The Scarlet Dragon (The Witching World Book 5)

by Lucia Ashta

  Chapter 2

  Every second that passed pulled me farther down into the greatest loneliness I’d ever experienced. It pressed in on me from all sides, pushing against my bare flesh—hard—making me feel like I was suffocating even though, as my dream had foretold, I was breathing underwater.

  A novice magician should never attempt to take on two of the most fearsome and powerful magicians in the underworld of magic on her own—or at all.

  But I had to, and even if I was a beginner witch, I was unique. I had a power within me that the magicians around me had never seen before. That had to count for something, right?

  Even if it didn’t count for enough, I had to try. My dream had shown me this was what I needed to do, and I might not know much about the spells, rules, and ways of magic, but I knew better than to ignore my inner guidance. Even if my intuition led me toward death, it was the path I was meant to walk.

  And it wasn’t just for the ones I loved.

  It was for me. I sank into the dark unknown because I was finished hiding from who and what I was.

  I was in the sea, terrified and alone, because it was the only true path open to me, and it was only when we listen to the guidance of our hearts that we have any chance at all of true growth.

  I’d lived enough of my life ignoring who I truly was. For better or worse, I’d do no more of it.

  I allowed myself a peek below. Finally, I saw something.

  From the darkness, I saw a gleam of light. Like a moth drawn to flame, I aimed my head down and swam toward it.

  Chapter 3

  Since Marcelo entered my life, little had been as I’d previously believed it, so it should have been little surprise when the uplifting gleam of light turned out to be something terrifying.

  I was unprepared, and even though I’d entered this water to take on our enemies, I froze, feeling myself very much the stupid girl I hoped I wasn’t.

  I ceased swimming, but the currents of the water led me right to the source of light.

  Mirvela was beautiful. A beam of light with no evident source illuminated her smooth, ageless face and turquoise eyes. Long black hair billowed behind her, framing a turquoise tail that sparkled in the light.

  The merqueen appeared immeasurably beautiful and serene, but my heartbeat jumped to my throat. She was a spider queen confident that her web would trap me. I was headed straight toward her, my thoughts useless, panic overcoming them.

  Twenty feet. Then ten.

  I managed to snap myself out of it. I tore myself from her mesmerizing eyes and their lies, which promised me the realization of my dreams.

  I resisted, moving my arms and legs so as to break the current that pulled me. But I managed only to slow it down.

  Eight feet. I pumped my arms, I kicked my legs vehemently.

  It made no difference. Six feet.

  Mirvela stretched out her arms in a gesture of welcome. I turned my head from it, kicking at the fingers that already reached for me.

  What have I done? Why did I come into the water alone and unprepared? I’d been foolish, and I’d pay the ultimate price for my error in judgment.

  I’d been prepared to die, but not without saving my family and friends first.

  This wasn’t a fight, this was suicide, and I’d played right into Mirvela’s hands.

  As the distance between us dissolved into nothing, her face dissolved as well. The harmonious and attractive features of her face distorted, revealing her true nature. Her eyes gleamed with greed while her face took on an edge of wickedness. When she drew open her mouth, impossibly wide, she revealed rows of spiky teeth that could only be meant for one thing.

  Oh god, is she going to eat me? That was a fate I couldn’t accept, at least not without the sort of fight that would leave her forever scarred with its memory, just as her trident had left a crisscrossed reminder permanently etched across Marcelo’s chest.

  At least she doesn’t have her trident now. But she was still about to (def)eat me, and I’d nothing to make her pay for her cruelty.

  I wouldn’t go out without taking at least some of the darkness with me.

  Mirvela opened her mouth wider. Sparkling light reflected off the sharpest of her teeth. Her eyes widened, her cheeks sunk in, and her fingers extended toward me like tentacles.

  She was a monster. And I was about to become dinner.

  I pumped my arms and legs in front of me to halt my momentum. While it didn’t work completely, it was enough to buy me a few more seconds.

