Twisted Soul (Cursed Legacies #3)

25. Maven

25

MAVEN

Few things in my not-life are as thrilling as the moments before a battle.

As we walk toward the outer ring of the Sanctuary, all of us dressed warmly, I check all the daggers on my person and try to tame my smile.

It’s no use.

Meanwhile, my quintet is not as thrilled.

“I understand this is exciting for you, but your eagerness to fling yourself into danger isn’t helping our nerves, ima sangfluir ,” Silas sighs.

It’s early in the morning as we stop in front of the second invisible magic door, but the endless deep twilight overhead remains just as it has since our arrival three days ago. The unsettling dimness reminds me of the Nether.

Outside the Sanctuary, enemies will be waiting for us. It’s inevitable because Parker let them know we’re here, and Douglas also probably tracked Silas’s transportation spell to Alaska. Since our enemies can’t get into the unbroachable, invisible Sanctuary, they’ll simply wait for us to emerge.

And since transportation spells, coming or going, don’t work within the Sanctuary, here we are. Ready to emerge.

For a fight.

I can’t fucking wait. I used to dread the death matches in Amadeus’s arena, but now I miss regular combat.

The Sanctuary acolytes were happy to see us go. Meanwhile, the Garnet Wizard couldn’t get out of bed because his curse was acting up, and he was somewhere in his early hundreds—but he sent Ross to see us off.

The caster is behind us, fidgeting nervously. “I could help fight if you would like. I would be useful, as I’m nearly a fourth-level acolyte.”

“Or you could fuck off, and Maven can stay in here while we take care of things,” Everett mutters.

He’s been broody this morning, but honestly? He’s got nothing on Baelfire, who has been worryingly quiet and downcast. He knows Crypt bound with me last night, leaving him the odd man out. Once we get away from here, I’ll give my poor, praise-loving dragon shifter some much-needed attention.

Then, we'll track down my next target.

I snort, replying to my testy elemental. “Nice try. I’m not staying.”

"It'll be brutal out there—a bloody massacre,” Ross warns, dread written all over his face.

"I already said I'm going. Don't try to sell me on it.”

Crypt laughs at that. He’s in a phenomenal mood this morning, and I’ve noticed his markings have been lighting up far less. I’ll ask my Nightmare Prince what that means later.

In the meantime, I’m enjoying how right it feels to be bound to him.

“Fine,” Everett grumbles. “Let’s just get this over with.”

“Unless you four want to stay in here,” I offer. “That way, if I lose control?—”

“Shut the fuck up. We’re sticking with you, and that’s final ,” Baelfire snarls savagely, not sounding like himself. Then he squeezes his eyes shut, rubbing his temples. “Holy shit. I’m so, so sorry, Mayflower. Mr. Alphahole Supreme is really on one today.”

“Keep your distance from Maven during the fight,” Silas advises.

“And mind your fucking tone with our girl before you become a lizard-flavored kebab.” Crypt pulls out his lighter, which morphs into a sword faster than I can keep up with.

I expect Baelfire to snap back, but he grumbles in agreement, not meeting my gaze.

Once again, he must be struggling more than he lets on.

Silas rolls his shoulders, his bleeding crystal in one hand as he approaches the door. He fed from me earlier this morning to fuel his magic for this fight. I may enjoy him feeding from me almost as much as he does, partly because it feels good but especially because of how worked up and out of control he gets.

“Are we ready?” the blood fae checks.

“Wait,” Ross says, facing me. “Do you have a phone? Because if there is ever a time you need assistance with anything at all, it would be the greatest honor of my life to assist?—”

He yelps when Baelfire drags him up by his collar to glare at him with searing amber eyes. “Are you seriously asking my mate for her fucking number right in front of me?”

“No, not at all! It’s nothing like that, I promise. I was only trying to?—”

“Scram before I roast your ass.”

He drops the gifted acolyte, who rubs his chest and grimaces at me. “Right. I’ll go. Please be safe, my lady—Maven, I mean.”

