21. Twenty-One

Twenty-One

Next time, she’ll kill them.

Tears streamed down my cheeks. My skin burned. Like a thousand tiny papercuts had been lit on fire.

Cyrus’s grim face swam in my blurred vision. He held his hands against his side. Blood covered him from wounds I couldn’t see below his warped armor. Wounds I’d caused.

“Ari.” My lips were numb. I pushed myself to my hands and knees.

I followed Cyrus’s line of sight to Ari, who was badly hurt. His clothing was torn, and blood pooled around him. Black blood.

“What happened?” Cyrus demanded.

I shook my head, unable to form the words. Sebastian stole his soul.

His scarred skin peeked out from his torn shirt. I pressed my hand to a deep cut on Ari’s chest to slow his bleeding. He wasn’t healing like the corrupt hunters had.

“What happened?” Cyrus asked again, his voice unusually soft.

Ari’s fingers twitched.

“He’s still alive!” I said.

Ari’s glassy purple eyes opened, and my stomach turned to lead.

“Enchanter,” Cyrus urged, “get away from him.”

There was no recognition in Ari’s gaze. I’d seen the same in Kira’s eyes in the Colosseum. Ari was undead.

And now he’d lost his soul.

I pulled away, but Ari grabbed my wrist with unnatural speed. I tugged against his bruising hold.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Cyrus move. A small pellet covered in runes hovered between us before it exploded in a blaze of light with a high-pitched noise. Ari let go of me as we shielded our eyes.

Blinded by the light, I crawled away from the grunts and renewed sounds of traded blows. As my vision returned, I saw the twins, their backs to me. Mana swirled around their hands.

“Don’t hurt him!” I cried.

“Is that Ari?” Shael hesitated, watching as Cyrus deflected Ari’s daggers with his bracers. “He doesn’t look right.”

We had to subdue him. But how could we do that without any of us getting hurt? Cyrus was barely dodging and deflecting Ari’s blades. If I absorbed his mana, it would mean absorbing more corruption, and taking away what little life force kept Ari alive ... or whatever he was.

Skye looked over his shoulder at me. “What happened to him?”

“His so—” My voice cracked, and I swallowed dryly.

The twins shared a look.

I took a shaky breath. “I could absorb some of his corruption, but—”

“No,” the twins replied in unison. Ari cracked the hilt of his dagger against Cyrus’s skull. Cyrus staggered back.

I pushed myself to my knees. Sensation was starting to return to my body. My muscles burned and I winced in pain. “We need to do something.”

Cyrus swayed on his feet, but he managed to raise his arms against Ari’s flurry of blades.

“We’ll find another way,” Skye said. Green mana gathered around his hands as vines erupted out of the packed dirt at our feet. The vines reached for Ari, but he was too quick. His cloak billowed around him as he darted from their grasp.

I searched for his mind again. Sebastian had controlled him. Could someone else?

“Quillon!” I yelled. “Can you take over his mind?”

“For you? Anything.” Quillon appeared at my side, his rifle slung over his shoulder and a smirk on his face. He offered me his hand, pulling me to stand. My knees wobbled, but I leaned on him.

Purple mana swirled around Ari’s head, making him trip over a vine. He caught himself and a pulse of corruption cleared Quillon’s mana. Ari slowly turned to us.

Skye’s vines captured Ari’s wrists, wrenching him down to kneel. Ari raised his head. His cloudy eyes seemed to land on me. A chill crept up my spine.

This man was deadly. He’d taken out a whole army when the corruption was in charge last time.

Ari gripped the vines and pulled, ripping them out of the ground.

Quillon’s aura surged, filling my senses with the sweetness of honey and the bite of tobacco. His brow furrowed. “There’s something wrong.”

“No kidding.” Shael gathered a flickering fireball in his hand and sent a sputtering wind at Ari, trying to drive him back. Shael was weak from the battle. They all were.

Sebastian hadn’t just been using daeva magic on Ari. I didn’t sense purple mana when he commanded Ari. He must have been using his corruption to control him like he’d done to me at the battle for Draqaar’s well.

But if Sebastian was no longer here to control Ari, that meant he was driven by nothing but corruption. Nothing but the darkest urges and emotions.

Orange mana flashed in my peripheral vision, and a massive black dragon lumbered between us. Felix had recovered enough to join in. He swung around, and his tail crashed into Ari, wrapping around his waist.

