Chapter 78

**Merianna**

My eyes felt like they bugged out of their sockets as I watched the mountain implode in on itself. I have seen magic that changed the ground’s structure before, but this was on a whole different scale. Zerial hugged me close as we watched the mountain cave in on itself and send dust and pebbles flying all over the place.

Coughing the dust out of my mouth, I frantically tried to look through the haze. Noch was still in there! I knew he was tough, but would even he be able to withstand tons of rock and debris falling on top of him? I honestly didn’t know the answer to that, but that didn’t stop the worry from gnawing at my stomach.

“What on earth are those guys doing in there?!” Arasule asked while trying to wave the dust away.

“Whatever it is, it's something big, as always.” Thyrion commented dryly as he stared at the now flattened scenery.

“What in the blue blazes have you done this time, Noch?!” Raska yelled from behind me. That’s when I was finally able to make out Noch’s silhouette standing on top of the rubble, as if nothing happened in the first place.

“Not my fault!” He yelled back. “That was all that bastard’s doing.”

A deep chuckle emerged from further inside the cloud of dust, sending a ripple of goosebumps down my spine. I was slowly able to make out Dermon’s figure on the other side. Something felt ominous though, like he wasn’t done with whatever it was he was up to. I saw him bend down and suddenly circles of magic seemed to expand outward from where he was. Warlock magic circles jumped up and covered the ground we were standing on.

“I might as well use what I have at my disposal now before I completely destroy this place.” Dermon’s voice almost didn’t sound like his own. It was unnaturally deep and ominous.

“What’s going on with him?” I asked Zerial under my breath.

“It seems that he had merged with a Demon. Most likely that so-called Guardian of his.This is not a simple case of possession.” He replied, while taking a few steps back.

I wanted to ask more, but the magic circles that were glowing a peaceful light blue a second ago suddenly changed and turned a red so dark that it looked black. I jolted as I felt a strange sensation tug at me. Glancing around in worry, I saw that no one else felt what I did. They were all solely focused on Noch and Dermon as the circle seemed to gain more power.

I groaned and clutched at my chest as that strange painful tugging sensation ripped through me again. Zerial seemed to notice my distress and glanced down at the magic circle. He seemed to go pale as he clearly suddenly knew what was going on.

“Break the circles!!!” Zerial yelled out frantically.

Thyrion sent him a questioning look. “I have no idea what’s going on, but I’ll never say no when an Angelic says it like that.” He then quickly planted his palms on the soil and poured his magic into the ground.

“I will assist.” Ela said as she bent down to do the same. “You disrupt the surroundings, I will disrupt the flow.”

I wanted to ask Hezerial what was going on, and what on earth was happening to me, but that strange sensation didn’t want to go away. It felt like it was suffocating me in a way, keeping me from doing anything. I ended up grabbing a hold of Zerial’s robes and digging my face into the fabric while something started to run rampant in my head, and a cold sweat broke out over my skin.

*“There you are, my sweet girl!” I stretched out my hand to rub the scaled snout of a giant beast with scales that shone like golden white pearls in the sunlight. Its low rumble of affection practically made my body vibrate-

*“Another round! You should definitely make some more of this Thelma! It’s great!” A big fire was blazing in front of my eyes as sweet mead trickled down my chin, laughter and dancing figures filling the shadowed area around me-

*“Not again… I did my best, didn’t I? Then why…” A forest, ablaze in dark red, and not just with flames. My hands trembled as I gripped the clothing of a youth that was lying lifeless in my lap. My eyes, on the other hand, were exposed to utter devastation. Hundreds of bodies, both friends and enemies, hundreds of forest houses ablaze. No sign of life was in sight-*

*Mom! Sissy! No! My young mind screamed, as I could do nothing but sit in the tree outside our house and stare at the men who were now setting our home aflame. The screams that had emerged when they walked in still rang in my mind. Where was my father?! He should’ve been home by now! He could’ve stopped them!-*

*Wind blew past my face so quickly that my ears could only pick up the sound of it whistling by. A warm, powerful, soft body of red feathers was beneath me. He was my only friend, my only family. I hoped to stay with him forever. He will be able to live forever after all-*

My vision flickered in and out as that intense, strange tugging sensation persisted in my body.

