Aleira Brightleaf's Arc

Chapter 11 of 18

The lava crept across the floor. Aleira dragged Morwenna back from the glowing edge, but the necromancer would not move her feet. Morwenna stood frozen, staff pressed to her chest, eyes wide and white. Aleira needed her magic. Morwenna could hold back fire the way she once held back the spider. But a terrified witch casts nothing. "Morwenna. Look at me." Aleira grabbed her shoulders. The heat pushed at their robes. "I need you to call your power. Now." "I can't," Morwenna said. "It's coming. The floor's burning. We'll melt. We'll die in here. I can't move. I can't." Her words tumbled out fast and flat, one fear stacked on the next. Her staff trembled so hard the skull on top rattled. Across the room, Hazel aimed her wand at the lava. "I'll freeze it! I'll blast it cold!" Aleira turned. "No! You'll crack the floor worse." Hazel lowered the wand, blinking, hurt. The lava spread another handspan and hissed. Aleira looked at the crawling fire, then at the shaking girl. The throne sat behind them, half in shadow, the thing she had crossed Hell to hold. It was not worth Morwenna's life. It was not worth any of theirs. She let the choice go and pulled Morwenna close instead. "Forget the fire," Aleira said, quiet now. "Look at me. You held the spider for me. You did that when you were scared too. I kept your secret. I hid you from your own kind. I'm still here. I'm not leaving you." Morwenna's white eyes found her face. "You kept the secret," she repeated. "You kept it." "Every day. Breathe with me. Slow." Aleira drew one long breath. Morwenna followed, shaky, then again. The staff stopped rattling. The trust she gave her minions, she was learning to give Aleira. Her shoulders dropped. Her grip firmed on the wood. "Now," Aleira said. "The fire. Push it back." Morwenna raised the skull staff. Green light bloomed at its tip. She spoke words Aleira did not know, low and steady. The dead magic rolled out and met the lava. The glowing flow slowed. It cooled at the edges into dark, cracked crust. The spreading stopped an arm's length from the throne. Hazel let out a breath. "You did it." But the crust only held the surface. Under it, the pressure still built. The tower groaned again. A new crack split the far wall, and through the fresh gap came a sound Aleira had prayed not to hear: many voices, chanting together. The sealed rubble at the old entrance began to shift. The necromancers had found another way in, and Morwenna's magic, the thing that just saved them, was a beacon calling her own kind straight to her. Morwenna heard it too. She did not freeze this time. She looked at Aleira and said, "They're here. They know I'm here. What do we do?"