Chapter 37

THIRTY-SEVEN

BASH

My body ached all over and my eyes refused to open. I lay there soaking in the cool atmosphere. The snow fell quietly around me. In the distance the sounds of battle echoed, but it was so faint I almost couldn’t hear them. It wasn’t enough to draw me from my stupor. I listened to my breath as the fog from my brain cleared. A sudden sharp zap shot through my chest, jarring me awake. My eyes flashed wide open. I was covered in blue flames.

I leapt to my feet and patted the flames running over my body, thinking the vials in my pocket had exploded. But when I pulled them out, they were still intact, which meant that these were coming from me. The flames within the vial raged, trying madly to get out. The flames on my body surrounded the vial in my hand and the lid burst free, and they leapt out of the vial and joined the others. They danced over my arms, and I thought back to what Riven had said and how to calm them all down. I closed my eyes for a moment and focused on pulling them back. Slowly, they began to lower and extinguish. Once they did, I was painfully aware of how banged up my body really was.

Pain shot through my face and body. I groaned and pressed my hand to the bones around my eyes. Agony burst in my temples, and I found my nose was bent at an unnatural angle. “Fuck me.”

I pressed my fingers to the sides of my nose, sucked in a sharp breath, and shoved it back straight. Blood trickled onto the ground at my feet and down the back of my throat. I spit it on the ground. I held my arms out and noticed I was still looking like Jada. I searched my pockets for the reversal potion and nothing . I spun around in a circle searching the snow for it.

“Looking for this?” a deep voice purred from a few feet away.

My eye snapped up and I froze. Standing before me was a man who was at least eight feet tall. His skin and hair held the slightest tinge of blue. His coloring was similar to my own. His body was much bigger, bulky even. He wore a silver helmet that was covered in intricate carvings and had a metal piece hanging in the middle of it to cover his nose. He held the vial out in front of him. There was something familiar behind his light eyes and the power that sizzled around him.

I opened my hand. “Give it here.”

He opened the top and held his hand over it. Light blue magic drifted from his fingertips and the liquid potion turned to frozen snowflakes. He lifted his hand, and they drifted out of the potion vial and twirled above his fingers in a frozen dance. He flicked his wrist and the potion flakes floated between us before stopping just above my head. He turned his hand and they fell over me like flurries raining down over my body. One moment I was Jada and the next I was myself.

“Better,” he grumbled.

I held my hands at my sides and let my magic flow. A mix of black smoke and blue flames wrapped around my wrist and up my arms. Why was he here by himself away from the army? “What are you doing here? What do you want?”

He didn’t take his eyes off me, instead he looked me up and down. There was cold calculation on his face. I’d seen that look before in my own family. I held still knowing if I gave him nothing, he’d know nothing. He pulled a stone from inside his armor and threw it in the snow at my feet. I didn’t take my eyes off him as I slowly bent down to pick it up.

It was a smooth peridot stone. I’d seen that green color all my life. I’d recognize that stone anywhere. “This is Helena’s chest stone?”

He nodded, showing no emotion at all. “Yes, you’re going to need that to end this. The Chaos Stone will require that everything stolen from it is returned. You better hurry. This is going to get ugly.”

I turned the stone over in my hand. No one did something like this without a reason. “Why are you helping me?”

He waved his hand, dismissing my question. “The why is irrelevant right now. Just remember that I did help you when I return.”

I slid the stone into my pocket. “Who are you?”

“ Thaddeus .”

He turned away from me and disappeared completely. I popped my wings from my back, about to take off toward the battle, when the rifts beside the castle suddenly began to close. They shrank down, cutting off the army about to spill through, then sealed shut, throwing pieces of severed limbs to the ground by the castle and leaving whatever army was left behind. It was as if the rifts never existed.

BASH . I froze. That was Collins. Her voice was like a whisper in my ear. Look to the forest edge. Your mother is struggling. A smile spread across my face . Meet me at the fight and let’s kill this bitch.

“Oh yes. Let’s.” I shot into the sky like a rocket with a smile on my face.