm, using all of my waning force to swing him around to face me.
