It reminded me of the door that had started all of this – the footage Cassidy had shown me earlier in the week of those two trainee warlocks trying to gain entry to a nondescript door.

  I had to be in the same building now.

  “No, let me out of here. Let me out,” I screeched, my desperate voice arcing high and piercing through the room.

  He laughed. It was a lilting, shaking, awful move. The laugh of a brutal mind trying to decide just how far it will go in torturing you.

  I was clammy and cold, but the frozen sensation shifting through me was wholly different from the usual cold that sat in the center of my chest. This sensation was more violent. Darker. It no longer felt as if I’d been transported to the Arctic. It no longer felt as if I’d swallowed a raging blizzard. My body was being destroyed, one cell at a time as they burst into ice, never to thaw again.

  “Not every century you’re gifted a frozen witch,” he commented with another lilting, dark chuckle. His eyes were devoid of any sense of warmth. They were aglow with such dark desire and dark promise, they appeared to be two little lights in this gloomy room.

  I felt Caxus’ shoulders relax, heard them creak as he unwrapped himself from around me and shifted forward.

  I bucked back. The gun was still in my hand, and this time I didn’t hesitate. I fired round after round into the center of his chest.

  … The bullets did nothing. The magic hissed, crackled, and spat around him, jumping high like a raging bonfire, but it couldn’t affect him.

  That casual smile never left his lips as he stood there, cocking his head to the side, intrigued by my efforts to kill him.

  With a click, I fired my last bullet.

  Sweat plastered my brow. As the cold raged through my stomach and billowed through my chest, I swore that sweat turned into ice as if I’d shoved my head into a freezer.

  With one hand lodged in his pocket, he offered me a casual shrug. “This is no way to treat me. Not when I offer you such a bright future.”

  “Bright future?” My voice was little more than a choked, hissed whisper.

  He nodded low. “A future befitting the frozen witch of the age.”

  “What are you talking about? Just… just let me go,” I begged, even though it was useless. This man was a demon. I couldn’t reason with him, and my pathetic attempts to beg him would only amuse him more.

  Sure enough, that dark smile dug harder into his cheeks. “Come now, you know nothing of your origins, nothing of your ability? Nothing of your future?” His tone changed.

  I couldn’t call it dark anymore. It was beyond that. It reached some level of soulless cold, it could no longer be comprehended by the human mind.

  “What… what are you talking about? I’m just a witch.”

  “Just a witch?” He pulled his hand from his pocket and gestured wide. “You are no ordinary witch. You can hardly be compared to them. Not considering the inherent chaos that drives through your heart.”

  I shook back, my gun still raised even though it was out of bullets. Nobody else had defined my powers as chaos. Only I had made the connection. Until now. As this creep drew that same conclusion, dread gouged my heart.

  I didn’t manage to hide my reaction. He ticked his head to the side, dark curiosity flaring as his smile twitched across his face. “You felt it, then? The storm that lies at your center. The cold reaching out to claim creation.” He grasped a hand into a fist, the move accentuating his thin, bony fingers. “The chaos that wants to freeze and extinguish light?”

  I couldn’t speak. I could barely face him. Were it not for the fact my body had seized up in terror, I would have clamped my hands over my face in a pathetic attempt to make this nightmare end.

  “I’ll never help you—”

  “Perhaps not yet. But when you realize what you are and what you can do, your horizons will expand.” He tipped his head back as he faced the ceiling above. He opened his mouth, his nostrils becoming slit-like as he drew in a deep, rattling breath as if he were attempting to draw all of creation into his lungs.

  “Just let me go,” I begged, even though it was useless.

  I had to get out of here before the violent promise in his every word could come to fruition.

  With darting movements, I let my gaze slip across the rest of the room.

  It appeared to be empty save for an old gentleman’s chair sitting on two slabs of cracked stone.

  The arms of the gent’s chair were worn, torn apart, in fact, as if somebody had clawed at the fabric for centuries. There were long fingernail gouge marks over the wood, the grain splintered and cracked.

  Caxus obviously realized that my attention had been diverted.

  He chuckled. “Find yourself taken by my throne?”

  “Throne?”

  “Hardly a seat befitting a king. But yes, that has been my throne for centuries now,” his voice became dark on the word centuries. “A doorway back to the gods.”

  My brow compressed with a twitch.

  With a flourish, he gestured at the chair. “Care to take a seat? You look tired, fragile on your feet.”

  As soon as he said fragile on your feet, my knees buckled.

  He moved around me, as quick as a bolt of lightning as he snatched up my hand and manhandled me towards the chair. I heard the hiss of his breath by my ear and felt the pull of those invisible fingers across my cheeks until they latched around my throat. “Don’t fight me. It will be a long, cold, lonely existence if you do.” With that dire warning echoing in my ears, he shoved me into the chair.

  As soon as I approached it, let alone when my hands brushed against those clawed arms, terror seized me. Even in the hands of Hank Chaplain, I’d still felt a measure of control over my body. Now that control faded away as this spell took hold of me. I felt it reach out from the chair, from the scratched fabric, from the gouged wood. My knees buckled, I lost all control of my arms, and my eyelids began to close.

