Clara thought it was done, but when she woke and gained consciousness from her momentary comatose state, she saw Marcus fighting and trying to keep Thornan back.

  They had a plan. They were supposed to fight together. “Get up, she ordered her body. ‘I need to fight. I need to help him,’ she stumbled, her hands shaking as she pushed herself off the ground.

  Clara knew she needed to be strong enough to protect her friends, but she was also uncertain. Could she really do it? She coughed and tried to get up, but her hands and body screamed pain at her.

  Marcus was stronger than her and possibly stronger than anyone she had met before. She knew he could win, she thought, now all she needed was to get up and help him.

  Clara had done the right thing– she had saved Zek or otherwise. she had not been sure if the large half Goliath boy would have survived. So she had not thought things through, she had rushed in.

  A grawn had her turning to her right, where Geneve was holding onto a muttering Ethne in her hands, and Linus was cradling his broken leg. She needed to help Linus with the healing ring because he was in so much pain—no, not now. The sound of fighting made her look away from him.

  Clara’s hands went to her rags, looking for the enchanted rings to give her an edge against Thornan. Early in her desperation, she hadn’t gotten the time enough to put them on, but if ever there was the time, it was now. She put on the elemental ring and the ring of light affinity ring for healing. She lifted her hand and tried to launch a fireball, but her body was exhausted, and there was no more elemental aether to channel.

  After she was done In her fiddling with the enchanted rings, she looked up again at where the two boys were fighting, only for horror to feel her entire body. Marcus was on the ground, and blood was flowing from his nose and mouth. His eyes were half open, and his chest was barely moving.

  “Another one dead because you couldn’t give me what I want.”

  “No, you’re just a Monster,” she said, crawling over and grabbing Marcus by the hand. With an effort, she started pushing light affinity aether into the ring and into Marcus’s hand.

  “You know if you had given me what I wanted. none of this would have happened,” Thornan said.

  “Why would I? You would just keep coming.” she tried to hold back her tears.

  “Yes. It’s payment. Do you think all of them,” he pointed to the shadows and rooftops, “have left you to do what you want because they are scared of you? “Then he said to the crowd, “They are not scared of you. It's me. They are scared of me.”

  “We never asked for your help,” she said, never meeting his eyes.

  “Do you hear that?” he turned to the gathered crowd of teenagers, young men and women. They don’t want my help. my protection.” He corrected, “which means that I can do with them as I please.” He laughed.

  Thornan walked over to Zek’s fallen body, went down besides the other half-Goliath, grabbed him by the neck, and started squeezing.

  Zek, who had been down and out trying to catch his breath from all the fighting he had done earlier, suddenly felt Thornan’s grip on his neck. His weak hands reached up, trying to free himself from Thornan’s grip, which pushed down on him.

  The Veystrix looked up at Clara with a manic look. “How about now?” he asked.

  “No, no, no, stop it, you have to help him, Clara,” Geneve said, scrambling forward but never letting go of the small girl in her arms. Her bloodshot, crying eyes bore into Clara pleadingly.

  Clara didn’t want to do it, but she had to. She had lost. They had lost.

  “F-fine.” Clara choked out.

  “Fine!?”

  “I said I will give you what you want.” she said through clenched jaws.

  Thornan turned back to the gathered crowd, his hands raised to his sides, “You all heard her. Remember,” he pointed out to the crowd, “this is what will happen when someone, any one of you ever thinks you should disobey me.”

  The gathered crowd of filthyings and Veystrix could only look away. After all, there wasn’t one among them willing to fight with Thornan and those who might’ve had a chance didn’t want the costly aftermath of winning such a fight.

  Meanwhile, Clara had forgotten whatever was going on. She had forgotten about her team, only thinking of a way to win.

  “Wake up Marcus, wake up” she gritted her teeth pushing as much light aether into the ring as possible, all the while her eyes kept darting between Marcus and Thornan’s back.

  “Wake up, You can’t die.”

  “Get up. we need you.”

  Marcus’s eyes shot open, and as if a man born anew, he rose to his feet. Clara saw the cold focus in the boy’s eyes, and for a moment, she wanted to step away from him. The only reason she didn’t was that Marcus was not looking at her anymore.

