“Let me handle him on my own, Kyan,” Lucia said.
Kyan kept staring at Jonas. “You’re wrong,” he said to Lucia, his eyes still on Jonas. “He doesn’t have the orb. I know I’d be able to feel its magic if it were really this close.”
“Perhaps not on him, but he did claim it,” Lucia pressed. “Where is it, Jonas?”
“No idea,” Jonas said evenly. “Sorry I couldn’t be more help.”
The young man narrowed his eyes, and in a sudden flash of light and heat, a ring of flames shot up from the ground, enclosing them in its circle. Jonas started and heard the crowd beyond the fire scream and scatter, abandoning the market.
Jonas shot a tense glance at his friends. “Olivia, tell me you can do something.”
Her eyes were wide and staring, filled with fear he’d never seen from this brave witch. “Oh, no,” she whispered. “Not now. Not here.”
“What are you talking about?” The heat from the flames grew ever more intense around Jonas.
“It—it’s too soon,” she said, clearly stunned and in a daze. “I’m not ready. I’m not strong enough.”
“Do what you can, then!” Jonas urged. “We’ll help!” He looked back to Kyan. “What are you?”
“You people keep asking me that. You weak, ignorant mortals. Born with so much potential, yet you are always falling short, failing at every turn. Sickening.”
“Kyan . . .” Lucia said, an edge of warning in her voice.
“Except you, little sorceress. You’re completely exempt from the failings of the rest of your kind. You are a perfect specimen, an example of what humans should be. What they will be.”
Jonas glanced nervously at the flames, the hellish cage trapping them there with a sorceress and this man—someone far more dangerous than any simple magic-wielder.
Kyan took a step closer, his fists clenched at his sides.
“Stay away from Jonas, you freak,” Lys snarled, stepping forward resolutely and fearlessly, then she gave Jonas a sidelong glance. “We can handle this, you and me. We’ve handled worse.”
Jonas’s heart swelled. He suddenly couldn’t take his gaze off her, this fierce, stunning warrior who’d stood by him every step of the way. This remarkable girl who’d told him she loved him.
But then his heavy heart ached when he thought of how he’d forgotten all about her the moment he’d seen Cleo, how he’d practically fallen at the golden princess’s feet as he’d begged for a kiss.
He’d been too blind to see that he’d already won the greatest treasure of all.
Jonas turned to face Kyan, staring him right in his amber eyes. “You heard Lys. Back off. I don’t have your orb, but if I did, I’d happily shove it right up your arse.”
Kyan regarded him with a chilling smile. “You’re either exceedingly brave or utterly stupid, boy.”
Jonas eyed Kyan and Lucia in turn. “Enough of this. Go play with your magic somewhere else. I can’t help you.” He sent a withering glare to Lucia. “And clearly you can’t help me either.”
Kyan continued to stare at Jonas so intently that he thought the man might be trying to read his mind. But then his expression slackened just a touch, and he frowned and cocked his head. “I do sense other magic here,” he said. “Undiluted elemental magic.”
Kyan snapped his gaze to Olivia and in the beat of a hawk’s wing, his amber eyes shifted to a vivid shade of blue. “Watcher.”
Olivia staggered back a step, shaking her head. “Stay away from me.”
“You dare to oppose me?” Flames rolled down Kyan’s arms, billowing with rage as bright as his eyes. “Did you really think you could conceal your true identity? What has Timotheus told you to do? Take me by surprise? Fool me? Trap me?”
Olivia turned to meet Jonas’s stunned gaze.
“Is that true?” he asked. “Are you a Watcher?”
“I’m so sorry, Jonas. I can’t . . .” Her voice trembled, she continued to shake her head. “Timotheus was wrong to send me.”
The circle of fire blazed brighter, rose higher, as tall as the oldest trees in Mytica.