Treason: Book Two of the Grimoire Saga (a Young Adult Fantasy series) (2 page)

Kara’s foot hooked on the root anyway.

She shot forward and skidded along the dirt path, shifting the satchel onto her back as she fell so that Flick wouldn’t get hurt. He barked in gratitude.

Sticks left gouges in Kara’s arms. Her cheek stung. She wiped her hand over her face, but that just made the stinging worse. Blood stained her fingers when she pulled them away.

A sword glinted in Kara’s peripheral vision. She sprung to her feet. Braeden stood a short way off, without a scratch on him. He grinned.

“Falling was an interesting choice,” he said.

“Cute.” Kara rolled her eyes and brushed dust off her clothes.

“We’re not done yet, so don’t get comfortable.”

He lunged. Light glinted off the blade as it missed Kara’s head by inches. She ducked and rolled beneath a nearby tree, losing a few strands of her hair to Braeden’s sword as he swung again for her neck.

Flick stirred in her satchel at the sudden movement, chirping his disdain that she was moving too much. Honestly, she couldn’t figure out why he stayed with her during these matches, but she was grateful for it nonetheless. She didn’t want to let the little guy out of her sight.

She glared at Braeden and focused her energy into her hands. Pearl blue light congealed over her fingers until it formed the shape of a sword. This technique had taken her hours to manifest and still longer to control, which was unnatural for her; she had gotten used to picking up magic quickly. The light blinded opponents and made her attacks stronger, which she always needed. She had about as much muscle as a plank of wood.

She gripped her sword even as it pulled its energy from her. The drain was a slow one, and she should be fine for this sparring match. This was supposed to be practice and all, but Braeden’s attack had been too close.
Way
too close.

“I don’t need bangs, Braeden!”

He laughed, and she used the moment to roll farther out of his reach. She was really getting the hang of rolling now that she had adrenaline and a small success under her belt.

“Tuck your head more when you roll!” he called.

She stood and chuckled. “Yes, sensei.”

He raised his hand without answering, even though Kara was pretty sure he didn’t know what a sensei was. A wind shot through the trees, rustling Kara’s hair on its way to Braeden’s palm.

Crap.
He was summoning blades from the air again.

Light bent around the air gathered in his hand as he aimed for Kara’s face. She ducked, the blade of air missing her head by inches. It landed with a
thunk
in the tree next to her and dissolved, leaving behind only a pale scratch in the bark.

“Hey!” she snapped.

“No one is going to be generous in a fight, Kara. Pay attention.”

The prince twirled his sword and ignited a gray fire in his hand. The flames burned and crackled, hovering above his palm as he poised for his next strike.

Who is he kidding?
Of course he was going easy on her. He could heal instantly and change his appearance at will. This wasn’t even his natural form. Braeden could have ended this sparring match the second it started.

A smile played on his lips, curling into a smirk as he shifted his weight and crouched. Kara’s heart fluttered, both from excitement and fear. He had spent his life training to fight, and she’d only found the hidden world of Ourea, with its magic and demons, a few months ago. Summer was bleeding into autumn, and she only had the barest understanding of how she was even still alive at this point.

“Pay attention!”

Braeden’s sharp command pulled her out of her daydream. She blinked. He was a good ten feet closer now and gaining ground at a full run.

She leaned backward just in time. His sword cut the air in front of her face. A burst of wind blew her hair out of her eyes. The gray flame in his hand sputtered and grew as he prepared for the follow-up attack.

Kara did
not
want to heal another burn wound.

Her lip twitched. She needed to harness all her energy for this, so she mentally broke her tie to the blue sword in her hand—it dissolved with a shimmer of light like a mirage. Heat pooled in her fingers. Sweat tickled her wrist. Weight settled into her shoulders, and she took a deep breath as she flexed her still-new ability to control magic.

When she wasn’t sparring or exploring the village, Kara had studied. The Grimoire, with all its lessons and articles on magic, had told her about a new technique, one even the first Vagabond hadn’t mastered in his time a thousand years ago: a red spark that could either heal or destroy, depending on its creator’s intentions. In a heartbeat, the spark could heal someone on the brink of death or disarm nearly any opponent. It could sometimes even kill, depending on how much emotion the creator employed. Kara had only ever been able to create a single
snap
as the red spark blinked in and out of her palm, but maybe a rush of adrenaline was all she’d really ever needed.

