Page 140 of Shadows of Perl

That’s when I spot Quell. She’s almost made it past the other Houses to the Sphere. Her clothes are a mess; she must have had an altercation with someone on the way. I don’t know what to do. Do I go after her? Or do I go after Beaulah, who’s watching the chaos from beneath the Sphere, her Draguns formed up beside her? Waiting. Watching. As Quell darts around their perimeter, Beaulah’s head follows her. And an eerie feeling slithers around my throat.

They’re waiting.

Waiting for Quell to break the Sphere. Beaulah was never going to do it herself. Having Quell do it was her plan all along.

“Quell, don’t!” But she’s too far away to hear. The sights and sounds of clashing bodies dull, and all I can hear is the thud of Quell’s heart. I clutch my chest, wishing the trace worked in reverse. Wishing I could get her attention faster.

“Quell!”

I dash across the graveyard, between Duncan and Marionne’s bloodbath, and shout for her until she turns in my direction. Her body bleeds dark magic as she prepares to direct it to the Sphere. I dodge bodies slamming into one another. When she gets within shouting distance of Beaulah, she comes to a sharp halt. I catch up to her. But her magic whirls violently around her, shadows swallowing her like a swarm of locusts. I can’t get very close.

“Quell, stop!” I plead. “Don’t do this. Beaulah’s played you. This is a suicide mission. This is not what you are!”

Beaulah watches greedily. Her Draguns could be statues, standing around the Sphere.

Staring at Quell on the edge of demise makes my soul feel like it’s being ripped in two. “Maybe, for you, everything between us wasn’t real. But it is for me. Somehow you are both heart and darkness, which should be impossible! But defying the impossible is what you’re best at. Please.” Don’t leave me to fight for freedom in this world alone.

Quell shakes her head, her cheeks stained with tears. “If I don’t do this, Mom died for nothing.” She rotates her arms together and casts her magic onto the cracked Sphere like a net. Shadows hook onto its glass surface, and the orb shudders. Beyond her, Beaulah’s mouth bows in a smirk. In the distance the Dragunhead races toward us. She has minutes.

Quell tugs downward, pulling on the tether of her magic.

The orb hits the ground, and the earth quakes. The black matter inside the Sphere is shaken up. When the matter settles, it churns in a counter-clockwise motion, growing slower and thicker with each rotation. My brother appears out of nowhere and joins Quell’s side, unleashing his magic. Beaulah wants this. She’s played them both, using their hatred of her to manipulate them into doing exactly what serves her purposes.

“No!” The Sphere’s innards harden into a sludge.

“Get out of the way,” the Dragunhead shouts.

“Sir, give me a minute—” I spin just as the Dragunhead’s dagger slams into my chest.

Fifty-Six

Quell

Jordan’s knees hit the ground and a scream rips from my throat. I glare at the Dragunhead, who is now beside Beaulah, watching my magic attach to the orb. Beaulah’s Draguns are staying put like obedient little minions.

“Jordan!” Magic streams from my trembling fingers. I want to let go. But Beaulah. My mother. “Yagrin!”

But he is already lugging Jordan’s bleeding body away. When I turn back to the Sphere, even several hundred paces away, the sight of it stills my pulse. A piece of its glassy casing has broken free. Matter in the Sphere rolls to the gash in its exterior. A trickle of magic seeps from the crevice where the Sphere meets the earth.

It hits the air.

Then vanishes.

Evaporating.

And just like that, a whiff of magic is gone…forever.

“She’s done it!” someone screams.

The Sphere’s insides writhe. I can do this. I can get my revenge.

“Get rid of the girl.” Beaulah gives the order, shoving Felix, Yani, and a few others in my direction. The linked hands around the Sphere break as Beaulah’s Draguns come for me. I feel my pockets for Jordan’s pendant as Draguns encircle me. I pull it out when the Dragunhead shouts, “Hurry!”

Draguns assault me, their toushana streaming through the air. When their magic hits me, it pummels the wind from my chest and the pendant from my grasp. Somewhere Yagrin howls. Another person shrieks. I scramble across the snowy ground, clawing through the snow, scratching at cement headstones in the pavement, for some sign of the red stone. I stagger up, still looking. But there is no sign of Jordan’s necklace.

It’s gone.

And so is my shot at forcing Beaulah to know my misery.