Uncrowned (Cradle Book 7)

by Will Wight

  The Remnant popped like a bubble and she tumbled to the ground, rolling through the grass. She shouted and slashed at Lindon, but no claws followed the motion.

  An arrow split her heart a moment later, and she vanished.

  Pride stood triumphantly over the spot where her body had disappeared, pointing at the empty space. “He was driving us back into an ambush!”

  Lindon stepped close enough that he loomed over Pride, emphasizing the fact that Pride's head only came up to his collarbone. He was so furious he felt like he was channeling Blackflame.

  “Did you not know she was there? I saw her on the way in!” Well, Dross had, but that was the same thing. “How is it an ambush when we're together and they're split up? They just wanted to meet up without attracting attention!”

  Spirits vanished all around them as beasts and sacred artists alike veiled themselves to approach.

  Pride's eyes were hard as purple stones. “You almost pushed us into a trap. I saved us.”

  “You turned us into bait! How are our teams supposed to get to us now?” They were already surrounded by enemies.

  Mercy landed to the side, grabbing them both. “Let’s have this conversation while running for our lives, what do you think?”

  They ran together, Pride and Lindon keeping their speed down for Mercy, who couldn't fly without her bow.

  Lindon swept his perception behind him, and his breath caught at what he felt. There were at least seven, maybe eight or nine enemies behind them. Their veils kept him from identifying their exact position, their Paths, or whether they were sacred artists or beasts. If some of them had veiled themselves more thoroughly than others, there could even be more.

  The worst of it was, they weren't fighting amongst themselves. They were chasing the Akura team as though they'd been put on a scent.

  [That's what we get for standing out!] Dross said in a panic. [They think you're extraordinary! Quick, let me talk to them and I’ll let them know the truth.]

  At that moment, Lindon’s spiritual sense lit up as he felt a column of light descend from the sky. He jumped up as he ran, grabbing a branch and pulling himself high so he could push through the leathery leaves overhead and take a quick look.

  Only a hundred yards in front of him, a column of golden radiance descended from the clouds. A dot in the center had to be the crown. And it wasn’t alone; to its left and right, two more beams of light shone as a pair of crowns floated down.

  Three crowns. Enough for a full team to advance to the next round.

