Sorceress Rising (A Gargoyle and Sorceress Tale Book 2)

by Lisa Blackwood

  Her mother pressed her lips together in a thoughtful line. “In fact, they probably are after the siren as well, though that won’t be their primary goal. They want your hamadryad.”

  That made horrible sense. “Because she’s now the Sorceress and they want that power?”

  “No, actually,” her mother countered and then clarified a moment later. “They want to use the bridge your hamadryads can form between Mortal and Magic Realms.”

  Lillian felt Gregory stiffen under her. So she wasn’t the only one surprised by that bit of news. She prompted, “Hamadryads. Plural?”

  “Naturally.” Her mother quirked an eyebrow. “You know there are two, surely? The one in this Realm, and the original in the Magic Realm—the one you took the cutting from in the first place.”

  In fact Lillian did remember Gran mentioning something about a cutting. Cuttings only came from other plants, and Gregory had mentioned about a first hamadryad. But she hadn’t put anymore thought into it—mostly for lack of time.

  “It lives?”

  “Your tree is very strong and is in fact flourishing. She’s almost twice as large as the one growing here. Though that shouldn’t surprise you either since she’s had an extra eight years to grow and absorb power from the Magic Realm.”

  “Hmm, I really don’t like the idea of a part of me still trapped there,” Lillian mumbled more to herself than any particular person. “What’s to stop the Lady of Battles from somehow using the hamadryad against me?”

  Gregory rumbled at her question, clearly not liking the thought any better than she did, though he’d probably thought of that angle long before her.

  “Hamadryads, being a hybrid of tree and Faeblood, are not something our enemy can influence. As a tree spirit, a hamadryad lacks thoughts or emotions that the Battle Goddess can grasp, understand, or corrupt.”

  That might be true, but it didn’t mean she liked the idea any better.

  “However, there is a way to exploit both your hamadryads, and I think the Riven plan to try.” Her mother frowned darkly. “They may have already done so once. It would explain why there are so many of them already in this Realm.”

  The terrain forced Gregory and her father to veer around the opposite sides of an ancient oak, following two different game trails. To Lillian’s dismay, she couldn’t continue the conversation for several strides. When Gregory and Darkness finally merged back onto the same trail, Lillian sought her mother’s gaze. “Tell me what you mean”

  “You’re aware that travel between the Realms is difficult, yes? Though it is disproportionate. The trip here to the Mortal Realm is less strenuous than the return journey. In fact, besides gargoyles, only dragons, phoenix, and gryphons have enough inherent natural power to return to the Magic Realm. Of those, only the most elite of their kind could make the return journey without damaging themselves. All others would require aid directly from the Magic Realm or some form of talisman that could enhance their natural magic.”

  Lillian thought she knew where this was going without needing more details. “And somehow my hamadryads can offer that help.”

  “Offer is perhaps incorrect, provide is a better one. Since she doesn’t, in fact, need to allow travelers to access the bridge.”

  Lillian quirked an eyebrow.

  “Your two hamadryads already form a bridge between Magic and Mortal Realms, allowing those with the knowledge to travel between with relative ease.”

  That revelation made sense, but opened up a whole other branch of questions.

  “You’re saying the Riven are planning to use my hamadryads to span the two Realms?”

  “I think some have already done so. It’s the only explanation why they are already so numerous here. This Realm is so poor in magic, there is no way so many could have been spawned here by their normal mode of reproduction.”

  “Dare I ask?” Lillian truly didn’t want to know if some Riven actually took children as hosts or if they shape shifted to look that way. She’d intentionally forgotten to ask Gregory that little detail.

  But she was done being squeamish. Her lack of knowledge was going to get someone she loved killed. “Tell me anyway. I need to know.”

