“Fuck.” I whispered the word as the shaking started because I couldn’t do that. I didn’t want to embrace the magic that spoke to me of nothing but blood and death and horror. All the bravado was gone as the magic swirled free of me. I’d invited it, and now I couldn’t control it.
Panic started a slow burn in my belly. “Oka, this is going to be bad.”
I’d fought so hard to avoid this, but now that it was here, I was looking forward to unleashing myself and all the fury of my mother’s magic.
Or so I thought.
The magic wicked out around us, faster and faster. The trolls stared at it, transfixed as a swirl of black death magic with rainbow sparkles within like a raven’s wing grew.
My energy dipped as the magic took from me and I stumbled, barely pointing my fingers at the trolls before I went to a knee.
The rolling black death hesitated and then shot toward the trolls. Everywhere it touched their skin shriveled and darkened, rotting where they stood, pieces falling off as if they’d been zombified on the spot.
The black death circled wider, and I fought to rein it in as it flowed toward the caravan. Sweat dripped down my face as I wrestled with the magic.
“Mother of God,” I heard from behind me. I think it might have been Tristan, but I wasn’t sure.
Before the troll screaming even started, a tremor rumbled under our feet. Not from me, but I’d take it. A crack cut through the earth, wide between the trolls. Behind me, the caravan members screamed. Earthquakes were common enough, but still frightening after the way the world had been destroyed.
None of the trolls fell into the mile-deep crevice. They laughed at me, pointing and jeering as those who’d not been touched by the magic started toward us.
I took a step back, holding my hands out and cringing as I did so. Suddenly I understood Sage better, why she made all the movements. I would do anything it would take to bring this magic under my control.
I didn’t step forward, or back. I held my ground. Much as I wanted to leap into the fray and kill with everything I had, I was the defense between the trolls and my people.
Oka was my defense, though, and she took her place on my right, catching those trolls that slipped past me. “Watch the magic, I can’t make it do what I want!” I said.
The black mist whipped between the trolls, slowing them down, herding them toward the crevice. They fell in, screaming as their bodies were eaten in chunks by a magic I had so little control over I wasn’t sure it wouldn’t turn on us next.
My arms shook, my belly clenched, and I didn’t think I could do this much longer.
“How many left?” I asked.
“Over fifty!” Oka snarled as she took one out, grabbing him by the leg and snapping him so hard, the bone snapped, jutting through the flesh of his upper thigh. She threw him back into his friends, toppling several more as if she were bowling.
My energy dipped further as I gritted my teeth and I dug into my reserves. The fear for my caravan was all that held me there, and I held onto it like a lifeline.
We were through about half of the troop when I caught them trying to sneak around to my left.
I had no way to stop them. “Oka, we’re being surrounded! Richard, get ready to go!”
I think he yelled back that they were ready. I don’t know for sure over the cacophony of the trolls and Oka’s roars.
Sweat poured off my face and I knew I had to finish this fast.
To my right, Oka kept the trolls from sneaking past us, crunching bones and tearing flesh. To my left came that same flash of white and this time it didn’t recede into the trees.
A bear that had to be eight hundred pounds galloped out of the forest, mowing trolls down left and right.
As he came straight for me.
Oh shit.
His teeth were stained with blood as he let out a booming roar that I felt through my chest, all the way to my spine. Oka spun and leapt across in front of me, placing herself between me and the bear.
Only, he turned at the last second and body slammed two trolls as they raced to get by me in the chaos.
This was the bear Faris had sent me? Hot damn.
“Oka, keep the right. Our new friend has the left. I’m going straight up the middle.”
A surge of energy caught me off guard, like a tiny burst of elemental magic coming up through the ground and through the soles of my feet. It wasn’t magic, but I took it and used it, feeding it into the black death that wove amongst the trolls, slower now, but still killing them.
With my energy running low, we had to get this going. I lifted my hands higher. One last push, I’d try to use the black mist to herd the trolls into the hole.
But I was too slow. Three trolls reached for Oka, grabbing her by the neck, front and back legs as they lifted her over their heads.
“Oka!” I screamed her name.
The trolls laughed as they launched her through the air, straight for the crevice.
My hand shot out as if I could still control air, as if I could still call the wind to my aid.
Pain exploded through my mind, and for just a second, I saw a Sylph, an air elemental who wore a bracelet that matched one of mine. Her eyes were wide, her long white hair done up in hundreds of braids, her face beautiful and unlined.
Someone spoke to her. “Jayla, what is it? You’re pale.”
She didn’t look away from me. “It is nothing, a bug.”
The pain ramped up and I saw nothing but the insides of my eyelids, the sound of roaring all around me.
Jayla, that was the name of the Sylph who’d taken one of my abilities.
I opened my eyes, flat on my belly, face down in the mud.
I pushed up to see the trolls surging forward, Oka in the middle of them surrounded in a flash. I don’t know how she’d ended up there, but I would take it.
“Bear, help her!” I commanded the beast to my right. He shot me a look, blue eyes flashing with what could only be irritation, and then he raced off, doing as I asked.
He barreled through the trolls and he and Oka worked back to back. Driving them away. But damn . . . it looked as though there were more trolls now than when we’d started!