He hurries back to the inner circle of the Sanctuary as I turn to face the invisible door.

“Okay, let’s do this.”

With a collective breath to brace ourselves, we watch Silas magically unlock the outer ring. The moment we all step out of the temperate green sub-realm and into the bitter cold, chaos unleashes.

Hellhounds howl. Magic crackles to life in the hands of dozens of caster bounty hunters and hirelings who surround us. Others shift or take aim with their weapons, the clicking sound of guns rising as a chorus in the wintry wild filled with dozens of tents, proof they were camping here in wait. Dozens of red laser dots appear on me like tiny dancing lights from the guns.

Douglas is at the forefront and aims at the center of Crypt's forehead.

The moment his finger moves on the trigger, a thick shield of ice slams up into place in front of us. Deafening gunshots fill the air, their thunderous echoes reverberating over the stark wilderness around us–but the bullets imbed in the thick ice in front of us.

As soon as the first barrage ends, Everett drops the wall of ice and lifts his arm to send a wave of icy spikes toward the massive group of hunters. At the same time, Baelfire races forward to slam into a lion shifter charging toward us, Silas releases a blood magic spell that neutralizes several magic attacks flashing to life, and Crypt drops into Limbo to wreak total havoc.

They're working much more like a team now. I let myself feel proud for half a second before I roll out of the way of another gunshot and dart towards Douglas. He's probably the most capable opponent here, so it's best to take him out quickly this time.

Whipping Pierce out of his hiding spot, I feign a blow before going for his gut. He sidesteps, but instead of returning the attack, he rolls away and dashes toward an area of the now-raging fight where other bounty hunters are starting to tear into one another, courtesy of the Nightmare Prince.

Apparently, Douglas has a bone to pick with my incubus.

My senses prickle, and I jump aside just before a wave of fire sears a path in the spot where I was just standing. The fire elemental tries again, but a wave of snow, like a sideways avalanche, crashes into the fire to smother it and the elemental.

Thanks , I tell Everett through the bond as I throw myself into the fray. Does everyone remember the plan?

Leave no soul alive, Crypt supplies chipperly, still somewhere in Limbo.

No, you fucking sociopath, Silas retorts as he goes toe to toe with three casters at once. The plan is to escape quickly, even if we must leave the fight behind.

Meanwhile, you are supposed to avoid killing so you don’t go all revenant on us, Everett adds.

And Crypt? I prompt meaningfully.

He sighs through the bond. Yes, yes. I’m also babysitting our dragon.

I can't see Baelfire in the raucous fight anymore, but the fact that he hasn't shifted into a dragon to rain fire down tells me he's fighting to maintain control. As helpful as a dragon could be in a fight, I don’t want to lose him to his curse when we need to make a getaway.

I dodge one of the wolf shifters, vaguely aware of a stray bullet grazing my thigh. Rolling to one side, I slice through a fae bounty hunter’s Achilles tendons to cut off her brutal magical attack aimed at Baelfire. She falls with a cry before I finish her off quickly, purely out of habit.

I guess you can take the bitch out of the arena, but you can’t take the arena out of the bitch.

A delicious, intoxicating buzz starts to pump through my system.

Crypt laughs from wherever he is in Limbo. I saw that.

Oops .

As the fight intensifies, so does the twisted urge that always overshadows me as I make my way deeper into a battle. Though I'm supposed to be looking for a way to leave all of this behind, I kill another opponent in self-defense.

Then another.

And another.

Dark magic pulses through me, and that exhilarating nothingness starts to gain a foothold as I kick away another shifter. Death hangs thick in the air all around me, a tantalizing cadence of endings and screams that sinks into my very being as a smile grows on my face.

I’ve been fighting my entire life. Through all the broken bones, blood loss, and agony, the thrill of dancing with death became an integral part of me. I wipe someone else's blood off my face as the killing urge starts to pound through my muscles and head.

