The Blender’s Bargain – Chapter 26

Garrick

Vessa squirms free and lunges. The knife glints purple. Aimed at Archie.

No.

Instinct takes over. I pull myself from the wet floor, shove forward, and create a human shield between the blade and the woman I… the woman I need to protect. I wrap my arms around Vessa’s waist again and pull her to the ground.

Agony rips through my side. A grunt escapes me, air punched from my lungs. I roll away, clutching the wound. Hot, wet slickness spreads across my hand, soaking my shirt. Vessa snarls, wrenching her body free.

The vortex howls, a swirling chaos of purple and blue-white light battling for dominance as Archie continues to chant. Enthralled guards stumble, disoriented by the deluge, their vacant eyes struggling to process the scene.

My head swims. Pain pulses, sharp and insistent. I need to stop Vessa. Can’t let her interfere.

I force myself upright once more, swaying. Every movement screams protest. My vision blurs at the edges.

Vessa recovers faster. She ignores me, eyes fixed on the altar, on Archie reciting those ancient, powerful words. She raises the knife again, preparing for another attack.

Protect Archie. The thought burns through the pain.

Before I can move, a blur tackles Vessa from the side. Marlo. She hits Vessa hard, sending them both sprawling across the slick floor, crashing into a stack of old mining equipment. The knife clatters to the floor.

Marlo hits Vessa like a linebacker possessed, all flailing limbs and surprising force. They skid across the wet stone. Vessa, surprised by the sheer audacity of the attack from someone she clearly dismissed, lets out a furious snarl. She tries to throw Marlo off, her movements sharp and practiced, but Marlo clings on like a designer barnacle, fueled by pure panic.

They grapple amidst the scattered mining tools, boots slipping on the slick floor. Vessa lands a solid elbow, drawing a sharp cry from Marlo, but Marlo retaliates, yanking Vessa’s hair. It’s not pretty, not elegant magic, just a raw, messy scrap in the middle of a magical apocalypse. Vessa almost reaches the fallen knife, fingers scrabbling, but Marlo kicks it away towards me.

Marlo wrestling with Vessa is surprisingly fierce. A rare moment of selflessness? Or just self-preservation?

Doesn’t matter. It buys time.

One of the nearby guards shakes his head, and his eyes clear. He groans, looking around in confusion, then focuses on the struggling women.

“The final steps!” Arvid’s voice rings out, startlingly clear over the din, emanating from the toaster arranged on the altar. “The ritual requires a sacrifice! Life energy!”

Life energy? Sacrifice? My blood runs cold despite the heat of the wound in my side.

“Not life itself,” Branwen’s regal voice adds from the mixer near the altar. “Years. Willingly given. As we did before.”

Archie’s mom steps forward, her face pale but resolute. “I will bear the cost. Alone.”

My head spins. Sacrifice? Years? What in the blazes? This isn’t some abstract concept ripped from the pages of one of my well-worn fantasy novels; this is terrifyingly, horribly real. This is Archie’s mom, standing there, ready to offer actual chunks of her life.

And Archie… God, Archie. She’s going to do the same damn thing, isn’t she?

I can see it in her eyes, that stubborn, beautiful, self-sacrificing streak that makes me love her and want to shake her all at once. We just got here, to a relationship, after all this madness. Is this how it ends? Me bleeding out while watching them fade away?

No. Absolutely not.

“No!” Archie cries, gripping her mother’s hand. “We share it. We have to.”

Her gaze finds mine across the chaos. Pleading. Determined.

My legs are like lead. Pain claws at me. But her eyes… they’re looking right at me, not with pity for my wound, but with an expectation. A reliance.

After she left me, after I thought I’d have to fight my way to her just to be allowed to help. Here she is, including me. Counting on me. A wave of something warm and protective washes through the pain. It’s a crazy, terrifying ask — to willingly give up years of my life. A course of dread skitters along my already aching spine.

Who does that?

But the alternative, being shut out again, watching her face this alone while I’m standing by? No. That’s a different agony, one I’m not willing to endure. If this is what it takes to be by her side, to face this with her, then so be it. Better to lose years together than a lifetime apart, wondering if I could have done more.

I push off the wall, stumbling towards the altar. Every step is agony.

“I’m in,” I gasp out, reaching them. My blood leaves a smeared trail on the wet stone.

Archie’s face crumples, ready to cry.

“We’ve got this.” I grip the edge of the altar for support. My vision tunnels, but I focus on her face. “Partners. Remember?”

