Between Light and Dark by Elissa Wilds Page A

must rest," he announced, standing.
    Wayne eyed him warily. "Are you sure you're okay by
yourself? You look pale. I know using the yearning like you
did kills your energy. And then fighting off that Umbra.
That had to be draining."
    Axiom's shoulders tensed. "Your concern is appreciated,
but I will be fine after I sleep."
    "Well, 'night then," Wayne said.
    "Good night." Axiom left the main house and found his
way to his cabin. He paused momentarily in front of Laurell's cottage, his closest neighbor. The lights were out, and
he sensed she slept. Something he must do, as well.
    He entered his cabin and flipped on the light. As soon as
he closed the door behind him, a sharp pain sliced through Axiom's midsection. His breath caught. A wave of electricity rolled over his body, and his vision filled with blackness.
He groaned and struggled to get to the bed, one arm wrapped
around his stomach while the other stretched forward, feeling his way. His knee struck the bedpost. He fell forward
onto the mattress, his head twisted to the side.

    His muscles twitched and leaped beneath his skin as
though they struggled to break free from his flesh. He could
barely manage to breathe. The sound of the blood rushing
through his veins filled his ears. He ground his teeth and
moaned, then felt his body arch from the bed as the current
dived into his gut and pulsed there. He forced his eyes open
again, but still couldn't see; a black void had consumed
him. That void was digging inside him with sharp claws,
like some wild beast on a feeding frenzy. Be gone, you wicked
thing. You cannot take me. The words reverberated through
Axiom's head.
    Images flashed through his mind, vivid and appalling. A
man beating his wife while she begged for mercy. A woman
thrusting a knife deep into a man's gut, her eyes wild with
perverted glee while his life dripped away in a pool of red.
Bombs dropping on innocent people who screamed in agony.
Parents sobbing in despair when the body of their abducted
child was located. The horrors of Earth. The despicable evils
of this realm. Things he had seen from the Light Realm that
made him ache with grief. Illustrations of the Umbrae's
tightening grip on the people of Earth.
    Axiom tried to push the visions away. Was he under some
sort of attack? How could the Umbrae have entered the protected space of the circle?

     

The dark energy wanted to control Axiom, to take him over.
He would not let it. He forced his arms, suddenly heavy with
fatigue, over his stomach, ignoring the way his muscles
pulled and twitched with the effort. Sharp pain sliced
through his gut, confirming that the energy was trying to enter through his solar plexus chakra. He focused his mind.
    Cool air stirred over his skin as he drew in his god force,
centered it, and willed it to form a hard shell over his human body. Then he called up the part of himself that was
of the Light, the part of him that he so cultivated, and
pushed at the thing. At first, it did not budge.
    Axiom used more of his god force to battle the entity. He
groaned with the effort, his skin taut, his muscles straining.
Just when he thought he could not exert an ounce more
strength, a sharp snap sounded in his ears. A moment later,
all was still. He could breathe again. Praise Source, the pain
had disappeared. Whatever had tried to take him over was
gone.
    Axiom lay dazed for several minutes, blinking at the ceiling and wondering what in the cosmos had just happened to
him. He eventually stood on shaking legs and stumbled to
the bathroom. He ran his hands over his face, staring at his
normally silver eyes, which currently still held the obsidian
pools of god force within them. He had utilized much power
to fight the thing.

    What was it? An elemental, some spirit unleashed by the
Umbrae? A new tool they had discovered with which to
fight him? A moment later, realization dawned.
    No, not the Umbrae. His own darkness. The side of him
he