With a wicked and confident grin, Lilah lifted one of her hands to the side. The pools of blood—myblood—she had spilled from our earlier bout quivered. Then, they lifted from the sapphire floor to answer her beckoning call. Droplets and puddles became tendrils, twisting in the air as they approached her waiting hand. The last remaining crystal spires of my family’s blood cracked straight down the middle with a pained scream. I wasn’t sure if it was this form where I was so connected to family or if it was because they were the last spirits left, but Ifelttheir agony and despair, heard every suffering shriek from them as they begged not to be used like this. I saw Ayrie and Aunt Titi cringe at the cries, too. But, there was nothing I could do as the blood joined my own. The blood congealed until it formed a long sword with the black hilt already in Lilah’s hand. Instead of being silver, the blade was a dark crimson with thick veins snaking down it and smoky shadows of the same color swirling around the blade.
I should be used to Lilah’s blood magic. I knew the feel of it against my skin and my scales. The burning, stinging ache was too familiar a friend to me. But this blade was different from every time before. I didn’t know if it was because it was formedfrom my blood and that of my deceased predecessors who had cried out against it, but it hit me harshly and heavily. It was so wrong. So unnatural. So evil.
I lost it.
I inhaled deeply. Hot, electric, and uncontainable, my magic welled up the back of my throat like a storm building pressure in the clouds before lightning and thunder were shot from there. As sweltering as its heat was, it didn’t burn my throat. I arched my long neck, opened my jaws wide, and Iroared.
A blinding cascade of magical crystal blades and light burst forth from my mouth, raining down like a monsoon of meteorites and stars from a vengeful goddess of the night. The stone points were the size and length of my human arm. The sounds of them raining down were cosmic and mystical, like wind chimes in a storm, rain against a windshield, stained glass falling inside a cathedral. They were as beautiful as they were terrifying, and I would hate to be on the other end of it.
Whatever quip Lilah parted her lips to say died there.
For a fraction of a second, I saw genuine fear flicker over her face as it paled.
It was the first time I had ever seen her scared.
With supernatural speed, Lilah raised her blood-forged sword at the same time that she threw up a series of crimson shields around her. I felt the resistance as my magic met hers like a tsunami wave slamming into a dam, but I also felt the pressure buckle under the battering of my gemstone blades. Just like water eroding stone, slowly, steadily, inevitably, a crack formed in her first shield. It wasn’t long before it shattered like ice under too much weight. With the first shield gone, it wasn’t long before my magic broke through the rest.
Lilah had no time to conjure another wall of blood. The gemstones were too fast and too numerous. With nothing left between her and my attack and no time to dodge, all she coulddo was hold up her blood sword and brace for impact. The rain of glittering stones battered her blade, ricocheting off it to join the others that fell around Lilah. Her weapon vibrated violently under the raining crystals of enchanted light. For the briefest of moments, it seemed like it would hold up against me. Then, the whine reached a fever pitch.
Just like her barriers, it started with one simple, thin crack.
Eventually, the blood sword, too, began to shatter into red and black crystal splinters.
The pieces of her own weapon turned into traitors because of the resulting shockwave and the persisting attack. They impaled her, remaining embedded there and causing her body to convulse under the onslaught. It was so unlike when I fought her before. Back then, my shards broke skin, but her blood magic kept them from going far to avoid serious damage and even pushed them out as it repelled them. Now, my crystal fragments bit deep, carving and splitting her open down to her bones. Blood spilled in large drops. Her blood magic wasn’t fighting back against me. Her wounds weren’t mending. Lilah wasn’t healing.
I didn’t stop my crystals from crashing down onto her.
Loud and raw, Lilah’s screams ripped from her chest and echoed through the chamber. The cave kept vibrating with my magic. It filled me, fed me,foughtalongside me. Lilah’s blood seemed to be pouring faster and freer from dozens of gashes and rocks sticking out of her body. Yet, her movements seemed to be slower and more lethargic. The unnatural clawing of her magic down my scales was so faint.
That’s it, baby girl! You’re doing great!
Quinn?!I almost lost control of the torrent of crystals coming from my mouth as my eyes widened in shock. I wanted to turn toward the entrance of the cave to look at her, but I couldn’t giveLilah that out for even just a moment. But how was I able to hear her?
Byrd?! You can hear me?Quinn replied, equally incredulous and relieved. Her voice was distant and quiet, brushing across the bond like a forced whisper. But it wasthere. I could feel Quinn again. Her presence pushed against the blockage of our bond, trying to shove her way to me. The encouragement and strength she sent trickled through, but it was more than enough. A spark lit up in my chest, brighter than any sapphire tower. Gods, I wanted to laugh just as much as I wanted to cry.
Keep going, Sweetness.Quinn said, her voice getting louder and closer, and her feelings of love flowing in stronger by the second.You are doing so well. You can end this. Youwillend this.
The warmth and support of her words and from my family, trying to find a way to break through Lilah’s weakening barrier coiled around my heart. I allowed the energy to flood into me before I used it to add even more power to my attack. Each strike sent more pieces of her sword into her and spilled more of Lilah’s blood, covering the ground with her splattered life force. There wasn’t much left of the sword to protect her as it was reduced to a jagged, unstable thing now, and it was getting harder to use it to dodge my crystals. The sapphires within her made her look like a bejeweled porcupine. Her knees threatened to buckle. Her hands shook with weakness. Lilah’s blood magic drained from her to the floor, and I realized then that I couldn’t even feel the creep of her magic at all anymore.
Lilah’s blood magic bled out of her.
Lilah was dying.
In the same way that she had almost killed me.
How fucking poetic.
Suddenly, through the barrage of my crystals, I saw a flicker of something cross Lilah’s face. It was gone as quickly as ithad appeared and before I could begin to decipher what it could be. Then, Lilah’s whole expression changed. It twisted with panic and rage, a coupling that produced that wicked lovechild named desperation. Her lips pulled back into a snarl, baring her too-white, too-straight, too-perfect teeth like a doll turned monstrous and horrific. Her roaring scream was feral. Her irises, once a deep wine red like her magic, flared to a red so bright that I thought it would burn me like a laser under its focus. Lilah looked wild and cruel, a demon backed into a corner with no other way out than forward.
She lunged toward me on the other side of the cave.
Faster than she should have been.
Reckless with a dying beast’s lack of care of a dying beast.
Manic as she moved unpredictably in a way that I couldn’t follow or track.
Lilah fettered around the blasts of my crystal breath. She summoned her own blood to surround the dragon blood sword, making it bigger and longer. Red smoke dripped from its broken, gnarled points, and it pulsed with violence and ruin. I wanted to destroy it. Its energy was too toxic, unnatural, and disrespectful to be allowed in this world. I picked up the fervor of my attacks, using everything I had to annihilate it. I pulled from a well of power I didn’t know I had to push more of my magical crystal blast out, increasing its range and intensity. I swung my tail covered in its sapphire daggers at her. The gemstones all over my wings scraped the sapphire floor as I flung them, hoping to cut her down.
