It felt to Nicci as if both of those powerful discharges thundered right through her. She could not understand how she was still alive. It could only be that Richard was shutting down the spell without destroying it. He was methodically extinguishing it, like snuffing out the flames on a row of wicks.
Focused in concentration, Richard put his other hand down lower and blocked another line. The line went dark, racing back through the complex matrix.
The shadow of the beast began to step out of the underworld, partially into the world of life, pulling and flexing its arms with the difficulty of the task, testing its newborn muscle. Fangs glistened in the lamplight as the jaws stretched wide.
Their attention riveted on the lines around Nicci, no one noticed.
Holding a block in one network of lines, Richard carefully inserted a finger to occlude a preceding framework.
The entire web, having lost not just its most important supporting structure, but its very integrity, began to come apart. Angles opened. Intersections disjointed, letting connecting lines sag away. Other lines collided, sparking flashes of white light upon contact that made yet more lines go dark.
All of a sudden, the web of remaining lines collapsed downward, like a curtain falling. Nicci could feel the network of power laced all through her slough away. As the falling lines of light hit the Grace they went dark. In an instant, they were gone.
Free from the tangle, Nicci abruptly dropped to the table as she gasped a breath, like a scream drawn inward. Her legs had no strength to hold her and she crumpled, toppling over the edge of the table.
Richard caught her in his arms as she fell. Her dead weight took him to one knee. He maintained his balance, cradling her in his arms, saving her from hitting the stone floor.
Outside, lightning went wild, casting the room in fits of flickering light.
It was then that the beast, a soulless creature created for a single purpose, materialized fully out of the world of the dead and into the world of life.
And sprang straight for Richard.
Chapter 7
Hanging limp and helpless in Richard’s arms, despite how much she tried, Nicci simply could not bring forth enough strength to warn him of the beast about to crash down on him. She would have given her last breath to deliver that warning but, right then, she had no breath.
It was Cara, throwing all her weight at the charging creature, who deflected the full force of the attack and saved Richard from a killing strike. The beast’s fangs caught only air as it crashed past Richard, but its claws ripped through the flesh at the back of his shoulder. Knocked off balance from Cara’s tackle, the beast stumbled past Richard and smashed headlong into one of the heavy shelves. Bones, books, and boxes tumbled down.
The thing scrambled to its feet, snarling, fangs bared, muscles taut. Stretching for a moment to its full height, it was a good foot taller than Richard and its shoulders were nearly twice as wide. Bony projections marked its hunched spine. Dark, leathery flesh, like that of a desiccated corpse, covered powerful muscles.
It was a creature that wasn’t really alive, and yet it moved and reacted as if it were. Nicci knew that it had no soul, and for that reason it was all the more dangerous. It had been conjured in part from the lives and Han—the gift—of living men. It acted with the single-minded purpose that had been instilled in it by its creators: Jagang’s Sisters of the Dark.
As it immediately recovered and again went for Richard, Cara lashed out with her Agiel. The beast didn’t appear to be harmed in the least by the weapon, but it abruptly halted and twisted toward the Mord-Sith with shocking speed and strength, backhanding her hard enough to send her flying. She crashed into a bookcase, toppling it back. Cara didn’t rise from the jumble of books and splintered wood.
As lightning flashed outside the tall windows, Zedd used the opening to thrust out a hand, unleashing a shimmering bolt of power that lit the room. Shards of white-hot light exploded against the dark hide of the beast’s chest, leaving lines of soot radiating outward as evidence of the contact that didn’t appear to have caused any real harm.
Nicci, after Richard had laid her on the floor, was just starting to be able to pull desperately needed air into her lungs. She put an elbow out to prop herself up as she gasped for breath. She saw blood running from Richard’s shoulder and down his arm. As he rose to meet his attacker he reached for his sword, but his sword was no longer there, at his hip.
Slowed for only an instant, he instead drew a knife from a sheath at his belt. As he met the threat racing toward him he slashed with the blade, making solid contact that sent the creature reeling. Staggered by the blow and knocked from its feet, it tumbled across the stone floor, stopping only when it collided with one of the massive shelves. A ragged flap of leathery flesh hung like a flag from the injured shoulder. Without slowing, without pause, the beast sprang into a somersault and landed on its feet, ready to renew its attack.
Ann and Nathan both threw fiery bolts at it. Rather than incinerating it, the conjured flames splashed off the beast. Unharmed, it roared with fury. Flashes of lightning glinted off the razor-sharp blade poised motionless in Richard’s fist. The creature seemed all fangs and claws as it again lunged for him.
Richard stepped aside, gracefully turning with the beast’s onrushing charge, and with a backhanded swing slammed his knife hilt-deep into the center of its chest. It was a perfectly executed strike. Unfortunately, it seemed to have had no more effect than anything else that had been tried.
The creature wheeled with impossible speed and seized Richard’s wrist. Before it could catch him up in its powerful arms, Richard twisted under the grip and came up behind his attacker. He gritted his teeth with the mighty effort of twisting the creature’s powerful arm up behind its knobby back. Nicci heard joints pop and bone snap. Rather than the injury slowing the beast, it whirled around, swinging the broken arm like a flail. Richard ducked and rolled away as deadly claws scythed past.
