Illusion: Book Four of the Grimoire Saga (33 page)

Pleasure ripped through Kara at seeing her enemy in pain. She smiled.

Calm.

Her smile faded. She listened again for the crackling thunder of the sparks racing across her skin. It hummed, ready for her next attack.

She aimed her fingers for Deidre’s chest. Sparks arced through the air and struck her in the abdomen. Deidre screamed and stumbled backward. She fell but rolled and pushed herself to her feet. The isen narrowed her eyes, glaring, but she flinched. She held a hand to her stomach.

Kara shot another burst of sparks toward Deidre. The woman rolled out of the way. Sparks bounced off the stone floor. Deidre summoned a beam of light into her hand—the same she’d used in Carden’s study.

Fear pulsed in Kara’s stomach. A whisper of the remembered agony swept through her. Her shoulder ached with the memory. Her glow brightened. Flares of energy bubbled along her arms, lashing at the air in a frenzy.

Peace.

Kara tensed, latching onto her focus. Only the present moment existed. The fear withdrew, however slightly. The flares receded.

Deidre loosed the beam of light. Kara stepped to the left. It sailed by her head. The crash of falling stones rumbled behind her.

Deidre threw two more within seconds of each other. Kara dodged one. The other struck her bicep. An all-too-familiar anguish ripped through her body and into her neck. She cursed and fell to one knee, her arm tight to her body. Deidre laughed, but the chuckle faded.

The pain receded. Kara examined the wound. Green light swarmed the area. Her blood pooled, clotting in seconds. The hole shrank. She clenched her fingers to test how the wound healed. They obeyed without issue.

A smile crept across her lips, but she suppressed the glee.

In a flash, Deidre dove for her sword and stood, blade in hand. She lunged. Kara listened to her body, letting it duck and weave out of the way. The green flares of energy swarmed around her. She tried directing them toward Deidre, but they rarely listened. One twitched in the direction she wanted it to go, but it didn’t follow through.

A flare broke free and sailed toward Deidre’s head. The woman’s eyes went wide. She twisted aside. A clump of her hair remained in the line of fire. It dissolved into ash on contact with the light.

She cursed and backed away.

A sinister joy built in Kara’s throat like a howl waiting to be released. Yet again, she pushed it aside. Yet again, it barely obeyed. The pause allowed Deidre to back up farther, but it was more important for Kara to remain calm.

Another flare of Kara’s energy bubbled out toward Deidre. It missed her and dissolved into the air.

Deidre summoned lightning and shot it toward Kara. It hit. Kara cursed. Her stomach burned. The hair on her arms stood on end. She faltered, stumbling. The energy should have blocked the attack—it couldn’t possibly hit her. Deidre shot another stream of lightning into Kara’s chest. It, too, hit. A third bolt struck her in the head. Kara screamed, splinters of pain fracturing through her mind.

Anger boiled in her gut, sweeping aside the veil of calm she’d maintained thus far.

Three flares of light burst from her, sailing toward Deidre. The woman ducked two of them, but the third brushed her arm. She shrieked and fell. A gaping hole in her arm bled onto her shirt. She clutched it, brows furrowed in pain.

Hatred pushed on the edges of Kara’s mind. She’d fought it back as much as she could. Her control slipped. A wave of loathing bubbled through her gut. In seconds, she stood over her enemy. She reached for Deidre’s neck, hands clamping around it with strength Kara had never before experienced.

Deidre choked, voice cut off as Kara strangled her.

“Why are you this way?” Kara seethed.

You can find out,
the first Vagabond said.

Right. Thanks to her connection with the first Vagabond, Kara had one weapon she’d almost forgotten amid all this chaos—her ability to see a person’s most influential memory. Perhaps she could use the knowledge to distract Deidre long enough to end her.

Deidre scratched at Kara’s face. One nail drew blood above Kara’s eyebrow.

Kara tightened her grip. “What made you the creature you are, woman?”

The room stilled. No one spoke. Time slowed. Deidre quieted in Kara’s grip, and Kara’s muscles tensed such that she couldn’t move, either. The floor splintered, the stone breaking into slivers of white light that wriggled into the air. The walls, the stairwell—everything dissolved into patches of white streaks. Kara’s vagabond gift took over, stealing her away as she dove into Deidre’s mind.

Kara would finally know what drove this woman to madness. And then, this woman would finally die.

Braeden hesitated at the bottom of the staircase as the two women fought above him. Flick still sat on his shoulder. Kara’s pet trembled, ears pinned back as he cuddled Braeden’s neck.

