Chapter 24: Rose Quartz Flesh

Note: Thanks to B0b and WRC 264 for beta reading this!

Aingeal

Princess Ava collapsed nearby. She gasped, shaking her rosy head. Quartz glittered across her pink skin, breaking me out of my stupor. The sight of the darkness had arrested me. Spirits of transformation bobbed in and out of the shadows, visible only to me. The inky thing attacking my family was a human witch. It had lashed the local spirits to its will through magical incantations. The spirits modified the shadows, inhabiting them, using them to make a fusion, combining the two different arts to form a lethal attack.

Sven retreated back. His sword blurred, but how much longer could my husband defend himself. I couldn’t sit here useless. I had to act. My back muscles flexed and...

Right, no wings.

I stood on my legs and reached out with my senses. Human witches had to bend and force the spirits, chaining them with knowledge. But the primal forces of the universe loved faeries and those with our blood. They surged towards me. Bright orange evocation spirits danced around my hand as I pointed at the shadows.

A lance of purple energy fired from me, a conduit through which the evocation spirits hurtled towards the shadowy form. The inky darkness rippled. Abjuration spirits surged to the forefront of the shadows, forming a shield of night.

“You think that paltry defense will save you?” I asked, advancing on him. I passed Zanyia rolling on the ground with the other catgirl. “You think I can’t batter down that little shield. I am faerie, mortal. You play with my powers.”

More and more evocation spirits surged down at me, powering my attack. They hammered into the inky shield. Abjuration spirits bust out of the darkness, sent spinning away by the blows of my attacks. Its shield shrank a little more. Sven recovered, charging in to attack.

I grinned my triumph. Sven’s sword would take the mortal in the body and—

A spitting yowl screeched to my right. Movement flashed. The black-haired lamia crashed into me. I gasped, her claws digging into my flesh. Pain burned up my collar bone to my throat. I spun around, her impact sending me off-balanced.

“No!” she hissed as we crashed onto my back.

Air wheezed out of my mouth. Her weight crushed my chest. My head cracked into the hard-packed ground and ... My brain rattled. Fog spilled over my thought as ... As...

Claws touched my throat.

Fear banished the fog as sharp pain tore into my throat. The lamia’s golden eyes filled my vision as she purred in pleasure. Blood spurted around her finger. My life spilled out of me.

Princess Ava

I gained my feet, shaking my head. I whirled around to see Sven charging in at the darkness. A beam of purple light slammed into it from Aingeal only to cut off as the faerie screamed out in alarm. The enemy lamia landed on her, dropping her to the ground.

The shadows rippled. Fear clutched at my real heart. I felt it so distantly, fluttering in my chest. Terror crystallized realization in my mind. The enemy would bring to bear all its deadly might on my betrothed. Sven closed the distance. He would be cut down.

I didn’t think.

I charged forward. The shadow lances stabbed at Sven. His boots dug into the pine-needle strewn ground. He slashed and swiped his sword, driving back the first attacks, but more hurtled at him, seeking to find his flesh. To kill him.

“No!” I screeched in fight and threw myself forward.

I flew between them. The thrusting shadows slammed into my stony body. The sharp points slammed into the rose quartz. Cracks snapped through my nonliving form. Bursts of sparkling chips exploded from where the attacks landed. I felt a shock through my soul, a tearing of the power animating the statue.

“Ava!” Sven shouted.

I hit the ground. The cracks spread. The impact twisted my body. The damaged crystals tried to move like a real body, twisting and bending like flexible skin. But where the statue was hit had reverted to hard unyielding quartz.

The cracks spread. I screamed as my body shattered and—

My eyes snapped open. I threw back my head, my entire body thrashing in my saddle. My mare neighed in fright. A thousand crystals stabbed into my mind. I clutched my head, my thoughts slashed to bloody ribbons. I leaned over my horse.

My stomach rebelled.

Bile burned down my throat. My breakfast spilled from my mouth in a vile stream that splattered the skirt of my dress. My bedmaid, Greta, screeched in alarm. She called my name as my stomach heaved again and again.

I hoped it was enough. I hoped I saved Sven. The attack destroyed my proxy. It thrust my soul violently back into my body. I clutched my pounding head, tears streaming down my face as I shook.

Sven Falk

Ava shattered at my feet. Her crystalline arm stuck me in the shin. I grunted, stumbling. A shadowed lance, half deflected by her quartz body, struck my sword. As I struggled to keep my balance, my grip had loosened. My short sword flew from my hand, tumbling through the air.

“Las’s putrid and disgusting cum!” I howled, jarring pain flaring up my leg. I collapsed amid the ruin of Ava’s proxy. Half her face came to rest before me, capturing the fierce love that compelled her to thrust herself in front of me.

Shadows stabbed.

I twisted to the side and—

Pain exploded in my left shoulder. My collarbone snapped as the lance penetrated my flesh and drove me back onto the ground. I screamed out in agony. It overwhelmed my senses. I thrashed on the ground as it twisted inside of me, an icicle shoved through my body, grinding against my shattered collarbone. Fire burned through my veins, attacking my mind.

Darkness washed across my vision.

The shadowy form loomed over me.

Zanyia

I lay on the ground, panting. Hithina had abandoned me. My left arm beat with agony. I wanted to gnaw it off. Tears burned my eyes as convulsions wracked my body. The poison rotted away my flesh. It smelled worse and worse.

Master’s scream of agony cut through the pain. My senses came alive again. He needed me. My Master needed his slave. I could hear it in the pain. In the suffering. Keythivak had injured him. That damn assassin would kill my Master.

Sven freed me from Therek. He rescued me from pain and suffering. That memory of Sven fighting Therek in his tent burned in my memory. I would be forever grateful to him. Even if I didn’t love him—and I loved him with all my being—I would die for him.

I sprang at the sound of screaming. I hurtled through the air, my tail adjusting my balance in flight, twisting my body, angling me at the sound of pain. I couldn’t see, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t give my life for my Master and—