WHAT IN THE GODS’ NAMES?
I step back, pressing into the wooden stage. The black liquid spreads across the sand like the tide, foaming and frothing until it takes to the air as a gas.
The dark clouds overtake the crowd, but nothing happens to the kosidán it hits. The tîtáns caught in its path merely cough.
It’s the maji who scream like their nails are being ripped off.
“Help!”
A young maji scratches at his throat. His light brown skin sizzles and burns. He struggles to scream as he chokes on the black smoke.
In that instant it dawns on me, the true nature of this attack. The poison of majacite, but not in chains or swords.
In the air.
As a gas.
“Go!” I scream at Tzain and Amari, clawing myself onto the wooden platform. Fear strikes my core like a battering ram. My feet go numb as I climb.
The majacite cloud moves through the dome, its thick mass expanding like a storm. Shouts and panic fill the air as maji scatter, trampling over one another in their dash for the far exits.
“Don’t let one rebel escape!” Nehanda thunders above the masses. “Orïsha must be protected from their madness!”
“Mother, please!” Amari yells, but Tzain yanks her off the stage. He grabs my arm as he charges through the people in our way, pulling us through the hysteria.
The queen’s personal guard closes in from all sides, golden armor flashing as they run. Like Nehanda, their forearms gleam with matching gauntlets. Golden masks sit over their noses.
“Attack!” Nehanda orders, and I wait to see more majacite blades or glass orbs. But when the guards’ hands glow green with ashê, I realize the reason behind their special rank.
They aren’t just her personal guard.
They’re her own legion of tîtáns.
Horror consumes me as the tîtáns’ powers break free and they target a group of fleeing maji. Circles of sand harden around maji’s feet like cement. Sand pillars shoot from the ground, striking my people in the back.
I scream with rage as Nehanda’s tîtáns desecrate the magic of Grounders before my eyes. How dare they wield our own gifts against us? But when one tîtán soldier bares his teeth in pain, I realize that they don’t understand the fragile magic they now have.
“Help me!” he cries.
People flee the space as the tîtán screams. The sand around him quakes with incredible force. His skin corrodes as the magic surges beyond his control.
In a flash, the green light explodes in his chest. The life fades from his brown eyes.
The tîtán falls into the sand, his corpse trampled in the fray.
“Zél, come on!” Tzain pulls me along, but I struggle to stay upright. The way that tîtán screamed, the way he lost control—I’ve felt that strain myself.
It’s the power maji are forbidden to use. A power so great it consumes all who wield it.
It’s the power of blood magic.
And somehow the tîtáns have it.
“Murderer!”
Amari screams as a noble grabs her braid and drags her back. Tzain dives after them, smashing his fist into the noble’s chin.
“Tzain!” I try to stay close, but within moments they’re lost in the crowd. Without my brother, the bodies in front of me become an unbreakable wall.
“Tzain, I need you!” I claw at those in my way, heart pounding in my chest. Tîtán soldiers charge from the front. The black cloud approaches from the back.
I try to forge ahead, but when the first tendril of majacite hits my neck, I can only scream.