Brithenwood was the key to making the fenceposts. It was a fencepost.
Using sheer willpower, she pulled it out.
The brithenwood sang to her, music bubbling through her blood and nerves, combining with her surging magic. Yes, this brithenwood staff could become a fencepost; she only need wield it.
Staggering with the overwhelming Song, she thwacked the branch across the soul-sucker's back. The soul-sucker's ululating scream deafened her. It released her and crumpled. She stabbed the branch down, through the soul-sucker and into the ground.
The branch transformed before her eyes, glowing yellow and growing to—a fencepost! Magic ran from it to the next post down the line, a hot blue streak of Power.
Thealia skewered a slayer and it fell on the boundary, shrieked as fire engulfed it, vanished. In the monster's place was a wall of flame.
For an instant Alexa couldn't find her voice. Then she shouted, yelled with magic and triumph so all on the battlefield would hear her. "The boundaries—they are fueled by the horrors' life force!" She saw a volaran and Chevalier die under a tangle of render claws. The bodies landed on the border too. Again the boundary flared, the bodies disappeared, and the border was strong and alive at that point.
With shouts, the Marshalls and Chevaliers pressed forward, maneuvering the monsters to the line.
Soon the entire front was lit with a visible wall of magic that the monsters behind it could not punch through. The beasts on the Lladranan side of the border were trapped.
Yelling battle cries, the defenders of Lladrana encircled and killed renders, slayers, soul-suckers and another dreeth.
Alexa stumbled back into the skirmish. Her bond with Bastien returned first, then Ivrog. Their tunes were uneven, flattening and nearly disappearing at points, but she was glad of any help she could muster.
She found her wandering horse and heaved herself into the saddle. She felt better, stronger, more in control on horseback. For the first time she thought she might eventually become a volaran fighter. Alexa kicked the horse into a run and helped finish off the remaining horrors, swinging her sword, using her baton automatically until she looked around and found only Chevaliers, Marshalls, Sorcerers, horses, and volarans alive. No sign of the monsters except a very tall, very bright boundary of magical flame.
Her arms dropped and she just stared at the new border. She didn't think she'd seen anything so beautiful in her life. Safety, security, triumph. The glowing fencepost and boundary line meant all that to her.
With a press of her heels, she rode closer to the fencepost and the huddle of Chevaliers who examined it. Where the post rose from the ground was a circle of jade. Alexa shivered. She—she had made the fencepost and it showed that. It also seemed to tally her kill, then go on to record the other beasts that had died on the line. Almost all of the Marshalls—including the Shields—had a jeweled ring around the pole. The Chevalier kills were shown in wood.
Thealia joined her, smiling faintly and cleaning her sword. "Well done, Swordmarshall. Now we know how the posts are formed—brithenwood staffs."
"Branches," Partis said as he and his volaran landed, "and freely given. Not cut, but culled from dead fall."
Loremarshall Faith drew near too. "Did you say any spell when you thrust the brithenwood into the ground, Alyeka?"
Alexa's mind went blank. Had she? She had the vague idea that all day long she'd been praying "Oh God," or swearing, "Oh shit." She smiled weakly. "I don't think so."
Bastien's stallion trotted up. The volaran looked magnificent and pleased, as if he knew he'd participated in a fateful event. Bastien's expression was strained, but he managed to dip his head and smile at her.
All her feelings about him roiled through her. Love, despair, caution. Suddenly she wanted her feet on the ground. That might steady her.
She slid from her horse and wobbled to the fencepost as if to study it. From the corner of her eye, she saw Bastien tense. Up close the fencepost was awesome. Yellow-white, it would be a beacon at night, a warning to those evil creatures who tried to slither into Lladrana. The gemstone rings of the Marshalls sparkled in the light, bright and new, the edges of the carvings crisply incised.
Reaching out, she meant to trace the dreeth, but her fingers just brushed the column.
Mist seemed to swirl around her and it was fast and thick and white and she couldn't tell if it was behind her eyes or in front of them.
