The Consumption of Magic (Tales From Verania 3)

I smiled weakly. “What can I say? I’ll try anything.”

“Make your choice now, apprentice. Your dragons cannot save you. Your friends aren’t here. Your beloved is at death’s door. Randall is hiding away in his castle of ice. And Morgan can’t be bothered to even know his apprentice is—”

“You always did try and speak for me,” a voice said mildly.

Myrin closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He let it out slowly. When he opened his eyes again, they were alight with something I couldn’t quite make out, but it almost looked like fear.

“Brother,” he said quietly as he turned. “Quiet as a mouse, you are.”

Morgan of Shadows stood in the entryway, looking calm and relaxed, robes billowing slightly. I didn’t know how long he’d been standing there, but I knew he’d cataloged everything in the room in mere seconds. Ruv, standing near the fireplace and looking suddenly unsure. Ryan, skin slick with sweat, his breath rattling in his chest. Myself, standing in a circle of dragon’s blood, more furious than I’d ever been.

And Myrin, of course. He seemed to only have eyes for Myrin.

“You were distracted,” Morgan told him. “You tend to be when you’re fully involved in your work. That hasn’t changed.”

“Nostalgia,” Myrin said. “That’s what you’re going for?”

Morgan shrugged. “Merely an observation.”

“Morgan,” I said, voice cracking. “You gotta help Ryan. Please, you need to get him away from here.”

Morgan glanced at me over Myrin’s shoulder. “Are you all right?”

I shook my head. “Don’t worry about me. Please. Just help him. He can’t—”

“Why are you here?” Myrin asked, head cocked. “Why are there no others with you? And how did you know he was here?”

“Questions,” Morgan said, lips quirking the smallest amount. “You always did ask questions. If there were answers you didn’t know, it would frustrate you to no end. And you would doggedly pursue those answers until you were satisfied. How strange is it that after everything, these little pieces of you remain.”

“You cannot speak to me as if I am the man I once was,” Myrin said, hands curling into fists at his sides. “You made sure that part of me died a long, long time ago.”

“I know,” Morgan said. “And I will regret to the end of my days not allowing you to pass beyond the veil. It was my cowardice that held on to the hope that one day, we could find a way to…. Well. It doesn’t matter now.”

“You regret not killing me?” Myrin sounded shocked.

“I regret not having the strength to do what I needed to do,” Morgan corrected gently. “If I had, we would not be here. I had hope. But I should have realized that you did not. And to answer your questions, I am here because Sam is my apprentice. I know all the steps he has taken. There was something just off about that page, though I could never put my finger on why I felt that way. But I learned long ago to trust my senses. You do not have much time, Myrin. You have entered the City of Lockes with ill intent. The King’s map will soon sound warning of your trespass.”

“The King’s map,” Myrin scoffed. “Elven magic. It is unreliable. It will show danger in the City, but how accurate can it be? The knights will scour Lockes, but by the time they find this house, it will be over.”

“Will it? And I assume you mean that you’ll have consumed Sam’s magic.”

“Let’s not remind him about that,” I said hastily. “Maybe we can just talk about something else instead.”

They both ignored me. “Yes,” Myrin said. “I will. And then Lockes will fall. The Darks will pour from the forest and Verania will be brought to its knees. Its people will look upon me as I tower above them, and they will beg for me to save them. And I will be kind to them, because the most loyal of animals are the ones that you have not raised your hand to.”

Morgan nodded as if that was what he expected. “There is one minor problem with that.”

“And that is?”

“I won’t let you have him.”

“No?”

“No.”

“I thought not.”

Morgan was moving even before Myrin finished speaking. He clapped his hands in front of his chest, and the house around us trembled at the strength of him. The sound of his hands striking was like thunder, and even as he pulled them apart, even as his magic roared throughout the room, Myrin countered, hands raised and glowing rust red, like dried blood. His fingers were curled like claws, and as Morgan’s arms stretched wide, a bright bubble spreading from the center of his chest—the containment—Myrin answered with a bright flash of light that smashed against Morgan’s magic. It collided with the bubble and ricocheted with a disastrous clang, the shock wave knocking Ruv off his feet, head smacking against the crumbling stone of the fireplace. He collapsed to the ground and stayed there.