3. Serena

"Son of a –" Nielsen whispers, clearly not expecting this turn of events.

Beth doesn't look joyful to have betrayed us, but as we scatter away from Nielsen, we all come into full view, leaving the magical ring's area of effect.

Somehow, Aldor is caught first.

He runs down the stairs by himself in a shitty gambit and winds up coming face-to-face with a series of dark elves, who had concealed themselves on the second floor using the same magic we used to sneak in.

Apparently, the floor wasn't as empty as we thought.

"Shit," he murmurs as four elves with drawn daggers corner him.

I'd rather not relive what happened to him. Clearly, they don't care about keeping us alive. But I feel like something beautiful is lost as he falls to the floor, dead.

And even though my mind is screaming at me, memorizing and absorbing the gory details while it tries to keep me trapped and rooted in place, my feet won't listen. Adrenaline motivates me while my world crumbles around me.

The one advantage I have is that I am the fastest among our group.

"Hey!"

One of the dark elves on the second floor calls after me, unleashing a torrent of lightning that temporarily illuminates the dank alchemy room. It grazes my arm, scorching me, but I keep running in spite of myself, feeling the pain move through my elbow and toward my shoulder.

When they corner Pierce, he doesn't even try to run. He thinks maybe, if he's reasonable with him, they'll spare him.

But these aren't just any dark elves. I don't know if there's such a thing as a good dark elf, but these are monsters with no concern for honor or ethics.

I watch in horror, running past one of the guards who brandishes Pierce's own walking stick. I hear them beat him with it as I run down to the first level.

What we did was a testament to our own hubris. I feel terrible about abandoning people I once considered friends, excluding possibly Beth, but if we die without accomplishing anything, then we die for nothing at all.

I dash through the book-filled first floor, past dark elves who seem surprisingly immersed in their own element, utterly indifferent to my existence.

Then I realize I'm running into the unforgiving night and that I don't have a plan. As I move through the entryway, glad the dark elves abandoned their watch for the good of proving an ironic point, I wonder how I'm going to survive at all.

But I am relieved to be free of the tower.

I push myself through the snow, running as fast as I can against the unstable terrain.

Then I can't move.

I push my legs forward, but my brain fails to connect to my legs. My brain is trapped inside my body, unable to do anything but think.

What's happening?

I can't turn my neck, and the distant wilderness is getting farther away from me, the monotonous hum of the towers growing ever closer.

"No," somebody behind me, now within earshot, says with amusement. "Let her keep trying to run. I want her to get farther away before we pull her back."

They release me, and I turn around, seeing a group of about five dark elves.

I turn and run, and they grip my body with their magic, pulling me backward again.

"Maybe she'd like to watch the ritual," one of the dark elves says.

"That's funny," another one, with a deeper, raspier voice, says. "Reel her in."

I panic as I'm pulled back into the building against my will, watching the vast wilderness become the tower"s interior.

My mind doesn't want to concede, even though it knows that I'm beaten. I look past towering shelves to alchemy tables, every time trying to find some impossible solution as I'm led up the stairs toward my inevitable death.

I can't speak. I can't even move. I have no idea what I expect to find.

I see Beth on the third floor, where she betrayed us.

We barely knew Beth.

She had escaped confinement on another continent. Then she came here to find a new start. I still remember the sight of her—hair disheveled, blood on her face, as she begged at the camp gates to be let in.

Nielsen thought she had earned our trust, so we gave her a shot, watching time after time as she proved herself. She offered a significant amount of her time toward helping the village and even led some missions.

"Please," she begs. "I gave you everything you wanted. Please just let me go."

She's on her knees in front of the same dark elves who killed Aldor.

"Your loyalty is invaluable to us," one of the dark elves, who speaks with a high-pitched, nasally voice, says. "We'll make sure your death is painless."

He wipes a strand of oily hair out of his eyes, then his fingers begin to glow as he lowers his hands.

"Please, no!"

Beth's eyes grow wide, and she inhales deeply.

Light extends outward from the dark elf's fingers toward Beth, weaving and snaking through the air.