  Just as my body shut down, I heard the demon’s cold laugh echo out from behind me. “Wait for me, my frozen witch. As soon as I plunge this city into chaos and open its heart to the violence within, I will be back. Then I will teach you the chaos that lies at the center of your own heart.”

  He tilted back just as the darkness closed around me from all sides.

  I fought against it, but with my body shutting down, I no longer had power.

  The gloom wound around me like a set of hands as it clamped over my face, locked around my body, and shoved me against the chair. My arms fell against the armrests, and my legs were tugged in until my ankles were locked behind the chair legs.

  Suddenly, violently, my chin was wrenched back. I scrounged all the energy I had left to open my eyes. Above me, on the old, dusty, cobweb-covered rafters, I saw a symbol. Glowing, crackling, dark blood-red and black – it was a mandala more powerful than any I’d ever seen, more intricate, too. As the runes darted across its surface, they bubbled and boiled like lava spilling from the center of the earth.

  They were mesmerizing. The more I stared at them, the more I shut down – the more the fight was stolen from me.

  … I had to escape. If I couldn’t, I just knew that Caxus would come good on his promise. He would plunge this city into chaos, causing its unwitting inhabitants to perpetrate the most heinous, violent crimes. When he was done, he would come for me.

  I had no chance to unlock my bangles. I doubted it would work, either. I just knew that Caxus would have cast a locking spell on them, just like Hank Chaplain had done a month ago.

  But I’d found a way to break through Hank’s spell.

  As my mind started to shut down – as my thoughts became insubstantial, confused, nothing more than wafting smoke billowing through my mind – I opened myself to the storm. To the chaos. To the cold.

  I didn’t sink into those confusing, violent sensations. I closed myself off from everything Caxus had told me. I wouldn’t let him make me afraid of my own abilities.

  I still had no idea how to control my magic. But as I called to it with everything I had, with everything I was, I let that desperation be my guide. And it was enough.

  With a surge, I felt a burst of power leap high through my chest.

  It was beyond chaos, beyond confusion. Though it had no identifiable pattern, that didn’t matter. At its heart, it was so much more. As I gave myself up to my power, as I pulled away from the confusion Caxus had cast me under, I felt my ice.

  It began to crack around me. Though my body was still shutting down, I heard icicles break through the air and form beneath my seated body.

  Caxus had been turning away moments before, but now he let out a hissing, biting breath. I heard the scatter of footfall as he sprang towards me.

  I had no idea how my powers would work against a demon. He wasn’t human. He didn’t require warm flesh and a beating heart to live.

  I didn’t let that question stop me. Regaining enough muscular control to crumple my brow and shove my teeth hard into my bottom lip, I pushed my every thought into my magic, letting it grow, letting it reach up from my heart and consume me.

  He bellowed in rage. I tuned out his violent, shaking voice. I… I did it. The ice shot towards him. It didn’t just push out of me in a chaotic swirl of power. In an instant I would never forget, I controlled it. I sent it shooting out with all its force.

  He let out a terrifying, gasping scream that split the air with the power of an atomic explosion.

  With a jolt, I felt a modicum of my energy return to me. It was enough that I could jerk forward against the invisible restraints that kept me bound to this chair.

  “No,” he bellowed.

  I paid no heed.

  The room was now covered in ice. The chair beneath me creaked ominously as the cold powered through it. Frost marched up the walls, encroaching on the rafters and that powerful, chaotic symbol painted across them.

  Great sparks of magic discharged into the air, the smell of sulfur filling the room. Sulfur and burnt flesh.

  For the first time, I saw my magic. It was shooting towards Caxus in a powerful arc of white-blue sparks. The air around it sizzled, jets of wind spinning around my magic and increasing its force.

  Though I’d managed to attack Caxus, I watched him jerk his head up, his teeth bared as he fought against my force.

  He managed to take a threatening step towards me.

  My breath breaking in frozen waves against my face, my whole body pulsing with adrenaline, I used all the control I had to keep that magic powering into him. But I wouldn’t be able to keep it up forever. My hands and face and chest were tingling – not with energy, not with sweet release, but with fatigue. As the magic spun out of me, it took my very life force with it.

  Caxus sneered, his lips snapping back as he howled with rage. The quality of it was so animalistic, he sounded like a wolf getting ready to tear its prey apart.

  I had to get out, and I had to get out now.

  The last dregs of the spell holding me in place broke with a snap. I jolted forward, my head spinning but my feet steady as I scrambled over the concrete.

  “Fight me,” he managed through an echoing, splitting stutter as if his throat were being burned, “and I will simply find a way to bind you tighter.”

  It was the most awful promise I’d ever heard. The words could have been crueler. His expression couldn’t have been any more brutal.

  I bolted past him, still concentrating with all my might and all my magic to keep him locked in place. He strained against the power of my spell, his cheeks practically flapping as if he were facing some terrible wind. Though he couldn’t shift his body my way, his gaze tore into me.

  “I’ll make you pay for your crimes,” I said, the words bubbling out of me as I headed straight for the door on the opposite side of the room. Just as I reached it, just as I threw out a hand and latched it over the cold metal handle, I half-closed my eyes and concentrated with all my might. Shifting to the side and flicking a hand his way, I sent the last of my power spiraling into him.

