Adreanna focused, muttering the words in the correct cadence. Voice was important in spoken magic, and certain spells required precise adjustments.
This was one of those spells. Fire was both wild and powerful, needing to be controlled, easily willing to rebel if held too tight. Balance was key.
"Suscitat ignes, illuminare tenebras"
The fire roared to life, bathing her in warmth. But it was the dark that really disturbed her. What things hid in those shadows?
"Nicely done." Her familiar Styx yawned. Familiars were servants summoned from the Astral Plane. In the century that had passed since her parents' demise, many witches had been slaughtered; their familiars banished.
To be without a witch was shameful to the others, and they had taken their own lives for it. But Styx fought back.
He was her companion. They helped each other, like friends did.
She had found him in the Wilds a few years ago. The Wilds were regions of the Astral, ungoverned and lawless. Their extent decreased by the day, taken up by divine spirits arming themselves for combat.
For war.
Let's hope I don't get caught in the crossfire.
She stared at the moon. It had been red ever since Hekate's death.
Styx stretched. She had created his body herself with the corpses of two animals. A black cat and a raven. Styx could shift between both.
The only things that remained same were his eyes. The eyes were the windows to the soul, and no matter how many glamours you cast, the eyes could never hide.
His were odd. One was green, the other blue. Both shone in the night. They differed from hers, which were deep black. Her hair blended into the shadows.
Adreanna directed the smoke away into her container, ensuring nobody would notice it rising into the sky. It had become as black as ash by this point, darkening with extended use. The days were getting colder, the nights harsher.
Finally, it was done, and she moved on to the cloaking spell.
This was a weaker, yet effective, method of inducing invisibility. The spell dampened energy, making things less noticeable.
"Silentium tenet verum, silentium tenet fast. In silentio incipimus, in silentio nos respirare ultimum."
She intoned, her voice barely a whisper.
Cold washed over her as her spell took form.
She lay her head against a gravestone. Years of neglect had allowed the grass to grow so long it reached her knees. The gravestones had all crumbled away, though few had survived.
Most cemeteries, contrary to popular opinion, did not have ghosts. Though those still existed, bound to the Astral Plane by magic or emotional attachment, most only had energetic residue of the deceased buried there.
But a greater danger than ghosts awaited her in such a place.
Cemeteries were sometimes places of worship to Hades, the Ruler of the Underworld.
That was why it was important to understand the energies at play. It would be easy for such a deity to find her here, in his place of power. She laid down, watching the darkness play with her mind.
Her mother's dead body, the abomination that had so greedily slurped up every drop of blood. All those thoughts walked through the screen of her eyes, forcing her to stay awake.
Or they would have, if not for the blade finding its way to her throat.
She kicked her head back in surprise, waiting for it to collide with the attacker.
She screamed as it collided with stone.
Blood trickled down her skull. Styx snarled, aware of the attack. He tumbled to the Earth in seconds.
She focused, trying her best to find the attacker, trying her best to ignore the pain. Bursts of unfocused, raw energy erupted from her body. Her muscles ached as mystical power built up inside her, releasing itself in rapid blasts.
Falling into the darkness that had greeted her so many times before, only one thought echoed through her mind.
Why?
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