A white blast hurtled at me.
The bolt met my fire. Flames plumed around me. Rather than frying under the heat of the lightning, I pummeled into the floor, burning a pothole into the foundation. The concrete liquefied. I sank deeper until the force of the blast was gone. My hands clawed their way back up the hole and then I was barreling toward the woman.
The scene around me, our burning house, the woods outside, all blended into obscurity. All I could see was the woman who killed my mother. I leapt into the air. Her hands glowed, conjuring another bolt of lightning.
A blazing light reflected into my eyes off her breastplate. For an instant, I was faced with the burning image of myself. An orb of fire encircled me like an explosion inside a sphere of glass.
Bronwyn rolled backward, escaping the flames as I fell. She swung her arm and snow gathered in front of her, solidifying into an ice wall.
The wall steamed into the air on contact.
She threw both hands outward and a frigid gale rushed to form an ice shield.
I burned into the ice squall, shoving toward her with each step.
“You killed her!” I screamed.
I thought of Mama’s face, and a white-hot pain overtook my senses. Fire flared outward in an amber flash, sucking the oxygen from the air, and tearing the leaves from the trees.
She flew backward from the burst, her armored legs scorched black. Her scream cut through the noise of battle. She hit the ground and scrambled back—just as I crouched to lunge.
“Bronwyn!” The redheaded man screamed and charged me from the side, abandoning a pile of Forged falling to ash. The air around him crackled with electricity. His glowing hands thrust outward.
A bolt of lightning three feet across thundered toward my chest.
I crossed my forearms in a panicked block. The liquid flames around me concentrated into a center shield, swelling out into a stream. The blows collided midair and the ground blackened beneath the meeting of the elements.
An instant later, the flames I forced into a stream propelled back. An electrical firestorm hurtled into me.
My shoulders braced.
I skidded across the dirt into the garden, right through the juniper bushes I always hated. My legs locked. The shrubs tore into the air after being sizzled in half. Hunks of clay liquefied and sprayed at my back. I dug my heels down and slowed. I muscled my arms forward against the blast. I lunged deeper to keep my foothold in the dirt, but the fireball advanced with each passing second. I poured more power into the stream, keeping it at bay, but the force was too great.
Tears rimmed my eyes. I had to draw more power.
My skills with fire magic had been lazy and uncontrolled, but I knew it was fueled by my emotions. I thought of my mother. That she was gone.
A boiling heat rolled off my body. The horrific image of her as I crawled to her side replayed in my mind. Rage. Unyielding and uncontrollable, it seethed from me.
The flames around me darkened, the deep hues weaved through the fire.
The blast soared toward the man.
“Lukas!” Bronwyn cried.
He dropped his guard and rolled across the ground to her.
The blast hurtled into the grass where he once stood and shook the earth as it formed a fiery crater.
They clasped hands. A blinding white light flashed out around them with a hiss, and then collapsed in on itself. When the light faded, they were gone.
I stood staring where they once were. My flames diminished. My body shook with sudden weakness. I looked back. Flames engulfed the house and roared into the night. Mama’s body burning with it.
I stumbled closer to the fire, but it bellowed kicking out flames. The heat burned my skin the nearer I got. A crash echoed out as the roof collapsed. Wood flew across the driveway. My heart beat wildly.
I can’t get to you, Mama.
Tears streamed down my chin. A heaviness set in on my muscles. I gave into exhaustion and fell to my knees. All I could do was stare at the burning flames.
Chapter Three
Hunger Calls
Smoke billowed up from the falling timbers. The firelight played patterns of gold against the dark plumes. A thought broke through my numbness. Smoke. Neighbors would notice the smoke and call the fire department. The firefighters would be here soon. The police would come with the firefighters.
My tears blurred the scene of our burning home. To say a woman blew up my house with a light beam and I accidentally set it on fire—was insane. Even if I used my magic, I couldn’t smooth this over. I would be blamed for my mother’s death. I would be charged with murder.
Run. I had to run. But how could I even get away? My keys, wallet, and cell phone would burn to ash with Mama.
“No,” I said.
Giving into despair wasn’t an option. Grandpa Dalca raised me to be stronger. Mama hadn’t given up her life for me to huddle into a ball and cry. She’d even planned for this very moment. The box.
I willed my legs of lead off the ground, commanding my limbs to work. I ran around the heat of the flaming house and into the backyard. My fingers raked the dirt as I frantically threw clumps of grass out of my way. Clay wedged under my fingernails and rocks scraped my skin, but the fear of living behind bars was more painful.
Metal gleamed in the dirt.
I snatched it up, only to shriek and drop it. The corners of the wooden box were silver. Charmed markings were carved into the wood. I looked down to see the silver pattern burned into my skin. I whipped off my jacket, wrapped the box inside, and dashed into the woods. I ran hard, putting distance between the house and myself. My lungs burned. I tapped into my vampiric strength. My senses shot alive with the thrill of the speed and the fear of falling prey to the manhunt that might yet pursue me.
Everything that happened took mere minutes to occur. Darkness cloaked the trees around me. My eyes struggled against the eerie night. My ears tuned into the sounds of the forest. I stretched my senses farther—the faint sounds of sirens. My muscles burned as wind and branches rushed by.
A root caught my foot and I flew to the ground. The force of my run surged my body into a violent roll. I rag-dolled down a slope. The impact at the bottom of the hill drove the breath from my lungs. The crickets silenced. I peeled my eyelids open and my vampiric senses worked to adjust my eyes to the blackness. The shapes of the trees stood out clearer. The back of my neck and head were swollen, pulsing from the whiplash of the tumble. My body ached. The box. I felt for it along the ground and tightened my jacket around it.
I continued through the woods at a light jog. This time not sacrificing my vampiric agility for speed. My right leg throbbed. I touched my jeans. No blood. Movement helped with the pain, so I upped the pace. Had it been ten minutes yet? Surely the first responders were at my house now. If they picked up my trail they would have to follow on foot.
My run continued to the edge of our land, and I slipped under our neighbor’s wire fence. The neighbor’s woods were twenty acres. Then, there was a wildlife conservation and a hunting reserve. I made a pact with myself. I would keep running for at least another two hours. A craving for fresh blood flared with the exertion, but after all the bloodshed, I couldn’t will myself to hurt a rabbit or a raccoon.
My mind tuned out as I ran. I lost track of my sense of time. The pine needles were slowly painted white with moonlight, and I could feel the force of my familiar friend rising. If the moon was almost above me, I had been running for hours. I used my heightened sense of smell to try to avoid any directions which smelled like two-week-old garbage, the stench of bear. When I stopped to smell the air, a fresh gust hit me in the face. I fell over in a tangled mess on the dirt, and then crawled onto the smooth terrain underneath the canopy of a red pine. Only then, did I do the math.