A hazy figure emerges from the roiling wall of shadow—the outline of a young Gardnerian woman.
There’s a steel-gray wand clenched in her hand, shadow smoke trailing from both the woman and the wand.
The woman draws closer, and a stunned recognition lights in Wynter as the birds’ primal screams of warning blare through her along with a remembrance of power sensed so long ago. An astounding level of power, read in just one fleeting touch of Elloren Gardner’s arm. Just as Wynter was able to read Yvan Guriel’s hidden Icaral wings so many months ago in one touch of his hand.
“No,” Wynter rasps to the birds, shaking her head against their nightmare image, her threadbare wings drawing in more tightly. “It can’t be Elloren.”
Wynter can sense the multitude of avian bodies and thoughts pressing themselves insistently toward her, keeping her locked in the scene as certainty rips through Wynter and tears fill her eyes.
“The Shadow is coming for you,” Wynter whispers to the terrible Elloren-image before her, grief-stricken for her friend as she reads the birds, the forest. “It’s going to come for you with all its might.”
Because it knows. This Shadow thing knows. And so does its enemy, the forest.
The Prophecy is here and there’s no escaping it.
The Icaral has risen...and the Black Witch is back.
Part One
MAGE COUNCIL
RULING
#366
All Icarals in the Western and Eastern Realms of Erthia
are to be hunted down and executed.
Assisting in the concealment or escape of Icarals is
hereby declared as one of the worst possible crimes
against the Holy Magedom of Gardneria.
It shall be punished without mercy.
VU TRIN MILITARY
INTERNAL MANDATE
Sent to Runemaster Chi Nam
Issued by Commander Vang Troi
If Mage Elloren Gardner,
heir to the power of the Black Witch,
demonstrates magical capabilities equal to
or exceeding those of her grandmother,
she is to be executed immediately.
CHAPTER ONE
THE BLACK WITCH
ELLOREN GARDNER
Sixth Month
Central Agolith Desert
I stare out over the desert, the Wand of Myth clasped in my hand, as I pull in a long, bolstering breath, my nerves alight with tension.
A sudden, fierce longing to have Yvan here with me for my first true wandtesting fills me.
Where are you, Yvan? I wonder, my heart constricting as I take in the sea of barren red sands before me. Have the Vu Trin brought you to a desert somewhere as well, to find out the full extent of your power?
I’ve been separated from Yvan for weeks now, as I’ve traveled east with the Vu Trin military through an elaborately constructed runic portal and then for many days on swift horses to get here, a secret, deserted location in the Central Agolith Desert. A place where they can test my power and teach me how to wield it.
A place remote enough to hide the fact that the true Black Witch has been found.
The ruddy sands of the Agolith Desert are colored a deep russet by the bloodred sun that’s close to setting, the air on my face and hands already cooling as twilight starts its descent, the desert world swiftly letting go of the day’s brutal heat. Clusters of small purple cacti, scrubby plants, and a few arcing stone formations dot the harsh landscape, but mostly there’s just the sea of sand.
Everything is quiet and empty, except for a lone bird circling high overhead.
I grip the Wand harder as I run my thumb over its cool, spiraling handle, a sense of grim anticipation building within me.
Turning slightly, I glance over my shoulder at Commander Kam Vin, her sister, Ni Vin, beside her, both of them dressed as I am, in the black garb of the Vu Trin military. Six other stony-faced Vu Trin sorceresses stand beside them, watching me and waiting. Four of these sorceresses are young, but two of them, white-haired Chi Nam and bald Hung Xho, are Lo Voi—powerful crones adept at both rune and portal sorcery.
Runemaster Chi Nam, who leans on her rune-marked staff, watching me intently, is the most powerful sorceress of them all.
They all continue to wait, tension thick on the air.
I glance back at the empty desert before us, as the desire to have Yvan here with me in this moment leaves a longing in my heart so strong I can barely breathe.