The earth under her feet vibrated.
And she heard the Song.
She'd thought the melody between herself and Bastien had been a Song, but this was more—richer, incredible.
This was the Song of a world.
And not the planet Amee or the land Lladrana.
This was the Song of her mother planet, Earth. A Song that whirled all the memories of her home planet into vivid life—the scent of snow, of spring grass, of the Colorado soil itself. Images of the law school campus, her office and battered desk, and her apartment. Of lost Sophie.
It brought tactile sensations too. The warmth of the chinook wind in February, a cashmere sweater she'd once touched in one of her foster homes, cornsilk.
Music. The real music, the crash of Beethoven's Fifth, the beat of rap, the zing of zydeco, the horns of jazz and holiday tunes and triumphal marches. The Song of Mother Earth's core-beat that called to her own blood, the beat of her own heart.
Everything, every sensory memory, overwhelmed her.
The Snap.
"Nooo!" she heard someone scream harshly.
It had sounded like Bastien, only his voice held a note she hadn't heard. She tried to turn her head but couldn't.
Rough arms grabbed her, shook. "Hold on to me! See me! TakeME!" she thought she heard. The words made no sense. Instead, she focused on the vision of the lovely house and children and a caring man—of black judge's robes.
But they were all wrong. Her body shuddered and she sucked in deep breaths and with them another Song, fractured and frail, weeping and calling to her. Her house was redbrick, not fake half-timber. She had no children, but friends and horses and beautiful winged creatures called volarans and a funny, wonderful shape-shifter. She didn't wear black judge's robes. She wore fighting leathers of a dreeth she had killed with her own hands—and wielded a magical baton, not an authoritative gavel.
The man was all wrong. He was caring, not loving. Their sex was good but not desperate and consuming. He gave tenderness and support, but she could have that and love. She could have more.
She could have a man she Paired with, fought with, loved passionately. She could have a land that was strong and free because of her actions.
She could save a land and save lives. She was needed here. In Lladrana she had been and would continue to be the difference between life and death, for people and for the land.
The cost could be very, very high. No children. A short life. Horror and fear and pain.
The reward was immeasurable.
She grabbed on to Bastien.
Mother Earth's Song diminished, faded and left a last blessing of the taste of Assam tea.
Amee's Song sighed, and wept, and flowed through her and claimed her as one of her own.
Alexa collapsed onto Bastien. The world steadied and she found herself clutched closely to his chest, hearing the rapid pounding of his heart. She looked up and he was blurred behind her own tears. She blinked and let the tears roll down her cheeks.
"The Snap," she said.
He squeezed her until her bones creaked. "I know." His voice was thick and muffled. "I know. I love you, Alexa. Stay with me."
She hugged him back with all her strength. He felt solid, good and wild in her arms. Wow. "I love you too, Bastien. I'm here for good. Here in Lladrana."
She turned in his arms, saw the Marshalls and Chevaliers watching her, eyes wide, obviously understanding what had occurred.
Thealia looked at her colleagues. No one moved. Her mouth twitched in impatience and she hurried to Alexa. "The Snap."
When Alexa took a step from Bastien, her knees faltered. He set his hands on her hips to steady her, but didn't constrain her. She lifted her hands to run them through her hair, lift it from her scalp and dry the perspiration of her head.
She smiled at Thealia, past Thealia to Partis and the others, and called, "The Snap has come and gone and I am still here. I will remain here in Lladrana."
More Songs entwined her, the threads of connections to the Marshalls, each individual and the Pairs, notes and links to Chevaliers with whom she'd worked so closely. From each came an uplifting gladness that she'd stayed, a tune of friendship. For her, Alexa Fitzwalter.
Welcome home, said Sinafin.
GUARDIAN OF HONOR
ISBN: 978-1-4268-4734-9
Copyright © 2005 by Robin D. Owens
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Worldwide Library, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and TM are trademarks of Harlequin Books S.A., used under license. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.
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Table of Contents
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