Arcane Rising: The Darkland Druids - Book One, R Nicole [suggested reading TXT] 📗

teeth gave him a lisp, reminding me of a certain hissing reptile.

“You king will be pissed if you kill me,” I said.

“Our king is not here.”

A roar bellowed from behind me and a blur leapt over my shoulder and collided with the Chimera. The sword flew from his grasp, clattering against the side of a crumbling mausoleum.

A tiger with glowing blue stripes mauled the Fae, swatting him with huge clawed paws.

Ignis. I’d know that daft cat anywhere.

Nothing in this world surprised me anymore.

The Chimera screamed as the tiger clamped its jaws around his neck. A snap echoed through the cemetery and the Fae were still.

Five pairs of eyes glared at me out of the gloom and the glint of metal told me that they didn’t come unarmed. Ignis prowled towards me, putting himself between me and the enemy.

The challenge was clear, but I had nothing to fight with—no knife, no sword, no skills—just a dangerous power I didn’t know the limits of.

Get a grip, Elspeth. Now wasn’t the time to fear what I might become. I had to grab hold of my destiny and make it my own…or die trying.

“Ignis? I appreciate the assist, but give me some room, will you?”

The tiger purred, licked his whiskers, and prowled through the shadows. His blue glow ebbed in the dark, letting me know where he was.

Focusing on the remaining Chimera, I hoped this worked.

I let go of the final barrier between me and the Fae blood swirling through my veins…and became black essence.

The cemetery went dark, all the light from the city blinking out, and the shadows began to rise. I took one step forwards and a black vicious liquid rose in my wake, floating in the sky as if gravity ceased to exist.

The Chimera hesitated, their eyes widening in fear.

They want to kill you, a voice echoed in my head. They want to cut you open and tear your insides out.

I looked to a shadow at my side. Mother?

It hissed and dove at me, slamming into my body and feeding the power that rose within me.

Kill them, kill them, kill them. They are the enemy.

My head snapped to the front.

Let me go. Let me go now!

I raised my hands, balking at the bluish hue my skin had taken. My gaze focused through a filmy haze of shadow and the Darkness rose up from the ground and encircled the Chimera.

The essence was me, yet it was something else. Something wild and elemental…beyond this reality.

The oozing black liquid crawled over the Fae, consuming them one by one—strangling, suffocating. I drew them into death, Colour binding them, and five souls became shadow then drifted away into the currents of death like sand blown in the wind.

Power rose behind me and I swung around, but I was too late to stop the unseen sword arcing towards my neck. Closing my eyes, I felt the Darkness seethe.

The sharp sound of metal colliding with metal rang through the air. My eyes jerked open and I gasped when I saw Rory locked in a tight grapple with the Chimera.

Their swords rasped as they slid together, then they broke apart and the Druid spun, the blade hissing through the air…and cut the Fae’s head clean off its shoulders.

Jaimie appeared behind him, his German Shepard form padding between the headstones.

My head snapped up and I stared at them through the film of darkness. More?

“Get out of here,” I rasped. “I can’t hold it.”

Rory dropped the sword and threw his arms around my trembling body. His Colours flared as he held onto me and the Darkness began to subside. I didn’t know if it was conscious or if it sensed his intent, but whatever I’d unleashed seemed to have run its course.

I slammed my Colour around the Dark things and began to shake. If it wasn’t for Rory, I would have fallen to my knees.

“Are you all right?” he asked, drawing back. He smoothed my hair behind my ears.

“I-I don’t know.”

His thumb brushed over my cheek. “The cut it gone. So is your black eye.”

I raised my hand to my face and found he was right. The prism burns didn’t seem to sting anymore, either. “My eyes?”

“Green as two shiny emeralds.”

I sighed. I was Elspeth again.

“It felt like that day in the close,” I said. “Like it was going to explode.”

“Whatever it was, it knew we were your friends,” Rory told me.

Now in his human form, Jaimie stood to the side. One hand covered his junk and the other swatted at Rory. “Help a man out, will you?”

Rory chuckled, shucked off his coat, and tossed it to the Druid.

Ignis leapt onto the headstone beside me and meowed, pawing the air. He was a tabby cat again, but no less needy.

Rory scratched him on the head. “Your cat is really something, huh? He must have had some serious magic of his own when he was alive.”

Nervousness crept into my heart and I glanced between the Druids.

“How long were you…” I edged backwards.

“Uh, a while,” Jaimie admitted.

They’d seen me talking with Owen, then. They’d likely heard our conversation…and seen me turn him into a pile of ash.

“You thought I was going with him, didn’t you?” I asked.

Rory shook his head. “Never.”

I glanced at Jaimie. “I just wanted answers.”

“I know, lass,” the shapeshifter said. “They were hard won…and we didn’t help when we should’ve.”

“You were there when it counted,” I told him, glancing at the dead Chimera. “That’s all that matters.”

I was the black sun.

The revelation hit me like a tonne of bricks. When the black sun rises, death will choose the hand of fate. My power would choose who lived and died, not me—not unless I learned how to control it.

“The Warren should be safe now,” I said. “I forced the truth from Owen. Well, the truth as he knew it.”

“What does that mean?” Jaimie asked.

“It means time will tell if the knowledge spread without his knowing.”

And everything he told me about the Fae and my mother might be a lie fed to