The Chronicles of a Scalebound Sage: Wandmaker Vol.2

WM [9] Confrontation

True teleportation magic was a complex and highly specialized type of darkness magic. Sure, Blink and Flash Step were pretty standard for mages and material users, but those were personal short-range effects that usually moved them no more than a few yards at a time. They were extremely limited in utility outside of combat. Tanisha's Arcane Shift was closer to actual teleportation and Blink hybrid and took far more visualization than a traditional Blink.

By this point, the swirling and condensing darkness magic was the culmination of two days of work on Loki's part. Teleporting himself and Ingrid over five hundred miles to the frontlines was significant. The room they were in was designed for darkness teleportation magics and would aid in the stabilization of the complex and powerful portal he was building with his magic.

The room was silent aside from the bubbling archway, slowly forming from what looked like a pool of absolute black. The door of the chamber opened, and Tanisha stepped inside. Ingrid glanced at her from a book she was reading in the corner of the room. Loki was too engrossed in creating the portal to notice Tanisha enter.

The girl had purposely waited until Bjorn was asleep to confront the anti-magic mage alone. She wasn't going to do anything drastic; she knew that if Ingrid wanted to, she could kill her in a second. She just knew this was something she had to do by herself.

Tanisha hadn't used the seiðr to suppress her emotions like she did with maya before the evolution. The extreme emotions she had to force herself to feel to create her new core soured her opinion of the ability. So when she saw the woman and the man who caused her and her friends so much pain, she had to take calming breaths to keep from doing something regretful. She didn't even look at Loki; she didn't trust herself to not lash out at him. Instead, she beelined to Ingrid, who sat cross-legged at a coffee table.

Ingrid didn't look up at Tanisha as she approached. The woman casually turned the page in her book as if the girl didn't matter. Tanisha stopped right in front of the snowfallen woman and towered over her mother, who looked even smaller in comparison while sitting down. After her transformation, Tanisha had grown a foot taller, making her closer to Joha than the five-foot-ten woman.

Ingrid sighed after a moment, "Can I help you, demon?"

Tanisha wrapped her tail around the book and threw it across the room. Ingrid lowered her hands that a moment before were holding the book that was apparently far more interesting than Tanisha. The woman didn't look up; she kept her head down, and her raven hair covered her face.

"You don't even care about the pain you caused, do you? You are just upset your crazy genocide didn't go according to plan," Tanisha said through gritted teeth.

"Demon. I. Suggest. You. Leave," Ingrid bit off each venom-filled word.

"Or what? Are you going to kill me? You already tried," Tanisha said. "Your whole fucking army tried; your Hand tried. But after all that, look who is still here. Is it me or Thyra?"

Ingrid looked up at Tanisha for the first time. It disarmed her for a second how red and puffy Ingrid's face was, and it was apparent she had been crying. Her expression quickly changed to anger the longer Tanisha stood over her, but there was no fight in the former Sword of the Salstars.

Tanisha was off balance; this was not what she expected from the woman who always told her those with power had every right to do as they pleased. Ingrid believed a person is only as important as the power they wielded, the men and women they controlled, and the land they could dominate. Yet now she was a pathetic husk; she lost one battle and was crumbling.

Tanisha's heart pounded as she fought the urge to strike the woman. She was almost sure that if she wanted to, she could wrap her hands around Ingrid's neck, and Ingrid would just let it happen. This woman had torn apart her life, uprooting everything as she was finally living a life she could be happy in. This was the woman who started a pointless battle that killed innocent people, that killed Helena. She felt hatred bubbling inside her, but seeing Ingrid like this, so broken and defeated.