Heat bubbled through her arms and neck as she focused. Time slowed. The world dimmed around her as she stole light from the very air, focusing it in her palm. Red sparks crackled between her fingers. She grinned—

—and a wall of gray flame barreled toward her.

She cursed and ducked out of the way, her red sparks fizzling out with a
pop
.

Braeden groaned. “Don’t try new techniques in the middle of a fight, Kara. You know that! It requires focus you should be directing toward your opponent!”

“I almost had it!”

“Hardly! You’re on fire.”

A trail of smoke wafted across Kara’s face, carrying with it a scent of charred thread that burned her throat. She coughed and glanced down. Sure enough, orange embers glowed on the edges of her sleeve. She rubbed them out, her palm searing as it grazed the burning fabric, but she let out a relieved sigh as the last of the ash fell to the ground. At least, that was until Braeden raised his palm and aimed another gray flame at her head.

Okay, time for plan B.

The wood’s energy pulsed through her veins, beating as a pulse separate from her own. Time slowed once more as she focused. Dirt shifted beneath her boots. Just as Braeden’s second wall of flame roared to life, creeping toward her at half-speed, she raised her hands and pulled with her the top layer of dirt.

The ground rumbled. Dirt blotted out the sky. The fire dissolved mid-air, and Braeden disappeared in the dust and crumbling soil. Kara coughed and covered her mouth to keep the dust from her lungs.

As the sun began to flit through the falling dirt, illuminating the layers of mud on her clothes, Kara stepped back into the forest; that way, she could catch sight of him first when the dirt settled.

She slipped behind a tree and crouched. Flick stretched in the satchel, making the strap slip a little over her shoulder. She corrected it as the dirt cloud dissolved.

The clearing was empty.

“Nice try.” A hot breath rolled along her neck, leaving goose bumps in its wake.

Kara turned a second before Braeden backed her into the tree she had only seconds before used as cover. He raised the sword to her neck, but kept his distance. It was a signal for her to forfeit, not a threat, so the sword never touched her throat.

No way would she give in that easily.

She reached into her satchel, brushing Flick’s forehead. They’d only had marginal success with teleportation, and they hadn’t yet worked out how to control it. Flick had only been able to teleport them once—when Carden had nearly ordered Braeden to kill her. Panic and necessity had fueled the teleportation then; maybe it could work again now. This was as good a time as any to try.

Braeden grinned, and she visualized standing behind him. Flick chirped—a short quip of a sound that made her smirk. This match wasn’t over yet.

A
crack
broke the air. In the blink of an eye, she stood behind the prince who previously had her cornered. He turned. His grin dissolved.

Kara pushed him back into the tree with one hand and summoned her pearl blue sword once more. She raised the blade to his throat, just as he had done to her moments before. She focused on the wind as it tore through the trees and borrowed a bit of it, drawing it into her palm to create a second blade of air sharp enough to slice skin. She held this just over his heart.

“Cheater,” he said, grinning.

“I prefer the term ‘resourceful twit.’”

“I’ll use that from now on, then.”

“So do I win?”

He just laughed. She would take that as a yes.

Kara stepped back and released the second blade of air in her palm, which hissed as it dissolved. Braeden stood and brushed the pearl blue sword aside with an ease that could only mean he’d let her push him back into the tree.

She huffed. “One minute, you’re giving me a haircut for not paying attention, and the next, you let me win? You’re the worst tutor ever.”

“I was genuinely caught off guard. That was a good move, using Flick. I hadn’t known you’d been working on it.”

“I haven’t.”

He groaned. “Dang it, Kara! You don’t listen to anything I say, do you?”

“I listened to the bit about tucking my head in when I roll. Doesn’t that count?”

He rubbed his temples. “Well, using Flick was still quick thinking, and that’s what I really wanted to work on today. I think we’re done with sparring.”

