And there was nothing I could do to stop it.
“Hey, arsehole, get off her!”
A fireball smashed into Raphael from behind and he whirled round with a snarl, but as he tried to start forward, the ground under his earth softened, sucking his feet an inch into it. He laughed as he stared at my two friends.
“Do you truly think such petty tricks will stop me?”
Zara threw another fireball, and the dark druid didn’t even bother to block it. It bounced off him and the blood drained from her face. She set her jaw and conjured another ball, but even from here I could see it was going to make no difference, and as soon as he stopped being amused, he was going to kill them both. No way was I going to let that happen.
I pushed myself up and my hands blazed to life, one pulsing red, the other yellow. I sucked in a deep breath and raised my arms. I’d never tried this before. I had no idea if it was even possible. But I knew I had to try.
With a scream of fury, I blasted fire from my left hand and air from my right. The air whipped the fire into a storm, swirling around Raphael until he was standing in the centre of a fiery whirlwind. He spun around, but the elements formed a cage around him, leaving him no way out. Twisting his lips into a snarl, he took half a step forward, and was immediately rebuffed. He tried again, and again the elements blocked him. I kept my arms outstretched, controlling the fire and air as they whipped around him, not daring to lose focus even long enough to celebrate that it was working.
Raphael howled in rage, blasting energy ball after energy ball into the fire cage, but the elements held.
“Lyssa…” Kyle’s eyes were wide, but I couldn’t afford the distraction. He seemed to realise it, and clamped his mouth shut. Holding Raphael was draining every drop of energy from me, but I would let myself be dried into a withered husk before I let him go again. Kyle deserved justice for his father. Caleb. Quinn. Callum. Aderyn. Kieran. They all deserved justice, too, and I played their names through my head like a mantra. Kayden.
The sound of booted feet echoed around the clearing, and movement flashed in my periphery: dozens of enforcers, spreading out and surrounding Raphael. I swayed on my feet, every cell in my body screaming in pain, but I had to hold on just a few more seconds. I had to.
Elias stepped up beside me, two familiars at his feet. One was a gnarled lion with a scar over one eye – and the other was a yellow-brown jaguar cub with black spots. It had known I was over faced and guided the enforcers to us. It hadn’t abandoned me.
I swayed again, and then my legs gave out. I was unconscious before I hit the ground.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
I rolled over in my bed with a groan.
“One day I’m going to stay conscious long enough to see the end of a fight.”
Then the events of the previous – hours? Days? Weeks? – flooded back into my mind, and I froze. I conspired against the druid enforcers and the prison of Daoradh. Against the Grand Council of the Druidic Circle. I freed Raphael.
“Lyssa, you’re awake!”
The voice came from right beside my bed, and I turned to see Zara and Kyle sitting there, their faces a mix of anxiety and elation… and exhaustion.
“How long have you been there?” I asked. “How long have I been here?”
“Two days,” Kyle said, though in answer to which question, I wasn’t sure. Judging by the state of the pair of them, both.
Guilt knifed through my gut. I didn’t deserve their concern. And worse, their loyalty could get them into trouble.
“You shouldn’t be here,” I said, ignoring the flash of hurt in Zara’s eyes, and pressed on quickly. “Elias will think you were involved.”
“I was involved,” Zara said.
I cast a frantic glance around the room, but we were alone.
“Shh! Are you crazy? Look, I’m in a whole tonne of trouble for this – I broke some pretty serious laws to save my own skin – but that doesn’t mean you have to go down with me.”
I’d been so stupid. I’d risked everything to save my magic – magic that was going to be bound the second Elias dragged me in front of the council. And then I’d be serving time at Daoradh, or maybe, if I was lucky, some lesser prison. I wondered if I could bargain with them – some longer sentence in exchange for getting my magic back when I was released. The hope withered in my chest almost before it had chance to take root. The council didn’t bargain. They handed down judgements, and we abided by them.
