Two red ears popped up from our bedroom window frame, right above the porch. My heart skipped a beat. Lirka.
The pointed ears rotated frantically, catching every hiss of the magic wind, and slowly they began to rise, revealing that wild mane and those predatory amber eyes, fixed on the back of Isabella's head.
One hand on the frame, then the other, elbows pointed upward to lift herself. But just as Lirka pulled her ears back, ready to pounce, a piece of the window wood let out a sudden creak.
Isabella started to turn her head, drawn by the sound, but a fireball erupted from the brazier right at that moment, recapturing her attention.
Emma. She had her arms stretched upward, the veins in her neck and wrists swollen from the effort; her gaze had become a deeper, fiercer red than the fire itself she manipulated.
Isabella didn't flinch. Yet.
Two consecutive cracks tore through the air: Isabella swept her wand and the fireball instantly transformed into a shapeless block of ice, which plummeted by inertia toward the two spectators on the ground.
Magnus snapped his fingers casually. A red flash burst from the floating red sphere and the ice dissolved into vapor before even touching the ground.
"I don't like showering away from home."
Damn it. If Lirka strikes now, she'll be spotted in an instant and turned into an ice statue before even hitting the ground.
I jerked my fingers toward the house, keeping my hand low so Magnus or the Sergeant wouldn't notice. Stay down. Wait. Lirka looked at me, a barely perceptible nod of her head. She'd understood it was best to wait for the right moment.
"Is that all?" Isabella asked, her voice as flat as the ice she'd just conjured.
"No!" Sipar stood on his feet now, his soaked clothes clinging to his skinny body. He had his hands clasped together and a golden circle—weak, trembling, but present—formed between his palms. "We… we won't give up!"
The sunlight seemed to dim for an instant, even though the sky was cloudless. My brother hurled the circle toward Isabella. It spun rapidly, a high-pitched buzz in the air as it traced a luminous trail, one last act of desperate defiance.
Boom.
A shield of polished stone, shiny as a mirror, appeared out of nowhere and deflected the blow. The circle bounced away, disintegrating into golden sparks before hitting the ground.
Magnus chuckled from below, lazily spinning one of his spheres. "Oh, Isabella, you're disappointing me. I thought you were more… creative."
The girl's face contorted into a grimace of pure irritation. She probably didn't like being criticized by her master. She thrust the wand toward me this time with sudden violence.
Now.
Throwing myself to the left, I rolled on the grassy lawn with a grunt.
Something gray and heavy crashed exactly where I'd been an instant before, a dull impact that made the ground shake. Spinning around, the stone disc had sunk into the soil, leaving a deep spiderweb-shaped crack.
I gotta get up. I pulled myself up with difficulty, breath short. Every movement was torture; the wind cuts kept bleeding, dotting my light tunic with an increasingly darker red. But I'd managed to move.
I was near the old well now.
Isabella still floated above the apple tree, smug in her advantageous position. But now, if she looked toward me, our bedroom window was directly behind her. Outside her field of vision.
Perfect. Feeling safe up there, aren't you? Now you'll see.
I couldn't see Lirka, but I hoped she could see me. Ready to give the signal, but before I could Isabella struck. Two consecutive bangs and the stone shield planted on the grass liquefied, transforming into a viscous puddle that took on a tapered shape, almost that of a snake, and slithered toward me with unnatural speed, charring the grass in its wake.
The smell of burnt grass filled my nostrils while I grabbed two of the well stones with the Breath of the Gods: they resisted, but came loose, bent to my will.
I hurled them toward the lava snake and clenched my hands into fists. The rocks exploded into rock spikes that pierced it, entangling it and dragging it backward.
"Oh no, Mom's plants!" The trajectory headed for the apple tree and my mother's fragrant plants; if the lava snake touched them, it would incinerate them in an instant.
Rage mounted, and my clarity faded. I pressed my feet into the lawn to sprint, every caution forgotten. But a single, dry click of Magnus's staff stopped the snake and the stones mid-air, letting them settle on the ground, harmless, without spikes or heat.
"I never liked baked apples," Magnus commented with irritating calm.
Okay Arek, think. The world slowed once the danger to the garden had passed. A moment was more than enough to understand Isabella's mechanism.
Two hits, two elements to create the lava snake: earth plus fire.
Her wand must produce that sound with every element she "created" from nothing. Every bang or crack was the sound of reality being forced by that object.
A golden glimmer from the darkness of the window, probably Lirka's eyes reflecting a ray of sunlight, was all it took for the pieces of the plan to click together in my mind.