Zedd used the opening to ignite a sphere of seething liquid fire. Even the lightning seemed to pause in the presence of such profound power brought to life. The room vibrated with the howl of the deadly, concentrated inferno Zedd unleashed. The knot of churning flames shrieked through the dark room, illuminating the tables and chairs, the shelves and columns, and the faces of everyone watching as it swept past.
The beast glanced back over its shoulder at the tumbling, hissing yellow conflagration wailing across the room and defiantly bared its fangs at the approaching fire.
It struck Nicci as an odd thing for the creature to do, almost as if it didn’t fear fire conjured by a wizard. Nicci had trouble imagining anything that could withstand such an onslaught—or not fear it. This was no mere fire, after all, but a menace that burned with phenomenal ferocity.
An instant before the writhing sphere of wizard’s fire reached its target, the creature simply winked out of existence.
Absent an objective, the fire splashed down on the stone floor, exploding across the carpets and breaking over tables like a rogue wave crashing ashore. Although conjured for a specific enemy, Nicci knew that runaway wizard’s fire could easily annihilate them all.
Before it could destroy the room or anyone in it, Zedd, Nathan, and Ann immediately cast yet more webs—Zedd doing his best to recall his power while the other two suppressed and smothered the flames before they had a chance to get out of control. Clouds of steam billowed up as they all worked to contain any errant droplets of the tenacious fire. It was a tense moment before they knew that they had succeeded.
Beyond the fog of vapor, Nicci saw the beast materialize out of the darkness.
It appeared behind Zedd, back in the shadows where she’d first seen it step into the world of life. Nicci was the only one who realized that it had returned in a different place. She had never before seen the creature slip in and out of the world of the dead at will, but she knew that was the method by which it was able to track and follow Richard across vast distances. She knew, to
o, that no matter the form it took, it would never rest until it had him.
Richard spotted the beast coming for him before any of the others and called out a warning to Zedd, standing directly in the path of the wild charge. Zedd blocked that charge by massing the air itself into a densely compressed, angled shield. The trick deflected the beast’s course by just enough. Richard used the diversion to slash at his attacker. Before his knife could make contact, the beast again winked out of existence, only to return an instant later once past Richard’s blade.
It almost seemed to be toying with them, but Nicci knew that that wasn’t the case. It was merely employing varying tactics in its soulless quest to have Richard. Even its seemingly angry roars were merely a tactic meant to weaken its victim with fear, thereby giving it a chance to strike. Instilling the capacity for emotion in it would have produced limitations; therefore Jagang’s Sisters had left such qualities out. The beast was incapable of actually feeling anger. It was simply unremitting in its purpose.
Ann and Nathan released a torrent of power concentrated into thousands of small, rock-hard, deadly points that could have shredded the hide right off an ox, but before the hurtling fragments could rip into the creature, it again effortlessly evaded the attacks by stepping into a shadow and coming out once again in another place.
Nicci realized that none of them had the ability to stop the thing.
Struggling to recover her strength, she scrambled across the floor to check on Cara. Still lying against a wall, Cara was dazed and having difficulty regaining her senses. Nicci pressed her fingers to the Mord-Sith’s temples, trickling in a thread of magic to wake her and revive her strength. She seized the woman by her leather outfit when she suddenly tried to scramble to her feet.
“Listen to me,” Nicci said. “If you want to save Richard, you have to listen to me. You can’t stop that thing.”
Not one to take instruction well, especially when it came to protecting Richard, Cara saw the immediate threat and sprang into action. As the beast spun around, focused on Richard, Cara threw herself at it, down low, rolling under it, knocking it from its feet. Before it could recover, she leaped on the beast’s back, as if mounting a wild stallion, and jammed her Agiel into the base of its skull. It was a move that would have killed any man. When the beast reared up on its knees, she hooked the weapon across the front of its throat.
With its good arm, the creature snatched Cara’s Agiel and effortlessly ripped it from her grip. Cara vaulted for the weapon and snatched it back, but it cost her a blow that again sent her tumbling across the floor.
As everyone clambered back from the creature, trying to stay out of the reach of its deadly claws, it threw its head back and roared. The sound was so deafening that everyone winced. Flashes of lightning lit beyond the windows, throwing blindingly bright light and a jumble of confusing shadows through the nearly dark room, making it difficult to see.
Zedd, Nathan, and Ann conjured shields of air and used them to try to force the threat back, but the beast was able to crash through the shields and charge for their creators, forcing them to dodge out of harm’s way.
Nicci knew that the three of them could not stop such a menace with the power they had. She didn’t see how Richard could, either.
As the others continued to fight with every bit of ability and cunning they could muster, Nicci again seized a fistful of Cara’s leather outfit at her shoulder and hauled her close.
“Are you ready to do it my way? Or do you want Richard to die?”
Cara, panting from the exertion, looked ready to spit fire, but she heeded Nicci’s words. “What do you want me to do?”
“Be ready to help me. Be ready to do exactly as I ask.”