“You were under the influence of the curse,” Zara said eventually. “That has to count for something. And you sent for help.”
She turned to Kyle for support, but he was spared from coming up with a lie by a business-like voice sounding from across the room.
“Ah, Lyssa, you’re awake. Excellent.”
I turned to the healer.
“Um, yes. Thank you, Deverell.”
A frown flickered over his usually impassive face.
“For?”
“Well, for healing me.”
“It’s my job.” The words weren’t so much harsh as a statement of fact – at least, I thought he meant it as more, ‘Why wouldn’t I heal you?’ than ‘I didn’t have another choice’, but as always, it was hard to tell with Deverell.
“I know. Thank you, anyway.”
He gave me a look like I was the one acting weird in this particular conversation, so I decided to move it along.
“How long until I can get out of here?”
Instead of answering, he stepped to my bedside and held a hand over me, chanting softly under his breath. He wasn’t a great one for speaking – at least, not to people – but he’d healed me a dozen times since I’d been here, so I stayed still and let him get on with it.
After a moment, he stepped back with a nod.
“Your injuries are no longer sufficient to keep you bedbound. You may leave. Head Instructor Marston has ordered you to report straight to him.”
Whatever enthusiasm for my pending escape had been welling up inside me withered and died. Elias. It was time for me to face the consequences of my crimes. At least I hadn’t woken up in cuffs. That had to be a good sign. Right? Or maybe he just knew that there was no way I could run from here. Maybe he respected me enough to know I wouldn’t try.
I glanced around for my clothes. I didn’t much fancy facing my fate in a hospital gown.
“We’ll wait outside while you get dressed,” Zara said.
Kyle nodded. “Then we’ll come with you.”
I stared at them both in alarm. “No! You’ve risked too much already. You need to distance yourselves from me.”
Zara folded her arms over her chest.
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen. Suck it up, Super Druid. We’ll be outside.”
They left before I could argue further, and a small smile tugged at the corners of my mouth as I sat up and pulled my clothes on. Whatever happened today, I’d made two good friends here. I couldn’t find it in myself to regret coming to Krakenvale.
A few minutes later, I was dressed and on my way to Elias’s office, with Zara and Kyle flanking me, trying their best not to look like they were waiting to catch me if I collapsed, and coughing loudly every time we passed a group of trainees in what I suspected was an attempt to drown out their whispers. It didn’t work, but I appreciated the effort.
I was relieved when we finally made it to Elias’s office, and not just because my stay in the med wing had left me weak as a two-day-old kitten. It would be a relief for it to be over. Waiting was the worst part. At least, that was what I tried to tell myself.
“Come,” Elias instructed from within.
Zara squeezed my shoulder, and Kyle gave me a nod.
“We’ll wait here for you,” he said.
“Thanks, but… I might need some space when I’m done here. I’ll see you in our dorm?”
The truth was, I didn’t want either of them to see me being led away in cuffs. This might be the last time I ever saw them. I reached up and wra
pped Kyle in a brief hug, and then Zara.
“Thank you. Both of you. For caring.”
I turned before I could lose my nerve completely, opened the door, and stepped inside.
“Ah, Lyssa,” Elias said, looking up from the paperwork in front of him. “Shut the door, please.”
I did, then moved to stand in front of his desk. There was a chair there, but he didn’t invite me to sit, so instead I stood with my hands clasped behind my back, and tried not to sway on my feet.
“I understand your curse has been lifted,” he said.
“Yes, sir.” I stared at the space over his shoulder, not quite able to meet his eye.
“I’m glad. But we need to discuss the events of two days ago.”
“I understand. I know what I did was wrong, and I know there’s no excuse. I’ll accept whatever punishment I’m given.”
I bowed my head, feeling the magic flowing through my veins – maybe for the last time. Would they do the binding here?
“I don’t need to tell you that your actions were beyond dangerous. And no matter your true intention, a dangerous criminal was almost freed, and lives were put in danger.”