The women yelled. Glass shattered. The stone walls of his castle shook with the force of their battle. He gritted his teeth. How useless, to stand at the bottom of a staircase while a war raged in every direction. He couldn’t go upstairs for fear of setting Kara off or distracting her from the fight of her life. But he should do something. This might have even been a good time to run to the throne room and retrieve the banner. End the war while she occupied Deidre.

He shifted his weight, ready to order Flick to teleport them away, but he paused.

He’d almost lost Kara once today. She’d saved him so many times, gave beauty to his life, gave him meaning. Now, she was in a life-or-death battle with the woman who nearly killed her once today. The battle could end any second. If Deidre got the upper hand at any point—if his presence could somehow mean saving Kara from death a second time—he couldn’t leave.

With a groan, he leaned against the wall and rubbed his eyes, ears tuned to the scuffle above him. He’d save his people, but first, he’d do whatever he could to protect his woman.

A muffled boom shook the air, evidence of the lives lost outside. Whether or not he’d made the right choice, he would stick with it. He couldn’t live with anything less. If something happened to Kara while he raced off, he’d never forgive himself.

As the minutes wore on, he did all he could do: listen and repeat the same, silent wish:

Please let her survive.

White slivers of light wove together, bringing to life Deidre’s most influential memory as they rebuilt whatever moment in time formed the woman Deidre was today. A window appeared. The corners of a room boxed Kara in. Beams of light curved into a portly man’s stomach and braided themselves into the hair of a middle-aged woman. Bit by bit, the moment that shaped Deidre’s future bled into view.

Kara couldn’t wait for this one. She wished she could fast forward. Though she rarely wanted to see these memories—she invaded the privacy of those who suffered her gift—she had to know what made this woman so evil.

I’ve missed you, Bear,
a man’s voice said in her ear.

If she’d been in her body, Kara’s throat would have tightened. She knew that voice.

Dad.

Kara had invaded Deidre’s mind, and she’d found her father.

The white wisps of the memory darted every which way, dissolving the scene. As the world unraveled, a shiver chased up Kara’s spine. Ice spread along her fingers like frost. The white light spun, faster and faster until it became a steady glow. It wouldn’t fade. She cringed, eyes burning with the brightness, but she’d retreated into Deidre’s mind completely. There were no eyelids to block out the light, no body to wrestle into submission.

Dad!
she screamed, not even sure if he could hear her.

Kara, please,
a voice said. A different voice. The first Vagabond.

Not now, Vagabond. I need to find Dad!

No, you need to control yourself!

A white hot pain shot through her mind. She cringed. The agony ripped through her, shredding her as if it had claws. She wanted to scream, but nothing came out. Another fiery pain shot through her, and another. Pulses of white flashed, keeping time with every shot of agony that tore through her mind. Deidre was putting up one hell of a fight.

Dad!
she screamed again.

She had to find him. She had to apologize, to make things right, to make sure he was okay.

A tendril of green light snaked past, smearing her vision with a white streak as it rushed her. Deep within her core, something snapped. The jolt broke through her defenses. Her grip on the magic pummeling through her loosened. A burst of green shattered the darkness. Another followed. Over and over again, green light tore through her vision, blinding her as she fought to find her father. A scream built in her throat. In the darkness of Deidre’s mind, Kara sensed her fingers shaking. Her abdomen tightened. Her back arched.

Bit by bit, she returned to her body.

A searing pain tore through her mind, ripping apart the last threads of her control. White burned along her vision. Splinters of agony shattered her from the inside out.

She screamed, and a force like a bomb hit her in the chest. Her world went dark.

Kara whimpered. Her body ached. She set her hand on the floor, but her elbow buckled under even that much weight. Her body twisted, and she fell shoulder-first onto the stone surface.

Bit by bit, her senses returned. Wind sailed past, ruffling through her hair. Cold. It carried the chill of snow. Smoke blended with each breath, charring her nose. She coughed. Her throat stung.

She opened her eyes. Nothing but blurs. Her fingers pressed into her eye lids, body moving in part out of instinct rather than on her command. She shook her head, trying to get her bearings.

Dad.

Hope burned in Kara’s throat as tears stung her eyes. Dad. He’d said hello and then gone silent. He was still trapped in that devil woman, that—

Deidre.

She bolted upright. Her head swam, and she set her palms on the stone to let it settle.

The memory. The fear. Fighting to escape.

A gust of wind blew by. Her hair snapped against her cheeks, stinging her with its force. She covered her face with her arm and peeked around it. Two of the ballroom’s walls were gone, exposing the night beyond. Mountains crowded the horizon, gray silhouettes on a dark sky. A black forest canopy filled the space between like a sea of dark leaves. Rubble lined the ballroom floor. Shards of glass lay beneath every window, the remaining panes littered with cracks. Lingering glass jutted like spears in the window pane, waiting for a victim to touch them and bleed.