"Let's make a deal," Marvel said to his athar. "I'm not the one who's starving here, am I? That's you."
The shadows grumbled that they'd gladly eat the thing in front of him. Unfortunately, it was too big to digest and would have to be dead first. Also, it would be helping Marvel, and they weren't interested in that.
"But that's a lot of energy," Marvel said. "As much as you hate me, I can feel how much hungrier you are. Don't you want to feed?"
The athar said it didn't need to eat to survive.
"But you want to." When it didn't answer, Marvel continued, "I can give you what you want. I'll kill it for you, and you'll eat, if you just let me use you. Please."
Silence. Then, Marvel felt a foreign amusement. The athar was curious to know how Marvel intended to use a detection spell and cycling to kill a creature that powerful.
"Wait and see," he said. "So, will you help?"
Nothing.
"If I win, you get to eat," he reasoned. "But if I lose, you get to watch me die painfully. It's a victory for you either way."
The shadows considered this. They liked winning. Marvel had a deal.
Just in time, as Grimm's shield shattered along with the barrier. Athar rained around him in shards of red magic.
The creature slithered forward on its tentacles, its thousands of eyes fixed on Marvel.
Alright, Marvel thought, stepping into cycling position. I hope to Satis this works.
The akathar wished him good luck.
Then the golem charged.
Marvel abandoned cycling to jump out of the way as a giant tentacle crashed into the grass where he'd been standing a moment ago.
His blood roared in his ears as he realized another flaw in his plan. Echo spent so much time drilling the Novice class on cycling because taking athar from your center, pushing it through your arrays, and forming it in your hands took an average of two minutes for a Novice. Higher levels did it in less than a breath.
Marvel didn't have years of practice like his classmates. And the snake golem wasn't going to give him two minutes.
He dodged another blow from a tentacle, ducking beneath a swipe that would have taken his head off.
Thank Satis for all that training with the Guard, he thought, running as three tentacles shot forward to catch him. He dropped to the grass just as they were about to reach him, whipping over his head and crashing into a nearby tree.
Marvel didn't wait for it to fall before moving again. He left the golem distracted, disentangling itself from the fallen tree as he rushed to the other side of the yard. Once again, he stepped into cycling position, only to fall out of it as a tentacle caught him in the stomach.
The impact knocked him into the wall of Grimm Boll's house. His head bounced off the hard surface. Everything went dark for a second.
Stupidly, he opened his eyes, face to face with a thousand coin-colored eyes.
Well, I needed to get close to it anyway.
Tentacles wrapped around him from every direction, coiling and trapping him. He fought against them instantly, thrashing as snakes began to leave the golem's body, slithering up his legs, over his torso, trapping his arms.
The same panic from earlier returned. He struggled within its impossible grip, his mind slipping away with fear.
He felt the stinging bites where fangs pierced his skin, the burn of venom flooding his veins. Weakness overtook him, the poison making his limbs heavy, his head hazy.
No, no, no.
He forced himself to focus, to breathe. Don't panic. Do magic. You're a godsdamn mage, aren't you?
Marvel sought inward, diving within himself. Somehow the urgency of the moment faded. Like this, he couldn't feel the pain of the bites or the scaly tentacles encircling his body. He couldn't feel the snakes sliding over his skin. All he saw was his new center, and the blinding beauty of the athar wrapped around it.
He took hold of the athar and shoved it through his arrays. But this time, he didn't form it in his hands; he waited.
He managed to free a hand, grabbed the neck of the awful thing, and pulled its face toward his. He felt its fangs slicing into his face, but he didn't care. He formed the dark shadows of his athar inside the creature instead of himself.
What had Baylin and Echo said? Golems were basically containers made to collect magical energy. Marvel had what felt like an unlimited amount of athar. What happened if he just kept giving and giving his energy to a golem? Surely the creature had a limit. What happened if Marvel gave it more than that limit?
He was probably wrong. It was an insane plan and would likely fail. He'd die an awful, painful death. But what else could he do but try?
The golem didn't struggle against his grip. After all, it was getting exactly what it wanted. It wanted his athar. Wanted to until he became nothing.
Marvel felt himself weakening, the poison coursing through him. His arrays were beginning to burn with pain that grew worse every second. He wanted to stop. He didn't let himself.
He poured all he had into the golem, but nothing seemed to change. So, I was wrong after all.
Only when his vision began to fade did he realize that the thing was fighting his hold, struggling to escape. It hissed wildly, tentacles pushing him away. He held on, giving and giving. His arrays were on fire, his body was dying. He didn't let go.
Finally, the thing gave a horrible screech, and something exploded between them. Marvel felt himself fly through the air, landing on his back. He heard the golem dying. It hissed weakly as his own body grew too weak and heavy with pain to move.
The hissing stopped.
With his last bit of strength, Marvel raised his head to see that the golem had stopped moving. He felt a brief glow of victory, knowing he'd finally killed it.
And then he fell into the dark.