Blooming Black: Rosewood Academy of Witches and Mages (Darkly Sweet Book 4)

by Juliann Whicker

  For a second I thought he’d kiss me, but he grabbed my arm and dragged me towards the sun chairs. He held out his hand and the towel over the back of his chair spun towards us, materializing into a jacket by the time it reached me. The green jacket was woven with energy and love. My kind of magic. He wrapped it around my shoulders and started escorting me towards the steps.

  “Where are we going? Can you really make the water do that? How? What happened to your dragon? Where’s Zach?”

  “I’m sorry I missed watching you kill the Creagh. You’re so pretty when you’re flickering with death. Here.” He put his hand against the cliff base and it opened into a tunnel. “Ladies first.”

  I stepped into the darkness that was immediately illuminated by green sparks as we walked deeper. I moved fast at a near run even though it sent more blood down my leg.

  “Is Zach okay?” I asked.

  He picked me up, swinging me until I was against his chest. The green mage armor was like green emeralds that pulsed in time with his heart. They were warm, like his skin, not hard but molding to my body. “The armies are coming, Stoneburrow jet fighters and Huntsman mercenaries. He’s having a good time showing off his mech mage suit. Move your hand.”

  He pushed my blood slicked fingers off my leg and put his own hand over it, sliding over my skin, muttering his spells until my skin was whole. His hand moved lower, over my calves to my feet then back up, over my hip, stomach, chest and arms. How could he carry me, hold a wave of water over a beach and heal me at the same time?

  “You must have attention deficit disorder.”

  He raised his eyebrows and a smile flickered over his beautiful mouth. It was swollen. It would taste like blood and ashes and black cherry if I kissed him. “Because I couldn’t be entranced with one witch long enough to marry her?”

  “Or seduce her,” I whispered and brushed his lips with my fingers.

  His lips parted and a sound like a sigh escaped. “Was I playing the wrong game?”

  “That’s what you get for playing more than one at a time. You get confused.” I leaned closer until my lips brushed his.

  He abruptly put me down while my lips buzzed from the contact. “Who is seducing whom, hm? If you’re feeling better, you can walk, or better yet, run.” He yanked me along, quickly over the smooth stone floor.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Piano.”

  “Oh. Well, now I understand.” I glared at his back.

  “The piano is enchanted. It has more protection spells than the entire world. Nothing will be able to take you from there. We’ll hold the battle at the beach while you stay protected.”

  I tugged on my hand. He didn’t let go. “I can fight.”

  “Yes, you can. You can also bleed to death on the beach. That would irritate me.”

  “Why?”

  His grip tightened on my wrist. I didn’t mind. I wanted his fingers to dig into my skin and bone and never let go.

  “I have no intention of giving him what he wants.”

  “It has nothing to do with you smelling like black cherry?”

  He glanced at me over his shoulder, his expression half appalled, half amused. “You’re smelling me at a time like this? It’s like the bucket. We’re running for our lives so naturally it’s the perfect moment to try your hand at seduction. You’re terrible, for the record. You have absolutely no subtlety.”

  “What does seduction have to do with subtlety? The sunbathing suit isn’t exactly subtle.”

  He groaned and pulled me along faster. “No, but mentioning it is. A little bit better, Penny Lane. Now say something about how strong and dashing I am. Also how much you love me.”

  I panted a little bit. My stamina was running out. The conflict was too far distant. Any time now the empathy would kick in. I swallowed down panic. I didn’t need Drake to see me like that. I pushed, gaining on him and then passing him through a wider part of the passage until I was in front of him.

  We came out in a small room with a shaft leading up into darkness. He grabbed me around the waist and pulled me against his chest. My heart pounded as I stared into his eyes. I grabbed him around the neck when we started rising into the air.

  “What’s happening?”

  “Magic,” he murmured as his nose accidentally brushed mine. Sparks of awareness went through me along with the ache in my back.

  “Can’t it go faster,” I whispered back.

  He narrowed his eyes at me, his hands pressing into my back. “And you claim to be stalking me.”

