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TEN YEARS OLD

B y the time I was ten years of age, Cirilla’s eyes had turned from the amethyst I once remembered, to the dark aubergine of when we had first begun studying together, to entirely black.

There was no pupil.

No iris.

Just a darkness I had never seen before. It was depthless.

I found it beautiful in its own way, though I doubt others felt the same. It was a sign of how powerful she was becoming. Of how much she had devoted herself to her studies.

I had asked her what had happened to her eyes, already knowing the answer.

She had never given me a straightforward response.

She had stopped going out, sending me on all of her errands and to do all of her shopping in town.

I didn’t mind going to the market for her.

I wasn’t sure if it was because she was getting older in years, or because she was embarrassed about her newfound appearance. She didn’t like to speak of it.

If I were her, I would show off my new black eyes with pride.

As her progression into dark magic continued, her hair had gone from grey to white, all color leeched from it.

Her face had always borne prominent wrinkles before, but now it sagged with age, her bones growing tired with the years.

All I could think was that I hoped she left the Grishina grimoire to me when she passed.

I chastised myself for the thought, but that didn’t stop it from repeating as if it were stuck on a loop in my mind.

I cared for her…in a way. But I cared for the grimoire more.

It had a power over me. I was enamored with it. Enamored with the idea of it. That it could grant me endless power. That once I was the most powerful Shade in the entire realm, nobody could bring me down. Nobody would make fun of me.

Torment me.

I would be invincible .

One day when I was on my way to Cirilla’s house, I could sense something…

different in the air. The snow was packed against the cobbled road to the point where it had become slick.

As if there were a sheet of ice atop the road.

It took me twice as long to get to her house with how careful I had to be.

It was still fall in Istmere, and I hadn’t yet broken out my winter boots.

When I had arrived, I prepared for my lessons at the small table nestled in the nook of the dining room. Cirilla had entered the room in a frenzy, a cloak tightly fastened around her neck, her white hair bundled into a hat.

“Don’t unpack—” She moved to stop me from taking my books out of my bag. “We are going out.”

“Out?” I asked, confused.

We never went out. Cirilla never left the house anymore.

“Out,” she confirmed with a nod.

When I noticed the Grishina grimoire tucked under her arm, any questions that bubbled to my lips were stifled. I swung my pack back onto my back, borrowing a cloak from Cirilla to keep the chill out.

It was much too long for me, dragging along on the floor. I kept stepping on it, groaning in frustration. I pushed it back and followed Cirilla out the door, down the front steps and toward the outskirts of Siraleth.

I had never left Siraleth before and was surprised when we trudged past the city center, toward the plains beyond. We continued on in silence, and I tried my best to keep up with her long strides.

She was fast, despite her age.

We passed through two long stone spires that reached up into the sky, so far that they disappeared among the cloud cover. When townhomes came into view in the distance opposite a bustling port, I realized we must be in Prins.

Did my father know that she was taking me out of the city? Where were we going ?

My questions were answered soon enough when we climbed a steep hill that switched back and forth against the mountain, homes lining each side of the road. We came upon a worn navy painted townhome, the cedar shingles falling off and leaving parts of the roof bare.

Cirilla rapped against the door furiously, the Grishina grimoire still tucked tightly under her arm. Her black eyes swept up and down the street, ensuring nobody spotted us here. The door swung open, and we entered.

The home was exactly as I had expected inside. It was worn down, unkempt, and filled to the brim with things . Brooms, books, dishes. There were trinkets on every available surface.

“Come,” Cirilla ordered, ascending a creaky staircase that was missing a few steps entirely.

I had to stretch my legs to make it to the next step and not fall through the gap to the floor below.

“You brought her?” I heard an unfamiliar voice say from around the corner.

“Indeed. The little witch is here. Come, come, Donika. Let us not make Persephone wait.”

The stranger, Persephone, was much younger than Cirilla.

She had to be about thirty years of age, twenty or so years my senior.

She had a deep, ocean gaze. Her mousy brunette hair was pulled back in a plait down her back.

The apron she wore across her tattered dress was stained with all sorts of substances.

She ushered me into the room, a long table stretching across the space. It took me a moment to realize that a body lay across the table. It was an older man, his arms crossed over his chest, his skin devoid of all pallor.

He was chalky white.

I reached out with a tentative finger and poked him. “Is he dead?”

Both women turned to me at the same time, answering, “Yes,” in unison.

I shrugged, unfazed. I plopped my book bag down on the ground, the floor groaning beneath the weight of it.

Cirilla moved toward the table at the center of the room and lay the Grishina grimoire atop it, hastily thumbing through the pages until her muttered “aha!” indicated she had found what she was looking for. She ran her finger across the page, murmuring the spell under her breath.

Why were we here? And who was this dead man?

He had to be as old as Cirilla, if not a little older. It had only been five years since I had met her, but she appeared to have aged at least fifteen in that short period.

My brow furrowed as it occurred to me that it might be the magic. The Grishina grimoire.

Was that why she was aging rapidly? Was that why her demeanor had…changed? She was much more…brusque than she had once been. Much less affectionate.

Our lessons had taken on a darker nature, but I had surmised that was because I was older now. Coming into my magic more. I had already proven to be quite powerful, and if I wanted to be the most powerful Shade in the realm, I needed to take my studies seriously.

“That fucking Stormshade will pay for this,” Cirilla muttered.

My head snapped up. I had never heard her swear before, and her language had taken me by surprise.

“I’m ready,” she finally said, running her hands down her skirt to wipe the sweat from her palms.

“Good,” Persephone answered, crossing to stand on the other side of the table.

“Donika?” Her voice was a question.

“Yes?”

“Please move to the head of the table,” Persephone replied.

