Veridia

Chapter 25

The Land In-Between, five minutes ago.

"You think Aethirians are the only ones who have magic. My my, what fools you have been!"

Romanov laughed, maniacal laughter that shattered through Geneva's pomp and bravado in an instant.

Every second that passed made the chasm wider, Aleksander on the other side.

"Geneva, we have much to discuss with each other! How has everything been? Enjoying your life as a backstabber?"

The king grinned, and Geneva was surprised that she couldn't see blood staining his teeth.

She didn't answer, raising her sword warily.

With a curtain of rain to her right and a canyon to her left, Geneva had nowhere to go. She was trapped.

Those were words she never expected to admit in her life.

"Poor Phantom. You are still just as lost as when you were a child."

"What- what do you want from me?"

The King merely laughed.

"Oh, I don't want anything of material value. I just needed you distracted."

Too late, everything clicked in place.

Too late, she saw Sergei standing in front of Aleksander.

Too late, she saw his sword pull out covered in blood.

Too late, she saw Aleksander fall.

Something strange was taking over her brain. A soft buzzing echoed in her ears, and then she snapped.

The buzz turned into a roar, and a giant hand of stone broke off from the chasm and grabbed Aleksander, carrying him out of the chasm and onto the safe ground.

That same hand took Romanov's head in between two fingers and crushed it into a bloody pulp like a plump wine grape.

Strange. I don't remember stone being able to form hands.

The rain curtain fell back, and Geneva stared at the battlefield from a bird's-eye view.

I also don't remember the field having a hill.

She isolated the red, green, and blue soldiers on the battlefield, every single one of them. Somehow, they all froze in place, like the ground was reaching up and growing roots inside of them, planting them into the field like stalks of tall, waving reeds.

Geneva imagined them turning to dust, returning their energy back into the soil.

Blood covered the ground, and Geneva felt it wash over her.

All she could see, taste, feel, was red. Every time the haze faded, flashes of Aleksander's blood pouring from the wound in his chest would cloud her vision again.

Distantly, she wondered if he was dead already. Point-blank range, with nothing to stop the blood flow. Healers work magic, but even magic isn't a miracle.

Suddenly, Geneva felt so, very tired. All of the energy went out of her, leaching back into the soil from where came.

Somebody was behind her, holding her upright. The assassin in her wanted to fight back, to raise her sword and give them hell.

The human in her was too tired to move, and black crowded her on all sides, replacing red with darkness.

~

When Geneva opened her eyes again, the light streaming in from the window was so blinding it hurt to see.

In fact, everything hurt. The kind of sore, dull pain one gets after doing a few too many lessons at Valorborne.