  Everyone would be headed for them, and he was caught between the prize and his pursuers. Trapped.

  ~~~

  Yerin had fought against greater numbers more than once, but these weren’t a handful of back-country sect disciples who’d managed to finally advance to Truegold. These were five of the deadliest Underlords of their generation.

  When the fight started, it was brutal.

  The three Ghost-Blades slashed out, Forging spectral swords the size of cattle as they swung, and clearly they had trained together. Their attacks came at subtly different angles only a whisper apart, so there would be no avoiding all three.

  As they struck, Yerin felt the walking fish of the Tidewalker sect conjuring bubbles of dark liquid madra. They held back, waiting to react as she did.

  Last year, Yerin would have dealt with the Ghost-Blades’ attack and fallen for the Tidewalker follow-up. Maybe she could have survived the first volley, with the help of her Blood Shadow, but she would’ve lost in time. These opponents were too coordinated, too well-trained and too used to working together.

  But she had a team of her own.

  Yerin ignored the attacks and activated the Endless Sword. The three swords of the Ghost-Blades rang like bells, aura erupting from them like a storm and shredding their clothes and skin, drawing light wounds and knocking them around like hurricane winds. Even the Tidewalkers caught the edge of it, staggering back from the sting.

  She attacked. Eithan defended.

  He was in front of her before she saw him move, blowing the Forged madra apart with Striker techniques of his own. And from above, Naru Saeya launched a burst of green wind madra as the Ghost-Blades still reeled from Yerin’s attack. From experience, Yerin knew it would snare them and drag them off-balance—easy prey for a blade.

  The three of them had reacted together, months of training crystallizing in action for the first time.

  But the enemy had training of their own, and greater numbers.

  A defensive construct on one of the Ghost-Blades activated a yellow shield that blocked Saeya’s Striker technique, so he stood strong as she dove in. The Tidewalkers refocused on her, Yerin whipped a horizontal Striker blade of her own at them to pull their attention back, and Eithan had to deal with further attacks from the other two Ghost-Blades.

  They traded exchange after exchange in a quick second, Forger techniques blowing apart, Striker techniques tearing the leaves from trees, blades of aura grinding up earth. Stroke and counterstroke, attack and defense, from eight Underlords with no wasted time.

  The air shook with continuous thunder. Yerin’s spiritual sense strained to keep up, and her channels burned as she quickly switched from technique to technique. A chain of explosions blasted the forest around them in one long roar, and in seconds the jungle around them was a clearing of debris and churned soil.

  Yerin moved as quickly as she ever had in her life, blasting away a Striker technique aimed at Saeya, ducking aside so Eithan could get a shot at an enemy behind her, driving her blade at one enemy and slashing her sword-blades behind her at another.

  Even so, they were outnumbered.

  Naru Saeya was the first to slip, a little too slow to block as she raised her sword with a wounded arm. She winced, instantly taking a Forged blade to the chest. A quick flood of green madra blocked it, but it sent her flying into a tree and then to the ground.

  Yerin covered her with a surge of the Endless Sword, but therefore she couldn’t cover Eithan, who had to focus on his own defense at redirecting a stream of water madra. Their formation collapsed, and then they were three individuals struggling to defend themselves.

  Only a breath later, golden light streamed down from the sky. It poured through the leaves overhead; she couldn’t see well enough to see how distant it was, but it couldn’t be far.

  Eithan reacted as though he’d known the crowns were coming, taking advantage of the momentary flicker in his enemies’ attention to let out a detonation of pure madra. His power swept over everyone, dense enough that it must have been reinforced with soulfire, and wiped away every active technique. Water madra fell apart, Forged blades vanished, Striker techniques died in midair, and Enforced punches fell limp on their targets.

  The only one not affected was Eithan, who rushed toward one of the Tidewalkers to stab her with a sharpened stick, but the loss of madra had only disrupted her for an instant. She was already Enforced again, slapping him aside and stepping away so she and her partner could focus on them together.

  Yerin could do nothing; it was all she could do to keep the Ghost-Blades from closing in on the wounded Saeya. The Naru helped as best she could, grabbing at them with her Ruler technique, but their enemies’ soulfire-aided aura control was enough to keep them safe.

  Yerin was on the verge of bringing out her Blood Shadow—an ability she hadn’t yet revealed—when her spirit warned her, and she realized why Eithan had wasted so much madra on a split-second interruption.

  It hadn’t been an attack.

  It was a signal.