  I glared at him. “I claim to not be stalking you. I don’t see how I could possibly stalk you while you’re holding me in your arms. It just doesn’t seem like those are compatible activities.”

  He nodded seriously, his nose brushing mine again. “That’s a good point. Also, we’re almost at the top of this shaft. Are you ready to sit on the piano?”

  I blinked at him and in a second was blinking in the dim living room of the massive beach house. An enormous couch circled the room, but the pale piano near the wall of windows was definitely the focus of the room. “So, I’m supposed to hide under it?”

  He pulled me along, holding onto my arm like it was a handle or something. He grabbed a couple of pillows off the couch, tossed them to me, then a pale throw that he tossed onto the piano before he turned and picked me up, swinging me up onto it.

  “Where are you going?” I asked when he finally let me go, turning back the way he’d come.

  “I can’t let Zach have all the fun, can I? You’ll be safe here. No one will be able to sense you. Whatever you do, don’t leave the piano. You’re not one of those stupid girls who can’t follow basic instructions. I really love that about you.”

  He turned and left, back into the wall that formed seamlessly once he was back in the shaft. I stared at where he had been, still seeing his soft lips, lips I’d kissed if only for a moment.

  I closed my eyes and lay my head on one pillow while I hugged another one to my chest. He loved something about me. He’d said it. My heart pounded so hard I thought the world could hear it, and then my leg shattered. Empathy pains. Misery. Multiplied.

  Chapter 35

  Mage

  “You took your time,” my dad said from the lounge chair. He was enjoying another glass of wine.

  I stalked past him, looking through the bubble of water to the battle beyond. Jello was enjoying himself immensely, Stoneburrow’s fighters in formation like they rarely got to be. Training to fight Creagh rarely worked when the Creagh never ventured into Dayside.

  “You said that Jasper is no longer with us? Hm. Who can we get to stock up the guest quarters with more emergency appropriate clothing? That sort of thing takes an eye for details. That poor girl fighting in such miserably inadequate garb.”

  I growled but didn’t turn to look at him. There was something else up there, something new. “Do you smell wyvern?”

  I cursed and paced up and down the beach, glancing at the bodies, the knife wounds, decapitated Creagh that Penny had slain. Pitch. If they’d wanted to kill her, she’d be dead. They wanted her alive. That was one good thing. Another good thing was the way my lips still burned from her kiss. No. That was not a good thing. Kissing Penny was absolutely out of the question. I could block my desire up to a certain point, but when I had so many other things on my mind, I couldn’t help but crave her unguardedly. In the tunnel I should have really kissed her. I could have blamed it on stress.

  My father stood up, getting in the way of my pacing. “She’s truly an aberration without magic?”

  I snarled and went around him. I should have stayed on the beach with Penny instead of calling Jello. I shouldn’t let my father spend time alone with her. He’d start getting ideas.

  “You love her, she’s the perfect woman for you, she adores you, am I missing something?”

  “You’ve missed everything since my eleventh birthday. It takes a while to catch up.”

  “Mm. You haven’t shown
up here for the past two years. I assumed you’d taken your rightful place in Darkside.”

  I stopped pacing. “You think that because I have a dragon I can’t be a Daysider?”

  “You don’t have a dragon, he has you. His anger and power is inside of you twisting you into something else. No one can tell how the magic will mix. You haven’t spent the last two years in Darkside?”

  I rolled my eyes. This was ridiculous. He should at least have checked up on me with Jasper. “Of course not. I graduate from Rosewood with honors in the spring. I’m Captain of Chemiss. I’m the prima donna in the ballet corps. You should see me in my tutu. Inspirational. I’m responsible for everything everywhere I go. It’s a curse. I didn’t get it from you, so it must be something that happened in ancient past, offending an enchantress who had it out for you.”

  “You’ve actually managed to not get expelled from that pretentious, factory of pre-made mages? Don’t you have anything better to do?”