This is what I was made for.

And I want more.

More blood. More buzz. More .

Maven, Silas's voice warns.

Where is she? Everett demands.

I'm fine, I insist. I was just ? —

I cut off when, all at once, my senses go haywire, honing in on something nearby. A shadow fiend is quickly approaching.

No, not just some shadow fiend…one that makes my nerves itch.

Him. He found us.

I'm so distracted by the approaching terror that I don't see the attack in time. Douglas lands a brutal blow to the back of my head with the butt of his gun. The world goes topsy-turvy as I fall to the snow, hot moisture already dripping from somewhere on my throbbing head.

He takes aim to shoot my chest, but I snap back to my senses, roll sideways, and leap from the ground to take him down. Knocking the gun from his hands, I pin him.

Damn it—why does the wind carry the scent of your blood ? Silas demands through the bond, sounding strained. Far away in the battle, I see crimson flashes of his unmistakable magic.

We have a bigger problem, I tell him and the others. My stomach clenches with dread as I feel wraith nearing by the second. Gideon is coming.

Their chorus of swears in my head is drowned out by Douglas’s shout when I quickly break his arms. I stand and land a savage kick to precisely the right spot on his thigh, snapping his femur for good measure.

He swears so creatively that I’m almost impressed.

“Stay down, or he'll target you,” I instruct.

“Who? And why the hell aren’t you finishing me off?” he demands, gritting his teeth in pain. “You did this last time, too. What are you, some kind of fucking sadist?”

I ignore him, scrambling to find all my matches in the ongoing bloodbath surrounding me. We need to transport out of here as fast as fucking possible before?—

Dark shadows slither across the snow, flinging fresh corpses to the side. Some tendrils wrap around bounty hunters who shout in alarm just before they go pale and drop like flies, paralyzed with horror, their eyes stuck open wide. Douglas inhales sharply when one of his nearby friends is abruptly beheaded by a blade of darkness. The disembodied head is flung hard to crack against the skull of another terrified hunter.

A shadowy figure rises out of the gathering snakelike shadows like a cold, dripping oil—a faceless, looming, all-too-familiar presence wreathed in unnatural darkness.

“Finders keepers, losers Reaper’s,” Gideon whispers with glee.

“What the…” Asher Douglas trails off, going pale as death.

“Maven!”

Everett’s voice comes from somewhere nearby. Fear clogs my throat, so I can only reach them through the bond.

Run. RUN.

And then, even though I feel like a fucking coward, I do the same.

Screams ascend behind me, cutting off abruptly as the wraith’s ability to wield fear either leaves them frozen in terror or altogether dead. Shadows snake after me as that chilling laugh dances on the wind—the same laugh I've heard every time he's broken me in the past.

I push myself hard, my boots digging into the snow. Cold stings my face and lungs, but the hot moisture from my head injury continues to drip, my vision swaying.

I barely leave the outskirts of the dying battle when Crypt appears, running beside me.

“No, stay in Limbo!” I shout at him. “It's safer there!”

“If it is, then?—”

He reaches for me to pull me into his plane of dreams. But before we make contact, shadows explode between us, flinging me down into the snow.

I can't see Crypt, but his hoarse scream cuts through the polar night.

Baelfire and Everett are shouting nearby. I want to tell them to run the fuck away , but before I can speak or even move, a massive centipede-like shadow curls over my body. Its dozens of tiny legs leave needle-like punctures in my skin wherever it roams, but when I try to shove it off, it’s like my hands pass through smoke. As it nears my head, I panic and struggle.

I can't let him fuck with my head again. I can't.

But it’s useless as his essence coalesces around me like a putrid, inky syrup. The dark shadow circles around my head, lengthening to smother my mouth, pricking my lips and jaw. The other end slides down to crawl into my ear, slinking into my head.