  It was enough to send him back.

  I didn’t wait around to see what would happen next. I yanked the door open and ran out into the night.

  I sprang to the left, running for all I was worth.

  I was in that same laneway. It was empty and silent – so there was nothing to stop me from hearing the shrieking bellow that split through the air.

  Caxus had picked himself up. His frantic, pounding footfall echoed out from behind me.

  I knew I had seconds.

  Tears streaking down my cheeks, my body almost breaking under the tension, I aimed for the mouth of the laneway before me.

  I concentrated on it with everything. I tuned out Caxus’ footfall as it grew louder, sharper, closer.

  … I made it. Drawing on the last of my muscular strength, I pushed forward and out of the laneway. I spilled out onto a city street, incapable of pulling up as I tumbled onto the road.

  I fell onto the asphalt and heard a sudden screech of tires right by my face. My heartbeat became a fragmented mess as my desperation cut me to shreds.

  I waited to be run over.

  I felt a car stop right in front of me. One of its wheels even pressed against my shoulder.

  I heard a car door open, heard somebody jump out.

  I… felt something. An unmistakable presence.

  I forced my eyes open to see him.

  Franklin Saunders. Or Vali. I couldn’t tell the difference anymore.

  Compassion crumpled his usually smooth brow as he shoved a hand towards me. That hand froze, almost literally, as he saw the symbols dancing over my skin.

  I saw the rage that was never too far from Vali’s eyes.

  It didn’t have long to flare. He twitched his head to the side as we both heard echoing footfall.

  Though I had to blink against the light of the headlights half an inch from my nose, I could still see Vali’s face as it crumpled with anger.

  He shoved forward, magic bursting from both hands as he powered towards the mouth of the laneway.

  Despite the fact we appeared to be on a busy street, all I could hear was Caxus’ breath.

  I fought against the weakness eating through my muscles.

  Caxus hesitated.

  I watched him come to a skidding halt at the mouth of the laneway.

  Franklin shot forward, a bellow breaking from his stiff, white lips.

  Despite the fact I was a good 10 meters away, I still saw right into Caxus’ eyes as he appeared to come to some decision. With a violent sneer crumpling his lips, he backed away into the darkness. Just before Franklin could reach the mouth of the laneway, it disappeared.

  In a flash, it went from existing, to fading away as if it had never been there at all.

  Franklin had to come to a sudden stop. He stood there, his back ramrod straight, his body poised for action, his magic still bursting up over his hands. Unlike most practitioners, he could clearly practice with both hands. No – his entire body. Every part of him, from his feet to his nose, was charged with magic.

  I didn’t shift up from where I’d fallen in front of the car. It was still on, and the sound of its vibrating engine lulled me.

  Almost.

  Franklin turned on his foot, the move hard. He bolted towards me.

  The rage still marked his features, crumpled his brow, and drew his lips thin. Fortunately it was no longer directed at me.

  He stood over me as he assessed me for any sign of an injury.

  Even though the headlights of his car shone brightly into my eyes, I could still see the reflected light of the symbols that covered my body.

  I could still feel them, too. Though they should have been distracting, nothing at all could detract from Franklin as he got down on one knee and reassuringly placed a hand on my shoulder.

  “It is over,” he said with clear, ringing certainty. The kind of certainty that could still my wildly beating heart.

  “What? What happened?” I stuttered. It was a rhetorical question. Franklin hadn’t been there. But as his mere presence offered me hope and protection, I turned my mind to the terrifying task of figuring out what had just happened to me. And, far more horribly, what could have happened if I hadn’t found a way to escape.

  Franklin stared at me grimly, then he reached a hand towards my wrist.

  Though his presence was offering me immeasurable calm, my body still expected an attack.

  I shrunk back and pressed against the tire behind me.

  He paused. “I will not hurt you,” Vali said.

  I could tell it was Vali, because his words were strong, his voice so direct, so brimming with power.

  I let him grab my wrist.

  The symbols that had been dancing over my body ceased. They flickered out like fireflies who’d been hidden within a dark cave.

  As those symbols extinguished, my drive did, too. My mind told me that it really was over now, and my heart agreed as it gave a fatigued shake.

  My eyes threatened to roll back into my head, but I held on.

  With a grim expression still playing over his handsome visage, Franklin took off one of my bangles, never loosening his grip on my wrist. As his fingers remained wrapped around my arm, I felt the unmistakable tingle of magic. It was clear he was using his own skill to suppress mine. Just as it was clear that as he inspected the bangle, he was trying to fix it.

  “I… I’m sorry, I think… I think I broke it. I just… I had to get away.” My words were garbled, hissing, and broken.

  Though Vali’s presence comforted me, it couldn’t detract from what I’d just survived. An image of those dancing, chaotic symbols burnt onto the rafters filled my mind.

  “Do not fear,” Vali said, “this is not your fault.”

  He said that with such power, it was clear it was more than a throwaway comment. He was presiding over my sins, judging me. This time I wouldn’t be punished.