Kara resisted the impulse to dance for joy. “I mean, if you’re sure…”

Braeden shook his head. “You’re so transparent. So what was that red sparking technique you tried back there?”

She shrugged. “Something I found in the Grimoire. It’s supposed to be a versatile technique, one that can either heal or disarm, but not even the first Vagabond mastered it.”

Braeden took a deep breath and shook his head. “So you decide to try it when I’m about to shoot fire at your face?”

Kara laughed. “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

“Well, stop doing that. Work more on teleporting with Flick before we leave and don’t try that red sparking technique in a fight until you have a better grip on that, too.”

She chuckled and bowed with a flourish. “As you wish, oh great master.”

He smiled and stepped closer as she stood upright. Her heart did that fluttering thing again. Her breath caught in her throat, which made him grin even wider.

“We only have a day left in the village, Kara. We have to go back to the real world tomorrow and—”

“‘Real world’ is a relative term,” she interrupted, the butterflies in her stomach making her lips move on their own.

Braeden just laughed. “You know what I mean. Before we go, I’d like to discuss our—um—
moment
from when we first got here. You’ve been skillfully avoiding that.”

“By moment, you mean kiss.” It wasn’t a question.

He nodded and closed the final few inches of space between them. She should have stepped back, really, but he smelled like oak and spices. His cologne melted her feet into the ground. All she wanted to do was lean into him and close her eyes, but she took a deep breath instead.

“We’ve been over this, Braeden. This—us—it won’t work. I’m going to get you killed. That’s what happens if vagabonds care about someone. They die.”

“Kara, I’ve lived a lie for the past twelve years. I’ll lie to everyone until they figure me out, and then I’ll probably be killed for disloyalty anyway. I accepted a while ago that death is coming sooner for me than most. It doesn’t mean much to me.”

“It should.”

“There’s something more you’re not telling me, Kara.”

“No, there isn’t.”

“You’re a terrible liar.”

“I’m a fine liar.”

“You really aren’t.”

She grumbled. “Leave this alone, Braeden.”

“Why won’t you give me a real answer?”

“Braeden, stop—”

“No! Not until I get a real—”

“The people I love die!” she snapped.

He stepped back, his eyes narrowing.

But Kara couldn’t stop. “When I care about someone, they die! I killed Mom when I tried to get her to a hospital. I killed Dad when I was trying to keep him safe. I don’t even have a picture of either of them, Braeden! I have nothing to remember them by. That’s just what happens to the people I care about! They die and disappear without a trace. I can’t lose you, too!”

His eyes softened. Regret panged in Kara’s stomach. Her cheeks flushed. She wanted to hit her head against a tree trunk and vomit at the same time.

Did I really say all that out loud?

Braeden grinned. “So you
do
want me!”

“You’re so frustrating!”

Kara turned on her heel and plodded into the forest, leaving Braeden at the edges of the clearing. He didn’t stop her.

How stupid. Love was too strong a word at this point, but yes—she wanted him. She wasn’t supposed to let him know that she’d enjoyed every second of the kiss or that she’d thought about it daily and wanted more.

But the Vagabond had ruined the kiss entirely. While she had closed her eyes and savored the tingling trace Braeden’s lips left behind, the first Vagabond had manipulated her mind. He’d forced her to relive the bloody image of his own lover’s corpse. He’d elicited the memory of Helen’s death to remind Kara of what happened to those the vagabonds love: they die.

The first Vagabond later told Kara to push Braeden away if she cared. She was a vagabond now, and that meant being lonely.

“Are you all right, Kara?”

The deep voice pulled her from her thoughts. She looked up to see the Vagabond’s ghost standing on the dead leaves nearby, his face shrouded in the darkness beneath his hood.

She gasped and gritted her teeth, closing her eyes until her heart settled.

“Don’t surprise me like that, Vagabond.”

“I apologize,” he said.

She looked him over once more. The trailing edges of his cloak drifted on the breeze, transparent enough to show the dirt and dead leaves littering the ground behind him. Though she couldn’t see his face, she knew what he looked like: tanned and blond, with gray eyes and a long scar on his cheek. That scar was a constant reminder of the lover he’d lost to his cause.

“You did not handle that well,” he said.