Legend's Academy

Chapter 21: Alexia

Chapter 21: Alexia

I was resting in bed after my shift when Daren ran in with Hollis on his heels. Daren's face was covered in tears, and Hollis had a comforting hand on his back.

I jump out of my bed and run over to them. "Daren? What's wrong?"

He looks up with red-rimmed eyes. "It's coming. She's coming."

Before I can ask what he means. There's an explosion outside, and through the window, I see flashes of purple. Lightning. Lissa's here. "Daren, do not leave this room. Hollis, you either."

I start to leave, but Daren follows me. "Wait, I can help!"

"Daren, neither you nor Hollis can fight. It's safer for you here, so please just stay," I say.

He looks ready to argue, but Hollis grabs his arm. "I'll keep him here; stay safe." I nod and rush from the room, running into Auden on the way.

"How'd they get on the island?" he asks.

"I don't know. Right now, the goal is to end this fight once and for all."

When we get outside, most of the other Legends have gotten out quickly and started fighting the incoming enemies. Our once calm courtyard is now a warzone.

There isn't much time to think as a legend comes at me with a long shard of metal. I manage to push it to the side with my wind as I throw a kick at the man's chest. He stumbles back but is quick to regain his feet. He goes in for another blow, but Auden uses his telekinesis to chuck a rock at him, knocking him unconscious.

"We need to find Lissa. We can cut the head off the snake, so to speak," I say; he nods, and we rush through the crowd, trying our best to help where we can, but ultimately to find Lissa.

We eventually find her in the Major Legend Courtyard, and I think it makes her smug that she can be there uninvited. She grins when we walk in at the ready.

"Aw, my two least favorite legends. Ready to die?" she asks with a tilt of her head. Lightning crackles and strikes around her, hitting the walls and causing some rubble to fall around us. I have to duck to avoid a larger part of the wall.

I pull my wind closer to Auden and me to block it, and the ice starts flowing through my veins as I push it through Lissa's lightning and into her chest.

She goes flying back but catches herself with a padding of lightning that somehow doesn't burn her. Instead, it starts flowing through her veins, starting at her hands and spreading through her arms until the flickering purple glow is encasing her body. Her eyes have completely merged with the lightning so that they are the lightning.

With a scream, she pushes it towards us, and for a split second, I think this is how I'll die. Just before the lightning hits us, Auden uses his telekinesis to throw a large piece of rubble in front of the incoming storm.

With an explosion of dust and rock, for the moment, we're safe. I use the slight distraction of the gathering dust to toss my wind at Lissa. She creates a lightning shield similar to the one she'd used to block me from my powers, and my wind glances off uselessly. Auden tries to throw more rubble at her, but it just melts on her shield.

Again and again, we try to hit her, but it does nothing. She's done what no legend before her has done; she's become one with her powers.

She is not a girl who controls lightning; not anymore. She is the lightning. How can we go against something like that?

My energy is slowly leaving as we try to pummel her, and it's only then that Hunter and Darcy show up out of breath from running.

Lissa notices and throws lightning at the pillar near his head. I try to use her focus on him to hit her, but she just lets out a psychotic laugh as the man from town appears next to her, and in the next moment, they're gone.

Silence.

"Auden?"

It's only at Hunter's broken voice that I turn around.

I wish I didn't.

The pillar Lissa's lightning had hit had fallen to the ground.

In my need to fight her, I hadn't even noticed.

I hadn't noticed Auden's grunt as the pillar hit him.

I hadn't noticed when he died.

In seconds I'm by his side. A small stream of blood leaks from his lips from what I can only assume is internal bleeding.

There's screaming. It takes me a minute to realize it's mine.

I'm gripping his limp hand like there's no tomorrow, and it's when the nurse pronounces him dead that I realize he won't have a tomorrow. I'll never see him laugh, or cry, or anything. He's gone.

I'm still kneeling in the dust when Daren arrives. When he sees what's happened, he immediately starts sobbing, rushing over next to me and trying to get Auden to wake up. Something too similar to my own experience with Daren. My tears start flowing, and Daren and I just sit there comforting each other as we grieve the best person in our lives.

It's too soon that we're dragged away from the body. Daren fighting the whole way; it's when he's fully pulled through the door that he lets out a heart-wrenching scream.

His eyes turn into a glowing white, and a burst of power escapes him before he collapses. I run to him. Am I losing two people today?

"Alexia. Daren's ok. It looks like his powers burst through. You two need to rest. We'll take care of the damage. The fights over," Mr. Cloak tells me.

It's on the way back to my room that I realize that Audens' wasn't the only life lost in the fight.