Nocturna (A Forgery of Magic #1)(16)

The girl’s feet stuck to the ground as if glued. The momentum she’d built while running worked against her and she fell forward onto her face with a loud thwack. The stones clattered to the ground, one hitting her on the back. She shouted a stream of expletives as she pushed herself up onto her hands and knees. Her forehead was bleeding. Alfie let the magic release her feet.

“One to one, then.” He crossed his arms in pride. She was a fighter, but she wasn’t properly trained. When stone carvers who’d studied magic called upon the earth, Alfie could see their colored magic surge with precision to raise stones. Hers barreled out of her recklessly only to grip three rocks. With an expulsion of that much energy she should have been able to do more, but she had no discipline. She’d soon tire herself out. If he played this right, it would be just like the cambió game—she might be stronger and faster, but he was smarter.

“Of course you’re into desk magic,” she grumbled, shakily standing. Alfie cocked his head. He’d never heard of spoken and written magic referred to by that term or with such disdain. “Figures, you move like you’ve been sitting at a desk all your maldito life.”

Alfie outstretched his hand. “A book, please.”

She glared at him, indignant. “You didn’t wound me.”

Alfie shot her a look. “You wounded yourself thanks to my magic. It counts.”

She sucked her teeth and threw a book at him with such force it slammed into his chest.

“Your first and only win for the night, Fox,” she said with a slur. “Cherish it.”

A smirk tugged his lips, one that he hoped rivaled hers. “We’ll see about that, Dragon.”

In a flash of movement, she launched herself at him, fists raised. She threw a messy punch. Alfie shifted sideways, her knuckles clipping his cheek as he caught her arm in his hand.

“Adormecer!” Numb.

Her arm fell limply to her side, swinging like a pendulum. She stared at it. “What the—”

Alfie landed a swift kick to her stomach, sending her falling onto her back. It wasn’t a rib-breaking hit, but it still would hurt in the morning.

The girl forced herself onto her knees, her arm still limp. A plume of satisfaction caught in his chest when he saw her shocked face. Maybe he was more fox-like than he’d thought.

Alfie closed the distance between them and held his hand out. “I’d numb the other arm too, but then how would you give me another book?”

The girl glowered up at him. On the ground between them their shadows snapped at each other. By the sheer force of her glare alone, he should’ve known that she was about to cheat. But Alfie was distracted by their shadows sniping at each other. It looked exactly like what happened whenever he and Dez had gotten into arguments as children. His heart ached at the sight.

Just like with her trump card, he guessed her intentions a moment too late. She whipped her hand upward. A stone from the road shot up between Alfie’s feet to hit him in the groin.

The pain roiled his stomach, sending him staggering. Then she was on her feet, her fist cloaked in a globe of stone. Before he could say a word of magic, she struck him with a powerful punch. His nose broke under the stone. The chunk of mask around his nose and cheeks shattered, crumbling away. She stepped forward, her palm thrusting up toward the sky. A column of cobblestone-tipped earth rose from the ground and pounded against his stomach like a fist.

He flew back, slamming into the wall of the shop behind him. His bag flew off his shoulder and landed ahead of him, at the midpoint between him and the thief.

Finn let the column of earth fall back into the ground.

For a moment, she thought he was going to walk it off. He pushed off the wall, raising his hand in her direction, but then he fell back against it, crumpling slowly to the ground until he lay pathetically on his side. His mask, now cracked and loose, was hiked up over his bleeding nose.

She swung her numbed arm uselessly. It was beginning to prickle. Hopefully it’d wear off soon. The idiot had numbed it so much that he might as well have chopped it off.

“Pendejo,” she muttered, nearly tripping over her own feet as she stumbled toward him. The drunkening card still had her head abuzz. It’d made her so tipsy that she’d tried to steal a dress before realizing she should just change her face. But then she was too drunk to get it to stick. But she’d still bested him. Drunk as hell and still unbeatable. Not too bad, if she said so herself.

She made to dig through his pockets before pausing in surprise. He had a holstered flask at his hip. She wouldn’t have expected that from someone so soft. Finn opened it, letting it spill onto the ground. Served him right for being such a pain. She searched his pockets, taking what she found before standing and tipping his head back with the toe of her boot. His head flopped back against the ground, jaw slack, lips parted. The blood from his nose ran into his mouth.

He obviously didn’t know how to fight with elemental magic, but he didn’t have to carry a water flask; he was talented enough to pull it from the air. A bruxo for sure. He probably spent his days lounging in some sprawling hacienda learning complicated magic instead of working odd jobs in the poorer rings. He definitely knew his way around a desk, but fancy desk magic wasn’t enough here. This was the street, not a dueling ground.

“Home advantage,” she said to his still body. “Nothing personal.”