  Within my mind, I reached for the five-petal knot at my center. I found it right away, rearing and ready to come to my defense, waiting for me to remember that I wasn’t a foolish, defenseless girl—well, I might have been foolish by entering the water on my own, but I wasn’t defenseless. Even if I had no idea what my magic might look like once I unleashed it, I’d manage to do something before Mirvela gnawed on me like I was some snack.

  I wanted to feel into the five-petal knot, to experience some of the magic that brewed inside it. But there wasn’t time. There wasn’t time for anything but immediate attack, and even then it might prove too late. I had to trust that I’d do the right thing. That by following my instincts, I could do magic the way other magicians performed it with spells. That the magic that brewed within was such a part of me that all I had to was project my thoughts outside of myself, and my magic would rise to fulfill my intentions.

  Defense. I needed to defend myself, and that’s all I thought about, my body carrying out the orders of that deep-seeded instinctual part of myself that was difficult to dissect.

  I opened my hands, palms wide, and aimed them at Mirvela. I looked at her, but I didn’t see her the way I had just moments before. I no longer saw her strong shoulders and round breasts, nor the navel just above the start of her tail that suggested merwomen gave birth to children on land. I saw a blur of creamy flesh, turquoise tail, and black hair, but mostly I saw her energy. What had just been physical form revealed itself as a glow of light, and even though she stole the life from others to extend her own, her glow was bright. A dark grayish light illuminated the ocean bottom around her, exposing a school of fish with monstrously large eyes. Were they there to finish what she started and eat her leftovers? Were they there with the intention of eating me?

  I lost my focus, and along with it, one of the last two feet between the merqueen and me.

  I pumped my arms again, with all the strength I had, and managed to retreat half a foot. Mirvela’s tentacle hands extended farther, nearly touching my skin.

  I shot my hands back out in front of me, allowed my gaze to lose focus again. Just like when you burnt yourself with the fire, I thought. Move beyond the physical form, beyond the container of the body, to the elements that are a part of me and everything around me.

  I continued to look toward Mirvela, but I no longer saw a terrifying merwitch. I felt rather than saw her individual components. I sensed the water, which composed so great a part of her, and the fire that kept it in balance, preventing the water from consuming her and rejecting everything else. I sensed the air that circulated within her and prevented her from sinking, like dead weight, to the earth beneath her, in the ocean floor.

  And I experienced the fullness of the fifth element as an etheric substance that bound the four elements together, promoting their balance and function.

  I doubted Mirvela knew about it, however. Not even Mordecai or his brother, Albacus, or Marcelo, all accomplished wizards, had known of the fifth element. It wasn’t a part of academic thaumaturgy, but it existed.

  I experienced my own personal energy, composed of the five elements, building. Like the heat of a fire as it explodes and reaches for more, or a billowing wind that gains speed and strength, warmth heated my core and traveled down my extremities. When the tingling sensation reached my fingertips, I didn’t stop to think or process, I nudged a surge of my power outward.

  It was as if I’d blown on a kindling flame. My power emitted through my hands in a
burst, crossed the distance to Mirvela in visible waves, and knocked her so far back that her beam of light was left only to illuminate the trails of my magic, which continued reaching toward her in diminishing waves.

  She fell onto the ocean bottom and bounced, kicking up sand. But the suddenly cloudy water couldn’t disguise her fury—or her surprise.

  Immediately, she scrambled to pull herself upright, but the waves I’d emitted continued. They diminished in strength as they reached her, but they were sufficient to keep her off balance long enough to allow me to prepare to launch another attack at her.

  Because I’d realized that it wasn’t sufficient to defend myself. Someone like Mirvela, who was so much like Count Washur, didn’t stop until she achieved what she wanted, and what she wanted was to take from others what no one should be allowed to take.

  Beings like Mirvela and Count Washur stole, hurt, and killed. And there was only one way to keep them from doing any more of it.

  I’d have to kill them.