Ari slashed at Felix’s tail, but his daggers glanced off the obsidian scales. Ari drove his dagger below the tip of one scale and pried it off. Felix roared but didn’t let go. He raised his tail and thrashed Ari around until his grip loosened on his daggers and they flew through the air, embedding themselves in the mud below.

Felix lowered his tail again, and Ari struggled for another moment before becoming deathly still.

Skye and Shael slowly approached, and Quillon propped me up as we followed. Ari stared us down with glassy eyes.

“Nice, Felix!” Shael smothered the fireballs in his hands.

Skye kept his mana primed, ready to call on his magic. “This isn’t a permanent solution.”

“We could kill him,” Quillon suggested. My jaw dropped, and Skye and Shael turned angry gazes on him. Even the dragon seemed disappointed. “What? I’m just throwing out suggestions.”

“We’re not killing one of our own.” Cyrus strode to us, clasping the wound at his side. He was hiding a limp. He was badly hurt.

I wanted to stab something.

Quillon raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think he’s one of yours anymore.”

“We’re not killing him,” I said. We had to control his corruption. Ari was too strong to handle like this. “I have an idea. Grab his arms.”

Shael, Skye, and Cyrus wrestled Ari’s arms. Cyrus took one while Skye and Shael took the other. Ari writhed in their grip, deathly still no more. I had to make this quick. I reached into my pocket. My choker had helped me control some of my corruption. Maybe it would suppress some of Ari’s.

I pushed away from Quillon and stumbled to Cyrus. My choker was too small for Ari’s corded neck, so I pushed up his sleeve and clasped it around his wrist. Ari cried out as the bloodforged iron touched his skin. I bit my cheek. Smoke rose from the reddened flesh. Ari’s black aura convulsed around him, dimming slightly.

It was working. But it wasn’t enough.

I spotted Genny not far away, sitting on the ground, staring blankly at the battlefield. I gathered what remained of my strength and walked to her.

“Your bloodforged iron,” I said, staggering to her. “What is it?”

Genny touched a wound on her head and inspected her bloody fingers. “My bracelet.” She blinked hard then scrambled to her feet. “They took Elias. We need to—”

I ripped the delicate chain from Genny’s wrist.

“What the hell?”

“I need this.” I turned on my heel and jogged as best I could back to where my men still struggled to subdue Ari.

“Bloodforged iron?” Genny rushed to follow me. “You know we have a whole room full of this stuff, right?”

I paused, registering what she’d said, then continued to Ari. “Good.” I wrapped Genny’s bracelet around Ari’s other wrist. He hissed and pulled harder against Skye and Shael as his aura dimmed more, but it was still strong. Like angry black fog. “We’re gonna need it.”

“Uh ... the forge. That’s where the iron is.” She jerked her head at a small building at the edge of the yard. “It’s this way in case you forgot.”

I moved to follow her. The forge was mostly unfamiliar to me. My father thought my time would be better spent learning how to wield weapons rather than make them. Genny’s father ran the forge with her mother. Before I’d run, she was apprenticing with them. But she always wanted to be a fighter.

I paused in the narrow doorway of the forge. Hunter weapons covered the workbench, the walls, and half a dozen crates. Genny pulled a blanket off a chest.

“Here we are,” she said, prying the lid open.

I peered inside. “What the hell was Elias planning to do with these?”

Amongst the usual bloodforged jewelry the Morgans wore were handcuffs, chains, locks and keys, and what looked like some kind of torture device.

“I don’t ask questions.” Genny pulled out a long, heavy chain and slung it over her shoulder. “So, are we in a hurry or—?”

“Right.” Ari. I reached in and grabbed a pair of shackles before we headed back. The bloodforged iron strengthened my tattered barriers, and the hollowness in my chest subsided slightly. I took a full breath for the first time since we’d arrived at the Morgan compound.

Genny strode up to Ari and wrapped the thick chains around his neck. He roared as the iron sank into his seared skin. Ari’s voice was still his, at least, with his usual rasp.

I gritted my teeth. We had to do this.

I clasped the shackles on Ari’s wrists beside my choker and Genny’s bracelet. His aura dimmed to a shadow over his skin. I could barely sense the corruption that fueled him.

“He should be easier to handle now,” I whispered. “His corruption is under control.”

But mine wasn’t. Even as I stood there, the corruption was building inside me. Like the pressure that built in my ears when I dove deep into the ocean.