*“I swear to you my Loyalty and my very being.” An Angelic. He had bandages over his body, his head was bent, so I couldn’t see his face, but I knew who it was. It was Hezerial. I stretched my hand out to touch his hair-*

A gasp ripped itself out of my mouth as the painful tugging sensations suddenly stopped. My face was buried in Zerial’s robes, my hands gripping the fabric so tightly that my knuckles were white despite the pain shooting through my slowly healing arm.

“Are you alright, My Lady?” Hezerial asked lowly while keeping his eyes glued to our surroundings.

“What the Hell was that?” I breathed as I turned to see what was going on around us. I wasn’t sure about what happened while I had those strange images go through my mind, but it seemed to have been big. The ground at Thyrion’s side was split all the way to where Noch and Dermon were still standing while the glow from the magic circles had disappeared.

“My, my, now what was that I wonder?” Dermon’s dark and ominous voice drifted over the distance to us. The dust was still thick, but I had the creeping suspicion that he was looking straight at us.

“I hope you’re not ignoring me.” Noch said as he let loose a barrage of fire projectiles towards his face.

A wave of blackness swallowed up the area that Dermon was standing on and engulfed the flames. The sight of that action sent another wave of chills skirting down my back. The sense of that motion felt like it could swallow me whole if it had the mind to. Dermon was most definitely not the same as he was a few moments ago when I had fought him, and it terrified me.

Noch retaliated against his assault with a different spell that seemed to form his energy into a series of chains that he sent careening towards his legs. Trying to follow the battle with my eyes only was futile. Searching out their energy signatures, I was able to track their movements in the new cloud of dust and debris that was being kicked up by their fight. From what I could track, the fight seemed even more impressive than it was when we were still in the cave.

“Should we help him?” I asked as their fight raged on.

“He’ll be perfectly fine on his own.” Ela snorted.

I looked over to snark back at her, but cut my train of thought short at the sight of a black mist rising up from behind her. “Ela look out!”

Ela wasted no time and struck at the area my eyes had been trained on without looking at it herself. The black mist jumped out of her reach and seemed to coalesce into a more solid shape. I looked around and noticed that Jasnine’s body was very still; she wasn’t writhing around anymore, and her pallor also seemed to have returned to normal.

“I think that one came out of Jasnine!” I yelled out to her. Ela didn’t say anything or react to what I said. She only focused on trying to decimate the entity that had emerged.

“I think you’re right.” Thyrion said as he jogged over to where Jasnine was lying on the ground. “It looks like it has left her body. She’s just unconscious now.”

“What a load of crap this has all turned out to be.” Arasule muttered. She clearly didn’t like that her little research subject was about to be no more.

“We’ll get you a new one someday.” Raska promised as she patted Arasule’s shoulder in sympathy.

“I think we should head towards the second group. They must be worried.” I piped up. I knew for a fact that Nalia was most likely already losing her mind. They must have noticed the chaos that was raging over here by now.

“That’s a good idea.” Hezerial agreed without hesitation.

I felt a slight sense of relief at his agreement. My relief didn’t last for long though. A big blast came from where Noch and Dermon were fighting, then a quake heaved beneath us, nearly sending us all falling to the ground again. A flash of black mist then suddenly popped up in front of my face and Hezerial flipped me behind his back to shield me, only for me to then see Dermon himself speeding straight towards me like a falcon swooping in to grab its prey. He was now slightly rumpled with a burn mark, having made itself at home on his left cheek. His eyes were another story though. I couldn't see it before, but they were now pitch black, like how Jasnine’s were a while back. His appearance only made the grin on his face even more unnerving than it had been from the beginning.

Everything was happening so quickly that I didn’t know what to focus on, let alone what to do. Hezerial was now cutting the dark mist that Ela had been fighting, and she came charging at the mist again from where it had slipped past her as well, while Dermon himself was heading straight for me without them knowing.

