Broken Souls (Book of Shadows) by Miranda Grant

Author:Miranda Grant [Grant, Miranda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Writing Evolution
Published: 2024-04-24T18:30:00+00:00

Thirty-One

HIM

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Enoch asks as he stares up at me from the floor of the gym, nursing his swollen jaw.

“Fine,” I say as I kick his sword back at him. “You need to get better at hand-to-hand. You rely too strongly on your magic. What happens if you lose it?”

Like Micha did? I see the question in his eyes even if he’s smart enough not to say it. Blowing out a breath, he works his jaw, then grabs his sword and climbs back to his feet.

“I’d get into the habit of carrying a gun,” he says. “What I wouldn’t do is use a sword.” He scoffs. “I don’t know why all the fantasy books keep to medieval shit. So many natural things burn so well. Did they just get rid of all of that, as well as teenage boys just wanting to fuck about with shit when they were world building? Like, seriously? Do you know what gunpowder was originally used for? Trying to make an immortal elixir. You’re telling me, no one in all the fantasy worlds ever decided to fuck around with materials just to see what they did? It doesn’t make any sense.”

He’s talking shit just to stall, and the irritation I have is growing. “Would you rather we lose the swords?”

He looks at me warily. He knows I’m holding back. He’s a shit swordsman, so I’m not hacking at him like he’s Khalid or Maddox. Hel, even Krypto’s footwork is better than his.

But Khalid is in bed with his girl, well deserved after the shit they went through. Antonio forced him to beat her while he touched himself. Khalid then cut off his own hand, the one he used to hit her, unable to bear having it attached to him. For hurting his girl is an unforgivable sin.

And Maddox is out hunting, rebuilding his stash of dead bodies, and Leno refuses to let me spar with his dog. Says it gives him too much anxiety.

So I’m stuck with the bottom-of-the-barrel Enoch.

“No,” my brother groans as he hacks his sword through the air at his feet. “I don’t need you kicking me in the balls this morning.”

“You ever planning on using them?”

“I use them all the time –”

“Not your dick. Your balls.”

He looks at me warily as I shift into a fool’s guard position, the blade pointed at the ground in front of me and off to the side as I bend my knees, ready to move forward or back as needed. He holds his up in a roof guard, his blade pointed back, with his hands up by his head, reminiscent of a baseball bat.

“Is this a very weird way of asking if I’m planning on having kids?” he asks as he darts forward and swings for my head.

I bring my sword up to parry. His blade slides off the tip of mine as he completes his arc. He swivels his wrists, swinging it around over his head, continuing to carry that momentum for a second blow.

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