After receiving a nod of agreement, Nicci scrambled back up onto the table. She placed one foot in the center of the Grace drawn in her own blood, and the other out beyond the outer circle.
Zedd, Nathan, and Ann threw everything they could conjure at the rampaging beast: webs of arcing power that could have cut stone, intensely focused force that could have bent iron, a hail of air concentrated into nodules hard enough to pulverize bone. None of it had any effect on the creature. In some cases it wasn’t affected by their power, while at other times it swiped at the assaults, brushing them aside, or avoided them altogether by winking out of existence only to reappear once the threat had passed.
It again turned its attention to its purpose and lunged for Richard. He dodged to the side and once more used his knife to rip through the creature’s tough hide, trying to sever an arm. That, too, Nicci knew, would do no good.
As the others shouted instructions, trying to find a way to destroy the threat, Cara, torn between helping Richard and following instructions, turned and peered up at Nicci. “What are you doing?”
Nicci, not having the time to answer questions, pointed. “Can you lift that candelabra?”
Cara glanced back over her shoulder. It was made of heavy wrought iron and held two dozen candles, none of them lit.
“Probably.”
“Use it like a lance. Drive the beast back toward the windows—”
“What good is that going to do?”
The beast lunged at Richard, trying to get its arms around him.
Richard twisted away and in the process landed a powerful kick to its head that did no more than momentarily stagger it.
“Just do as I say. Use it like a lance to drive the creature back. And make sure that the others stand back and stay clear.”
“You think that if I can club it with the candelabra that will stop it?”
“No. It learns. This will be something new. Just drive it back. It should be momentarily confused, or at least cautious. As soon as you force it back, throw the candelabra at it and then get yourself clear.”
Cara, her lips pressed tightly together in frustrated fury, considered for only an instant. She was a woman who knew that hesitation could bring harm. She grabbed the heavy main post of the candle stand in both hands and with a mighty effort lifted it. The candles fell from their cups, bouncing and rolling across the stone floor. It was clear to Nicci how heavy the iron stand was. She thought, though, that Cara had enough muscle to handle it. There was no doubt that she had the mettle.
But Nicci could no longer worry about Cara. She put the woman from her mind and straightened both arms, extending her hands down toward the bloody depiction of the Grace beneath her. She disregarded her doubts, her fears, and, as she had done countless times before, drew her mind back into the core of Han within herself. This time, above the Grace, it felt like falling back into an icy pool of power.
Ignoring the fate she was condemning herself to, she turned her palms upward and lifted her hands, using that icy pool of power within herself to begin to bring the verification web back to its induction point. From within the dominion of the Grace, Nicci concentrated on a mental image of removing the countervailing blocks within the spell-form that kept it contained and inert. With deliberate intent, once she had exposed the inner field that only she could see, she used both sides of her power to connect opposing junctions.
In an instant the green lines again started twisting their way up, like some ravenous vine made of light. In a heartbeat, the network of lines was as high as her thighs.
Cara thrusted and stabbed at the beast. Several times she made solid contact with her unwieldy iron weapon, knocking the creature back a step. Each time it took a step back, she immediately jabbed again, forcing it back another step, then another. Nicci had been right—the creature reacted cautiously to the unexpected nature of the attack.
She hoped that Cara could get the beast back not only far enough but in time.
Bolts of lightning arced through the night sky, illuminating the wall of thick glass windows. Compared with the forces of the storm, the oil lamps were so weak as to be nearly useless. The flashes back and forth between blinding light and darkness made it difficult to see.
As the glowing, greenish lines that were th
e mere reflection of the inner aspect of a spell that had been created thousands of years before by men long ago lost to history wove their way up around her, that inner spell-form once again ignited, lancing through her far faster than it had the first time. Nicci hadn’t been entirely ready. She went blind before she expected to. She struggled to breathe while she still could, while she still had a remnant of control.
Her gifted vision began to flicker back and forth between both worlds, between the light of life and eternal blackness. The dark void beyond came and went in flashes, much like the lightning outside the window, but with blinding darkness rather than blinding light. Straddling both worlds, Nicci felt as if her soul would be ripped apart.
She ignored the pain and focused on the task at hand.
She knew that she could not destroy such a beast with her power alone. Sisters of the Dark had, after all, created it with the help of ancient powers that she could not begin to fathom. The conjured creature was the match of anything Nicci knew how to call forth. It would take something more than mere sorcery.
Back near the windows, the beast finally dug in and halted its brief retreat. Cara jabbed at it, but the snarling beast would retreat no more. Cara was having difficulty handling the heavy iron candle stand. When Richard started to come to her aid, she yelled at everyone to get back. When he didn’t obey, she swung the candle stand around, making him jump back and letting him know that she meant business.
Putting all her strength into the effort, Nicci brought her palms up, preparing to do the impossible.
She had to find the cusp between nothing and the ignition of power.
She needed not power, but its precursor.
The green lines advanced farther up around her in their determined work of encasing her in the totality of the spell. Nicci tried to draw a breath, but her muscles would not respond. She needed the breath—just one breath.
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