He was with me the last time I did this. The time we both realized we were each two points of the Prophecy. But somehow with him I believed everything would be okay. That we’d make it through this. That we could make the world a better place. But as I stand on the precipice of finding out the true extent of my power, I’m not so sure.
I’m frightened.
Frightened that I might, in fact, prove to be the destructive being predicted by the Prophecy.
I desperately want to believe, as Yvan does, that prophecies are dangerous, often self-fulfilling superstitions. That the power growing inside me isn’t twisted like my grandmother’s. But even the sparse desert trees here—it’s clear that they sense something irredeemable in me.
Black Witch, the trees called out ceaselessly on the wind, low and accusatory, every time we passed through forested land. Ever since I blasted a forest into flame and Yvan and I discovered what I really am, the trees have been sending their aura of hate through me with a mounting intensity, so much so that it was a relief to finally portal out of the hostile forest and into this more barren landscape.
What if it’s true? I agonize as I ready the Wand of Myth. What if I’m at risk of becoming just like my grandmother if I harness this power?
What if I’m a danger to Yvan and everything good on Erthia?
I look back down at the Wand, suddenly filled with an overwhelming reluctance to use this wand, even though it’s been dormant since we rescued Naga. Even though my brother Trystan could no longer wring the simplest candle-lighting spell from it.
“I can’t use this,” I tell Kam Vin, my voice shaking. I turn and hold the Wand out to her. “I’ve a sense it’s too powerful. I told you what I can do with a little branch.”
Kam Vin’s expression hardens. “Elloren Gardner, that is why we are in the Agolith.” She motions toward the vast expanse of desert. “There is nothing here,” she points out with a sweep of her hand. “Nothing for leagues.”
Fear gnaws at my insides as I peer back over the red desert sands and my sense that something awful is about to be unleashed grows. I remember how I conjured a great, killing fire with just a slender twig.
I remember how the forest screamed.
“Give me another wand,” I insist, turning my back on the desert expanse and holding out the Wand again to Kam Vin. “A weak one. Then I’ll do it.”
Kam Vin makes a sound of disdain, her fist on her hip. The sun’s ruby light glints off the silver star weapons strapped diagonally across her chest and does nothing to soften the severe look on her face. “You are being foolish, Elloren Gardner.”
“I don’t care,” I counter. “I won’t try the spell. Not without a weak wand.”
She narrows her eyes and glares at me for a protracted moment before gesturing toward young Chim Diec with a jerk of her chin.
Chim Diec is coldly formal and graceful as a heron. Like most of our party, she seems to view me with deep suspicion and has made a point of keeping her distance. She approaches me warily, then reaches inside her black tunic’s pocket and pulls out a simple wooden wand from a cluster of four, this one made of pale wood with a swirling mahogany grain.
Mountain Ash.
“This wand is perhaps one step up from a tree branch,” Chim Diec tells me, her words crisply accented.
Heart pounding, I sheathe the Wand of Myth in th
e wand-belt around my waist and take this new wand in hand.
I can feel this wand’s lesser power the moment I touch it, my magic drawing down, retreating through my feet and back into the earth. I can sense that the wood has fewer layers, roughly put together, shoddily done.
When I touch my Wand, I can feel layers and layers of wood going on to infinity, and, sometimes, if I have it in hand when I’m surrounded by forest, I can barely hold on to the power that strains up from Erthia to meet with it. It’s been like this whenever I have a wand in my grasp ever since I sent a spell through that small branch. Ever since I discovered what I truly am.
Something within me has been unleashed. And its potential for destruction terrifies me.
And even though this wand in my hand does feel weak, it’s still a wand.
“Step back,” I nervously order the sorceresses, recalling the runic shields they’re capable of creating. “And send up a strong, combined shield.”
Kam Vin seems to be rapidly losing patience, the already tight line of her mouth drawing tighter still. “It’s unnecessary,” she bites out. “And will take well over an hour’s time.”
