CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

My heart thunders in my ears. When I'm gaming, adrenaline always means excitement and battle, but this is so effing real.

Wind carries the sour stench of the ogres to me in a nauseating mix of poor hygiene and horrible breath as they yell in unison, shaking their weapons overhead. Even the sounds are different, each one more individual, coming at me in layers of complexity and direction even the best gaming headphones can't match.

And one other thing is startlingly different—I'm backing away from the fight instead of standing by my friends and joining in.

Fuck! What a time for my magic to fail!

The ogres start forward at the same time, but a couple of them are faster.

Krivoth clashes against the first one in a clang of metal on metal as he deflects a vicious downward strike that threatens to split his skull in two. His beautiful sword flashes in the sunlight as he twirls it in a quick blur that sets the point right over the ogre's heart.

The ogre gasps, hands clutching at the blade, slicing his own fingers as he tries to pull it free. Not that it does any good.

Krivoth's wide shoulders give a violent shove forward. Then he plants a foot on his opponent's stomach and shoves the ogre backward, off his sword.

The monster flops to the ground, arms failing limply outward. He's not unconscious. He's dead. Someone just died for real in front of me, and I'm…

I'm fine. I probably shouldn't be, but I am. I'm glad even. Maybe what all those hand-wringing people said about violence in video games is true—maybe it has made me used to it. But that's going to help me survive this new world. I'd be even more of a liability curled up on the ground having a meltdown.

Krivoth's sword slices right, flinging black blood and catching the strike of another ogre's mace as he faces his next opponent.

Storm's horn clacks against the flat side of a battleaxe, and he rears up, hooves pounding into the ogre's chest.

The gray creature backs away from him, arms flailing as the battleaxe goes flying.

Storm's front feet strike the ground, and he immediately lunges forward, driving his horn into the ogre's neck in a spray of black blood.

Mist…

I glance around, then startle when Mist appears at my side, blocking the way of a kelpie who used the distraction of the main fight to sneak around its edges.

God, the thing's even bigger than Storm! It's all green scales and weird, waxy pieces of inch-wide green fronds for a mane.

I spin and pull out the knife Krivoth gave me. It seemed so oversized at the time, the blade a good foot long, but compared to the kelpie, it looks like an effing toothpick.

"This isn't your fight, cat sith," the kelpie says in a deceptively sweet feminine voice.

"Here, fishy fishy," Mist taunts. Her Cheshire-Cat grin widens past amusement until it becomes downright lethal. "You showed up just in time. I'm feeling peckish."

"Foolish feline, you think those are teeth? These are teeth worthy of the name." The kelpie opens her mouth more widely than anything resembling a horse should be able, unhinging her jaw to show off rows of sharp shark teeth.

Mist yawns as if bored.

The kelpie rears up on her hind legs, front hooves pawing at the air. As her body drops back to the ground, Mist strikes.

Her first leap carries her to the side, where she spins on a dime and leaps again. The big cat yowls as she sails over the hooves to hit the side of the kelpie's neck with a meaty smack that knocks the horse-like fae to the ground. Mist's fangs and front claws sink in, shredding the kelpie, who bleeds green.

The ogres circle both Krivoth and Storm, pounding at them with furious strikes. More of the kelpies head my way—far more than Mist can take care of alone.

I clutch my crystal in one hand and reach into the ground below me. I thought I'd leveled up! I thought I could do this! But all the previous times I called my magic were really effing calm compared to now. Power leaps inside me, surging against the inner walls of its space so hard I almost expect it to make me tip over—I certainly feel like a tiny row boat struck by the crashing waves of a stormy sea.

None of my practice prepared me for this. It's like playing one of those poorly thought out games where you're thrown into situations you haven't been prepared for, the kind where the designers think they're being edgy and "hard," but really they've created a game that's unfair. Those games might make an initial splash, but they never last. Gamers don't want things to be easy—that's boring—but they do want the ability to level up so each challenge is difficult but doable after a reasonable number of tries.

Too bad I'm not writing the ogres into the game of my life—I'd have them attack in a week or two when the timing would be perfect instead of now.

Because no matter how hard I strain, every time I almost make the connection to Alarria's magic, something jolts me out of it. Krivoth growls. An ogre yells. Storm snorts. Mist yowls. Weapons clang. Fists crunch against flesh. The noise of battle is continuous, and every single sound sends icy shivers of worry racing through me about my friends.

About Krivoth.

I should be the most powerful person here, and instead, I'm a liability.

It grates, and not just my pride—our lives are on the line.

Two more kelpies slip around the edge of the main fight. Mist leaps for one, but the other races straight at me, shark teeth flashing.