Bloodline Diplomacy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 3) - Lan Chan (thriller books to read .txt) 📗

up by tendrils of lightning. They struck the earth in a shattering of destructive force. The sky opened up around the spot where Terran sat. Rain fell in a heavy flood that began to put the fires out.

Basil appeared by my side with Isla and Rachel. “We need to get out of here now!”

I couldn’t agree more. Except when I tried to move with them, something caught hold of my foot. I slipped and twisted around to find my foot snagged on something in the sand. Phoenix growled as the others managed to run a few metres up the edge of the embankment concealed by Basil’s magic. I kicked my leg thinking that I’d just snagged it on a protruding root. That was until the root turned into a vine that sprouted leaves and more vines. Without thinking, I drew circles around the vines. I thought of death and the magic cooperated. The vine stopped growing. It sizzled at its tip. But every tendril I managed to kill just sprouted two new shoots. Was this some kind of Medusa plant or something? It gained ground and snaked up my thigh. The sand bulged and slithered as though there were a snake gliding through it. The vine became so thick it burst through the sand.

Everywhere around us, shifters and goblins scrambled to get away from the lightning. The mages and Fae attempted to gain control of the atmosphere, but they might as well have been waving their arms around aimlessly. The cloud density became so thick it could have been night time. Rain shot at me like icy bullets. Even though I was soaked through, the vines managed to continue to hold me.

“Lex!” Basil called. He dispensed with the magical camouflage. A shot of orange fire ignited along the vine around my foot. The thing reacted by expanding in girth and whipping me around in a circle. I screamed as I was spun like cotton candy in its wheel. The vine started to drag me into the water. I clawed at the sand but it made zero difference. Phoenix grabbed my shirt in his teeth and tried to pull me back. Basil and Isla did the same with my arms. Neither of them was strong enough to halt the pull. Basil let go suddenly and threw his arms in the air. The lightning bore down on us a second later.

He braced against it. The beach became bathed in a bright glow of orange. Again and again lightning struck. Basil took the brunt of it as best he could, redirecting it as far away from us as possible. But he’d already spent much of his energy keeping the portal open. Without him holding on to me, the vines circled around my waist and renewed their pulling. My feet hit the water. Though I was no longer afraid of the ocean, I was for damn sure terrified of the fifty-foot deity who split the cyclone of water and stepped out from between the waves.

She wore a moss-green Grecian dress that fluttered softly despite the hurricane-level winds. The shroud of hatred was still etched on her face. She flicked her wrist and the vines lifted me ten metres into the air. I lost sight of everything as my world turned upside down. I thought I heard Jacqueline calling my name, but the sound was stolen by another crack of thunder. More and more vines grew out of the sand. They swept across the beach in smacking motions, collecting as many of the supernaturals in their wake as possible.

Gaia turned me upright. “You should never have been born,” she moaned. The vines around me constricted. My mouth opened, but I didn’t have enough breath left to scream. I tried to draw a circle around myself so that it slowed the vines from crushing me to death. It was pointless. Her power was comparable to the seraphim. And she was on her home turf. One more squeeze and she shattered my circle. Something cracked in my side. This time I did scream.

“Alessia!” I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to laugh or cry at the sound of Matilda’s voice. I didn’t have the wherewithal to check where she was. My knees scraped against each other. Phoenix was on the beach growling. Bright lights flashed all around me like fireworks. The supernaturals were hitting Gaia with everything they had but it did little to dissuade her. Their high magic was nothing more than a mosquito-like irritation.

Tired of their pathetic attempts at fighting back, Gaia waved her hand and the vines offered me to her. She took me in a grip that matched the tightness of the vines. The look in her eyes said that she wanted to feel the life draining from me. All I could think of was that if I had my hedge magic, I might have been able to fight back.

She made a furious derisive sound. “You dare to consider hurting me with the very power I bestowed to your blood?” she demanded. “You betrayed me!”

I was bleeding in a bunch of places. My head was light from having been held upside down. I’d like to think that was why I wasn’t thinking straight.

“Hey, lady!” I yelled, my voice hoarse. “I didn’t do anything to you. And I’m starting to think my great-grandmother had the right idea.”

Of course she took it the wrong way. The circle I weaved around me lasted about two seconds against her crushing grip. I curled myself into a ball and expected to be dead soon. Instead, over the sound of the thunder and the supernaturals fighting in the background, I heard a portal opening. It gurgled and spat, telling me it had opened up in the water. The demon squid with hundreds of tentacles rose up out of the water.

“Kraken!” Professor Mortimer’s voice shouted.

I didn’t get a good look because the next thing I knew, one of the kraken’s tentacles shot out. It snatched Gaia around the waist and tugged.