“Humor me,” I insist.
Runemaster Chi Nam calls out something to Kam Vin in the Noi language, and Kam Vin gives a terse, reluctant nod before shooting me a glare. Then Kam Vin, Ni Vin, and the other Vu Trin back away toward where the horses are tethered to stakes.
Rune sorceresses Chi Nam and Hung Xho set down rune stones on the ground in a circle around the sorceresses, then lower themselves to each stone in turn, tapping runic codes onto the stones with their glowing blue rune styli.
Luminous sapphire lines fly from stone to stone and arc over the sorceresses, strand by delicate strand, as Chi Nam and Hung Xho painstakingly weave the shield’s framework.
Eventually, both elderly sorceresses rise and Chi Nam touches her rune staff to their webbed enclosure.
The shield buzzes to life, a translucent dome of blue coursing from Chi Nam’s staff and over the woven strands until it fully encompasses all of the Vu Trin sorceresses and most of their horses, the pulsating shield casting azure light in a wide radius around itself.
Both Chi Nam and Hung Xho turn to me expectantly, glowing blue rune styli in hand.
“We are shielded,” Kam Vin informs me from underneath the radiant dome, an impatient edge to her sharp tone.
I survey the entire scene anxiously. Ni Vin’s ebony mare is unshielded, but safely tethered far behind the shield at what looks like a safe distance away.
I turn. The sunset’s colors are now dimmed to a blush of red that limns the horizon, our stretch of desert awash in blue rune light. I lower my gaze to the wand, my fastmarked hand firmly clenched around its handle. My throat tightens, and not because of the dry, sandy air.
A rapid scritch, scritch, scritch sounds before me and my eyes flick up. Not far from me, a small desert animal races through brush and down into a sheltering hole.
Yes, that’s right, I think. Run for cover. Tunnel down as far down as you can.
I hesitate, wanting the small animal to have time to hide deep in the earth, safe from me.
And then I take a deep, quavering breath and raise the wand.
I begin to speak the words to the candle-lighting spell, the words beginning to roll off my tongue as if drawn out of me by the wand, and it begins.
Tension builds in my lower body, warm and simmering, as the words draw up Erthia’s power. This sensation doesn’t surprise me. I’ve felt it before.
But then the rumble of energy coursing through my lines coalesces in a wholly new way. The power contracts and intensifies, then makes a sudden rush for my wand hand with startling force, fire magic blazing through my affinity lines.
I gasp as my wand hand burns hot and begins to glow scarlet without pain, my fingers seeming fused to the wand as my entire body contracts toward it, driving the air from my lungs and rooting me to the spot. Tremors begin at my feet and slowly work their way up my legs as panic seizes hold. Soon, my whole body is quaking with violent energy, and I’m helpless to stop it. I gasp and strain against it, completely at the mercy of Erthia’s massive, unpredictable power.
I cry out as another overwhelming surge of power shoots up from Erthia, through my body and wand arm, and courses straight through the wand.
Fire explodes from the wand’s tip in a roar, rapidly furcating into thick streams of flame that fan out over the desert, the streams coalescing into a blazing flood that sets every last bit of vegetation alight as I buck and tremble, completely at the mercy of the power.
The sea of fire surges forward and engulfs the landscape, multiple exploding fireballs at its edges destroying everything in their path.
The fire flashes toward the horizon, up the distant hills, arcing skyward, its heat building. Pillars of black smoke rise as the great ocean of fire crests and then starts to curl backward, everything transformed into a cataclysmic world of flame.
Aghast, I struggle to pull my hand away from the wand, away from the power that has taken on a life of its own, as the great arc of fire starts its tidal wave roll back toward us.
A scream rises in my throat.
My savage connection to the wand abruptly gives way and I wrench my hand from it, falling backward onto the ground as the wand falls from my grip and the roaring inferno crashes down on me, a sky of fire meeting earth.
