Ashes of Chaos (Legacy of the Nine Realms #2) - Amelia Hutchins Page 0,48
It was a very tempting thought, one neither of us would mind in the end.
Chapter Sixteen
I washed the blood from my hair and body before pulling a sheer dress over my head and tying a belt around my waist. Frowning, I winced at the idea of what was to come. Each witch charged with holding land had slivers of power within their bodies removed, returning the magic to the earth.
Tediously, I sliced the witch’s arm open, retrieving the fragments of the crystal from her flesh. Her legs, hands, arms, and forehead bled freely as she cried, pleading for her life.
I’d have felt bad for her if she hadn’t been a coldhearted, murderous bitch. It seemed to be a common theme for those who ruled to be vile, heartless creatures. Knox was guilty of it too. I could hear him rattling low, and it was soothing even though it shouldn’t have been.
Setting the crystal shards into the cauldron, I leaned over the altar, rolling my head on my shoulders as I stretched. I’d gotten little to no sleep lately, with Knox intensifying the hunt when he wasn’t out burning down villages and shit. Ever since the silver-haired men started appearing, he’d gotten more brazen, amplifying the search to capture me.
Moving back from the witch on the altar, I flicked my finger, watching as the upside-down cross rose from the earth, and her body floated to it with a wave of my hand.
Sidling closer to the cauldron, I peered over the rim, watching the crystals’ slivers as they formed into one shard again. I reached into the boiling water, withdrawing a crystal skull that I cradled in my palm, watching the rainbow hues that danced within it.
Turning toward Knox, I paused, finding his mouth close to his witch’s ear, whispering against it. Anger and jealousy rushed through me, causing his blue eyes to slide toward me as they narrowed on the skull.
I closed my fist around it, glaring at him as he pulled her closer against his body. The skull vanished in my palm. I flattened my lips, watching her hands sliding up his chest that was now bare and free of his heavy armor. On her wrist was the exact symbol that adorned the chest plate of his armor. His personal insignia branded onto the inside of her wrist, marking her as one of his witches.
Bastard.
Exhaling the fury, I closed my eyes as the cross vanished, and the witch slammed against the ground. Dismissing Knox and his weak-willed witch, I crept toward the witch in my circle, crawling through the dirt as she tried to escape. Her sobs made my stomach tighten with unease, knowing that I’d murder outside the heat of battle. It sat ill within me.
The moment she crossed the circle’s barrier, her body began the slow process of aging and decomposing. Her skin turned leathery, darkening until it stretched wrongly over the bones beneath it.
The stench of death clung to her body, pronouncing her rotten insides had turned putrid. She rolled onto her back, howling as she revealed sunken eye sockets and a rotten tongue liquefying. Lips pulled back as the skin grew taut, and her lungs released the last sigh before her body caught fire.
As I watched, she turned to ashes picked up by the wind and blown through the air, returning her to the land. When we died, our ashes turned into magic particles that returned to our homeland. A newly born witch would inherit her powers if she were born lacking, which added hope to our race.
“Aria,” Knox’s deep, husky voice disturbed the peace, causing irritation to add to my growing emotional overload. “You need to stop and come to me. Now,” he demanded.
“Fuck off,” I hissed, fighting the inner turmoil.
“Jealous, Little Monster?”
I snorted, rolling my eyes. “You know what, Knox? If you want that basic bitch, you have my blessing,” I growled indignantly, using my fingers to call forth the Keeper of Lightning, the elemental I’d come to collect today.
The sky above me cracked with thunder as lightning slammed down around me. My hair lifted from the electrical current that rushed through me. I listened to the world howling as lightning began to pulse with the threat of the impending storm.
I leaned against the altar, sensing the presence behind me as it leaned against me, inhaling my scent, bringing its nose to brush against my throat.
Doubt and fear rippled through me.
That moment of clarity where you do something and then instantly regret that you