“Says the girl in mine.”
He isn’t wrong, but the problem is, I don’t mean to be there. There’s this empty space I keep stepping into. A thread that’s always open, and without thinking, I tug on it and find my way to the other side.
A shock wave pummels across the beach, kicking up a wave of sand. The guards run for the cover of the tents as Wilder wraps me insomething.
“Aether.”
My eyes widen. “Aether wielders don’t exist in this realm.”
“I’m not from this realm.”He smirks, standing.
His hands open and his eyes close.
Aether wielders predate the old texts. None have been noted for millennia. Or so I thought. But as the air bristles and everything from my tongue to my toes prickles, I believe that’s what Wilder is. Aether isn’t a substance of any one realm. It ties them all together. It’s the pieces of all things. The very essence of what makes the plants, the trees, magic itself. It is everything, and yet, not well understood. It is light, space. Reimagining.
And destruction.
Wilder holds his palms to the sky, calm as can be. His hair stills like time itself has stopped moving. The runes peeking through the laces in his tunic glow.
Marks of the gods.
Maybe Greer was right. Not that he’s a god. If anything, Wilder strikes me as a Fae who would bring them to their knees. But something beyond this realm exists within him.
Something boundless.
My ears buzz as his magic trickles out, and I can’t tear my gaze away from the look on his face. It’s peaceful. Serene. Only broken by a dark smile that stretches like he’s laughing at the gods for giving him their power.
They had to have known what could come of it.
At last, the top of Wilder’s scar flares with a pinprick of light. It seeps beside his brow, over the ridge of his nose. A golden stream splits out in a fork at his cheekbone. Until it’s so bright—his magic burns so hot—it explodes.
The essence of the air around us crackles, and the shadowy onslaught sweeps back into itself, forcing the ravagers to take their physical form.
A form we can fight.
“You made them appear.” My eyes scan the beach, where ravagers step out of the darkness into creatures of flesh and bone.
Their teeth shine in the moonlight as their white eyes glow.
Wilder reaches for the sword at his hip, unsheathing it. The streams of his magic have condensed at his hands and forearms. Weaving around them like a second set of veins. Flowing with a surge as bright as lightning.
He glances at the dagger in my hand. “You should get back.”
“I’m not going anywhere until we find Greer.”
The beach swarms with guards as the battle breaks out. Four ravagers set their sights on Wilder, and when their lifeless eyessweep me, a chill runs my spine. I expect Wilder to argue or shove me away, but he snatches a spare dagger from his belt and hands me the blade instead.
His stare hardens. “No mercy. They will kill you.”
“Or worse.” I remember what Greer warned.
Wilder nods, turning to face the oncoming wave. “Only wounds to the throat will slow them down. That, or you need to take the head clean off. Heads or hearts. That’s all that kills them.”
I’m outmatched without my ability to wield my magic, but I’m not going to hide when failing means the ravagers will get past the camp and into the village.
To Millicent and Lune.
Wilder’s gaze meets mine, and what I find in his gaze is confusing. A whirlwind of emotions.