  The crowd that had been silent suddenly began muttering, much to Thornan’s irritation and frustration. He looked around in confusion at first, and then he turned to see what had everyone’s attention.

  Marcus, the boy he was sure was going to die by the time he was done, was standing there in front of him bloody. He held the dagger he had stolen from his belt in his hand, and the half-aasimar was bouncing on his feet with a body full of energy.

  Thornan frowned.

  And didn’t wait for the boy to gather any more courage than he had from the crowd. He struck. This time, he would make sure the boy was dead.

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  The first thing Marcus did when he got to his feet was use his arcane sight, as Ivor had told him.

  After much trial and error training with Ethne and Geneve, he could accurately tell another person's affinities and their magical weights. Sure, if someone lacked a particular affinity, it would show nothing. Marcus had to just account for the missing one.

  A this is what he saw.

  Thornan.

  Affinity Strength/ Weight

  Light 2

  Dark 1

  Elemental 3

  Arcane 2

  Psychic 3

  Shadow 4

  Bloodline 7

  By the looks of it, Thornan’s affinity weight of twenty-one was not that much higher than Clara’s, which was eighteen. This meant that all his power came from the number of spells he held in his grimoire. The spells the veystrix read every morning when he woke up, he did this to have the more useful ones ready at hand.

  And unlike all the other aether flows surrounding the Goliath the red bloodline aether twisted in a spiral-- a sure sign that he was using his innate magic.

  Thornan, on the other hand, moved. His fist went straight for Marcus's head, and the glee he felt at the sound and feeling of his fist meeting flesh was like ecstasy-- the stupid boy should have died when he had the chance.

  When he came to a stop and looked to the side, he was confused. Then his confusion turned to fury.

  Clara watched as Thornan moved, and in the blink of an eye, he was punching at Marcus.

  She watched as Marcus moved and blocked the blow with his scrawny aasimar arms causing the punch to glide off. She watched as Thornan’s face went from a pleasant manic superiority to confusion and bottomed down to rage.

  His blow had been taken by a half human. He was a Goliath and yet the other boy seemed unfazed.

  Clara watched as Marcus moved forward with his odd fighting style, and his fists landed on Thornan’s face. When Thornan recovered, all Clara could see was shock on the veystrix’s face, as if he believed himself untouchable.

  Clara watched as Thornan threw himself at Marcus, his blows coming in wide, unavoidable arcs aiming to down the bouncing half aasimar, half human.

  Marcus, for his part, stepped back, blocking where he could and casting the [Iron bones] bloodline spell that made his bones heavier and strong enough to deal with the goliaths blows. It was the spell Ivor had suggested, and after three weeks of casting the spell and the fact that he had used it early that day, it was fresh in his mind.

  Marcus didn’t blink after he took the blow-- his face remained blank. In exchange, the blow that Marcus landed stalled Thornan’s advance, causing the boy to step back and frown.

  Clara watched Thornan flex, clench and unclench his fingers in confusion, his eyes never leaving his opponent. Thinking of something else in his mind, she watched him lunge forward, aiming to grab and hold Marcus, but as soon as he did, the dagger Marcus had been holding at bay, ready to strike a fatal blow, came up and slushed through the half Goliath thick leather and deep into his forearm.

  “An enchantment of [lesser strength],” Thornan growled, realizing the ring on Marcus’s fingers and why the other boy was able to stand on par with him.

  “Fine!!”He said, pulling out his other dagger with a predatory smile, and before all their eyes, he vanished. He disappeared into nothingness. One moment, he was there before Clara and the rest of them, then the next, he was gone.

  ‘Shadow magic’ he was using shadow magic to conceal himself.

  "Marcus he is—" before she could finish a hard kick landed on her side causing her to double over and swallow her words.

  Marcus was startled when the large half Goliath boy he was fighting suddenly disappeared, his attention suddenly shifted as he watched Clara double over.

  Marcus look around trying to understand what was going on, and in that moment a blow struck him sending him back then another.

  And another.

  And another, each blow leaving bleeding cuts all over his body.