  I’d have to take the life from them before they could take it from me or anyone else. Where I hesitated, they wouldn’t. I regretted the need to kill, to take the gift of life, where they’d relish it.

  While I’d lamented what I realized I needed to do, Mirvela had managed to position herself upright. Her face consumed with rage, she lunged at me. She pumped her mertail and managed to close the distance between us in a second.

  I was in the process of sending my magic down my arms for another attack when she sank her fingers into me. She cut into my flesh with sharp claws and pinned me in place. I tried to push my magic outward, through my skin and my fingertips, and while I managed to make progress, it was too slow.

  Her own magic must have been fighting mine. It seemed like my magic was trudging through sludge trying to break free.

  It was now or never. Kill or be killed.

  I focused all my might into my core, and then pushed myself outward with all that focused strength. I put every ounce of my will behind my magic, which still tried to get out, to save me, to take down the merwitch that was opening her mouth to pull me in tasty pieces into the abyss.

  Our magic battled. When mine gave a little, she pounced, but then my strength managed to hold her back just enough to turn the momentum. My magic was about to crest my fingertips, which I sank into her bare torso, when an impossible voice reached me.

  “Stop this instant!”

  Chapter 4

  Mordecai? How was Mordecai underwater and shouting at us?

  Then a thought of brilliance struck me. It wasn’t Mordecai at all. Mordecai couldn’t talk underwater, he slept in the castle along with the rest of them. This was some kind of illusion, one of Mirvela’s tricks, perhaps with Count Washur’s complicity. She was trying to distract me when I was about to overcome her.

  I resumed my focus and discovered that she, who’d startled for a moment at the sound of Mordecai’s voice, had already done so. Her pointed teeth were close enough to the skin of my neck to nick it and draw blood.

  I pulled my hand back, my neck straining against her hold, and started pushing my magic outward again. I had to recoup lost momentum and I pushed with all my strength.

  We were moments away from a shift in reality, in which either I’d kill her or she’d kill me. We were a tangle of long red hair and black strands. It was I or she. Only one would leave this ocean, and only one of us was fueled by the stolen lives of others.

  Odds might be in her favor, except that I possessed an awareness of the five-petal knot she didn’t.

  The magic burst forth from my skin as I experienced the searing pain of teeth burning into the side of my neck.

  Then there was a blinding light that knocked loose every thought, presumption, and intention. Moments before I lost consciousness, I had three thoughts. That light was beautiful. If I have to die, then I’m glad that was my last sight, and not that of an unhinged merwitch eating me alive. And, I’m sorry, Marcelo. Because even though Gertrude would be devastated by my loss, and the others would lament it too, Marcelo had taken on a responsibility toward me. He’d had every person he ever loved ripped from him, and now I’d be gone too.

  Then I sunk to the ocean bottom and my eyes closed. How quick the fight was over, how peaceful the end.

  When my eyes squinted open, I closed them again. If I was indeed dead, then this was a strange afterlife. But after I attempted it another time, I realized I couldn’t be dead, because no afterlife I might imagine had a saggy old face with a saggy beard and worried eyes, free of their usual mischief.

  “Mordecai,” I grunted then pushed up onto my elbows. My eyes widened in shock and I quickly shut them yet another time to process. I’d spoken aloud, I was sure of it. But I was underwater. If I could speak underwater, then perhaps the warning voice that sounded exactly like Mordecai had been him indeed. But if it was, then why would he warn me off of Mirvela? Was it to kill her himself and spare me the torment of having to end another person’s life?

  Was Mirvela under control? I needed to find out right away.

  But I hesitated to re-open my eyes because I realized what awaited them. When I’d looked at Mordecai moments before, I’d seen more than his face. A naked old man.

  I’d left my clothes behind on the shore before entering the water, and I agreed to the reasons for it. Clothing hampered agility in the water, and we needed every single advantage we could get. But... this was Mordecai, a three hundred and seventeen year old wizard.

  And he was naked... and looking wholly concerned for my well-being.