As the light pours into her, she falls to the ground, cracking her head against the stone floor.

That's when the same dark elf who killed her turns toward me.

"Well, you're in luck," he says. "See, we're preparing this new ritual, and we only need eight bodies."

He extends his hand. I stare up at it.

"Arcanis Hightower," he says. "It's a pleasure to meet you. We've been expecting you."

One of the dark elves begins uttering an incantation, and my hand is moved upward without my permission, shaking the Arcanis's hand.

So Beth planned this all along.

My hand is withdrawn, and I feel myself lifted through the air, up the flight of stairs toward the fourth floor.

"Don't forget to gather the bodies," Arcanis says to his minions. "It'd be pretty awkward to start the ritual then realize we forgot those."

Immediately, the dank green light of the third floor shifts as I'm led up the stairs, noticing hues of flicking orange. There's a series of cells against the walls, and in the large, circular room's center is a white, glowing light. Eight dark elves gather in a circle around the center, uttering an incantation I don't understand.

"Throw her in a cell," Arcanis commands. "We'll deal with her afterward. Maybe she can prove useful to us in other ways."

I'm relieved when I regain control of my body, the cell door slamming shut behind me. A dark elf walks up to the cell, locking the crude, wrought-iron door.

Then I see the bodies of my friends, laid haphazardly on the floor in a circular pattern.

"So much trouble for such a simple thing," Arcanis comments.

I notice that the room is very hot. At first, I think it might be the flickering candles and sconces that fill the room, but it's so much hotter than that.

Then I notice that Nielsen is nowhere in the room and that he probably got away.

At least there's hope for one of us.

The white light pulsates, becoming much larger.

"Now's the time," Arcanis commands his men. "Start the ritual."

He looks toward me, and I almost throw up in my mouth as he winks.

"Sweetheart, I hope you're watching," he says. "This is a big moment for your people."

In unison, the dark elves' incantations grow louder.

They extend their arms, reaching toward the center. Suddenly, the light in the room's center begins spreading, flowing toward the men uttering the incantations.

I shouldn't have looked down at Aldor. Maybe I thought for a moment I could see his beautiful face one more time, or that there might still be signs of life somehow and that I might have a chance of a life with him.

But he's being sucked dry, used as little more than a fuel source. His body is skeletal, drained of its fat, muscle, and blood.

"Yes!" Arcanis cries out as I get a glimpse of a fiery cavern room, emerging in place of the bright white light. "It's working! Don't stop!"

My friends are little more than bones now. I'm watching it happen, and it still doesn't feel real to me.

I cover my eyes. The room is almost blinding now, the portal in the room's center almost overtaking it. I can barely even see the torches within the irradiating, expanding white light.

Then, with no warning, I hear a loud explosion, and the light vanishes.

There is no portal in the room's center. There are only nine confused dark elves, scanning around the room.

"What happened?" Arcanis asks. "Did it work?"

Nobody says anything.

None of them know what to say, all of them just as uncertain as he is.

"No," Arcanis says, shaking his head. "It can't have failed."

He stomps over to me, scowling, his teeth bared. "You did something! What did you do?"

"I have no idea," I tell him. "I'm sorry!"

Then I hear another explosion, and the nine dark elves around the room are all flung from their spots, crashing into the floors and walls.

The white light reappears and disappears suddenly.

In the center of the room is a fire, brighter than anything I've ever seen. I can't explain how, but there's something almost enticing about it.

Is that a face?

Without warning, rocks are pried free from the tower's structure, flying through the air in all directions toward the fire in the center. I duck as the wall behind me is partially ripped apart, the cell door crashing open against the force.

The black stone reconfigures around the fire, constructing an almost humanoid body overlaying its fiery core.

"What are you…" Arcanis says in horror, looking up from the floor, where he's battered and bloodied.

A patrol of dark elves run up from the floors below, and I swear I hear an explosion followed by a series of crashes on the floors above me.

The fiery creature stares at me.

And I don't know why I'm not afraid anymore.