Dermon didn’t come more than a few feet away from me though. A blast of potent energy came crashing into him from behind me, which sent him flying back into the dust he had come from.

“Hey Noch! Keep your playmate where he belongs!” Thyrion yelled as he put a reassuring arm over my shoulders.

“He has gotten more slippery than before.” Noch yelled back. A gust of air suddenly kicked up and blew the dust away from where Noch was standing. I then noticed that he was the one that made the wind move in the first place. Why the hell didn’t he do that earlier?!

Dermon’s figure struggled up from the surrounding rubble and dusted himself off. He looked back at me. “Such a shame I wasn’t able to grab you.” He mused while cocking his head to the side.

“Why do you want her so badly?” Thyrion asked in a cold voice, only to smirk. “She’s much too young for an old fossil like you, plus she’s spoken for, so don’t even think about touching her.”

Huh…? 

Spoken for?

I forgot all about my fear and just stared incredulously at Thyrion. Was this a ploy for empty distractive wordplay? Was I supposed to play along? I sure as hell didn’t want to. I didn’t belong to anyone but myself and Nelia after all. I sure as hell hoped he wasn’t meaning what I thought he was leaning towards. Especially with his arm snaked so possessively around my shoulders. Wasn't he interested in Nelia in the first place?!

“Ha!” Noch’s snort broke through my rambling thoughts and made me glance back to where the danger really stood. Hezerial was back at my side with Thyrion, the lesser demon now nowhere in sight.

Dermon didn’t react to their banter at all and just scrutinized me. “Very curious indeed. You keep surprising and stirring my curiosity the longer I look at you.”

I wanted to snap back at him with some smart and cheeky retort, but I had the feeling that, that would have the opposite effect of what I wanted. Heck, this whole situation was driving me nuts as it was. What the hell was that magick circle? What the hell were those images that I saw? Were they my memories…?

“How curious that my circle only had a reaction to you.” Dermon’s voice shook me back out of my thoughts again. Goosebumps rose on my skin as I saw the leering smile on his face. To him, this obviously meant something.

“What was that circle for Dermon?” Noch asked as he readied himself for another round of fighting.

“And why should I tell you? If you knew you’d want to kill me.” He replied while turning back to him.

A surprised scream suddenly escaped my lips as I felt something cold suddenly clamp over my ankles. Thyrion grabbed me around the waist as Zerial brought down his sword on the black oily arms that had emerged from the ground under my feet.

“What the Hell!!!” I screamed at the sight of the arms disappearing again. I’ve had enough of today. I was hurt, I was tired, I was scared, I was frustrated, and now Dermon obviously wanted to take me at all costs for some reason. Most likely to become another one of his experiments. It felt like a small string inside me had snapped.

“For the love of all things Cursed, can’t you leave me alone?! Your fight is with Noch! Leave me out of it! I don’t like you! In fact, I hate your guts! I hate being used as a rag doll even more! I’m not some object, I’m a witch! You want a go at me, just say so! Don’t try to be a coward and use petty tricks to catch me! I’ll make sure to fry you so badly that not even your ashes will be left behind!” I screeched out. I was about to toss some more words, but Thyrion’s palm landed on my head.

“Now, now that’s quite enough. You’re injured. There’s no way you’ll be fighting him right now. Just leave this to the adults.” 

There snapped another string.

“Same goes for you too! Who the hell is spoken for, huh?! Where did I ever give consent for anything?!” I gritted out while glaring furiously at him.

“All in good time, my dear. At least you’re safe when you’re around me.” He gave me one of his handsome grins. One of those that he probably knew always worked on women around him. But not me…

“You...” my eye twitched in annoyance.

“Save your lover’s quarrel for later kids. Right now, we have things that need to get sorted.” Noch yelled over to us as he started attacking Dermon again.

“WHO’S MY LOVER?! I snapped back. Only to have my voice drowned out by the resounding boom of their magick clashing against each other.