My vision whites out for a moment, and then I'm naked, covered in pale, wriggling maggots. A scream lodges in my burning throat as I try to brush them off—but they're not just on my skin.

They're inside it.

Hatching. Feasting. Multiplying.

They start to crawl out of my nose and mouth—burrowing out of my rotting flesh. I'm nothing but a withering corpse riddled with death and worms.

“Dead yet so afraid of what death brings,” Gideon's voice mocks. “But a corpse needs a grave.”

Oxygen whooshes from my lungs as unbearable weight presses on every side, burying me alive. Dirt fills my mouth, nose, eyes—it crushes my chest until my eyes feel like they’ll pop out.

“Let’s continue our game of finder’s keepers.”

I can’t move as the wraith’s shadowy hand slides into my chest, rooting around for the heart he won’t find. What he does find are my crushed lungs, which he begins to tear out slowly.

But just as the internal pain and horror begin to eclipse my every thought, I hear it.

My matches. Screaming.

No.

Gideon's demented laugh scrapes inside my head as if he's trying to gut my thoughts from the inside out. “They were never yours, broken raven. Now they’re mine.”

“No,” I rasp, desperate to get to them.

They're mine .

I'm not letting this twisted echo of my past hurt them more.

They. Are. Mine.

All the adrenaline, fear, and darkness crashing through my veins reaches a fever pitch when my anger crests. But it feels different, somehow—less the heady buzz of death and more like…something powerful I’ve never experienced before.

Whatever it is, the next time my psyche lashes out against Gideon’s control, I break free from the horrors he's forcing into my head. My vision clears as I roll to my feet, instinctively withdrawing the only knife I have left on me without getting a chance to look at it.

Silas is writhing in the snow beside Baelfire, both of them tangled in shadows that are sliding into their ears, mouths, and noses and warping their minds as they cry out. Crypt is motionless in the blood-stained snow surrounding him. He’s missing an arm and leg like he was being ripped apart slowly before Gideon decided to focus on?—

Everett. Who is in silent agony as the wraith delves into his mind. One of the blade-like shadows lifts in the air, an onyx-like guillotine poised above my elemental’s neck.

My vision goes red.

“No!” I scream, launching forward and driving the knife into the shadow fiend.

It shouldn't work.

But it does.

The wraith shrieks in pain as I stab it again and again, rage rushing through my system. That strange new power burns me alive as I bury the blade deep in the wraith’s center.

Gideon screeches loud enough that my ears ring before wrenching away from the knife and dissipating, his shadows slithering into the distant darkness of the polar night.

I drop to my knees, shaking in the aftermath as the adrenaline and strange new strength slowly calm. A dark liquid coats me, and I realize it must be wraith blood.

But how?

The blade in my hand starts to crumble. I blink down just in time to see the bone knife Everett gifted me crumble away to ash.

Just like a blessed bone weapon.

What the hell?

Maybe…shit, maybe I’m a saint after all.

I don't understand, but right now, I don't fucking care. I crawl through the snow to Everett, who lays utterly still with ashen-gray skin. My hands tremble as I check his pulse.

He's alive.

So are Silas and Baelfire, when I check them. Only Silas is vaguely conscious, but he can't seem to focus on me with those beautiful crimson irises. And when I hurry to my Nightmare Prince, hot liquid dripping from my chin, I nearly choke at the amount of blood he's lost. His beautifully marked, dismembered arm and leg are beside his body.

When I check his pulse, his head lolls to one side. He blinks several times before his eyes slip shut as he exhales raggedly.

“You’re bleeding,” he slurs.

“Shh.”

Talking isn't good for him right now. I wipe at the stupid fucking moisture uselessly escaping my face and carefully move his arm and leg closer to his body.

“Hurts, love,” he whispers, face contorting in such agony that my chest aches. “Wantto numbit but…I’d feelless ofyou…if I makeit stop…”

His words blend together and make no sense. I gently hush him again before getting the others to bring them closer. In my semi-hysterical state, I think that it's convenient I was given unnatural strength, or else dragging my matches around would be a hell of a lot harder.