I nodded, my eyelids fluttering closed for a moment. No, he didn’t need to tell me. I knew. I knew what my desperation and selfishness had almost cost, starting with the lives of my two friends.
“But.”
I jerked my head up to meet his eyes. But?
“I’m aware the curse impaired your judgement.”
“Yes, sir. But it’s no excuse.”
“I’m still talking,” he said, glaring at me, and I clamped my mouth shut. “An enforcer is expected to be able to resist a judgement-impairing curse. But you’re not a fully qualified enforcer. Yet.”
Yet? I opened my mouth, remembered myself, and clamped it shut again.
“Myself and the High Enforcers have spoken with the enforcers at Daoradh, and with Cody – yes, he’s fine – and the official report will show that the prison was tied up with a training scenario.”
“A training scenario?”
Elias raised an eyebrow, and I quickly pressed my lips together again.
“Enforcers have always looked out for our own – and disciplined our own, as well. Do not think this means you will escape punishment.”
“No, sir. But… I’m not going to prison? I’m not being kicked out?”
“You’re not. I understand your act of desperation, misguided though it was. And you are not the first enforcer to misjudge an interrogation – even an unsanctioned one. But let me be perfectly clear about something.”
He leaned forward over his desk, and I battled the urge to shrink back.
“Had you not sent your familiar for help – however you did that, given that you’re not even bonded – we would be having a very different conversation right now. The fact you came to your senses and sent for help the moment your curse was lifted is the only reason you’re not on your way to trial right now.”
“Thank you.” Relief made me lightheaded, and I blinked a couple of times, focusing on keeping my legs under me.
“Don’t thank me,” Elias said. “Understand that you get one of these, Lyssa. You’re officially on probation. And if anything like this ever happens again, I will haul you to Daoradh myself. Is that clear?”
“Yes, Instructor Marston.”
“Good. Now get some rest. Your end-of-year assessments start tomorrow. Fail any of them, and you’re going to be looking for a new career.”
“Yes, Instructor Marston.”
I made it halfway to the door before he spoke again.
“Oh, and Lyssa? I’ll be overseeing your assessments myself. Don’t disappoint me.”
Great. No pressure, then.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Elias was right. I should go straight to my dorm room and get some rest, because something told me that the exams here are Krakenvale were going to make Dragondale’s look like they were designed for pre-schoolers. And I would have. In fact, I was halfway to my dorm – where Kyle and Zara were probably tying themselves in knots wondering what had happened – when realisation griped at my stomach. Much as I wanted to go straight there are celebrate my good news, there was someone I needed to see, if I wanted to stand a chance of passing my assessments tomorrow.
I tapped on the open office door, and stepped inside.
“Lyssa,” Iain said, his face lighting up with a genuine smile. “I didn’t know you were up and about.” He frowned. “Wait, should you be up and about?”
“I have assessments tomorrow.”
“Ah.”
“Yeah.”
“Take a seat,” he said, gesturing to the seat in front of his desk. I did. Jalen, curled up on the corner of the desk, hopped down and retreated to the corner of the room with a silent hiss.
“Hello to you, too,” I grumbled, and then perked up again. If things went well, that would be the last time he – or any other familiar – reacted to me that way.
“I gather your curse has been lifted,” Iain said, and I nodded. “Which means there’s no longer anything stopping you bonding with your familiar.”
“Other than the fact it’s trapped here, away from the forest?”
“Druids have been forming bonds with familiars for as long as we have existed. Long before Tàthadh Forest existed.”
I blinked at him. “We have? So…”
“It can be done. It’s hard, but it can be done.”
I chewed my lip. I hadn’t expected it to be easy. Hoped, but not expected.
“Not to sound ungrateful, but you do realise I have less than eighteen hours until my assessment, where they’re going to test the strength of my bond? And ideally, I need to actually sleep sometime between now and then.”
He gave me a sympathetic smile.