Before I could act, a call from above cut me off.
"Let's put out this fire and see what you can still do, shall we?" Isabella sneered.
A violent bang seemed to make the leaves on the tree vibrate. A massive jet of water extended from the wand toward the glowing brazier.
"Emma, Sipar! Defend the fire!" I shouted.
The two moved in unison in front of the flames, arms stretched forward.
Both were sweating as a large wall of fire, fed by every spark remaining in the brazier, positioned itself between them and the water jet. The noise of the water instantly evaporating when it touched the wall of flames created a thick, hissing fog that invaded the garden.
Emma and Sipar had their foreheads beaded with sweat, teeth gritted from the effort, while Isabella remained impassive, except for that arrogant little smile on her blue lipstick.
She's distracted, it's time.
"Lirka, your turn!" I shouted.
The instant I spoke the name, a red shard leapt out of the window without any preparation, so fast it was almost a blurred streak.
Her arms pulled back, Lirka didn't describe an arc, but a taut, straight trajectory, from the window toward the flying figure of Isabella. It was like watching two patches of color collide in water; I almost expected that from that red and that blue a single purple stain would emerge.
But Isabella reacted with inhuman speed. She thrust her free hand behind her and dragged it from top to bottom with a violent gesture. A tile from the house detached from the roof and hit Lirka squarely, instantly wrapping her in ropes of clay that dragged her to the ground with a dull thud.
"Oh, I wasn't expecting this one. You all right, little foxy?" Magnus's acid voice overcame even the residual roar of the fire wall.
Isabella brought her chin back toward us with a slow steady motion. Our wall had been extinguished and the water jet had definitively suffocated even the last ember of the brazier. Her head began to scan right and left: she was searching for me.
I got you now, flying fairy!
I was enveloped by the warm fog created by the clash between flames and water, directly below her.
A crack. Then wind swept away the fog. I bent my legs before she could react now that she spotted me and sought the strength of the earth, that deep stability that only the ground can give you.
Two columns of dry earth suddenly stretched from under my soles, acting as a catapult and helping me make a desperate leap.
I flew straight toward her, my hand extended.
When Isabella's eyes met mine, they went wide. She pointed the wand at me, but by then it was too late. I stretched out my fingers, grabbed the solid bone and tore it away with all the strength I had, the smooth, warm surface slipping across my palm.
My shoulder impacted her chest and we fell toward the ground.
I didn't think about this part. I closed my eyes tightly preparing for the impact with the garden floor.
A tick, a light sound, and it was like landing on a soft pillow. The violent impact I expected never came; the earth and grass welcomed me as if they were made of goose down, wrapping me in a dark, soft embrace.
For an instant I even felt the tickle of the grass blades against my face, a surreal contrast to the violence of moments before.
The world suddenly reopened: light returned and the ground opened just enough to let me re-emerge, immediately resolidifying beneath my feet.
"What the…?" I muttered, confused.
"This time I was ready to catch you. Sorry, foxy, your move wasn't anticipated." Magnus said, laughing between his teeth.
There was no time to pay attention to the mage. I got to my feet, showing my trophy with pride to the blue earthbound fairy.
The smooth white spiral vaguely reminded me of something I'd broken a long time ago, a horn of some sort. Among its coils, small stones embedded along the entire length shone with the colors of the magic currents: red, blue, white, silver, gold… I counted at least twenty, though many were cracked or completely extinguished.
Each stone a different element? Are these what give her this power without paying the price?
I had no time to analyze it further.
"Good job, Arek! We won!" Sipar was shouting, while Emma smiled, fists still clenched but her gaze proud. Even Lirka from the ground, still wrapped in the tight clay rope, gave a grin; a sharp tooth jutted from her lip, dirty with dust.
With a brutal yank, she broke the clay bonds like they were paper.
Emma and Sipar approached, forming a semicircle around Isabella.
The blue haired girl slowly rose from the other side of the garden. Her hair was disheveled, her precious dress torn in several places. But those eyes, those damned ice eyes, remained cold, still calculating.
"It's over," I said, my voice hoarse but firm. I raised the wand toward her as if to threaten her.
"You don't have this anymore. And now it's four against one."
Isabella brushed the dust off herself with an almost listless movement, completely ignoring my threat. Then she smiled with her blue lips. It wasn't a warm smile. It was the coldest thing in that garden. And she hadn't cast a spell.
"Really?" she said, her voice flat. She finally raised her nose toward the clear sky and added: "There's a lot of light today, isn't there?"
And she spread her arms wide toward the sky.