Felix shifted back into his normal form. He and Skye led Ari to the great hall. I set my jaw and walked back to the forge, Shael and Cyrus in tow.

“Are you all right, Enchantress?” Shael’s presence was warm at my side.

“I will be.”

I went straight to the chest of bloodforged iron and slipped a few rings onto my fingers. I sighed as the corruption subsided slightly. These rings would have been enough for even the most powerful Morgan to control their abilities.

“I need more bloodforged iron,” I said, wincing at a pair of butterfly earrings. I dug around for more practical pieces and pulled out a few necklaces. “I don’t want to ...”

Kill you.

“I don’t want to do whatever that was again.” I tried putting on the first necklace, but my shaky hands slipped on the clasp.

“Here,” Cyrus said. The bloodforged iron was cold against my skin as his bloody hands secured it around my neck.

“Cyrus, remember when you said to tell you if my secrets ever became a liability?”

I remembered it like it was yesterday. They’d asked me for a favor. To help them break into a daeva slaver’s warehouse. I’d made him promise to not ask questions about me. A promise he’d honored. But in return, I was to tell him if my secrets put his team at risk.

“If I lose control again ...” My voice wavered. “Protect them. Please. Protect yourself. Promise me.”

Cyrus’s fingers brushed the sensitive skin at the base of my neck. They traced a path down my hunter marks until they disappeared into my collar. “I can’t do that.”

Shael hooked his finger under my chin and lifted my eyes to his. “Don’t worry, Enchantress. We’ll find a way to get rid of your corruption.” He truly believed that.

I couldn’t tell Shael the truth. So, instead, I looked him in his ruby red eyes and lied. “Right. Of course we will.”

With each piece of iron, the corruption sank deeper. But so did my connection to my hunter abilities. By the time Cyrus secured the tenth chain, I could no longer feel my own barriers.

“That’s enough,” I said.

Cyrus guided me out of the forge with a hand at the small of my back.

Without my mana to dampen my pain, my injuries became apparent. Countless scabbed cuts split my skin, and my shoulder ached. My channels had been strong and callused from my work in the Aether, but now they were mangled and raw.

With the iron, I didn’t have access to the corruption’s healing powers. I didn’t even have my usual accelerated hunter healing. I’d heal like a human.

“Where should we put him?” Felix asked, staring at Ari.

“I saw some posts outside of the hall,” Skye suggested.

“No!” I cried.

All eyes landed on me.

Those were the sacrificial posts where my mother bled to death. I wouldn’t let Ari be tied to them.

I hugged myself. “Bad memories.”

Shael squeezed my shoulder. “It’s all right, Enchantress. We’ll find a nice place for him.”

I nodded. Cyrus guided me toward the great hall. I stepped over the body of a headless corrupt hunter. Likely Cyrus’s work. My pace slowed as I took in the damage done to the compound.

Parts of the concrete wall were gone, cracked and crumbled from some sort of blast. Many of the buildings left standing were on fire. Injured hunters brought buckets from the well, but it wasn’t enough. Smoke rose from beyond the broken wall, concealing the pink and orange sunset.

Genny knelt over a man I recognized as a Morgan. She checked his pulse, and her lips thinned. He bled from four puncture wounds in his chest.

My jaw dropped. Those wounds were from my corruption. I killed him.

A Gray woman bandaged her thigh. The gauze passed over another puncture wound. More still bodies.

Finally, my gaze landed on Shael and Cyrus. I gasped and reached for Shael. My hand hovered above a gash on his bicep.

“Just grazed me.” Shael raised his arms and flexed. “See? I’ll be all healed up in a few days.”

“I hurt you. I could have killed you.” Like I’d killed so many.

I shook my head as tears blurred Shael’s face. I had to get out of here.

My mom’s screams echoed in my ears. Max’s wails mingled with hers, mourning the loss of Matthew. I closed my eyes, but scenes played out on my eyelids. Ari appeared from the shadows, blocking the blow that was meant for me. The smell of smoke and burning flesh as I pressed bloodforged iron into his skin.

I took off in a cold sweat, sprinting through the ruined gates. I pumped my arms as I ran the familiar trail, weaving between ancient pine trees and weathered boulders. Sebastian and I used to sneak out here in the night. We’d climb trees, roll in the soft grass, and swim in the still lake.

Farther.

I pushed myself harder, but without my hunter mana, I was weak.

I’d hurt those I’d loved, and now I was powerless to fix it.