  Her mother gave a very slight nod in acknowledgement. “You might call the Riven a plague, and it would be true in a literal sense. At their core, they began as a speck of evil, liken it to a seed if you wish. Once housed in a suitable host, that seed of evil grows. It multiplies and infects all parts of the host body, tainting it and warping it to the Riven’s needs. As the speck becomes a flood, it overwhelms the host and the Riven becomes a sentient, thinking, reasoning being.”

  “Gods above. It’s like a virus or a cancer.” Lillian shivered in horror as another thought occurred. “An intelligent cancer that consumes you, body and soul.”

  Her father flicked an ear in her direction and suddenly his voice was in her mind. “A soul belongs to the divine and cannot actually be consumed, but it can be enslaved. The Riven traps the host’s soul and uses it as a link to the body. Being more of the spiritual than the physical, without the soul to act as an anchor, the Riven couldn’t remain in the host and would drift away and be torn apart by the cleansing power of the elements.”

  It was too horrible for words so she said nothing, merely tightening her hold on Gregory.

  Perhaps sensing her distress Gregory interjected, “It’s all right, love. When we destroy a Riven, we are freeing the soul to return to the Spirit Realm where it can be cleansed and healed of all scars. And we will kill all the Riven, take peace in that.” Gregory twisted to nuzzle her shoulder. It was a small gesture, but eased the tension in her spine.

  Yes, they would destroy the Riven to the last bloody one. She was hardily sick of them always sneaking around and then striking when one was weak.

  Well, she’d show them what a coward’s reward was. “You said they have used my hamadryad as a bridge. How does that work? Because I’ve never seen a horde of Riven suddenly appear within my maze. I would have noticed that. And the protective spells on the glade like the Riven no better than I do.”

  “As your mother mentioned,” Darkness continued, “the return journey is much more difficult unless one had a bridge. To return to the Magic Realm from here, one must have direct contact with the hamadryad, be potent with magic, and be willing to shed a bit of one’s own blood in payment. However, coming here is much easier. Think of it as a river or stream, the hamadryad in the Magic Realm feeds magic to the one here; that current is ever flowing and directional. Swimming against a current is difficult and requires much strength and skill. But the other way—simply jump into the current anywhere within a morning’s walk of the hamadryad and follow the flow of power here to the Mortal Realm. And as far as avoiding the stone circle protecting your grove, all the traveler needs to do is ‘jump’ out of the stream before they arrive at the destination and they will wash ashore somewhere else in this Realm.”

  “Just like that?”

  Gregory coughed. “It’s a bit more difficult than that, but yes, I understand your father’s meaning. Some Riven may have slipped through while I slept. If they were far away when they arrived here, they wouldn’t necessarily register as an immediate threat.”

  “How far could travelers deviate from my hamadryad’s actual location?” That information would give them at least some idea where a Riven army might appear.

  Gregory’s ears flicked back toward her a few times as if he was debating her question. Finally he said, “It would depend on how much power they were willing to expend. The more power, the farther the distance.”

  So much for that idea, Lillian grumbled in the depths of her own mind. “How can we keep the Riven from arriving in mass? Is there a way to sever the bridge between the two hamadryads, even for a short while?”

  “Not from this end,” Gregory replied.

  “From the Magic Realm, then?”

  Gregory remained silent.

  “Yes,” her father said with equal reluc
tance. “But whoever tried would soon find an army marching upon them. To truly neutralize the threat, the Riven army must be destroyed.”

  Lillian’s thoughts turned in another unhappy direction. “From what I’ve gathered, the Riven do not serve the Lady of Battles. They are like an experiment gone wrong. Yet she does nothing to curtail their activities? Why? She doesn’t seem the type to share power. Doesn’t she want to invade this Realm or conquer the entire universe or something like that?”

  Her father made a huffing sound, though Lillian couldn’t decide if it was agreement or disagreement with her line of thought.

  Her mother took pity and clarified for her. “The situation is complex. More so than even your gargoyle beloved may realize,” she said and glanced at Gregory. “The Lady of Battles mostly considers the Riven beneath her notice. From time to time, when they became too numerous, she would eradicate those encroaching upon her territories. Beyond that, she paid them little heed for they were nothing compared to her power. She was more focused on building her own army.”