“Pamela, they’re sweeping wide!” Richard shouted from behind me.
I pushed to my feet, and a troll came straight for me. He swung a big two-pronged sword that I barely caught on the edges of my own blades. I stepped out of his way and did a double sweep of my curved blades through his back, severing his spine. I turned back to the trolls again, counting. How many more could we take down? Fifteen?
Twenty?
It didn’t matter because there were more coming, pouring out of the forest.
The bellows of the polar bear and Oka came loud to my right.
“Stay with me now!” I shouted as I fought to light a fire with the dark magic.
“Come on, you can feed the flames, burn them to a crisp,” I whispered.
There was a pause inside of me as if the magic considered my request, and then agreed.
Thank the gods.
Different than my elemental fire, this fire was as black as the mist that had gone before it. I pushed it out through my fingers, like a black oil, and when it touched the dry grass and brush, it went up like a bloody torch. Better, though, it created a physical barrier. For a moment or two, minutes if we were lucky, I had bought us a little time. I pointed with my fingers, drawing a line around the caravan, creating a horseshoe of flames.
I lowered my hands and looked up at the sky. The morning sun rose to the east.
Oka limped up to me. “Pam. More trolls are coming, we have to go.”
I nodded, breathing hard. The polar bear drew close but stopped about fifteen feet away. “Faris?” I asked softly.
“He sent me. I owed him.” He grunted, obviously irritated with that fact. I smiled.
“Well, it’s a good thing, or we would have been overrun.”
“The day is young, witch,” he growled.
I wanted to ask him his name. I was sure he was a shifter and not a familiar like Oka.
Someone tugged on the edge of my cloak. I looked down to see two of the toddlers staring up at me. Lily and Ruby, the two girls.
They held their tiny, grubby hands up to me, and for a moment I just stared at them in utter shock. A roar from behind me as one of the trolls attempted to cross the flames snapped me out the paralysis.
“What the hell?” I scooped them up and ran with them back to the caravan. “Sage!” I yelled for her, and then Richard stepped out and took the kids.
“The trolls came around the back, two slipped through, we killed them but not before . . .” He shook his head.
I let him take both girls, but not before Ruby gave me a kiss on the cheek. Her little mouth felt like she had imprinted me, a brand that bound me to them as surely as any powerhouse spell.
I swallowed hard as I rounded the Humvee to find Sage on her back, her belly sliced open and her guts in her hands. She stared at the sky. “I held it, Pam. I held the barrier. Longer than I thought I could. Thank you for believing in me.”
I looked up at Richard. “Where’s Frost?”
“With Chris. Sage . . . she saved them. She bought us the time we needed to kill the two monsters.”
Sage smiled. “I did it, didn’t I?”
I dropped to one knee beside her, my throat tight. I couldn’t save her, I didn’t have the magic to do it. “Sage, hang on.”
Oka crept up beside me and amazingly none of the humans gasped in fear despite her size. “Can you help her at all?”
I shook my head, shocked to find the tears on my cheeks. “I can’t help you, Sage. I can physically stitch you up, but . . .”
She brushed my hand away from her face and her words echoed Oka’s. “No. Save your energy. Protect them. I’m just . . . I’m just glad I finally did something good. Maybe it will make up for the hurt I’ve caused.” She smiled, her body jerked once, and a big breath slid from her.
Just like that, she was gone, her body stilling as her hands slid from her torn-up belly.
Richard stepped in. “Get her body into the truck and wrap it. Pamela?” He turned to me and I nodded.
“Time to run.”
Chapter Seventeen
We scrambled to get everyone into the three vehicles before the trolls realized the line of fire I’d put up had an opening to the east.
Thank the gods they were just dumb enough to buy us a bit of time.
“Go!” I yelled at Richard as the trucks started, a deep rumble from the engines that cut through the air and no doubt alerted the trolls to what was happening.
Richard and the other drivers hit the gas—basically thirty miles an hour if they were lucky.
The polar bear was to my left and he swung his big head toward me. “You got a plan for the three of us?”
I nodded as I followed the trucks. They sped off and I walked. “We cover their escape for as long as we can before we have to run.”
Of course, that was assuming the magic I’d been wrestling with would give me anything more. As it was, I felt like I’d had the shit kicked out of me repeatedly, and that was with just a little usage. And the magic hadn’t even done what I’d wanted with the exception of the fire. But what witch had to convince her magic to work for her? That was ridiculous.
He gave a low grunt. “Damn it, you’re going to get me killed. Faris was right, you are trouble.”
I reached out and put a hand on his back, as I did so often with Oka, a gesture of comfort that I did without thinking. His fur was thick and silky, which was unexpected, but the heat flowing off him was what made my breath catch.
Hot, and the sharp tang of ice on the wind slid up my arm and made me shiver in a not unpleasant way. Those pale blue eyes of his swung my way, but he said nothing as way too much rippled between us for a single touch.
Oka nudged me. “You were saying?”
Shit, was I saying something? The heat and ice that flowed from the bear into me had done something to my brain, obviously, but it was reminiscent of that burst of energy that I’d drawn from in the fight. There was a touch of something elemental to him, which made me that much more curious about him.
