Page 85 of The Fractured Prophecy

“What were you doing in the crow’s nest?” he demanded. “A warning could have saved us before we were caught in the current.”

My throat thickened as he shook me, rattling my teeth. He was right. I’d wanted privacy with Torvo, but it had cost us precious minutes. Tears stung my eyes as the wind whipped my hair around.

“Let go of her,” Torvo commanded from behind.

Rivven thrust me away from him, disgusted, and turned toward the bow of the ship, running a hand through his own tangled mess.

“We need all the air wielders up here! Now!” He shouted, voice booming above the howl of the storm.

“Even with a handful of talented wielders, I don’t know that we can combat this,” I said, forcing my voice to rise enough to be heard.

“Either it works, or we die,” Rivven replied, eyes flashing with flame. But he quickly blinked it away. “We’ll use the water as well.”

Then he turned and shouted once again. “Water wielders too!”

By this time, Galan had emerged from below deck and joined us. The wind forced back his golden locks, and I bit back a cry when I saw the wicked scar marring his perfect face.

“She’s right, Riv,” he shouted. “This is beyond our abilities.”

“NO.” Rivven turned on his friend, looking like a wild man. “Do you have the crystal shard?” he asked, grabbing my arm again.

Torvo shoved him back, but I stepped between them, pulling it out of the pocket Nyah and I decided to keep it in.

“We have the amplification of the crystal,” Rivven shouted. “That could make the difference.”

But it wasn’t the entire power crystal. It was a shard. Could it possibly be enough?

It didn’t matter, I decided, rolling my shoulders back. I would give every ounce of magic I had to fight. And I had a lot to give.

“Air wielders, to the bow,” I said, motioning for the small group to take position.

Galan stood at the front, the point of an arrow, his normally jovial face turned serious. He raised his hands, and the two men behind him on either side followed suit. One was the old captain Jym. The other was one of the men I didn’t like that had come on board with the one-eyed pirate. It didn’t matter whether I liked him or not. He’d have to give his all if he wanted to survive, along with the rest of us.

“Water wielders, over here,” I motioned for the group, headed by Rivven himself, to a spot off the port bow where they could see the enormous vortex trying to drag us into its depths. Behind him stood his sister, Sharlyne, and the boy I’d seen with her before, the orange-haired one.

I stood directly between the two groups then shouted, “Now!”

Reaching out with my magic, I tested each cluster of wielders. I was pleased to find both were strong, especially the men at their heads. I split my own attention and forced both air and water to bend to my will. The currents fought against us, a force of nature that rotated in an unbendable rhythm. It was stronger than anything I’d ever encountered before. Even in my trepidation, a sense of awe struck me.

If I died here, I’d at least experienced something beyond my wildest imagination. For some reason, that thought alone spurred my magic. I hadn’t ever truly let loose. Not completely. There had always been that underlying fear that I might hurt someone or cause a tragedy. But right now, in the middle of the ocean, I no longer feared what I could do. The idea of not succeeding scared me far more than such vague what-ifs.

Had Illio ever faced such a thing? I wondered as I called upon the air around us. My hair whipped in a frenzy as I lifted my arms with a grin, clutching the glowing violet crystal.

Then I unleashed everything.

Thirty-Five

Rivven

We’d just reached the edge of the giant whirlpool, the point where the whirling pull of water was so strong that even color couldn’t escape its dark depths. The boat’s nose had tipped forward, ready to fall into a chasm of dizzying current that threatened to break us apart and swallow us down. I pulled with all my might against the tide, to no avail. My will called to the waves beneath, but whatever fueled this giant storm was impenetrable.

I cried out, grasping for the water’s strength with all my might. Then the air that had also been fighting to slow our approach became so strong that I slid backward several feet, until I grabbed onto the mast with one hand. The entire ship lurched, and the bow turned as the boat was blasted back from the precipice of doom.

Slowly, impossibly, we moved backward, away from the magnetism of the hungry maw. I called on the water again, feeling the others tug with me as we pulled one wave, then another, against the natural flow to wash us away from disaster. Inch by painful inch we reversed course, opposite the spinning storm. But the waves grew heavy, my arms tired, as I tugged and tugged at the current. Whatever the source, this funnel was stronger than anything I’d ever witnessed before. Surely there was magic feeding this monstrosity as well.

Around us, steel gray storm clouds gathered, lightning sizzling across them like a warning from an angry god. Water pelted my exposed skin in an onslaught of tiny icicles that stabbed like a thousand tiny needles. Miniscule drops of blood colored the exposed skin on not just me but the other’s as well. The flashes of light around us revealed a smear of deep scarlet and pale, terrified faces all around me.

I huffed and doubled down my efforts. If Darvol was angry and had caused this, then I was angrier at him. For abandoning his people. My people. And for fucking making this harder than it should be when all I wanted was to right the biggest godsdamned wrong in history.