  Lillian tightened her hold on Gregory as he gathered himself and leapt over a fallen tree. When the way was smooth again, she asked, “If the Battle Goddess was looking to build an army, why didn’t she conscript the Riven—she and they seem like they’d make a perfectly bloodthirsty match.”

  Her father huffed out a chuckle. “That was the problem. She demands loyalty above all else in her soldiers.”

  Lillian’s stomach tightened at his words. If that was true, why were her parents here? Even though they had survived Gregory calling on divine power to heal the Hunt, that mention about loyalty put her parents’ true motives into question once again.

  “By your expression, I know what you’re thinking, and,” her mother gave a slight shift to her shoulders, “yes, I was loyal to my Lady. All her subjects are, and I would still be serving her if I thought her actions wouldn’t bring about the death of my children.”

  A cold lump formed in Lillian’s stomach, but River continued with barely a pause.

  “We were her subjects long before the loss of her consort and the schism with her twin, which led to a millennium-long war. She was not always as she is now. Long ago her battles were against darkness, her twin fighting at her side. She once was a goddess of justice.”

  “The glory of what one once was, no matter how great, doesn’t remain untarnished by the misdeeds of our present existence,” Gregory said with undisguised censure.

  Her mother bowed her head ever so slightly. “That truth took me a long time to understand. I held out hope for centuries that time or reason would gentle the rage burning within her. A small part still hopes for that one day, but I could not sit by and wait for that day, not when my own flesh and blood would suffer at her hand to sate her need for vengeance.”

  “Nicely put,” Lillian added, “but that doesn’t explain why she’s suddenly allowing an army of Riven to cross her borders unchecked.”

  “Doesn’t it?” her father picked up the story. “She can’t come to this Realm to retrieve you, not while the duality curse holds sway. Without her twin’s agreement, she is trapped in her temple. And the Lord of the Underworld will never allow his twin to walk free, not willingly. So she is forced to use other methods to shape the outcome of certain events.”

  “The Riven.”

  He nodded. “She doesn’t control them but she is allowing them to invade her own land. We think she wants them to come to this Realm to force Gregory to fight or flee with you back to the Magic Realm. Once there, she believes you will be strong enough to overpower him and serve him up as a great prize.”

  Lillian thought she’d just tripped her parents up with her questioning. “I thought she wanted me to beget a child with Gregory so she can use it in her fight against her twin—a way to finally win the blood feud.”

  “That was the original plan,” River agreed, “but she never took into account that Gregory would emerge from his mother’s tree two whole years early so that he could come to your rescue. And you, yourself, further surprised her a quarter year ago when you refused to return until Gregory was fully ‘yours’.”

  “She raged about that for a half moon,” her father said with undisguised humor, “before calming and deciding to send us to learn just what was going on in this Realm. We reported back with an altered account of events. She would never have believed it coming from me, but your mother was her most trusted confidant. I suppose that was why I was given into her keeping when I was first captured.”

  Now that was something she wanted to know more about.

  Her thoughts derailed when the abusively loud crack of gun fire split the night. And not the type of guns used by hunters. No, this was the kind she’d only heard in the movies, not real life. Instinctively, her back muscles knotted with tension and she held Gregory around his neck so tightly she was surprised he didn’t complain.

  “Those are the weapons the human warriors carry, aren’t they?” Gregory asked with another brush of his mind against hers.

  “Yes.”

  “Then they are free of Tethys’s enchantments, which means one of two things.”

  Lillian swallowed. “Bad news, and yet more bad news?”

  Gregory tilted his head enough to give her his exasperated gargoyle look. “It means either she has released everyone under her control so they can fight the Riven, or that the enemy has already overrun her position and her enchantments died with her.”

  Lillian sent up a silent plea to the heavens for the siren’s survival. Three hours ago, she wouldn’t have believed she’d be praying for Tethys.

