The Sacred Oath

If he dies before I kill him it will be mercy. For him.

His throwing star sinks into my skin, almost ripping my shoulder out of its socket. Icy cold fire spreads through my arm and neck, followed by a peculiar sensation, not unlike a strong feeling. It seizes my heart and freezes me on the spot, forcing me to remain idle as I stare at his broad figure leaping over the rocky terrain, gaining precious ground I cannot allow him to have. Ground I will die before I give.

There is no way he's getting to the Amulet first. If he wants to use Magic so be it.

I close my eyes, silencing the world around me. In the darkness, I sense the light and I open my eyes as fire spreads through my veins, igniting a blazing inferno beneath my skin, steaming his off-putting ice off me. I'm thankful that fire was awoken within me, but even if it was something else, I know not to question what Magic chooses to bestow upon me. I'm only proud It answered my call. Proud It deemed me worthy of yielding It.

In one swift move I rise from the silver rocks, blazing hot like a sun and aim my fire at his climbing shadow. An orange arc, beautiful in its intensity, encircles him in a fiery globe, blasting his path to smithereens and burying him in the rocks.

I smile savagely, admiring my handiwork. That definitely hurt and it will buy me time to-

The mountain groans, the terrain shifts and I'm free-falling to my death.

I grit my teeth. "Damn you Alvaro!", I curse as I plummet into the darkness.

It's his goddamn fault for using Magic in the first place on the Holy or Malvern Terrain -as is the translation in my people's dialect. He forced me to defend myself and now we might both die from his recklessness.

I shake my head firmly. No. I must not think like that. I know not to think like that. Magic doesn't answer the call of the cowards. Doesn't answer in fear, anger, panic, or pain. It answers in hope. In happiness, in gratitude, in bravery and resilience. In strength.

Closing my eyes, I call upon it once again, picturing the calming happiness of the glistening sea of my homeland, the chiming laughter of my sister and best friend, the soothing smell of my mother, the warm summer air on my skin-

Vines leap from all around me drugging me back onto the path, while the air wraps to cushion my landing. I grip my family's Tiger Eyed amulet murmuring a quick thanks to Magic and open my eyes.

An endless obsidian void stares back.

All the calm I had managed to accumulate rushes out of me, as I take an involuntary step back.

The void blinks.

Suddenly icy daggers clash with my firewall and before I've realised what's happening, it spirals into an explosion that throws us both in the air and then violently crushes us to the ground.

I fall into purple-indigo grass littered with copper and golden flowers as ashes of icy fire fly around us, rainbow hued and light as snow.

Trying to recover from that brutal fall, I hear a grunt from the sprawled figure some feet away. "I swear to your Holy Magic Lumina, if you kill us before we even get a chance to find the Weapon, with my dying breath I will strangle you."

"What's the point of strangling a person who is alredy dying you idiot?" I spit back at him, ignoring the peculiar way my stomach tightens at the sound of my name in his deep voice, as I gingerly try to sit up.

"The satisfaction of knowing it will be by my hand and not by your foolishness", he growls, while doing the same.

Now we are facing each other over the narrow, colored grass separating us.

"You used Magic first you piece of shit", I can't help but growl back.

He quirks an eyebrow. "That doesn't sound very calm-Holy-Magic-approved to me. Is that why you landed on your ass instead of a bed of flowers princess?"

I sputter. "At least I don't treat Magic like a pet to be tamed, rather than the privilege It is!"

His eyebrows forrow, as he slowly gets up. "Do you really think that's what we do?"

"Of course it is!" I exclaim, getting up as well, enraged by the way he seems offended by my accusation. "You manhandle it, keep it trapped and abuse it! It's because of you that Magic has become so scarce and unruly. You've broken It!"

His mouth clunches, eyes hot as coals with emotion that burns as he opens his mouth-

A groan followed by a seismic tsunami shakes the ground, travelling all the way to my bones, clattering them violently. Startled I look around, realising that the rainbow hued shards I was busy ignoring, have burned through the earth around us like acid, creating a circle with us in its center.

And now that circle is moving.

Or more like breaking apart from the ground. And fast.

Quickly I turn to jump away, but a strong hand grips my arm and pulls me forcefully back. I whirl around teeth baring in a snarl and find Alvaro's sharp features a hair's breath away. My blistering insult dies in my throat as my eyes fall to his mouth -lush and curved as if in an endless aggravating smirk. I'm so annoyed with it, so mad at him that at first I don't realise he's speaking to me.

"Stop!", he growls his grip tightening when I try to pull away. "Can't you see? The ground is extremely volatile. One sudden move and it will break."

"That's why I want to jump you jackass", I hiss, lifting my gaze to his eyes.

Something flashes in them, but then his jaw ticks in anger and I feel a rushing sense of accomplishment at rattling him. "And I would have gladly let you fall to your death if it didn't mean condemning me to the same fate. Look Lumina, really look."