  Black dragon’s breath lanced out from the trees. One of the Tidewalkers reacted in time to defend with a wide bubble of water madra, but the distraction allowed Eithan to land a blow on him. The fish-man’s eyes bulged, and he flew back, tumbling through the bushes. His partner ran after him a moment later, and the two of them lost no time before scampering away.

  Eithan let them run, turning to the Ghost-Blades. A hail of black arrows pull
ed them away from Yerin, and an instant later, a short man with shining purple eyes dashed among them.

  They slashed at him, but crystalline amethyst armor materialized only for the instant it took him to block their blows. He slid through, a whirlwind, catching one enemy with his fist and another with a foot. They defended themselves, but the impact of flesh on flesh sounded like thunderclaps.

  Instead of fighting his way through to the Akura team, Eithan had called the Akura team to them.

  Yerin speared the closest enemy through the back as Lindon arrived, shoving dragon’s breath point-blank into another Ghost-Blade’s chest.

  The two of them dematerialized at the same time, but the third—the farthest one from her—had managed to make his escape.

  Panting heavily, Yerin slapped Lindon on his shoulder. Despite knowing that death couldn’t touch them here, surviving still left her drunk with elation.

  “Aren’t you a welcome sight!” Yerin said, but Lindon never stopped moving. He grabbed her wrist and pulled her with him. Mercy and Eithan were seeing to Naru Saeya, who had made it back into the air, and Akura Pride had already run ahead. He wrecked his way through the undergrowth like a bull.

  “Talk later!” Lindon shouted as he tugged her along, and she cast her perception behind her.

  When she felt the now-unveiled presences hunting them, she sped up until she was dragging him.

  Chapter 13

  It was a bloody fight around the crown. So to speak.

  There was much less actual blood than in most of the fights Lindon had ever seen, as a lethal attack caused the victim to dissolve into light and rush away. Only lesser wounds left blood behind.

  But it was chaos. They had reached the central crown, which had attracted the most competitors. And the presence of sacred artists had drawn beasts, so at any moment there could be sacred artists conjuring massive ghostly swords against monkeys, silver crocodiles snapping jaws down on flashing cages of lightning, or flocks of razor-taloned birds clashing against Forged techniques of crimson light.

  Lindon and the others skirted the bounds of the fight. The first of their pursuers crashed through the woods behind them—one a half-human red dragon, another a female figure in a brown hood and a stone mask.

  They couldn't ignore the battle and keep pursuing the Akura teams. Unfortunately, Lindon couldn't avoid it either. He evaded an emerald lance and a conjured spirit that raked claws in his direction, narrowly missing his chin.

  Dross, Lindon thought, how many people are here?

  [Seventeen, counting you. You can count yourself, can’t you? Of course you can. Sixteen. No, wait, that’s confusing. Seventeen. Wait, do I count?]

  A quarter of the people who had started out on the island were left. The rest were either waiting their hour to return, going for one of the other two crowns, or waiting to see how the fight shook out.

  Lindon stopped behind a tree, waiting for the others to push through the stray attacks as well. We're the largest group here, and we can’t keep waiting for our other teams to join us. We should regroup and push for the crown. Let them know.

  Dross relayed the message, and in a few seconds they had all gathered. Mercy hung from the top of a tree, watching the fight with excitement in her eyes. Yerin stood closer to the battle than anyone, white sword in her hand and hair blowing in the breeze, occasionally deflecting a Striker technique headed their way.

  Naru Saeya crouched behind a tree, the peacock feathers in her hair somewhat wilted, tending to her wounds. Eithan ran a comb through his long, blond hair as though he were in his own home. He snatched a flying knife from the air and used it as a mirror.

  “Where's Pride?” Lindon asked.

  [I told him!] Dross said. [You can't blame me!]

  Mercy sighed and pointed.

  Lindon found him between a richly dressed woman with flying swords hovering around her head and a young man in blue robes with rings of lightning crackling around his arms. The three of them exchanged attacks in a rapid sequence of blows that would have been hard for him to follow before he advanced to Underlord.

  [Stormcaller,] Dross said, indicating the man in blue. [Cult of the Weeping Dragon. The woman is probably from Moonwater, the nation next door to Ninecloud.]

  The Stormcaller shot a blast of blue-and-yellow lightning madra at the woman, who caught it on a globe of green madra in her left hand as she used her right to direct the swords against Pride. Pride leaped over one sword, back-fisted a Striker technique from an unrelated fight and kicked another sword aside. He had closed the distance with the lightning artist, but a floating metal shield appeared from the lightning artist's soulspace and deflected Pride’s punch.

