Witchmarked (World's First Wizard Book 1) by Aaron Schneider (my reading book .txt) 📕

you! I am the one who healed you! I am the one you serve!”

The pseudopods retracted, and the figure raised a hand to its chin as though deep in thought.

“THE PRINCE WILL HEAR THEE!”

Despite the statement, Milo and Ambrose saw a shiver race through the stinking expanse. Neither could have explained how they knew, but both were certain it was rage.

“This isn’t going to end well,” Ambrose growled under his breath as he exerted himself, though at the angle he was being held, Milo couldn’t see what his bodyguard was doing.

“That’s better,” Imrah cooed with icy confidence. “Things are going to change now. I’ve been lax with you, letting you roam free. You will still be fed, but it will be by my hand and whom I choose. Your hunger has already complicated things more than it should have.”

The figure straightened from its pensive pose, shoulders squaring indignantly.

“THE PRINCE HAS LAID YOUR ENEMIES LOW,” the chorus wailed in outraged testimony. “EYES AND EARS BEAR WITNESS TO THE SLAIN!”

“You wiped out an outpost of ghuls!” Imrah cried, a brittle note in her voice. “You were meant to save my people, but now Ifreedahm is bolted shut for fear of you. That was not what I bargained for.”

Ambrose gave a straining grunt, and Milo twisted as best he could to see the big man bent nearly double, the dead soldiers nearly burying him under their gripping limbs.

“What are you doing?” Milo whispered.

Ambrose looked up from under a corpse’s arm and flashed Milo a strained smile.

“Working on something,” he panted.

Before Milo could ask anything further, the chorus sounded again, the unnatural voices rising in clear anger.

“YOU IMPUNE THE PRINCE’S HONOR? YOU WHO STAY THE PRINCE’S HAND UPON THE FIELD?”

The wall loomed over Imrah, a hundred tortured faces glaring down condemningly as the figure crossed its clean limbs.

“Kimaris!” Imrah roared, but one foot slid back reflexively. “I am your mistress! I—”

With frightening speed, the figure’s hand swept out, slapping the ghul’s face with such force that she was thrown off her feet.

“FAITHLESS KNAVE!” the chorus shrieked. “YOU ARE UNWORTHY OF THE PRINCE! JEALOUS AND PETTY INSECT!”

Ghulish ichor dribbled from Imrah’s lips as she looked up from where she’d fallen. Milo could see the terror in her face, but as their eyes met, incredible sadness stole over her features. She lowered her gaze and shook her head as she climbed to her feet.

Milo’s fingers tightened around the cane in one hand, and he began to draw his focus.

“It was always supposed to end like this, wasn’t it?” she asked, turning back to the figure looking down its nose at her. “One way or another.”

The chorus' cry was strident with triumph.

“YOUR AMBITIONS ARE SMALL! THE PRINCE’S DESTINY COULD NEVER SURRENDER TO YOUR INSIGNIFICANT DEMANDS.”

“Your destiny was to waste away in that ruin I found you in!” Imrah spat. Again the hand struck out, and she was upon the ground. Teeth and brackish blood fell from her mouth.

Milo felt the unnatural force begin to flow into his arm.

“SILENCE, WRETCH! THIS IS THE PRINCE’S HOUR! WITH THE WITCHBORN’S DEATH, IT SHALL NEVER END!”

The gelatinous wall surged forward, swallowing the figure as it made for Imrah, who released a handful of twinkling dust that kindled to blue flame midair. At the same time, Ambrose loosed a terrible roar, and corpses flew into the air like rag dolls. Milo twisted free to sweep his cane in a wide arc, pulping fingers and snapping arms.

The living tide that was Kimaris recoiled before Imrah’s fiery onslaught but it did not retreat, drawing its leading wave up higher.

Ambrose was free of dead soldiers, sword in hand, hacking and punching with the basket hilt left and right. Milo kicked free of the last corpse clinging to his legs and spun to smash the length of the cane across a soldier groping toward him. With the lingering effects of the alchemical strength coursing through him, Milo’s blow sent the corpse flopping to the ground.

Ambrose had hewn a space around them, and without the direct intervention of Imrah, the remaining corpses milled around aimlessly.

“We need to run!” Ambrose bellowed, turning this way and that, congealed blood covering his blade.

“Imrah!” Milo called, casually blasting a corpse back with witchfire as it lurched forward. “Imrah, come with us!”

From her place on the ground, the ghul’s attention alternated between Milo and the towering Kimaris. Her hand was inside her skin-coat, frantically groping for something as the curtain of blue flame began to shrink. The edges of the ocean crept around the waning barrier.

“Hurry!” Milo shouted as he started toward her, reaching out. Ambrose grabbed him by the shoulder and hauled him over the twitching, squirming bodies.

The air began to fill with thrumming.

“Come on, Magus!” the big man growled, outmuscling Milo with ease as the last of the alchemical strength left his limbs.

“Wait!” Milo shouted, fighting his bodyguard’s grip ineffectively. “She can still make it!”

“Damn it, Milo,” Ambrose snarled as he shook the magus. “She doesn’t want to.”

Milo shot him an accusing glare, then turned back to see that Imrah had found her feet and whatever she’d been looking for in her skin-coat. An ivory powder horn was in her hand, more of the twinkling dust tumbling from its tip to spread azure fire at her feet.

“I’m sorry, Milo!” she shouted back. “It was too late before I ever met you!”

Her eyes rose above him, and Milo followed her gaze to see a zeppelin churning toward them as it made for the sky over the draw.

“It’s over,” she called, looking at him one last time. “Goodbye.”

With that, she turned toward Kimaris, the crest of his wave nearly thirty feet high.

“Come embrace me, O prince!” Imrah screamed as she raised the horn and upended it over her head.

The air was sucked from Milo’s lungs as his teacher burst into blue flames and ran shrieking toward Kimaris’ descending bulk. He couldn’t even scream as she disappeared in a rush of slime and a cloud of putrid steam.

All he could do was give