There was no introduction between us, it appeared we were getting straight to work.

I moved to the head of the table, where the white hair of the man before us was cascading over the edge. His lips were so white they almost looked…blue. I stood there, waiting for instruction.

“Place your hand on his forehead,” Persephone instructed.

Cirilla continued to murmur an incantation under her breath, rocking forward and back, her eyes pressed closed in concentration.

I did as I was told, pressing down the instinct to recoil when my palm met his cold, dry skin.

“Now give me your other hand,” she instructed next.

I outstretched my right hand toward her, and she grasped it. Cirilla moved her right hand to clasp my shoulder, and when she did, a shock of magic coursed through me.

And it was like nothing I had ever felt before.

It was…exhilarating.

Intoxicating.

I relished the power as it ran through me, my back arching, my feet lifting off the floor. My head was thrown back, my eyes falling closed as it coursed through my blood inside of me. I had never experienced something so incredible in my entire life.

“Chant with us,” Persephone instructed.

I peeled my eyes open once more to see Cirilla’s hand not currently clasped on my shoulder any longer, but grasping a knife off the table. She held it out to Persephone’s open palm, the one not currently in mine, and cut her open with a brutal slash.

Blood welled to the surface quickly, pouring forth and spilling over her palm, coating the chest of the man below. She pressed her bloody palm to his heart, right between the opened buttons of his tunic.

Cirilla’s endless black eyes snapped to mine. “Chant.”

I nodded, chanting along with them.

“Hoc sanguine resurget.”

“Hoc sanguine resurget.”

“Hoc sanguine resurget.”

As we chanted, the energy that had filled me began to pass through me, out of my core and fueling out toward my hand. I could sense the magic passing from me into the man beneath my palm.

“Wait—” I protested, a hollow sensation welling in my core as the magic passed through me. Left me.

I felt…empty. Lonely. As if a void had been left behind.

As if I had never been alive before this…I was only alive now that I had tasted that magic. And if I didn’t taste it again, I would simply die.

“You’ll have more soon enough, girl,” Cirilla ground out.

She had never spoken to me so…coldly before.

I nodded in response, swallowing down the anxiety that simmered inside of me as the magic passed through me like a funnel.

The chanting changed, and I continued to murmur the words alongside the two women.

“Cor nondum infectus.”

“Cor nondum infectus.”

“Cor nondum infectus.”

It hadn’t occurred to me, exactly, what we were doing. Not until the eyes of the man before us peeled opened, and they too, were black. He gasped, his back arching off the table as he took a big, gulping breath. My hand fell back to my side in surprise as I stepped back.

My mouth fell open in shock.

“This is necromancy.” The words escaped me before I even had a chance to think about holding them back.

Cirilla’s head snapped toward me in a mechanical manner. “Yes.”

Who was this man we had resurrected? Who was he to Cirilla? I had no idea that there was a spell in the Grishina grimoire for necromancy. But then again, I couldn’t read half the spells. I was marginal at reading Latin, but getting better with each lesson.

Cirilla moved forward to embrace the man, and he held her fiercely against his chest. Persephone reached out a hand to clasp around his shoulder.

Only moments ago, when I had first seen her, her eyes had been a deep ocean blue.

Now, they were black.

Just like the man we brought back to life.

Just like Cirilla.

Had her eyes been darkening with the use of the black magic? Was that the effect this kind of magic had on the body? Was that the price paid?

There was always a price to black magic.

Always .

Persephone spoke, her voice deeper than it had been before. “You are alive. Changed, most certainly, but alive.”

When the man turned to her with a grin I gasped, my hand flying to my throat.

“What happened to him?”

I had never seen anything like it before. The pallor of his skin was much the same as it had been in death, pale and chalky. His eyes were black tourmaline. But his teeth…

They had been sharpened into fangs.

“Is he…is he a vampire?” I asked, stepping back until I was pressed against the wall and could go no further.

Cirilla grinned, and the sight sent a chill running down my spine. I pressed my palms flat against the wall behind me.

“Not a vampire,” she answered, shaking her head. “So much more.”

I wasn’t sure what that meant, or that I wanted to find out. The fanged creature before us seemed so…unnatural. But the more I studied him, the more it also seemed…right. I had never felt so whole as I had when that black magic had been coursing through my veins.

I craved another taste of it.

I needed it to survive.

That night when I had returned home, I fell into bed utterly exhausted. The magic we had performed that day had taken a toll on me, and I wanted to sleep for at least three days to recover. Maybe more.

Zion had come to my room to tuck me in. He had slid the sheets over me, tucking them tightly beneath the bed. When he sat beside me, pushing my white-blue hair back from my face, he startled.

“Donika? Are you all right?” he asked, concern in his voice.

“Of course, father. Why wouldn’t I be?”

He paused for a moment, his gaze never leaving mine in the dimly lit room. He shook his head, as if dismissing the thought. “Your eyes…I just thought. Never mind.”

He smiled down at me, placing a kiss against my forehead. “Sleep tight.”

And I did. I had slept for two days after that spell, waking only when Cirilla came to fetch me for my next lesson.

When I had moved to the bathroom that morning to brush my teeth, I glanced in the mirror and reeled back with a start.

My eyes had once been glacially blue, like my mothers. But I didn’t remember her eyes any longer. Didn’t remember her face. Maybe I had imagined that they were so blue before. Maybe they never had been.

Maybe mine hadn’t either.

I had never taken the time to study my own reflection, after all. Maybe I was mistaken. My own hand moved to run across my cheek as I stared at my reflection for a long moment. My hand was cold against my flesh, but I didn’t reel back from it.

I didn’t flinch at the cerulean blue eyes that stared back at me.

Because they were mine .

Between the time I had left for my last lesson and now…my eyes had darkened.