shoulders, blood leaking from her eyes. In her hands, the Chalice glows like the moon, the alchemical symbols blazing.
“The blood of the Unworthy is yours, child,” he says. “Drink.”
She lifts the vessel to her lips.
“Stevie, no!” I lunge for her, my hands wrapping around the edge of the bone, but it’s too late. Her mouth is stained red, the dark liquid running down her chin. I try to pull her close, try to kiss the blood from her mouth, but it’s too late. I’m too late.
She slides out of arms and tips into the water.
Without a second thought, I dive in after her, following the shape of her into the blood-red light.
Fifteen
KIRIN
My head is a ringing bell, the sound so all-encompassing it makes the room tilt sideways. Sparks of light dance before my eyes. I can’t catch my breath. Can’t see through the blinding flashes of magick igniting the air.
Out of the haze, rough hands grab my shirt, hauling me to my feet and shoving me behind a bookcase just as another blast descends.
All around us, glass shatters, books topple, magick explodes. The chaos finally breaks through the shock, snapping me to attention. Another blast rockets down the staircase, and Baz grabs my arm, portaling us out of there just before the room collapses.
We land hard in the middle of the main storage room above, just in time to see a half-dozen black-cloaked mages closing in on Casey at the other end of the room. Quintana is on his back beside her, blood leaking from his temple. My sister’s got her gun drawn, but she doesn’t know where to aim—the mages are too quick and elusive, like ants scurrying over spilled sugar.
“Casey!” I shout.
From across the room, her gaze locks on mine, her eyes widening with new fear.
“Get out of here!” she shouts.
“Not on your life.” I’m back on my feet in an instant, raising my hands and calling on my Tower magick with everything I have. Standing beside me, Baz chants his own spell, dropping half a stone wall on two of the mages.
All around us, bookshelves fall like dominoes. Another mage goes down, buried beneath a pile of ancient tomes, the confusion buying Casey just enough time to take aim.
She hits a fourth mage square in the chest.
But just as quickly as they fall, the mages reform, gathering like smoke that thickens and solidifies before our eyes, once again ready for battle.
“What the hell?” I grind out.
“Black-mirror magick!” Baz shouts, and my gut clenches.
I’ve never seen it in action, but I’ve read about it—a kind of projection spell that makes it impossible to know where the actual casters are standing, or how many of them are even surrounding us.
“How the fuck do we fight them?” I shout.
“No idea, but if we don’t figure it out, your parents are picking out two headstones tomorrow!”
Wasting no more time, I push myself to my energetic limits, reaching out for every ounce of black magick I can sense, pulling the darkness from the mage spells into my own. The Tower card appears crystal clear in my mind—a dark stone spire rising from the sea, a powerful bolt of lightning striking the top. Thick, red-black smoke roils in the sky, and two mages jump from the tallest window to escape the flames inside, likely to their deaths.
I hold the terrifying image in my mind, calling on its transformative energy. The spell comes to me easily:
Tower of fury, tower of rage
Siphon the power that fuels the dark mage
Collapse and destroy, remake and reform
I call on their chaos, for I am the storm
I repeat it seven times, my voice getting louder with each recitation, my skin electrified, blood simmering in my veins, my entire body on fire with magick. Soon I can no longer separate the feeling of my physical form from the force of the magick storm swirling around me. Smoke rises from my skin, lightning arcing through it, power gathering inside and out.
The mages flicker before us like an old TV picture, then finally solidify for good, no longer able to call on their dark magick.
My dark magick, I realize. All of it, held fast in the palms of my hands, crackling and hot, ready to do my bidding.
And it feels… holy shit, it feels fucking amazing.
Drunk with power, I let out a laugh I barely recognize, everything inside me buzzing with intense pleasure. Soon I can no longer recall a time when I ever feared this darkness. Is that even possible? How