Marked For Death: A Dark Urban Fantasy Novel Becca Blake (fiction novels to read .txt) 📖

I nodded. “Hellhounds.”

Ayla pushed past him and peeled the remnants of my shirt away. I gasped again as the fabric tugged at my raw skin around the wound.

“Careful,” I hissed.

“I’m trying. This is pretty nasty,” she said. “Come lie down on the couch.”

Ayla’s living room was a maze of books, all stacked in piles of various heights across the floor. It looked just like her apartment back in Haygrove. I had to admit, I was impressed by the collection she’d built up since she left, considering she’d only been gone a little more than a month.

When I nearly tripped over a stack as high as my knee, she gave me a sharp look. “Watch it.”

I put my hands up. “Sorry. I’ll be careful.”

She picked up the book that fell and returned it to the pile, then moved aside so I had space to get to the couch.

I dropped my bag and collapsed onto the soft cushions. The tension I’d been carrying in my body relaxed as I realized that, at least for now, I was safe.

Ayla sat down on the reclining chair across the room with her feet tucked under her and an energy drink in hand.

Orion pulled a stool over and sat beside me, still wearing that same worried look.

“I’m fine,” I said, though I knew as well as he did that it was a lie.

Instead of answering, he dug into my bag and pulled out my jar of healing herbs.

“It’s infernal,” I reminded him as he unscrewed the lid of the mason jar.

“They’ll soothe the pain. At least for a bit.” He pulled my shirt down just enough to rub the salve beneath my collarbone. “It’s better than nothing.”

My skin tingled under the mixture of herbs as cool relief spread across my chest and neck. I closed my eyes. “That does feel better.”

“We’ll have to be careful with that supply,” he said, wrapping a bandage around my shoulder and upper arm. “We’re not in Haygrove anymore, so we can’t run down to the alchemy lab when we need another jar.”

“Why not just use real magical healing?” Ayla asked.

Orion’s frown deepened. “That’s dark magic.”

“We’re not with the Arbiters anymore,” she said, rolling her eyes. “We don’t have to follow those rules.”

“Dark magic is outlawed for a reason. It’s unstable. It eventually makes users go insane,” he said.

“No.” Ayla pushed a stack of books aside and set her energy drink down on the table next to her reclining chair. “That’s a lie.”

“I know how much you hate the Arbiters, but not everything they say is a lie.”

“You weren’t born in Haygrove,” I said. “Dark magic is something Orion knows a lot about. I trust him on this.”

“You’re both wrong.” She crossed the room and knelt down beside me, looking over the infernal wound again. “There’s no such thing as dark magic. There’s suppression magic and expression magic.”

“I’ve seen what it can do to people. Dark magic really is dangerous,” Orion said.

“What’s dangerous is putting a muzzle on half of your magic. It’s supposed to exist in a balance. Use only one type for long enough, and you cut off an important part of yourself. When you use only emotion-based magic, you become a slave to those emotions. It’s easy to lose control.”

“Exactly.” Irritation crept into Orion’s tone. “That’s why it’s dark magic.”

“But when you use only magic that suppresses emotions long enough, it represses your ability to feel anything at all. And that’s a problem, too.”

“If that were true,” I said slowly, “we’d know about it, wouldn’t we?”

“Lack of emotion is seen as a good thing in Haygrove,” Ayla said. “How else could the Council convince the people who know the truth to work for demon lords?”

“That’s—” Orion began. He stopped himself with a shake of his head. “Where did you hear that?”

“It doesn’t matter. It’s the truth.” She looked at me again. “Riley, you said you’ve used expression magic. Does it feel wrong to you?”

“I… don’t know,” I said. “I don’t like how angry it makes me.”

“Fire magic is especially hard to control, but it gets easier with time. You’re not practiced in it. Every type of expression magic is connected to a different emotion. Mastery of those emotions leads to mastery of the elements. Fire is anger. Lightning is fear.”

“And healing?” I asked.

“Love.”

“Where did you learn all of this?”

“There are some benefits to reading. You should try it sometime,” she said with a sly smile.

“So, healing magic… it can heal infernal wounds?” I asked.

“You’re not really considering this, are you?” Orion asked.

“You and I have both used… expression magic,” I said, stumbling over the new term.

“Sure, but—“

“What Ayla’s saying makes sense to me. Besides—my chest hurts like all the hells, and if she can fix it, I’m on board. Even if it ends up driving her to insanity.”

“I appreciate your confidence in me.” Ayla waved at Orion to move, then took his place on the stool. She pulled the bandage aside and dabbed away the healing herbs, careful not to press too hard on my tender skin.

“This won’t hurt?” I asked.

“Just relax. Close your eyes.”

She brushed her finger against my chest, right next to the open wound below my collarbone. Instinct forced me to wince, but there was no pain. Instead, a warm sensation flooded through my body, starting at my shoulder, and a sense of peace coated me like a blanket.

The intensity of Ayla’s emotion flooded through me, and I could feel the strength of the bond we shared. I felt how deeply she cared for me and her regret for abandoning me.

The connection severed as suddenly as it came. I opened my eyes and looked at my chest. At first glance, all that remained of the wound was a pink patch of new skin. On a closer inspection, I could see faint lines left by the hellhound’s claws, slightly puffy like a freshly healed scar.

“That scar may never heal completely, since it was an infernal wound, but the real