The wards have to go up. “You both have to live. Promise me you’ll choose to live.”
Because I’m starting to realize the price of imbuing this wardstone in time to save everyone I love, and it’s my life. My power feels so insignificant to a stone this size. It would take all of Tairn’s power—his very life—and I won’t give that. But I can give enough that the riders who make it can finish the job.
I fall to my knees, but I don’t lose contact. I pour and pour, opening my Archives door and taking on the full force of Tairn’s power, shaking with the effort to keep it controlled, focused, constructive instead of violent.
“Violet?” Brennan’s voice sounds from far away.
Heat surges through me in waves as I push power into the stone, and my world narrows to pain, heat, and my racing heartbeat.
“Violet!” Mom rushes to me, her eyes wide with fear as she reaches for my free hand, then gasps, drawing back a red, blistered palm.
The ground rises toward my face, and I throw that hand out to catch myself against the stone floor and keep channeling. So what if my skin sizzles, my fingers redden, my muscles give out, and I surrender to the fire? Nothing matters beyond imbuing this stone, raising the wards that will save my friends, my siblings, Xaden.
“What’s your signet?” Mom shouts, but I lack the strength to lift my head.
“You can’t do this,” Andarna argues in a shriek.
“You have your purpose.” Even my mental voice is a whisper. “Maybe this is mine.”
“Hasn’t manifested,” Aaric answers in a panic.
“What about the others out there?” Mom’s voice rises.
He starts to answer the ones he knows of, and I tune him out to stay focused on control, on lasting long enough to be the most use.
Brennan hits the ground to my left, crouching a few feet away, his lips moving, but I close my eyes and reach for more of the power that’s slowly killing me.
“You will cease!” Tairn orders.
“I’m so sorry.” The muscles in my arm lock from exhaustion. Finally. Now I won’t have to hold it in place. I’m entering the final stages of burnout, just like I had on top of the mountain with Varrish. “You shouldn’t have to lose two riders this way.”
Forcing my eyes open, I stare at the pattern of rock beneath my fingers, and I get it. I finally understand why someone would turn to stealing magic. All of the power in the world is beneath my fingertips, and if I channel, if I take from the earth instead of from Tairn, I’ll have enough power to save—
“You must save yourself,” Tairn demands. “I chose you not as my next, but as my last, and should you fall, then I will follow.”
“No.” Steam rises from my skin.
“Let go,” Andarna pleads, and the rush of air in the chamber paired with the slight tremble of the ground tells me she’s landed.
“I won’t do it!” Sloane’s shout echoes off the walls and breaks through the haze.
Inch by painful inch, I force myself to raise my head, just in time to see Brennan’s eyes widen and Mom’s boot rising toward my shoulder. She makes impact softly, and before I can open my mouth, she kicks with her full strength, sending me sprawling across the chamber floor and breaking my hold on the wardstone.
Power flies into the air with the crack of lightning as I hit my back, and a scream tears from my throat, the sound echoed by Brennan as his face fills my vision and he grasps my hand. Cool relief streaks up my arm, the burn fading, my muscles mending from the strain and releasing.
If I don’t cut the power, he’ll die. He can’t mend me that fast over and over, and the next wave of heat pushes forward—
I shove the Archives door closed with the last of my mental strength, and the power cuts off. The relief from Tairn and Andarna is instant, but all I taste is the sour bite of defeat as I lie there, my brother kneeling next to me as he mends the body I’ve been so reckless with.
And above me, I see a flash of green before the swarm comes into view, the sky darkening with beating gray wings.
“It’s the only way,” Mom yells, and I turn my head as my muscles knit and my skin cools. “You can’t imbue something this big in an instant. Not without hundreds of riders, which we don’t have. If you want to save your friends, you’ll do this!” she shouts at Sloane, her fingers wrapped around the first-year’s wrist as she drags her to the wardstone.
“Mom?” I croak, but she doesn’t answer.
“You’re a Mairi,” Mom says to Sloane.
“Yes.” Her bright blue eyes meet mine, wide with uncertainty.
“I killed your mother.” Mom taps on her chest.
“Mom!” I shout.
Brennan collapses next to me, pale and sweating, and I haul myself to my knees.
“I tracked her down and hauled her to her own execution, remember?” Mom says to Sloane, pushing her against the stone. “You were there. I made you watch. You and your brother.”
“Liam,” Sloane whispers.
Mom nods, picking up Sloane’s left hand and putting it on the lowest circle of the massive rune carved into the stone. “I could have stopped his death, too, if I’d just paid a little more attention last year to what my own aide was doing.”
“No!” I shout, lunging forward. Aaric runs in from the side of the ward chamber, not only catching me but stopping me. “Let me go!”
“I can’t,” he says apologetically. “She’s right. And if I have to choose between her life and yours, I choose yours.”
My life or…hers?
“Andarna!” I scream.
