Chapter 11
Tully
Iblink, and I’m in warm, strong arms.
A voice is suddenly at my ear and breath drifts over my temple, giving me chills. “You could have just asked for a hug, Witch. No need for the dramatics,” Argos whispers.
The foreign magic at play must have blasted me backward. I shake loose of Argos and find my feet.
“You all right, Tully?” Laini presses a hand to my cheek like I might have a fever.
“I’m fine. Thanks.”
Argos lifts my hat from the ground and dusts it off. I rip it from his grip and slam it on my wayward red curls. This is all his fault. Everything was safe in town until he showed up and he is acting like he’s completely innocent.
“Okay,” I say to Argos. “I realize this sounds wild hearing this from me, but I think maybe we should stick to shovels until we figure out what is going on.”
“Maybe you should just put your khymeia in your room so they’re not in the vicinity,” Laini adds.
“But what if you need backup with whatever this?” Argos asks.
I raise an eyebrow. “Back up from you? Let’s not worry about that.”
“I’m keeping the stones,” he says. “I’ll go get some shovels.”
But he doesn’t leave because a few townsfolk appear with what we need. We get down to work. Laini leaves us and the crowd breaks apart. I can only shovel one scoop to Argos’s three, but soon enough we have a large opening in the ground. Our shovels clang against something metal.
I bend and wipe the wet dirt away from the object. Scrolling flowers and skulls made of both bronze and some dark material appear in the muddy earth. Argos joins me in cleaning the dirt from the thing. We uncover a shining surface that reflects our faces back to us.
“A mirror?” Argos tilts his head, and the mirrored image of his wide-set horns reaches from border to border on the strange object. “Is this what’s causing our problems?”
“You are causing problems.”
“Yes, of course. But in addition to my existence, maybe?”
“So you do acknowledge it.”
“Yes. But maybe this is creating problems as well.”
“Maybe.” In reality, the magic zipping off this scary-ass mirror is mind-boggling. I’m not about to tell him how worried I am.
“Do you want me to get it out of there?” Argos rolls his sleeves up to his elbows. Muscles and veins show along his forearms. “Eh, did you hear me?”
“I.. What? Yes. Yes, remove it. But slowly and I’m going to stay ready to fight back.”
“It’s going to attack us?” he asks.
“Quite possibly.”
“Fantastic.”
He grips the edges and yanks the mirror free. Clumps of mud and churned earth fall away from the object and the crowdreforms around. Thankfully, they keep their distance. Magic hums loudly from the mirror and makes my skin buzz. It’s not necessarily a terrible feeling, but I don’t adore the fact that it’s powerful and I have no clue what it is.
“Is this stone here in the frame the same as my khymeia?”
“Oh. Yes, actually. I think it is.”
“I’ve done some research on this material,” Argos says.
