Angel Fever (Immortal Legacy #3) - Ella Summers Page 0,70

the birds, but they’d fought too hard to give up so easily.

“I don’t think it’s only the monsters,” replied Damiel. “It’s us too. Our magic is hardly working at all now.”

“But why?”

“I’m still trying to figure that out.”

The birds shot down through the jungle canopy. A few plants couldn’t deter them from their single-minded goal of killing us good and dead. I shot spell after spell at them, running through the entire magical spectrum.

Vampire strength. Potions. Siren’s Song. Elemental spells. Shifting. Telekinesis. Fairy curses. Flight…no, scratch that; I couldn’t even get my wings to reappear.

Finally, I tried telepathy. Nothing. Either my telepathic magic wasn’t working, or the birds were resistant to the spell. Or both, if Damiel was right.

A large wild cat jumped down from its hiding spot in a tree. The beast looked a lot like a jaguar, except with dark purple spots instead of black ones. It growled at the birds, and they scattered in all directions. Then the feline beast stalked toward me, smooth and graceful, a tightly-coiled explosion of power simmering just below the surface, waiting.

Something hit me from the side, knocking me to the ground. I looked up into the gold eyes of a black panther. I struggled helplessly under its paws. What was left of my supernatural strength had left me the moment the panther touched me. All my other magic was gone too. I felt like I’d drunk one of the gods’ magic-silencing potions.

“Stop!” I shouted at Damiel as he moved in to assist me. “If you touch the monster, it will drain your magic too.”

Damiel drew a throwing knife and aimed it at the beast. He never got a chance to throw it.

An arrow whipped past us and sank into a nearby tree. The next moment, it exploded. The resulting magic shockwave knocked the panther off of me. A second arrow exploded next to the jaguar. The two wild cats hissed, then bolted off through the trees. Arrows shot after them, their explosions chasing them deeper into the dark jungle.

A hooded figure with a bow rushed in and carried me out of the path of the magic blasts. Finally, the explosions stopped, and the man in the hood set me down beside a small waterfall.

“Thank you.” I tried to see through the shadows cast over his face, but he’d moved too far away from me—and my supernatural senses had still not returned. “But how did your magic work on the beasts when ours did not?”

“I will explain everything,” he replied, his voice deep and rumbly. “Later. Right now, we have to get out of here. More beasts are on their way. A lot more.”

“We aren’t going anywhere with you, Hoody,” Damiel said as he joined us by the waterfall.

“You always were a suspicious bastard, Damiel.”

The man dropped his hood to reveal the face of Jiro Goodman, Damiel’s best friend, the man who’d died during Damiel’s archangel trials two hundred years ago.

23

The Shift

Damiel’s cold eyes locked on to the man with his friend’s face. “You are not Jiro. I saw him die.”

“A lot of people have supposedly died, Damiel.” Jiro’s brows peaked. “Including you and Cadence.”

“We faked our deaths. Jiro actually did die. And then the magic released by his death powered up the Magitech generator in the City of Ashes. That wouldn’t have happened if he’d faked his death.” Damiel folded his arms over his chest. “And so you are not Jiro.”

“I was dead,” he replied. “But now I’m not.”

“You’re a phoenix,” I realized.

He smiled.

“So it is you,” I said. “And you are alive.”

“Yes.” Jiro expelled a short, impatient breath. “But Damiel doesn’t believe I am who I say I am.”

“And why should I? A phoenix cannot survive the gods’ Nectar. It’s a completely different, completely conflicting kind of magic. To gain the Legion’s magic, a phoenix’s own magic would be overwritten. And then that phoenix wouldn’t be a phoenix anymore. Which means that when that ex-phoenix died, he wouldn’t be reborn.”

“Very logical reasoning, Damiel.”

Damiel nodded. “Of course.”

“But you’re completely wrong,” Jiro told him. “It wouldn’t be the first time. The day we met, you insisted you could do more pushups than I could. You were wrong then too.”

“Only because you sat on me.” Damiel frowned. “And this won’t work.”

“What won’t work?”

“You’re trying to convince me that you’re Jiro by telling me a story only he would know.”

“And?”

“And I won’t fall for it.”

Jiro sighed. “I’m not trying to make you fall for anything, Damiel. I’m trying to help you. But you need