Jessica Andersen - Magic Unchained

No, damn it. Not good-bye. He was going to get them out of there.

The ceiling bumped his head, forcing him down as he caught her hands in his and gripped them tight, holding on to her. In that moment, he was achingly aware of the way she fit seamlessly, perfectly, even though they were so different in size and temperament. But where those differences had loomed so large in the past, now they mattered far less than the heat that rose between them, making the water seem suddenly warmer than before. He couldn’t let that matter as much as he wanted to, though. He never could.

The water hit his chin and crept higher. His heart hammered in his chest, but he forced himself to stay calm and meet her eyes, hold them as he cut his own palms, first one and then the other, so he bled into the water. The air began to hum, singing the high, sweet note of power. Magic. The second foxfire died, then the third, but it didn’t matter, because the magic was there inside him, racing in his veins and lighting up the water around them with red-gold sparkles. It poured through him, expanding his very soul, until he felt bigger, stronger, more powerful than ever, yet still not enough to fight the earth and stone that held them prisoner. He was going to have to rely on the gods for that.

The gods… and Cara. Because somehow he needed to bring her with him into the magic. It was the only way.

Drawing her close, he cut her palms to match his own and then threaded their fingers together so their palms aligned blood to blood. He didn’t feel a blood-link, didn’t feel anything but her narrow fingers in his, yet that was enough to shift his heart in his chest. Please, gods, he whispered deep in his soul as he took a last deep breath and straightened to sink beneath the water. When she did the same, trembling against him, he touched his lips to hers and whispered against her skin, “Pasaj och.”

The magic of a barrier connection flared inside him, even though it shouldn’t have been able to form with them still several days away from the equinox. The power was bottomless, eternal, and it reached out of him to surround her as her eyes went wide in the red-gold sparkles. Then he leaned in and kissed her, and this time he didn’t hold back, instead pouring into her all the wishes and longings he’d kept locked inside for so long. She stiffened, clutching at him. He could feel her surprise, her confusion, and the heat that leaped up in answer. Then there was a soundless detonation. The bottom fell out of his soul. And he dropped into the magic, taking her with him.

Somewhere in the magic

The surprise of Sven’s kiss—the heat, the intensity, the fireworks—turned instantly to shock as the cold water went hot and Cara’s world lurched like a trampoline.

Suddenly she was moving without changing place, her consciousness leaping out of her body and accelerating through a dizzying, zigzagging blur of gray, green, and brown. She still felt like herself, but an insubstantial version. Part of her was cold, wet, and drowning, while another part flew free. He had brought her into his magic. She hung on to his hands, squeezing tightly. It’s working!

They swerved and slewed, and then plunged down, up, sideways, and into a corkscrew spin that flipped her insubstantial self head over ass—wham, wham, wham—like an airplane barrel roll. Her heart leaped into her throat; she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t scream, couldn’t do anything but jam her eyelids shut and hang on for the ride. The spinning got worse, until she didn’t know up from down and the motion stopped feeling like movement and became the spinning of her mind, which knew only that she was still clutching his hand like a lifeline.

Then, gradually, the spins slowed. Her vision cleared. And she found them standing together in a beautiful underground grotto, facing each other and holding hands as if waiting to hear, “You may now kiss the bride.”

It would’ve been a ridiculous thought—she wasn’t a wedding kind of girl—except that the color scheme carried the vibe too. He was wearing combat black-on-black without the body armor or weapons, while she was somehow wearing a filmy white dress made of a woven fabric so light it felt like she wasn’t wearing anything at all. It clung to her, seeming to be a single piece of fabric wound intricately around her body, showing every dip and curve. It ended high on her thigh on one side and trailed down to touch the ground on the other. Her hair hung loose down her back, fully dry; his was slicked back as if he’d just gotten out of the shower. To add to the what-the-fuck factor, they were both barefoot. Soft grains of sand shifted between her toes, and it was as if she could feel each inch of her body individually: the brush of her dress, the blunt pressure of his fingers on hers, squeezing as if to say, It’s okay.

“Where are we?” she asked softly. “Is this the barrier?”

“No, not the barrier. We’re in a vision,” he answered, voice equally quiet, though the echoes were picked up by the arching walls of the circular cave.

“It feels so real.”

“It is, just on another level of reality.”

She stared around her, wide-eyed, heart drumming with a mixture of fear and exhilaration. This is what all the fuss is about, she thought, borderlining on awestruck. This is magic. The air was warm, humid, and redolent of the rain forest she could see through the fallen-through spots high overhead, where green vines draped through and sunlight splashed down at a late-afternoon angle. They stood together on a wide, flat spot beside a deep pool. In places, stalactites dripped down from the ceiling or stalagmites pushed up from the water, thick, blunt, and slick with moisture.

Then, suddenly, the shaft of light nearest them brightened, as if the sun had been cloud shrouded and now burst fully to life. Then it brightened further, went supernova. Sven shifted to put his body in front of hers, and Cara lifted a hand to shield her eyes, scared yet somehow not as scared as she probably should’ve been. When the light dissipated, a figure stood in front of them, man shaped but genderless, with thick skin that stretched over bone and sinew, and featureless black eyes that stared, unblinking, at her and Sven.

A nahwal!

She gasped, but Sven’s fingers tightened on hers, warning her not to back away. So she held her ground, staring at an entity she had never, ever expected to see for herself. Creatures of the barrier, the nahwal contained the collective ancestral wisdom of the Nightkeepers. Some held the experiences and personalities of the strongest magi of each bloodline; they passed messages to their descendants and could be both help and hindrance. Others were all-knowing and could answer questions, while some were cruel and vicious. This one’s forearm lacked the coyote glyph, which meant it didn’t belong to Sven’s ancestry, but it wasn’t volunteering information and hadn’t made any move to attack. So what was it? Why was it here?

“Are you the Father?” Sven asked quietly. “Are you the one we’re supposed to resurrect?” A shiver raced across Cara’s skin at the thought.

“No. I am his messenger.” The voice was a descant of many, as if a church choir were speaking. “The seer is blind and deaf, but the information must be passed, and here you are among us, son of the coyotes. So it comes to you.”

A message! Hope flared, tightening Cara’s throat. “What information?” she whispered, not sure whether the nahwal would even acknowledge her.

It kept its featureless black eyes fixed on Sven, but answered, “In order for the Father to arise, the magi must bring the screaming skull to Che’en Yaaxil on the cardinal day.” Then, shifting its attention to her, the nahwal said, “That was one question. You have two more.”