The battlefield formerly filled with gunshots and the exhilarating sounds of battle has fallen eerily silent. Anyone left alive is either unable to move and likely falling to hypothermia, or they're heavily injured and will bleed out before the cold kills them.

Except Asher Douglas.

As I finish struggling to move Baelfire next to the other three, my gaze connects with the bounty hunter in the far distance. He's managed to sit up and is healing his broken arms with soft green magic while he watches me, his gun in his lap.

He could shoot me right now. Take me to the Legacy Council and leave my matches here to rot.

Instead, he looks away, taking in the massacre around him.

As soon as my quintet members are all touching, I call on the life forces still pulsing in my veins. Dark magic flares around me, and after a brief, blinding flash, we're abruptly in the same hotel room suite we previously got in Nebraska.

It’s the first place I could think of. The universe is merciful for once and no humans currently occupy this room. Lifting my hand, I double-lock the front door using common magic.

Then I sit and stare at my matches as blood drips from me.

Crypt is bleeding out on the carpet, now as unconscious as the rest of them. Baelfire has silver bullets embedded in one of his arms, and Everett is bleeding from a wolf shifter bite to his shoulder. Silas is only bleeding from his nose, a sign of magical strain on the brain, and he looks awful. They all do.

This is why I have to fight like hell to keep them safe

No—it's why they should have accepted my fucking rejection in the first place. If they had, they might've been perfectly safe and matched to some other legacy by now if they had just appealed to the fucking gods like I told them to.

“I warned you guys,” I whisper angrily, voice breaking.

But my anger is short-lived.

These legacies were always going to be mine. Right now isn't the time to linger in shock or feel sorry for our situation. I need to help them recover, keep them as safe as possible, and get the fuck on with my plan.

I read Engela's letter earlier. She doubts the other two members remaining in her quintet will be hiding in the same place. I’m almost certain of where Iker Del Mar may be, thanks to Engela’s detailed accounts, but I'm sure as hell not bringing my quintet with me for this hit.

They’ll need time to heal, but I have to take out another member of the Immortal Quintet before Amadeus harms Lillian or the humans.

Yet the idea of leaving them behind…

Gods. This is going to fucking suck.

Newlybound legacies need time with their matches, basking in the afterglow of bonding and growing closer as the bond strengthens. I’m not a legacy—but damn it, if only we had time for all of that.

Oh, well. Life is a bitch, and so is death.

As I plot out my next move, I work. I’m not a gifted healer with common magic, but right now, there is so much power from the battle pumping through my veins that I harness to stitch Crypt’s arm and leg back to his body. His incubus healing can take care of the severeness of the injuries slowly. I carefully remove the silver bullets from Baelfire before cleaning and bandaging Everett’s shoulder.

Snowdrop …

I pause to study Everett’s face, but he doesn’t rouse from the stupor that Gideon left them in. With a grimace, I reach behind my head and breathe the necromantic words for healing the worst of the injury there. It’s far less potent without spell ingredients, but the bleeding stops.

Next, I bundle Silas and Crypt in blankets from the two bedrooms to help them recover from the lingering Alaskan cold, place heavy protective wards on the entire suite, and leave all the lights on. I add a few light spells for good measure and slowly back away from them, studying all four of their handsome, blood and dirt-streaked faces.

If I had to guess, they might shake this in a couple of hours. Possibly sooner—especially Crypt, who must have a serious tolerance for true horror, considering his history.

But that still gives me time to get shit done without putting my quintet in more danger.

“I’ll be back soon,” I quietly tell my unconscious quintet as I prepare a transportation spell, unnatural magic humming to life around my blood-darkened gloves. “Get better because I…”

I can’t survive losing any of you.

The words catch in my mouth, and I instead mutter, “Because I’ll be pissed if you don’t. And when I get back, we’re going to Canada.”