  “Sword girl,” Mercy shouted, and everyone attacked her at once.

  Dragon's breath, the Rippling Sword, an arrow of shadow, a green pulse of wind, and a mundane knife flew at the woman at the same time. She defended herself well, taking only a cut to her leg from the knife, but their second volley finished her.

  Which left Pride to pour madra and soulfire into one huge blow against the Stormcaller. The lightning artist managed to get his shield in front of him in time, so the strike launched him into the jungle. At which point he must have fled, because he didn’t show up again.

  Pride did not acknowledge them. He dove deeper into the fight.

  “He has the right idea.” Naru Saeya pushed up to her feet. “Eliminate as many as we can.”

  As she said it, a further light streaked down from heaven. Now that the battle had destroyed many of the trees in the area, the sky was clear, and Lindon could see the golden column stretching between the sky and the earth. It wasn't close; it seemed to be falling at a distant end of the island.

  Dross, how long has it been since the first crowns appeared?

  [Six minutes exactly,] Dross said. [Well, not exactly. As closely as I can estimate. Is the error in the timing of the crowns, or in my calculations, or in your fleshy human brain?]

  “Well, that's a wonderful chance,” Eithan noted.

  Now that there was another crown, the competitors who were interested in an easier battle had started to slink away. Even those who wouldn't have a chance to reach this distant crown would leave, because now it was clear that more crowns would appear every few minutes. Only those close to actually seizing this prize stayed behind.

  The fight closest to the crown was a three-way battle between two blood artists in black leather and misty red veils that looked like Goldsigns and a woman who was clearly a member of the main House Arelius. Her long, yellow hair was tied back into a braid, her blue eyes were bright, and she wore tailored green pants, a ruffled pink shirt, and a short green jacket. The Arelius crest was sewn in white on the back of her jacket.

  Bright sparks crackled on each of her knuckles, and Lindon thought they must be the beginnings of a two-handed Striker technique until they never went away. Her Goldsigns, then.

  [House Arelius, though even you could tell that. The others are disciples of Blood-Chorus; he's one of the warlords controlled by the Eight-Man Empire.]

  A Forged red wolf leaped from one of the blood artists. The Arelius woman pierced it with a lance of crackling light, but a gust of bloody rain landed against her and started to burn through her skin. She screamed, stumbling back, but still put up a shield to defend herself.

  When she saw Eithan, she brightened and shouted something. Once again, Lindon felt as though he almost understood, unsure whether it was another language or a thick accent.

  [She wants him to help,] Dross explained.

  That had been obvious, but Lindon was still curious. Can you understand what she says?

  [Of course I can. I was originally the guide construct to an international facility.]

  Can you translate?

  [Sure, yeah, no problem. Ahem: she says something along the lines of, ‘I want you to help.’]

  Lindon's hopes were dashed.

  Pride landed among the Blood-Chorus artists before Eithan reacted. He
landed a black-rippling punch on one and shrugged off an attack from the other with the gray haze of his defensive Enforcer technique. One of the blood artists made a grasping motion, and Lindon could feel the power of blood aura spike as Pride staggered. A Ruler technique.

  Before Pride could counter it, silver sword madra crashed into one enemy and black arrows ravaged the other.

  Eithan helped the Arelius woman to her feet. She asked him a question and he responded in the same language.

  While the rest of the team cleaned up the two from Blood-Chorus, the Arelius woman said her farewells to Eithan, cast a last regretful glance at the gold column of light, and then ran off into the trees.

  “Pardon if you don't want to answer,” Lindon said, “but what did you say to her?”

  Eithan waved a hand as though to say it was nothing. “Oh, certainly. She asked me if I would help her seize the crown, because the further House Arelius makes it, the better chance we have to rebuild. I said something about me being a core descendant of House Arelius who fled after the death of our Monarch, and she said that she understood and would leave this crown to me. Then she ran off to wait for the rest of her team to return.”

  Eithan's smile was unshakeable, and Lindon couldn't read anything in it. The rest of the team had eliminated the Blood-Chorus pair and was defending the crown's beam of light.

  Lindon stared at Eithan, waiting for him to elaborate.

  [...I think he's telling the truth,] Dross said.

  “Do you ever intend to tell us where you came from?” Lindon asked, a little irritation leaking into his voice.

  Eithan's eyebrows rose. “Did you want to know? You've never asked me.”

  Lindon stopped. Surely that couldn't be true.