  Having a thought, he remembered and cast his innate magic, and instantly, the world shifted to one of colours. Everyone around him had colours. Even the shadows had colours. But he was looking for one specific figure. ‘There.’ A figure covered up in purple psychic and grey shadow aether was stalking around him, ready to attack him at another opportune moment.

  Marcus turned, much to the other boy’s confusion and faced him directly. Thornan looked confused at first but thought it was some bluff. he thought that the boy was playing around. His dagger shot forward, aiming for Marcus's eye, and to his surprise, the half human half aasimar brought the dagger the veystrix had let him have up to meet the one in Thornan's hand. not blocking but guiding it away from his face,

  Thornan stopped, paused and frowned. He looked at Marcus intently, and there was no sign the boy could see him but for the feeling of tingling cold on the back of his neck.

  He took a couple of steps to the right and then a couple of steps to the left, and the half-human, half-Aasimar’s mismatched eyes followed his every step.

  “[Mage Sight].” Thornan snarled the word .

  Marcus had thought he was ready. but Thornan dicided to do something else he acted as if something had flipped in his mind.

  The goliaths attacks were wild and frantic, filled with rage and every exchange left Marcus bloody with cuts.

  Marcus dodged the dagger, aiming for his neck, and received a fist to his gut. In retaliation, he pushed as much aether as the ring’s enchantment could handle, and a large force of pure arcane aether pushed the goliath back and forced Thornan out of his invisibility spell.

  Seeing Marcus was back on level ground as him and gathered crowd looking at him with mouths agape as though they could not believe what they were seeing.

  Thornan cursed, “ fuck this.”

  With the distance between them Thornan did not bother with attacking Marcus, he pulled his grimoire, his belt and started reading through all the stolen spells he had earned. He stopped at a particular spell and with a quick thought he quickly memorized it.

  Since he couldn’t counter a mage sight he chose to force his way through the battle with the next best spell.

  The shadows grew darker and denser around them, and those closest to Thornan unnaturally crawled their way onto the half Goliaths legs,

  Just as he finished casting the spell Marcus swung his dagger and cut his fingers causing Thornan to step back in more shock and surprise that turned to anger.

  “Am going to enjoy killing you. rat,” he said glaring.

  Marcus, for his part, lifted his hand and motioned for him to come on.

  Enraged and furious Thornan used his [shadow step] spell to move faster than Marcus could blink, one moment Marcus was ready for anything and the next a blow sent him stambling back towards the ground.

  “Am gonna take my time killing you,” Thornan said.” am gonna make sure no one dares to think of doing what you did.”

  Just as Marcus was getting to his feet, Thornan appeared behind him and sunk his dagger into the upper section of his thigh.

  Marcus slushed backwards but the figure was no longer there. the dark shadows turned and started moving unnaturally, with his [arcane Sight], he saw the gray aether gather in front of him and in an instant, moving as fast as he could blink a punch landed on Marcus’s face causing his head to whip back and his one good leg to give out sending him back on his knees .

  Marcus felt all the pain in his body, everything everywhere and all at once. he was starting to realize that he had over done it, he had taxed his body with not one but four spells [iron bones] which made is entire body heavier to match the Goliaths weight class, [lesser strength] to match the strength,[ arcane push] and lastly his [arcane Sight], in the end his body needed to rest something which was impossible as Thornan held a dagger to his neck.

  “Looookk…. Look at what you’ve done,” Thornan yelled, looking around and all he could see was pity, maybe for him or the other boy,” I’m gonna kill you.”

  “Fuck off,” Marcus spat with blood-covered teeth. He tried to get up to his feet, but the other boy’s hand pushed him back to his knee.

  Thornan grew angry. He looked the frail boy up and down, then around at the silent, onlooking crowd that watched him,

  He knew he couldn’t show weakness. He had to kill the other boy and Clara, probably all of them. To keep his strength in the eyes of the others if he didnt the rats would think him weak. Victor would think him weak.

  “Any last words”

  “Yah” Marcus huffed weakly.

  “Oh yeah And what’s that?”

  “Nova…. Of …..Shadow…..Sun”