“Nothing that lies in her future is going to be easy.” Elric’s voice isn’t without sympathy. Which might be why Liam decides not to pursue the argument, even though I can sense the growl building in his throat.
“But we can take a break,” Elric suggests.
So we do. Elric goes to the river, while I sit with Carys and try to collect myself. Liam, who still seems restless over my near-fainting event, manages to talk Soren into replacing me as his sparring partner—a set-up that will probably end poorly, but which I currently lack the strength to protest about.
“That was really impressive magic you know,” Carys says after a moment of watching the guys fight.
They’re still playing nice for the moment, so I allow myself to look away and meet Carys’s eyes.
“Aside from the aftermath,” I mutter. “I still feel like releasing that magic left me full of holes or something. And also like I could probably sleep for a week now.”
“You could sleep for a week even if you hadn’t used all that magic,” she says with a wry grin.
“True. I am talented like that.”
“Sleeping isn’t a talent, Elle.”
“It is so. It’s like meditating—being able to turn your brain off for that long isn’t easy.”
She rolls her eyes. “Speaking of talents, Soren looks like he’s physically holding back his.” She nods toward the sparring match. Soren has definitely gone on the defensive. It looks like it’s irritating Liam, who seems intent on turning their little practice match into a full-on brawl.
I sigh.
“It’s probably better that he holds back,” I think aloud.
“You don’t think Liam could beat him otherwise?” She stifles a laugh. “Don’t tell Liam that, please.”
“It isn’t just Liam.” I hesitate. “It’s just that I don’t really know how powerful Soren is, exactly.”
And I don’t like to think about it, really.
I meant to keep that last thought to myself, but I still feel her cut her eyes toward me.
“I didn’t actually tell you this myself,” I say, “but I’m sure you’ve figured out who Soren is. What he is.”
“A blood sorcerer,” she says quietly, as if reciting my own thoughts. “One whose magic gets stronger after every battle he fights, and for every drop of blood he spills. Between that and all his secrets and illusions, it’s impossible to say what he’s really capable of, or what he could possibly become. Right?”
“Of course you’re right,” I say with a little smile. “You always are.”
Carys draws her knees up, hugging them against herself. “In this case the knowledge was…let’s say, thrusted upon me. Crap kind of hit the fan after you left. Lots of council meetings, and one particularly scary visit from Maric Blackwood himself.”
She shakes her head at the alarmed look on my face.
“It’s okay. Everything—everyone— was still mostly in one piece when we snuck away. Things are definitely out in the open about the Blackwood coven and their intent, though—and yes, about Soren. And you.”
“What were people saying about me?” I ask before I can help myself.
She stretches her legs back out in front of her, sits on her hands and shakes her head. “Oh, what does it matter, Elle?”
“That’s code for ‘they’re saying really nasty things’, huh?”
“Not everyone,” she says sheepishly. “Your parents still love you. And so do we. And besides, you’re going to save the world—worlds—or whatever, and then everyone will understand why you made the choices you did, right?” She gives me a cheerful smile that I can’t help but return.
“Ha. We’ll see.”
“We’ll be fine.”
My eyes drift back to the match, which has escalated into cheap shots and not particularly friendly banter. “They’ve taken their shirts off,” I muse. “That means they’re getting serious about this fight, doesn’t it?”
“Men are idiots,” she replies with a shrug. “But at least they aren’t bad to look at.”
She’s not wrong about that.
“Although I can’t say I blame them for losing the shirts, either,” she says after a moment. “It’s gotten hot, hasn’t it?”
“Maybe it was that impressive bit of fire I summoned earlier,” I joke.
“Maybe.” There’s an uncharacteristic puzzlement in her tone that makes me uneasy.
I think of the sudden, biting cold I felt when the Anima were approaching.
Is this sudden heat another warning sign that something is coming?
A loud thud draws my attention back to Soren and Liam; the latter is on his back, looking furious. I can smell the wolf threatening to rip its way out of him, and I still feel a bit dizzy when I try to stand, but I test my weight anyway—I have a feeling I’m going to have to intervene before they end up killing each other.
“I’m not sure Liam is ever going to really understand my choices,” I mutter. “At least not where Soren’s concerned.”
Carys stands as well, but grabs my arm and holds me in place. We’re quiet for a long moment, watching the other two and mirroring the tension in their bodies. And then she says: “Seven days. You were gone for seven, awful days on our end, and we thought you’d been kidnapped, and he blamed himself the whole time. He told your parents it was his fault.”
When she looks over at me this time, her eyes are sparkling with unshed tears. She quickly wipes them away and averts her gaze. “He’s afraid of losing you again. We both are.”
“I understand. And I know Soren made mistakes.” I stare at him as he backs away from Liam; he looks more than ready to stop the fight. “He lied. I haven’t forgotten. But he’s saved me, too—he could have left me to fend for myself several times since we came into this world, and he hasn’t. He’s on our side.”
She offers me a tired smile. “I hope you’re right.”
Soren glances at me as I walk over to the two of them—the distraction gives Liam enough time to hop back to his feet and position himself to launch into another attack. I step between the two of them before he can.
