The Secret of Spellshadow Manor by Bella Forrest (best way to read ebooks TXT) 📕

saw sweat on Aamir’s face as he attempted to strike Alex, who bobbed and tumbled between the bursts of magic.

When Alex grew exhausted, he taught Aamir and Natalie what he had learned, having each demonstrate a spell so the other could follow it. While neither of them took to the art as naturally as Alex, it wasn’t long before their duels over the little bottle of wine took on a more delicate, dance-like approach. They stood, trying to keep one eye on each other and one eye on the bottle, Aamir dancing his magic away from Natalie’s gasping motions, parrying her blows, then making desperate assaults. Alex, seated against the wall, thought it looked rather beautiful.

Tuning out the rush of fire, Alex stared down at his hands. They were shaking, red with frost, and he noted with consternation that his left hand was actually bleeding where the skin had dried and split. He sucked at the wound, thinking.

When he had been with Natalie in his room, he had been able to focus his anti-magical energy into a wand of sorts. When it had turned magic to cold, the ice hadn’t been on his person, and therefore it hadn’t hurt him. He considered that, then drew himself into the first pose he had ever learned: Alaman’s Inner Enlightenment and Fire.

The pose was meant to make a pillar of energy coming off the creator, so when Alex inverted it, he assumed he would get a downward push of energy. Rotating his arm, he mixed in Gren’s Stalwart Shield, opening his palm and trying to picture a blade of anti-magic spearing down into the ground.

A rush of cold, and a burst of power. Alex staggered back against the wall as a wavering, sloppy blade seemed to slide from under his skin, glittering silver and swirling like stardust in the air. The other two, each with their eyes intent upon the other’s hands, didn’t notice as he lifted the eerie weapon, trying to give it a swing.

It blew apart the instant he tried moving it. Alex let out a huff of disappointment as the blade dissolved into the air. It seemed that controlling anti-magic was a finicky process, made all the worse by his complete lack of any knowhow on the topic. Drawing in his breath, he tried to form another blade.

This time, he managed to focus on it enough to bring the weapon around to his side, although the tip drooped like a depressed sunflower. He strained his mind, fingers moving in delicate motions that massaged the void. He realized on some level that his ability to form the blade would be meaningless if it required this much attention; to take his eyes off of Aamir in a fight, even for an instant, would result in a swift and painful loss. However, he focused on holding the blade together until it broke, spilling to the ground in a silvery cascade, onyx lines breaking to dust on the air.

A crash of glass sounded. A spray of red cut the air as Aamir finally managed to sneak through Natalie’s grasping magic with a line of fire and slam the little bottle into the dirt. He let out a triumphant sigh, a victorious grin quirking one corner of his mouth.

Natalie, rather than sulking, clapped excitedly.

“Nice one!”

Aamir gave a slight but gracious bow. “Thank you.”

“That,” said Natalie, dabbing at her brow, “was your first time to break the bottle with fire! I think that is your win.”

Aamir’s eyes brightened. “Then you mean—”

“Yes,” Natalie said. “I will teach you to grab. Of course. But first, I think we should check on Alex; he has looked poorly for some time now.”

Alex started. It seemed that one of the duelists had been paying enough attention to her surroundings to notice Alex’s experiments.

Aamir, on the other hand, just looked perplexed. He looked over at Alex, who just shook his head.

“Just messing around with anti-magic,” he said.

Eyes still bright with his victory, Aamir set his stance, energy gathering as Natalie retreated to the wall. “Want to test it?”

Alex smiled in response, inwardly praying that he wasn’t about to end up on the floor again.

Aamir’s attack came in a savage hook, an arc of flame that cut out to Alex’s right before launching itself in at him. Alex moved his hand toward it, altering his stance. Meron’s Blade.

A shield of anti-magic surged out from his wrist, and he felt a dull impact as the fire spilled over it. He gritted his teeth, but the cold didn’t come. The ice and snow flared around his shield in a great explosion of white that left Alex temporarily blinded. He cursed, waving a hand, trying to see Aamir through the surge of snow. He had just gotten sight of the boy’s hands again when a bolt of lightning carved the air between them. Alex’s shield imploded in upon itself as he tried to bring it around, and he hastily ducked.

Aamir’s magic seemed to erupt around him, and Alex rolled haphazardly to and fro, trying to get into a position where he could summon another anti-magical weapon. Aamir, however, did not seem willing to give him that chance. He launched assault after assault, each seemingly designed to keep Alex on his feet and moving, unable to concentrate.

An attack slammed down at Alex from above, and he only just managed to produce a pulse of anti-magic that turned the sundering flames to snow. Aamir laughed, crouching lower in his stance before throwing himself forward, his eyes ablaze with glittering sparks as his leg snapped out, sending a wave of fire rolling off it.

Acting on an impulse, Alex stabbed his hand down. Gren’s Stalwart Shield, he thought as the blade speared out of his hand in a fount of cold, and then he carved upwards.

As expected, it broke halfway through the swing, but the flecks of anti-magic still took the brunt of the fire, turning the air into a swath of steaming mist and sending a spray of water