Frantic yelling in the language of the sorceresses. Horses screaming as the searing heat plummets onto us, accompanied by the earsplitting, all-encompassing roar of the fire.
I close my eyes tight as the fire flickers red through my lids and the heat rises, and I wait for the terrible pain. My Vu Trin garments are made to shield the wearer from fire, but they can’t possibly protect me from this.
I’m going to burn to death.
I scream as the fire burns through me, and I wait to feel my own flesh melting down to exposed nerve endings, then to bone, and finally to dust. I keep screaming, the sound drowned out as the fire roars its unbearable heat through me, its force shaking me like a discarded rag doll.
And then I surrender, falling into the fire the way the drowning must eventually submit to the water, as I wait for death to turn the red to black.
The black comes, and the roar begins to die away.
Lying on the ground, I feel for my body and am shocked to find it solid and whole. The dry, crackling sound of fire is all around, the acrid taste of smoke in my mouth as a cool breeze touches my cheek.
The skin of my cheek.
Dazed, I reach up and touch flesh that is still miraculously there.
I feel strangely disconnected from the panicked whinnying of horses in the distance, the cries of the sorceresses frantically calling to each other in their language, the din like a faraway dream.
I open my eyes and sit up, afraid of what I’ll find, not completely trusting my body to be whole.
Before me is a charred, smoldering landscape, even the stone formations rendered to ash. Small brush fires dot the desert as far as the eye can see. A bloodred sky filled with clouds of black smoke looms above it all.
Stunned, I hold up my hands and turn them over and over.
They’re covered in black soot, but still there, marked by the fasting lines. I glance down at my body. My fireproof Vu Trin garb is sooty, but intact. But the travel bag and wand-belt that hung from my waist have been burned away, only a few singed leather strands remaining, the Wand of Myth nowhere in sight.
I lift my hands closer to my eyes, stunned by the sight of them. Unharmed.
Recklessly curious, I thrust my finger into a small brush fire that burns beside me. The heat courses through my finger as I turn it over as if coating it in rich honey, but...nothing. I thrust in my entire hand, then my arm. Nothing again.
I’m impervious to fire.
The reason pr
icks at the back of my mind.
Yvan. His kiss.
Realization dawns that by giving me his Wyvernfire, Yvan’s made me immune to it, just like he is. But the sorceresses. And their horses...
I whip my head around, focusing in on their impassioned voices as they cry out to each other in the Noi language. My body slackens with relief as I take in their dark forms through the haze of smoke, the blue glow of the shield around them rapidly diminishing.
They’ve survived.
But only because of the shield.
I spot the horse that was left outside of the shield, Ni Vin’s mare, and my gut churns. The mare is lying dead, half melted into the sand.
Shocked by the devastation I’ve wrought, my head whips back to the sorceresses as their shield dissipates. One of the Lo Voi crones, bald Hung Xho, points at me and snarls something at Commander Kam Vin in their language, both her tone and the gesture thick with accusation. She launches into what sounds like a fierce argument with Chi Nam, Kam Vin, Ni Vin, and Chim Diec, the sorceresses appearing to have split into opposing factions.
As I stand on shaky legs, Hung Xho fixes me with a look of such pure hatred that I freeze, heart racing.
Even though I can make out only a few scattered words of their language, it’s clear from the way they’re glaring and pointing at me that they’re at complete odds over the use of my monstrous level of power. And it’s then that I understand, from the fear written on all of their faces...
I’m more powerful than my grandmother ever was.
And they were wholly unprepared for it.
Shaken, I watch as they yell and rage at each other and realize I’ve become an agent of division and discord, setting allies against each other.
One of the younger sorceresses, Quoi Zhon, a spiky-haired, sturdy woman with a powerful stride, breaks away, like a murderous crow straying from the flock, and makes straight for me.
The Shadow Wand Page 7