  I gestured up at the wall of water that flowed around us, keeping the witches at bay. They hated running water. “Apparently I’ve been completely wasting away. It is difficult to balance the instinctual Darkside magic with the learned spellcraft. I’ve been working with a spellmaster who makes me realize exactly how negligible my knowledge is.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “You have weak spellcraft? Ah. Because I always told you how essential it was. This spellmaster, is he anyone I know?”

  “Do I know who you know? You haven’t exactly introduced me to any of your contemporaries.”

  “Good. They’re a lot of dissolute wretches, every one. Except Stoneburrow. No one is more sober than that mage. His son is quite different. Maybe only on the surface. Are you actually going to let him have her?”

  Why wouldn’t he shut up? What was he trying to get me to say, to do? Everything with him was like that, a game, a lesson. “She needs a strong Daysider mage. Stoneburrow is her best option. If I’d married her, I’d be in his power.”

  “But after you defeat him, you can freely marry her. That’s how the rules work, isn’t it?”

  I ran my hand through my hair as I inhaled deeply. Definitely wyvern. If there were enough of them, they could cause some serious damage to Jello. “How do you defeat a deception sorcerer who the Devil of Darkside and the Prince of Darkness can’t pin down?”

  “You’re the one who has his pinkie on your table.”

  “I can’t hurt him, or it hurts her.”

  “So they’re tied together. He’s her father?”

  “Maybe.”

  “It seems that—” Whatever else he was going to say was cut off as my chest came alive in agony.

  I let the wall of water fall and leapt as high as I could. Jello was beneath my feet, winging me towards the house, his body casting an enormous shadow over it. We passed through the barriers around the house without any trouble. I ran along his wing to the deck as he passed and Zach landed with a thud only a second behind me. I opened the door of the dim room and stared at Penny Lane, writhing and screaming on the piano, but completely alone.

  I spread my hand out, searching the room for any other presence, my magic sparking green while Zach did the same before he looked at me and shook his head.

  “She gets really horrible after she channels Pitch. It might just be…” He winced and grabbed his wrist then shook his head and we stalked over to her, weapons ready.

  She was beautiful even with a shattered face. How was that even possible?

  “Her knee,” Zach said reaching out then flinching back when he came in contact with the piano’s barriers.

  Her left knee was the size of a coconut, red, oozing and had two white puncture marks. “Poisoned?” I reached out and hesitantly touched the swollen area. Yes. How convenient that I knew absolutely nothing about poison.

  “Get her off there. I need to treat it!” He already started removing his mech suit, weapon forgotten.

  I stared at him. “She’s safer on the piano.”

  His eyes were bright blue and burning. “She’s dying. She’s terrified of being poisoned. I’ve been studying up on treatment. Move her, Drake. To your bed. It has the best rejuvenation spells. Move.”

  The crack of his voice moved me. I scooped her into my arms, her body convulsing, bones broken, limbs flopping. I ran, healing her bones as I went. I could do that. I put her gently on my bed and ran my hands over her, the jacket sustaining her, strengthening her. Zach came back with ingredients from the witch cupboard, mixing and mashing while I healed her internal organs. So many injuries. I’d left her whole, hadn’t I? What had poisoned her, beaten her so badly?

  “That’s the trouble with Pitch,” Zach muttered, spreading a white paste onto her forehead. “She’s amazing and unbelievable and then everything she inflicts on other people comes back to Penny only worse. At least she doesn’t have empathy for death. Can you finish her leg? I’m going to slice it open and I want a whole leg so I can gauge the veins more clearly.”

  I nodded and smoothed my trembling hands over her broken, swollen, poisoned leg. What was wrong with me? I was the leader, but I couldn’t seem to focus, couldn’t make hard decisions like Zach, slicing through the skin of her leg, then the vein, blood and black fluid spilling onto my blanket. It smelled like tar.

  “Get rid of the blood, Drake. I need to see what I’m doing.”

  The blood was everywhere. What was I supposed to do with it? I rolled it up and funneled it into a sculpture that had a convenient opening in the top. It could be a vase. What flowers would you hold in blood?

  “Hold the skin back.”