There he goes again. Calling me by my Magic-sworn name, like he's known me my whole life. Like we aren't enemies by birthright. Like we didn't grow up hating each other. Like this won't end in bloodshed for us.

Trying to ignore the storm of feelings raging inside of me, worsening everytime his searing gaze captures my own, I turn around and assess, beyond the need to escape this -escape him- the reality of our situation.

To my dismay, I find that he's right. Our piece of ground is the only thing still solid enough to stand on and I would have truly fallen to my death.

Because, to my astonishment, everything else is moving like an earthy sea. A spectacular, startling pandemonium of colors, raging from silver rocks, to purple grass, red mud and copper gold flowers, all under a sunset colored sky.

"It's beautiful" I whisper. It truly is mesmerising, all the glory of the Holy Terrain unfurling before me, an endless land of mystic, of wonder. Of hope. The reason why I'm here.

I just pray Magic truly deems me worthy enough to allow me to make it through the end.

The unworthy stain behind me clears his throat reminding me of his unfortunate existence and the reason I'm in this mess in the first place.

"What?" I snap, returning my gaze to his -located almost an infuriating head taller than mine.

He scowls, dark eyebrows furrowing over almond-shaped eyes. "Do you have a plan Malverna? Because I wouldn't snap like that to the person who does."

I fume at the way he says my people's name. Like it's an insult. Like he's mocking us. Mocking me.

"Are the Lichtei truly capable of making plans that don't include the destruction of the world as we know it?" I spit back, saying his people's name in the offensive way it's meant to be said in, since its translation is the Sinners. The Damned.

His light-bearded face suddenly turns serious, erasing his perpetual smirk. "It truly is maddening how wrong you are. The lies they've told you to keep you complacent like sheep being led to slaughter", he growls with an intense, base fury. It reverberates through me making me scowl harder. What in the name of Magic is he on about? And why on earth is my arm still clasped in his hold?

I rip it away and his eyes run over my face, darkening further. "Are you truly that clueless? That blind? Have you ever truly wondered why would we want to destroy the world? To destroy magic? How would that benefit us? Or why is my magic stronger and more in control than yours when it's "being abused"?" He leans down shortening the distance between us, his fiery stare rooting me to the spot. "And how my dear rival, if all the lies they've fed you are true, did you manage to perform magic all this time without this?"

He raises his hand and I stare as my amulet hangs from his calloused fingers. I gasp, shocked, my fingers moving instinctively only to clutch over nothing on my throat.

Panic wars with my rage. "How is this possible? How did you take it from me?"

The Licthei son of a bitch has the audacity to smirk and that does it for me. Rage wins colouring my vision red. Swiftly, violently, I surge to take it from his unworthy hand, but faster than lightning he grabs me and spins me around so that my back is to his front and his mouth is to my ear.

For a moment I can't seem to be able to breathe. Unwanted shivers rake down my spine and he chuckles roughly in my ear.

"You truly have a death wish don't you?", he rasps, feather soft on my sensitive shell.

I ignore the hairs rising in the wake of his breath and open my mouth ready to bite his hand off-

The rock-island we are standing on collapses to one quarter of its size, shaking us roughly. I loathe that it makes me reactively plaster myself tighter into Alvaro's arms. A Lichtei's arms. The Lichtei's leader's arms.

I tense, shaking from sheer anger and revulsion, feeling trapped, unable to use Magic and despising it.

He chuckles, an annoyingly deep, raspy sound, tsking and makes his hold on me tighter, more punishing -mocking me. Torturing me.

"You haven't had this offensive piece of shit since the moment we stumbled into each other's paths two days ago, when I realised what it is."

This doesn't make sense. He doesn't make sense. I frown, shaking my head, causing his mouth to travel to my neck and immediately regretting it. "What are you talking about? I was wearing it a few minutes ago, clasping it into my hands." My head pounds to the beat of the fluttering pulse on my neck, where his hot breath scalds it.

And the bastard full on laughs.

It's so sudden, so rumbling and uneasy that it catches me off guard. I feel it overflowing my ears and piercing through my skin, rattling my bones, making my knees feel unsteady. I'm pretty sure I just had an allergic reaction to that offensive sound.

"What you were clasping sweetheart", he starts and I grind my teeth in angry disgust -a whole new feeling I've discovered through him- "was a mimicry I magicked so you wouldn't notice you were without it. I needed time before what's sure to be an overdramatic and definitely violent reaction from you, to figure out the consequences of doing what needs to be done."

A sense of dread grips my heart and I'm too preoccupied by it to kick my head back and smash his face to pieces for his numerous insults. "What needs to be done? What are you talking about?"

If possible he leans even closer to my ear and I feel the sinuous shape of his mouth gliding over it, mouthing his next words.

"What I'm talking about desinia is this."

And he wrecks my world apart.