  Grow up, Clara, I said to myself. I steeled myself, opened my eyes, and trained them on Mordecai’s face, refusing to acknowledge the naked body attached to it.

  “Are you all right, Clara?” he asked, his focus on what was really important.

  “I think so,” I said and pushed onto my elbows, kicking up a bit of sand into the water around my head. I looked everywhere but at him. “Where’s Mirvela?”

  There were no more brilliant flashes of turquoise tail. But there was a body there—that had no tail. “Is that...? Wait, is that Grand-mère?”

  “Yes, child, that is your grandmother.”

  “I don’t understand. Is she okay?” Her body, also nude, laid, unmoving, twenty feet or so away from me on the ocean floor. It was dark again, but I could make out Grand-mère’s features and waves of crimson hair.

  “I think she’ll be all right, but it’s hard to be certain until she wakes.” Mordecai gazed at her worriedly, with a tenderness to his gaze that revealed what his words didn’t. He moved between us, hovering, the many small braids of his hair floating behind him, the colorful beads that capped them muted by the darkness.

  I reeled my gaze inward, as much to avoid seeing more of Mordecai than I could ever unsee as to wonder. The beam of light that shone on Mirvela was now absent. It must’ve been some sort of magic since we were too far down for the sunlight to reach, which implied that the merqueen did indeed have access to her magic—or at least some of it—even if Mordecai had bound it.

  Without Mirvela’s light, it should be too dark to see this deep. But I could make out Grand-mère and Mordecai, not well, but well enough. So light must be coming from somewhere.

  I looked to Mordecai. The farther he drifted from me and toward my grandmother, the darker it got.

  And then I realized what must be happening and looked down. It was me—or, it was that part of me that embodies all the magic of the world in one five-petal knot. My chest was glowing enough to dispel the worst of the darkness. A light emanated from between my bare breasts and colored my entire chest in an orange glow.

  It was becoming more difficult to conceal the kind of witch I was becoming. No other magician I knew of glowed with the magic she contained within, if any of them allowed the magic to grow inside them.

  Count Washur said he’d been waiting to collect my soul until I grew powerful enough. One look at me would be enough to convince him the time had passed.
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br />   The stakes were too high to linger. I shook the daze off and swam toward Mordecai and Grand-mère, deciding I didn’t care that we were all naked. My time as a captive to Mirvela’s merworld had taught me that many of the habits of society on-land were unnecessary artifice. Particularly in the water, we didn’t need it. Were we really different than the fish that revealed their scales?

  I drew close to Grand-mère so the glow of the five-petal knot could reveal her face. There were no signs of injury and she looked peaceful in her slumber, at least that was something.

  “What’s wrong with her?” I asked Mordecai. “Why’s she underwater?”

  That’s when it occurred to me. This had all started with a dream so real to me that I’d believed it to be true. Perhaps this was another one. It would explain why Grand-mère and Mordecai were here on the ocean bottom instead of in their beds, where I’d left them. If indeed a dream, then maybe this was a warning message that I shouldn’t enter the water alone after all, that it’d be a mistake.

  But Mordecai dispelled my suspicion with a warbled chuckle. “Child, did you really think you’d be the only one to enter the ocean to try to spare those you love?”

  My mouth dropped open. I closed it when the water rushed in.

  “I wrote letters to Marcelo and Ariadne, explaining that I was going to go into the water and that I didn’t want them to follow. I implored them not to. I’m an old man. I’ve lived a full life far past what nature intended. My loss wouldn’t be a terrible one. I wanted to take the risk alone.” His eyes grew sad when they traced Grand-mère’s face. “I checked on Sylvia and Marcelo and left his letter. But when I went to do the same with Ariadne, the stubborn woman was absent from her bed, and I realized precisely where she must’ve gone.”

  He looked at me. “I raced to the bottom of the cliff, but by the time I reached the shore, she wasn’t there. But her clothing was, and so was yours.”

  So Grand-mère must have entered the sea after me. I hadn’t seen any sign that anyone from the castle had the same idea as I.