Page 174

Crimson threads rose out of the obsidian and curled around her arms like living veins. The Eitr met them. The relic, in the place she'd dropped it, hummed and joined the working. Three forces braided together along her ribs into something that should not have been wieldable.

The storm faltered.

Vinea hissed.

He didn't press the attack. He used the moment. He twisted in mid-air and went into a fissure in the plane, the shadows taking him. Balmo, ever practical, darted past Idonea and went after him, vanishing into the void's edge.

The plain was quieter than it should've been.

Nellith stepped out of the shadow behind her. Her smile was calm.

"There you are," she said. Her voice cut through the after-storm chaos. "I knew you would find it, eventually."

The blood ran down her arms. She couldn't stop it. The magic within her hadn't finished rising.

"This ends now," she said.

Nellith tilted her head. "You think so?"

"He doesn't intend to leave me whole, mother."

Nellith stilled. A breath. The proud smile didn't slip, exactly, but it adjusted.

"He told you what you wanted to hear." Idonea pressed forward. "That I would survive what crossed through me. That I would be transformed, not consumed. He never meant it. He agreed to it because the agreement kept you working. He's done this before. To the witch in the village. To whoever was building before her. He uses women who think they are partners. You are the last in a long row, mother, and he hasn't told you that either."

Nellith's mouth opened, then closed. For the first time, Nellith looked uncertain.

"Don't." Her voice was sharp now. "Don't speak to me of what he has told me."

The shadows at her fingertips flickered. They didn't weaken; they hardened. Her body had decided what her mouth hadn't yet caught up to.

Shadows erupted from her fingertips. They struck the ground around Idonea, carving trenches through the stone.

Idonea staggered but held her ground. The magic in her arms had a weight now it hadn't had before.

"You could stand beside me," Nellith said. The surrounding shadows swelled. "Finish opening that relic. You feel the power waiting, don't you?"

Lightning cracked overhead.

She stood in a quiet field. Sunlight warmed her face. She blinked.

Nellith stood a few steps away, dressed not in shadows but in the simple dress Idonea remembered from childhood.

Nellith smiled gently. A genuine smile. The one she'd worn when Idonea was afraid.

"Do you remember this?" she asked.

The garden of their home in Draugaros. Where Nellith had once taught her how to shape the Current.

"You were so afraid at first," Nellith said, drifting towards her. "And now look at you."

Nellith reached out, brushed a strand of hair from Idonea's face with gentle fingers.

"You've become extraordinary."

Tears rose unbidden. "This isn't real," she whispered.

Nellith's eyes softened. "Of course it's real. I am your mother."