A beat of silence hangs between us, thick with unspoken emotions.

The guard, now free of Vessa’s control, lets out a confused roar and stumbles towards the grappling women. Vessa, distracted by this new, uncontrolled variable, turns her head.

Bad move.

Marlo, seizing the opening with the desperation of a cornered animal (or maybe someone who really wants to go to Coralton), snatches up a heavy, discarded wrench from the scattered mining tools. She swings it with a surprising grunt of effort, connecting with the side of Vessa’s head. Vessa’s eyes roll back, and she collapses like a puppet with its strings cut, landing right on top of Marlo.

Oof.

“Hell no. Get off me, woman.” Marlo shoves Vessa’s limp body off of her. She pulls herself to her feet and wipes mud and water from her face. “Don’t leave me out of the dramatic finale,” she mutters, her breathing ragged as she approaches the altar.

Unbelievable.

The four of us. Archie, her mom, me, Marlo. We form a shaky circle around the altar, hands finding hands. Archie’s fingers tremble in mine, cold but strong. Marlo’s hand is hesitant, then locks with mine and Archie’s mom.

The appliances — toaster, blender, mixer — sit arranged with the charm.

Ready.

“Now, Archie!” Ysroth booms from the blender.

Archie takes a deep breath, closes her eyes, and begins the incantation again. The ancient words flow from her lips, stronger now, and Branwen, Ysroth, and Arvid join in. I don’t even know how she remembers them! It must be the magic in here spurring her along. The blue-white light at the vortex’s core flares, pushing back the swirling purple darkness.

Energy surges through our linked hands. A pulling sensation starts deep within me, chilling and invasive. It feels like… like threads being drawn from my core.

Years. That’s what it is. Years of my life, unraveling, feeding the seal.

My breath hitches. Images flicker behind my eyes — a future birthday party, laughter echoing, faces I might never know. Grey hair I won’t live to see.

Gone.

An ache settles in my chest, sharp and profound. Loss.

I glance around the circle. Archie’s face is tight with strain, tears streaming down her cheeks but her voice is unwavering. Her mother stands tall, accepting the cost with quiet dignity, though lines deepen around her eyes even as I watch. Marlo grits her teeth, a single tear tracking through the grime on her cheek.

This is not how I expected to spend my summer vacation.

The vortex roars and fights back. Purple tendrils lash out, trying to regain dominance. But the blue-white light holds and grows brighter and stronger, fueled by our shared sacrifice.

The pull intensifies. A searing drain. Twenty years? More? Impossible to tell. Just… gone. Sucked into the hungry magic of the seal.

My head spins with the loss. Fleeting images flicker past — a classroom, yes, but not one of brick and mortar; instead, it’s under a wide, alien sky, the students’ eyes shining with more than just curiosity. Archie is there, her hand in mine, laugh lines etched around her eyes, but still undeniably her.

Our future, intertwined with a destiny I never asked for but now stirs within me. A faint thrum, a resonance distinct from the draining sacrifice, whispers of a power I didn’t know I possessed.

My own magic? A counter-current to the years being pulled away, a promise of what might still be, even after this.

With a final, blinding flash, the vortex folds in on itself and blinks out. Silence crashes down, absolute and deafening after the roar. The oppressive weight lifts. The unnatural hum fades.

It’s over.

My knees buckle. The adrenaline drains away, leaving only bone-deep exhaustion and the screaming agony in my side. I collapse to the stone floor and gasp for air. It’s like the time I fell while hiking and got the wind knocked out of me.

Around the cavern, the shuffling stops. Groans echo as the enthralled townspeople awaken, blinking, looking about in dazed confusion. The guard standing next to the unconscious Vessa looks down at her, then up at us, bewildered.

I push myself up onto one elbow. Archie sways on her feet, trembling. Her mother looks… older. Definitely older. Lines etched deeper, hair faded. Marlo leans against the altar, face grey with exhaustion.

But we’re here. We’re made it.

We did it. We stopped Vessa. Stopped the magical portal and sealed the darkness.

Archie stumbles towards me, collapsing to her knees at my side. Her hands hover over my bleeding injury. “Garrick…”

I manage a weak smile, reaching out to touch her cheek. Her skin is cold. “Hey.” My voice is rough, barely a whisper. “I’ll be fine. We’re alive.”

Alive. But the cost hangs heavy in the sudden, echoing silence of the mine.

A cost none of us can ever get back.