The trucks were well ahead of us now and the trolls were just figuring out they were losing their prey as they roared their displeasure.
“We aren’t dead yet,” I said. Sure, my reply was delayed, but I had reasons. Fatigue being at the front. Nothing to do with the bear to my left nor the sensations I picked up from him. I tipped my head from side to side and stretched my back. It was going to be a long fucking day at this rate.
I made myself break into a jog, to get to the opening between the flames. Maybe we could stay far enough ahead, maybe I could somehow get the flames to follow us?
Laughter from deep inside me said it all. My magic was done with helping me. But why?
Embrace me.
Fuck off was my response to that.
A wash of guilt tugged at me. What if the caravan was wiped out because of this day? Because I’d said I could help and they listened to me? Because of my stupid magic that was really like an asshole just waiting for me to break?
I wasn’t sure my soul could survive another beating like that.
The shouts and snarls of the trolls grew louder, and with the sound, my heart picked up its pace. We could not let them cut us off.
“Here’s the plan,” I said. “We put our backs to the east and keep the trolls in front of us no matter what. Soon as we can, when the caravan has had enough time, we make a break for it.”
The polar bear grunted but kept up with me. Oka’s emotions, determination, fear, and pride in what we were doing, flowed into me and with them came a pulse of strength.
“Stop that,” I said to her. “You’re going to make me cry.”
“You are my charge. Do not tell me how to take care of you,” she said without an ounce of heat in her voice. To her, she was just stating fact.
“Shut up, both of you,” the bear grumbled.
I wanted to twist around and ask him how the hell he could hear Oka, but we stepped outside the circle of the flames and were hit with the stench of the trolls.
Along with the stench came several swinging clubs that were tipped with rusted iron spikes. I dropped to one knee; Oka and the bear bounded ahead of me, jaws and claws snapping troll limbs, gutting them, tearing them down.
The darkness deep inside of me whispered. Kill them all, we can do it. We can take them down. Let me help you.
Panic cut through me. Not because it spoke, but because I felt myself waver.
I had to save the caravan, no matter the cost.
Shaking, I called that dark magic up. Embrace it, no, I didn’t do that. I let it go.
I pushed to my feet and flung my hands to my right, pouring my strength into the magic that I slammed into the oncoming trolls. Flesh burst, heads rolled from shoulders, the scene turned into one of blood and flames, of death incarnate.
The laughter inside me slipped out of my mouth and I barely bit it back.
I kept at it, stepping east one foot at a time, trusting the two shifters to hold my back as I slammed the trolls with every last ounce of power I had in me.
My breath came in gasps as I struggled to keep up with the beating of my heart, the darkness pulling me down.
Oka tried to give me some of her strength again, but I blocked her. I didn’t want this filth to touch her.
The darkness whispered again. Well done, daughter.
I screamed, fear spiking through me like nothing I’d ever felt before. The darkness was not my mother, it was not. Distantly I knew Oka was trying to get my attention, but it took all I had to keep my eyes on the trolls, to keep them in my sights while I worked with the last of my strength to keep them at bay. The magic was out of control, and I knew it.
The trolls surged forward, their numbers seemingly undiminished despite all we’d done. The two at the front each hel
d a large globe the size of a watermelon, and behind them was a pale troll that I knew as one of their mages.
“Fuck, shit, damn! Get ready to run!” I yelled at Oka and the bear.
The trolls at the front launched the globes and I threw a hand up, sending a bolt of black magic into them.
The trolls laughed.
The globes exploded with witch fire. I scrambled back as the blue-green flames lit up the air and landed all around us.
“Don’t let it touch you!” I yelled. “Nothing can put it out except the death of the witch who created it.”
The three of us backed away as hot summer wind blew in our faces . . . pushing the blue-green flames toward us.
I stumbled sideways, partially blacking out from exhaustion, and a paw reached up around my waist and then I was on the bear’s back.
“I got her, cat. Let’s move,” he growled.
I fought the sleep that came for me, because I needed to be ready to fight again. I knew it in my belly that we weren’t done. Three times the caravan had faced death, but that felt off. Like we’d missed something.
Or maybe it was just the dark part of me that wanted more death? That thought horrified me, but I couldn’t stay awake even for that.
I sunk into the thick fur of the polar bear, his wide back holding me easily as he galloped down the road, the movements of his stride rocking me to sleep.
I didn’t dream, but there were voices I couldn’t block out. Oka’s. The bear’s.
“She’s asleep,” Oka said. “How can you hear me, bear?”
“Polar bear shifters were created by elementals. I was meant to be a familiar.”
“You have another shape then?”
“Yes,” he grunted.
“Why are you really protecting her? Because I don’t believe you for an instant that it’s just because of Faris,” Oka said.
Underneath me, he tensed, and I dug my fingers into that thick silky fur.
“Because she is important, Oka. Or did you not figure that out yet?”
“Do not sass me!” she hissed.
He laughed. “I’ve been a familiar before, Oka. I can show you the ropes if you like.”
She was quiet. “Why would you do that?”
Aimless Witch Page 16