“Enough,” I say.
He bristles at first, but then exhales slowly and bends to pick up his discarded shirt instead. “We were just fooling around,” he says, using that shirt to wipe the glean of sweat from his neck and chest.
“Uh-huh.”
“It started that way, at least,” Soren says flatly.
Liam flashes a grin that’s more like a baring of teeth. I know that look. I can tell he’s about to make a smart-ass comment.
A loud commotion in the nearby trees draws our attention before he can.
A second later I spot one of those telltale awful red masks flashing between the tree limbs.
Anima.
“STOP HIM!” Elric yells from somewhere in the distance.
Easier said than done—because the Anima isn’t on foot this time. He’s sitting astride a dark creature that is darting so quickly through the trees that I can barely get a good look at it, much less stop it. I draw back automatically at the sight of them—but they aren’t barreling toward us.
They veer to the right and head for the edge of the mountain.
Black wings unfurl from the mounted creature, and it leaps from the cliff and soars toward the valley below.
Chapter Eleven
I didn’t want to risk losing control during a shift, so I let Carys and Liam do it while I remain human.
With my sword in one hand and the other hand gripping the fur between Liam’s shoulder blades, we rocket down the mountainside, scattering rocks and plowing over small trees as we go. Carys and Soren are thirty feet ahead of us, doing the same thing.
Our target is a black dot in the valley below, growing increasingly difficult to see against the crimson horizon.
An enemy spy, Elric had said, gasping.
He didn’t have to explain why this was bad news.
The whole point of channeling my magic through my swor
d was to keep me from being found. This guy can’t make it back to his queen, or whatever other commander he answers to, or there could be an entire army trying to rip the Earth key out of my body by this time tomorrow.
So Elric raced to find Casandra, and we raced to make sure the Anima didn’t get too far out of sight.
I lean lower, and Liam picks up speed. The terrain isn’t that different from what we’re used to back home, so racing down the perilous incline is second nature to him.
And the good news is that that creature the Anima was riding can’t really fly per se; just glide. It isn’t as fast once it touches down, and once we reach flat ground we’re just as fast. More importantly, wolves are built for endurance. So after a mile of chasing it, it starts to slow. But we’re still going strong.
Carys and Soren sprint ahead, cutting off its escape.
The bad news is that once we’re closer, I can actually see the Anima’s mount clearly.
It’s a dragon.
But not like a cute, Puff the Magic Dragon with fluttery wings and sparkling eyes or whatever.
No. It is a hideous, giant lizard with gross scaly skin, a tail and a neck that move in creepily fluid ways that shouldn’t be possible, and a forked tongue that it immediately flicks in my direction. One flip of that tongue and I cringe so hard that I nearly fall off Liam’s back.
My worst phobia, blown up to the size of an elephant.
I officially hate everything about this world.
(Don’t faint on me,) Liam thinks.
(I want to kill it with fire.)
(Good thing you have that ability, right?) Carys chimes in.
The only problem is that I can hardly look at the beast without nearly collapsing into a shuddering mess.
Well, that, and also the fact that I’m still exhausted from our training session.
I actually have a lot of problems with the current situation, come to think of it.
The Anima snaps the gross-lizard-beast’s reins. The creature lunges obediently into action, its jaws open wide as it dives toward us. Liam bounds nimbly away, but the creature is just as quick. Over and over it attacks, and on its fourth attempt it manages to come away with a bit of Liam’s tail fur in its teeth.
I leap from Liam’s back so he can dodge easier, and I clutch my sword and back away as the two giant creatures square off. I’m still inwardly cringing at every creepy reptilian move the dragon makes, but I keep watching, trying to relax and let the magic build steadily through me as I wait for my opportunity to strike.
Carys joins Liam in that deadly dance he’s performing with the dragon, and Soren jumps from her back and moves to my side.
“Plan?” His hands are twitching restlessly—the only part of him that lacks his usual calmness.
It’s completely embarrassing, but I can’t answer him immediately. I’m too busy trying not to throw up after watching the creature whip its head toward Carys in a particularly snake-like way.
“Can you like…illusion it into a kitten or something else that I can actually look at, for starters?”
“What, so you can pretend you’re killing a cute kitten instead? You monster.”
“Yeah, okay, good point. I’m not thinking clearly.” I take a deep breath. “Okay. I can do this. “Help them keep it distracted. I’m going to practice some more magic.”
He hesitates. “Are you sure you’re up for that?”
“I’ve never wanted to set something on fire as much as I do right now,” I mutter. “I’ll be fine.”
His expression is still doubtful, but he nods and joins the other two while I lift my trusty sword and attempt to infuse it with that magical energy drumming through me.
Kill it with fire, kill it with fire, kill it with fire—
The flame appears as suddenly as it did before. I’m better prepared, and I don’t startle this time; I keep my eyes open and zeroed in on the flickering light, focusing on building it bigger and brighter until it blocks out the gross creature from my entire field of vision. As long as I keep my eyes on the fire, everything else is just a shadowy blur. Enough that I can track the dragon and aim toward it, without seeing it clearly enough to be freaked out by it.