  I moved back to the bed, put the vase on the floor so the blood could all drain into it. I’d put it in her veins afterwards, or maybe Zach could do that. I breathed shallowly as I spread the skin apart so the vein was isolated. Zach was inserting something into it, a paste that once it touched her flared magic and crawled through her veins like a worm, eating away the poison. Maybe.

  “How long do I have to do this?”

  He gave me a wild grin. “You look a little bit pale. I thought you’ve been spending time in medic tents. Blood make you woozy?”

  I closed my eyes and breathed through my mouth so I couldn’t smell Penny’s blood and the poison. “I need a healer mage. I can’t do this.”

  “You’re doing great. We’re almost done. Then we’ll have to leave her and hope she can recuperate on her own. Nasty poison. I think she’d be dead if they’d been trying to kill her.”

  I opened my eyes and stared at him. “Someone did this just to make her suffer?”

  He tilted his head while he stared at me. “Or to make you suffer. The subtle sorcerer has made it personal with you. You’re clearly suffering. Don’t tell me you’ve caught some of her empathy.”

  I gritted my teeth. “It doesn’t bother you to see her hurt? It’s not empathy, it’s my own pain, my own aching, not hers.”

  “To be honest, it does. I’ve been practicing, though. That helps. Still, I really, really want to hurt whoever did this.”

  I nodded until the worm descended from her vein in her leg, now the color of blue ink. “Can we heal her?”

  Zach nodded and sat down on the floor, gripping his knees with his bloody hands, head between his legs.

  I stared at him. “What are you doing?”

  “Not passing out. That took a lot of magic. Also a lot of intestinal fortitude. Finish the job, Drake.”

  So I wasn’t the only one completely disturbed by this process. Of course not. He cared about her. She was his Pitch. Pitch. She could handle pain. I drew on the protection spells in the bed and after what felt like hours, she was back together. She still twitched on the bed, sweaty and cold.

  I sank down on the floor beside Zach, leaning against the bed and listening to her raspy breathing. “Why do we have to wait for it to get out of her system? We’re magic. We can do cool stuff.”

  He swung his head towards me. “Cool stuff? Your water trick was pretty cool. I�
�ve never seen that before. And your dragon, that’s not just a little dragon or something, that’s a great dragon, the mythological kind that eats worlds. Should you really take it out of Darkside?”

  I shrugged. “Why can’t you cure her all the way?”

  His eyes went bright and he showed me his teeth. “The last time it took her two days to recover from being Pitch. That was without poison. Curing her is only part of it. It affects her nervous system and the rest of her when she overloads her energy circuits. She’s like a transformer that blew. She has to fix that. It pisses me off so much. Every time I was celebrating Pitch’s amazing victory, she was in the back of a van somewhere falling to pieces. Her fans ripped her apart like she rips herself apart. How can I hurt her when she hurts herself so efficiently?”

  I nodded. “I get the empathy overcharge thing, but why can’t you cure the poison all the way?”

  He shook his head, slow, tired, worn out. “I can keep it from killing her, but it’s resistant to magic. It will make its way out of her system organically. That’s what the worm was for, an organic cleansing method that doesn’t register as magic, but it’s not going to get everything. I don’t hear any more fighting. Did we lose?”

  I stood up suddenly. We’d have to take her far away if we had. Where would be the best place? Darkside, in the Burning Lands, I could protect her from any threat, except that she wouldn’t be able to breathe. Also, Sooth could claim her as his aberration to protect. I wasn’t going to risk that, even with a dragon.

  “I’ll check. You stay with her. Here.” I grabbed a t-shirt out of my drawer and some soft pants. I threw them at Zach. “Pull them over the bikini. She’s cold.”

  I left him with Penny. He knew about poison because he was taking his role as her protector seriously. He loved Pitch. Even if she was only a little part of Penny, he would take care of all of her. I went down the stairs slowly. I could hear the voices coming from the living room, a woman’s low, chilling tone making my arm hairs rise.

  I hesitated in the wide doorway, leaning on the edge while I took in the sight of my father standing with his wine glass, a look of boredom on his face while a Creagh female of startling beauty and long golden locks lectured him. There were five Darkside mages who held various elixirs in their hands.