  Then again, the phrase ‘choosing the lesser evil’ had originated somewhere. She wasn’t the first person, nor would she be the last, to eat her own words and side with a former enemy to face a greater threat.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  As they drew closer to the savage sounds disrupting the night, Gregory winced at the bruising noise. He skirted wide, not wanting Lillian or any of the Hunt to get caught in the path of the tiny vicious projectiles.

  At his mental command, six sidhe archers broke off from the Hunt to aid the human soldiers. The sidhe took to the trees, that relatively high position might offer them some protection from the path of the bullets.

  Having no time to partake in the smaller skirmishes, he continued to run, intent on the main Riven force closing in on Lillian’s hamadryad.

  Lillian held her peace at the direction of his thoughts; however, she turned her head to track where the sidhe had disappeared. A new tension in her body told of her indecision.

  “The sidhe will do what they can for the humans. We must stop the main force before it can reach your hamadryad.” Gregory softened the harsh edges of his thoughts, allowing compassion to bleed across their mental link. “I’m sorry, but I fear there will be many deaths this night—clan, coven, and human alike.”

  Lillian’s thoughts brushed his in return, warm with the depth of her love for him. “Run swiftly, my love, and perhaps we can prevent greater losses.”

  He lengthened his stride in silent agreement. They passed several other smaller skirmishes along the way. Gregory ran down two Riven with the poor judgment to get in his way. To either side, he saw Lillian’s father and brother take down their own share of the enemy.

  On the outer edge of the gardens, Gregory ordered her to draw her blades. She did as he asked even as more Riven poured out of the night-shrouded greenery, forcing the Wild Hunt to slow. This particular horde fought and died with a greater ferocity, and he assumed they were there to slow the Hunt no matter the cost.

  At first Lillian’s two long blades must have felt awkward compared to the type she was accustomed to, for her moves were cautious to the point of hesitant. Gregory brushed his thoughts with her then, showing her what she needed in order to wield the blades with a deadlier precision. Soon she was instinctively hacking and cutting at Riven. Her rudimentary skills bloomed into something far fiercer under his guidance and he smiled.
As her kill count increased, so too did her confidence. Then her thoughts darted to the possibility of dismounting to give him a greater freedom of movement.

  “No,” he sent in a mental blast of desperation. “Stay where you are. We’ll fight better together than apart. Merge your thoughts more fully with mine.”

  There was a small hesitation on her part, and then he felt her thoughts brush more firmly against his, then deeper, until they were fully merged.

  His spirit thrilled with happiness and pleasure, uncaring that it was battle that forced the bond. With her astride, they were of one mind, body, and soul. It fed that all-consuming craving to belong, his greatest weakness, and as close as they were merged, he couldn’t hide it from her. The shame at his personal weakness was still there, but mild and muted by the sheer joy of running into battle with his lady upon his back.

  Her essence shifted deeper within his soul, followed by the soothing wash of her voice in his mind. “There is no shame in what you feel.”

  Another six Riven in his path forced him to bury his fierce joy and focus on battle. More bodies fell before his claws and Lillian’s silver blades. Within moments, the pristine gravel path darkened with blood and more unwholesome substances.

  He continued down the path with a reckless speed, spearheading the mad charge, the rest of the Hunt swift on his heels. He didn’t slow until he came upon the hulking shadow of Lillian’s maze. A great mass of Riven had already made their way inside the south entrance. Distantly, the sounds of battle reached his ears, and he knew there must be another group of Riven attacking from the north entrance of the maze as well.

  The wind carried the snarls, grunts, and screams of battle. More importantly, his keen hearing told him that the battle hadn’t yet reached the middle of the maze where Lillian’s tree grew.

  Within, an unknown number of his people still fought.

  A familiar voice rose above the din of battle, shouting orders and encouragement. Vivian’s tone confirming there was still hope. There was still time to stop the Riven. The gods had been merciful.