Shoulder the Skye (Skye Druids #2)(71)
Author: Donna Grant

 

As she drove like a maniac toward the manor, she saw of a group of people attacking each other.

 

“Here we go,” she murmured as she hurried toward them.

 

 

 

 

 

She could kill Sydney. Bronwyn knew that for a fact. It would only take one assault.

 

And little effort.

 

The additional power she’d received upon turning drough assured it was possible. It roiled within her, in turns urging and demanding her to give in to the darkness. She had fought it for weeks. Buried it, ignored it.

 

But she couldn’t do that anymore.

 

It was too loud. Worse, it matched the wrath within her, blocking out everything but one person—Sydney.

 

She delivered strike after strike. None of them killing blows. Yet. Just enough to cause him pain and knock him around. She enjoyed his suffering, but it did little to erase the image of her father crying out from the blow of magic Sydney delivered. It didn’t stop the memory of her dad collapsing to the ground, never to move again.

 

It didn’t ease her pain of never speaking to her father again.

 

Yet Sydney wasn’t to blame for everything. A great portion rested on her shoulders. Maybe that was why she wanted to hurt Sydney so desperately. Because she couldn’t hurt herself.

 

Or perhaps she already had by using blood magic.

 

Bronwyn tried to drown out her thoughts as she advanced on Sydney, easily dodging his half-hearted shots of magic while trying to scramble away. She could take him down and end everything. Bronwyn reared back her hand.

 

She came to a sudden halt when something stirred in the air, something she recognized. Bronwyn lifted her face and looked upward to see the mist advancing and receding in rhythmic movements that she realized were in time with her heartbeat.

 

At almost the same instant, she knew that whoever controlled the mist was here. Bronwyn looked toward the oak. She couldn’t see the person, but they were there. Watching. She wanted to know who it was and what they wanted, but she had Sydney to deal with first.

 

The bounce of headlights then caught her attention. Bronwyn glanced from the approaching vehicle back to the mist. Its attention was no longer on her. Instead, it was directed at Sydney.

 

The mist gathered together tightly, almost like a snake coiling as it readied to strike. Bronwyn couldn’t explain it, but she knew it was about to attack. She hadn’t felt any danger when it had been fixated on her. Indeed, it had almost seemed as if it were there to…support her…if that was possible.

 

“Bronwyn!”

 

She heard the panic in Elias’s voice, but she couldn’t look at him. Her attention moved between the mist and Sydney. It was going to kill him. She knew it with the same certainty she knew she was past saving. With the same sureness that she knew she loved Elias.

 

Elias.

 

She didn’t want him to see what she was now, what she had fought—and lost—against. Deep down, she knew she would embrace the darkness of being a drough. That was why she hadn’t wanted anyone fighting alongside her. She’d lied to herself when she said she was strong enough to ignore the wickedness that came with becoming drough.

 

All this time, she had thought about how she would make Sydney suffer in the hopes it would ease the emptiness and grief that had been her constant companions since she’d lost her father. She needed Sydney to physically hurt.

 

But did she have to do it? The mist was here. It could take Sydney’s life. She wouldn’t lose her soul to the darkness. Though she might have already and simply wasn’t aware of it. She couldn’t give in to her animosity and wrath and come away unscathed.

 

She looked at Sydney. His confidence was shaken. He breathed hard and couldn’t put weight on his left leg. He also favored his right arm. She glanced upward and watched as he lifted his gaze. A smile pulled at her lips when his eyes rounded in horror, and a new kind of fear took hold of him—the kind of fright that froze a person in place.

 

Bronwyn was there, watching, and yet she felt detached from it all. As if she were watching it in a dream. She spotted Sydney’s chest heaving as his breaths came quickly. She noticed the dots of sweat on his brow and the way he trembled. He tried to run, only to trip over his feet and fall on his arse, his hands behind him.

 

Her eyes drifted upward as the mist grouped itself into the unmistakable form of a fist. This was it. This was how Sydney would die. She had prayed for his death. In the next heartbeat, Sydney would be dead. Her nightmare would be over.

 

But then a memory surfaced of Elias gazing at her with such love in his eyes that she felt safely cocooned in it. Love blossomed rapidly and pushed away the hate and anger, tamped down the blackness that tried to claim her.

 

“You have my heart. My soul.”

 

Bronwyn’s eyes swam with tears before one dropped onto her face. She didn’t hesitate as she loosed a scream and used all her magic to open a portal between Sydney and the mist. The mist back peddled quickly to keep from being sucked in. Then it retreated—and came for her.

 

 

 

 

 

“Bronwyn!” Elias bellowed again as he watched the mist turn and attack her.

 

He watched her lift her hands in defense, but she was no match for it. It plowed into her, knocking her sideways into the house, causing the windows to rattle. Then she fell in a heap, unmoving. Elias forgot about everything but her. He tried to go to her, but George used his distraction to deliver a hit that landed him on his back, knocking the wind from him so he saw stars.

 

Elias fought the panic that set in when he couldn’t catch his breath, even as he attempted to roll to the side. Pain radiated everywhere, but his only thought was Bronwyn. The woman he loved, the one he had promised to save.

 

A foot pushed against his chest and kept him on the ground. He blinked, willing the pain to retreat to a manageable level. He wheezed, dragging air into his starving lungs. And found himself looking up at George as she stood with one foot on him, triumph in her eyes.

 

“You will pay for what you’ve done,” George said.

 

Elias glanced at Bronwyn. She hadn’t stirred, and the mist continued moving around her as if it hadn’t yet decided whether to kill her or not. He reached out a hand to Bronwyn, needing to touch her one last time. But she was too far away.

 

He groaned as George put weight on his chest and leaned over him. The little air he had managed to drag in dissipated quickly. The aches of his body combined with that in his heart was too much. The edges of his vision darkened. He tried to pool his magic to dislodge George so he could get to Bronwyn. If he was going to die, he wanted to be beside her.