“Lyssa, I know being raised away from the druid community has left you with some doubts in your own ability, but I have to tell you, I have never – never – seen a druid able to work in such harmony with an unbonded familiar. That familiar wants to bond to you. And now the block is cleared, you just have to give it the opportunity.”
“You really think I can do this?”
“I do. Your familiar is strong, there’s no other way it could have manifested outside of the astral plane during your hour of need. It will help you.” He looked me up and down. “Do you feel up to going into a trance?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Sure.” He shrugged. “You could give up and go home.”
“Funny.” I cast a look around the room. “In here?”
The office was small, even by Krakenvale standards. Just the desk and the two chairs we were using took up most of the space. Iain, apparently unperturbed, dragged the desk against the wall, and I put our chairs next to it, creating a space that was just about big enough.
I laid flat on the floor, and let my eyes flutter shut. I drew in one slow breath, and another, and another, slowing the rhythms of my body, and settling my mind. The familiar fog-like sensation floated over me, so that Iain’s words were a distant whisper.
“Release your grip on the physical. Allow yourself to drift…”
My stomach bunched up in a knot of anxiety, and I took another, deeper breath, and let the fear go. Just because bad things had happened the last few times I’d gone into a trance, didn’t mean bad things were going to happen now. The curse was gone. The last trace of Raphael had been banished from my body. Everything would be fine.
I invited the fog to seep through my muscles, relaxing and smoothing them, and easing through my mind, relaxing that, too, so that I was floating on a wave of calm. I could do this.
Of course, this was the easy part.
As I slipped into the trance, I couldn’t help myself: I let my consciousness drift from behind my eyes, down through my chest, and my stomach, following the energy centres in my body. I moved slowly, looking and feeling for the inky blackness of the curse, some stain that Raphael’s malice had left be
hind.
There was nothing.
Elation swirled through me, almost yanking me out of the trance. It was gone. Truly gone. All of it.
“Lyssa? Can you hear me?”
Iain’s voice brought me back to my senses. There’d be time to celebrate later. I grunted – the most movement I could make without risking pulling myself out of the trance.
“Good. Try not to get distracted. Call for the familiar.”
Had I been capable of opening my mouth, I would have asked him how on earth I was supposed to do that. In hindsight, I probably should have asked before I went into a trance. Oh well. Too late to worry about that now.
The familiar was out there somewhere, on the astral plane, and it hadn’t abandoned me so far. I had to believe it wouldn’t abandon me now. It had reached out to me the first time I entered Tàthadh. It had followed me home when I couldn’t bond with it, and it had followed me everywhere since. It wanted to bond with me as much as I wanted to bond with it.
*Malaika.*
I jumped so hard I almost burst right back to consciousness. I drew in a breath, and let the fog settle back over me. The familiar was here, and it was speaking to me.
*Malaika.* I repeated, letting the name echo through my mind, and I felt the familiar preen. *Thank you for choosing me.*
*Druid is strong. Druid is pure of spirit. Druid is courageous.*
*Druid– I mean, I am called Lyssa Eldridge.* I did nothing other than think the words, but the familiar seemed to pick them from my mind, and I could feel its understanding press back against me. A ripple of doubt ran through me, morphing into uncertainty. Malaika thought I was courageous?
*Lyssa Eldridge is courageous.* The familiar all but purred the words. *Lyssa Eldridge will make a good human-familiar for Malaika. Will Lyssa Eldridge accept Malaika’s fealty?*
*Yes.*
Yes. I said it with my mind, with my heart, and with every fibre of my body. Yes, I wanted to form this bond. I wanted Malaika to be my partner. I just didn’t know how.
No sooner had the thought swum through my mind than a bright light flashed in the room, searing my pupils even through my eyelids. The light gathered itself, and dived into my chest, straight into my heart chakra. All seven of my energy centres blazed, and I gasped, eyes popping open as I sat bolt upright.
Familiar Magic (Druid Enforcer Academy Book 1) Page 20