The Secret of Spellshadow Manor 6 by Bella Forrest (books for men to read .TXT) 📕

a Kelpie equally terrifying looking as hers, with two others, whom Alex didn’t recognize, riding behind. Once the four riders had pulled their steeds to a halt, the Kelpies snorted hot air from their nostrils and pawed the ground with their hooves. Somehow, they appeared to have grown in size since the last time Alex saw them, their white eyes staring him down.

“Stop right there!” Ceres bellowed, her eyes as furious as those of her steed.

Alex lifted his hands in a gesture of surrender. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

She jumped down from her horse, landing neatly on the ground. “You know exactly what the matter is, Alex,” she spat, striding up to where the group stood. “There are rumors flying around that you’re headed to see Julius.”

“Who told you that?” Alex countered.

“Never mind who told me—is it true?”

Alex nodded. “It is, but if you’ll hear me out, I’ll tell you why.”

“I don’t need to hear you out; this is a stupid, reckless thing to do,” she snarled, evidently not in the mood for negotiation. “Not to mention the fact that you’re putting my people in danger—more than you already have. Don’t you care about anything other than your ridiculous ‘mission’?” Her chest heaved with emotion, her eyes narrowing. Demeter and the other two riders stayed where they were, though the auburn-haired man flashed a questioning look at Alex.

“It’s not ridiculous if it means they can be free,” Alex replied calmly. The last thing he wanted to do was get into a mudslinging match with Ceres, given the tight schedule they were on. It had been ten when they’d left, but the walk over had taken at least half an hour, and would be much the same on the other side, from cave to pagoda.

“Listen to yourself!” Ceres barked. “You think going to Julius will do you any favors? You think he’ll just roll over and give you what you want? I know Julius a damn sight better than you do, and I know you won’t come back from Falleaf if you step through that portal.”

Helena stepped forward. “He’s my grandfather, Ceres. I think I know him a lot better than you do. He’ll see the benefit in what we’re trying to do. Everyone will love him, and that’s exactly what he wants most.” She spoke softly, looking Ceres dead in the eye.

Ceres scoffed. “You weren’t there when war broke out. You weren’t there when he implemented the essence system, with such a look of glee on his face—you’d think he’d just been given the best gift in the world. You don’t know him at all, girl, and you’re a fool if you think you know him better than I do.”

Helena’s cool façade slipped slightly at Ceres’s sneer, and the two royals looked tense, almost poised for a fight. Before either could make a move, Alex stepped in, wanting to defuse the situation as quickly as possible.

“You both know him well enough to think that he just might hear me out,” he said. “We don’t want to fight you, Ceres. You’re our ally. But, please, don’t stand in our way. I know I’ve said it before, but I’ll repeat it until I’m blue in the face, if it’ll make you see sense. This is the only way we can get what we need to do the spell that could end all of this suffering.”

Ceres shook her head. “You’re idiots. Young, stupid idiots. We were doing just fine until you came along, and you are set to ruin everything,” she snapped.

Natalie stepped up beside Helena and Alex. “If you think protecting a small portion of people who’ve had half their souls torn out is ‘doing just fine’, I think it might be you who is the idiot,” she said coolly, though Alex instantly wished she hadn’t.

“What did you just say to me?” Ceres whispered, a hint of menace in her voice.

Natalie looked alarmed by the change in tone. “What I meant to say is… If you think what’s going on now is okay, you have a very warped view of the world.”

“This world is warped,” Ceres snarled. “You just haven’t been around long enough to see it. You are not getting through that portal, if stopping you is the last thing I do!”

With that, she lunged forward, an orb of magic spiraling from her hands and heading toward the group at breakneck speed. It caught Jari in the leg. He fell to the ground with a hard thump. Aamir ran to him, helping him up, as the others moved to intercept Ceres. Natalie and Helena worked on the offense, sending wave after wave of shining bursts, with Ellabell attempting to shield them against Ceres’s onslaught of golden orbs.

The two riders behind Demeter jumped down and sprinted to their leader’s aid, sending bolts of energy toward Ellabell’s ankles. They were strong, despite the fact that they must have been two of her half-soul survivors, but Alex dispensed with one of them swiftly, letting his anti-magic coil around her legs, causing her to stumble forward and fall flat on her face. Only Demeter remained astride his Kelpie.

Jari took out the other rider, slamming a barricade of magic into the man. It knocked him out, rendering him useless on the ground, unmoving, though still breathing. Jari flashed a grin in Alex’s direction. At least now, there was only the one-eyed royal to contend with, though that wasn’t much of a consolation. Ceres was ferociously strong, as Alex had imagined she would be. Her hands were moving so fast that Alex couldn’t even see them, let alone the direction in which her magic was flowing. A few orbs hit him, and though they didn’t have nearly as much impact as they had on the others, it still felt like a heavyweight boxer had punched him hard, the blows winding him.

Jari was up and fighting again, though Aamir hung back, given his reduced ability where magic was concerned. Alex made sure he got between any blasts of