Page 294 of Cursed Evermore

This wasn't me. This wasn't the girl who'd promised herself she would always try to fight.

I had to do something.Anything.Anything I could think of to stop them from taking me.

I was supposed to help Wolfe find the ring. Everything had led me here to this point. So, I couldn’t allow myself to get taken by his sister and throw off his plans to get his kingdom back.

A group of rebels reached me and started throwing balls of fire at the shield. Wolfe was so distracted he didn’t see.

The only thing I thought of that came to mind was using my powers. But I needed to think ofhow.

As horrid as Zyrra had been, she helped me realize there wasn’t anything wrong with my powers. I just didn’t see them for what they were.

I’d conjured a rose and made it age in the space of a minute. I didn’t know what the base power was—if I could speed up the life of something or call on death—but I needed to apply the same principles here.

I searched through my mind, trying to think of the answers, and something came to me. The point of conjuring was calling forth something and bending it to your will with the energy from the Fray. What if I called on all the years these rebels had to live and make them live out the rest of their lives within a minute?

Could that work?

Blessed Mother, there was only one way to find out.

I thought of the conjuring spell. I’d need to swap out the lines relevant for flowers and maybe use the old mage language from Ivaliyahce because there were so many rebels. The old language was more powerful.

Quickly, I wove together a spell in my mind, one that wouldn’t affect Wolfe. Then I took a deep breath.

I’d have to remove Wolfe’s shield to cast the spell. Within the walls of such a powerful shield, nothing would happen. The problem wasn’t removing the shield; I could do that part. Arielle told me that no matter how powerful the shield, the person inside it could remove it, but they needed to use a basic power. It was a way of dismissing the protection by honoring the natural laws of magic.

However, if the spell didn’t work, I would have basically handed myself to the rebels. By the same token, the shield was breaking from their energy balls, so they’d get to me eventually.

I had to act now or get taken.

I counted. One. Two. Three.

Summoning my elemental power, I broke down the shield.

As soon as it disappeared, I shouted, “Dokombriva, mortiulim, carpe liveum.” My voice carried in the wind, a desperate plea from my soul.

A rebel grabbed me, and I feared the spell didn’t work.

“Dokombriva, mortiulim, carpe liveum!” I repeated again and again and again. Andagain. That last time, something snapped inside me. Or switched on. It felt like…touching fire and being burned.

White light shot out of my hands, just like I’d seen with Arielle’s power.

The rebels holding me froze. Then they all did. Every single one of them. And even the beast Wolfe was fighting.

Seconds later, the rebels' skin began to change. What started as smooth flesh quickly became lined and weathered, as if decades were passing in heartbeats.

Their eyes grew cloudy and sunken. Their cheeks hollowed as their bodies withered. Their hair shifted from dark to silver to stark white, then began falling out in clumps that scattered on the wind.

Muscles atrophied, shoulders hunched, and their once-strong frames became frail and bent. Age spots bloomed across their skin like ink stains spreading through water.

Then came the cracking. Their skin split and flaked away like old parchment, revealing dried sinew beneath. Their bones became visible through translucent flesh that looked ready to tear at the slightest touch.

Within moments, what had been fierce warriors were now decrepit shells barely able to stand. They tried to scream, but only wheezed gasps escaped their withered throats.

And then, as if a strong wind had blown through the clearing, they simply... crumbled. Crumbled to dust.

Their bodies collapsed into themselves, flesh and bone disintegrating into fine gray powder that drifted away on the morning breeze.

Gods. It worked. It actually worked. I did that.