My whole body shakes from the effort of trying to build and hold my attack.
My knees are close to buckling when it finally happens: one of the wolf-shaped shadowy blurs slams into the dragon blur hard enough that it sends it stumbling toward me.
I have a clear shot.
I take it.
I swing the sword with all my might, and the fire releases from the end of the blade and hurtles through the air, slamming into the dragon’s broad chest. It staggers backward with a hiss and an irritable fluttering of its wings. Then it rolls onto the ground and flops around for a moment, as if trying to put the fire out, before it sinks into the stillness of death.
The Anima tumbles from its back. It attempts to strike up a formidable pose, but it’s clearly off-balance and outnumbered now.
I hit my knees, breathing hard. All of my remaining strength is barely enough to keep my grip on my sword.
Carys lunges for the Anima’s throat.
Just before her teeth sink in, it lifts its head and releases a terrible, loud, warbling noise.
And a chorus of shrill cries answers it.
The three of us not currently dismembering an Anima all turn toward those cries.
(Shit,) Liam thinks.
“Is that…” Soren begins.
“This was a trap,” I breathe, taking in the sight of no less than twenty more mounted Anima careening toward us. “It was just trying to lure us out into the open.”
And I swear that laughter is the last sound the fallen one makes before Carys finishes it off with a crunch of her powerful jaws.
Soren’s hand brushes my arm. An attempt at a calming gesture, I think.
But even though it sends warmth simmering through me, a million panicked thoughts are still crashing through my head.
Where are Casandra and Elric? What do we do now? We can’t fight this many at once. What do we do—
“Run,” Soren says quietly.
I’ve already struggled to my feet and started backing up—until I realize that he’s not backing away with me. He’s stepping toward the approaching monsters instead.
“Take Elle and run,” he says. “They’re after the key, and we can’t let them get it. I’ll distract them while you find someplace to hide her.”
“Don’t be stupid,” I argue.
He tilts his head toward me, and I think I see the corner of his mouth twitch upward. “Most of what I’ve done these past days is stupid, right? Why stop the trend?”
Before I can protest him using my own words against me like that, Carys has my sleeve in her mouth and she’s dragging me away from him. Liam is there to help her a moment later, blocking me from the desperate sprint I was thinking about making.
I’m not strong enough to get past them.
Not fast enough.
I can barely stand after that last bit of magic.
The Anima are closing in, and Soren is walking calmly toward them, and this is a disaster. And I can feel an even bigger catastrophe building inside of me. Magic swirls restlessly in my gut. My wrist—the key I hold—burns. The pain makes me clench my teeth so hard that I think they might crack.
(Hurry up and get on,) Carys urges, kneeling beside me.
I don’t move, and Liam’s voice is booming through my head a moment later: (NOW, Elle.)
“He’s going to die.”
(We’re all about to die.)
(And if they get that key,) Carys adds, (Earth is going to meet the same fate.)
I grip a fistful of her fur to steady myself.
I can’t just leave him.
Over and over I’m thinking that, but for some reason I’m still moving, heaving myself up onto Carys’s back. I’m still clutching my burning wrist against my aching stomach. And I’m putting all of my strength into keeping that key
safely inside of my body, instead of into running after Soren.
I shouldn’t have to choose, but I do.
The fate of two worlds, or the boy I jumped into this hell for.
I can’t save them both.
I desperately wish I could, but I can’t.
So I close my eyes, and I cling tighter to my burning wrist, and I let myself be dragged away.
Chapter Twelve
From the relative safety of a thick clutch of trees, one growing wild around the river that runs through this valley, this is what I’m forced to watch:
A barely-visible dot—Soren—who looks even smaller as the army of Anima begin to circle him.
A glint of steel as he lifts that twin sword of mine, as if it could somehow be enough to hold back the flood of monsters rushing over him.
Then comes an explosion of magical energy, the same whitish blue light that flashed around me right before I was captured at the Anima’s campsite. Even from this distance, it’s blinding. Grass and dust swirl and a choking, burning scent overpowers me.
And when it all settles, I don’t see Soren anymore.
Some of the Anima are scattering out of sight. Others appear to be hanging around and searching—for me, I assume, now that they’ve taken care of the annoying sorcerer standing in their way. They canter around on their dragonish steeds, exploring every nook and cranny of this valley, searching every hollow and every cluster of foliage.
Or almost every one.
But I guess the universe decides I finally deserve a break, because they never come close enough to our hiding place to find me.
A strange calmness overtakes everything in the valley as the rest of the Anima file out of sight.
Hope stirs in my chest.
Maybe Soren is hiding himself in plain sight, waiting until it’s safe to drop his illusion?
I get to my feet, but Liam blocks the path out of our refuge.
(It could be another trap,) Carys says. (They might be hoping you’ll come out if they hide and keep still.)
It makes too much sense for me to argue back. So I force myself to settle back down.
We sit in silence. Tears stream down my face. I don’t bother to wipe them away. I don’t bother moving at all, aside from tightening my grip on the hilt of my sword as I imagine utterly destroying the next Anima I see, slicing a magic-infused blade through it until I render it unrecognizable.
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