Oh, jeeze. Talk about passive-aggressive guilt trips.
What did he want her to say? That everything was forgiven, they could move past the final massive betrayal made by the Laen’aroth who also served the Dalu’Rázj, and they’d go right back to Earth together because she couldn’t do this alone?
Maybe she could. He certainly seemed to think so. And Jessica had more than enough experience crawling out of dark holes and clawing her way to a solution using what she had in the moment, which was a lot more now as the Guardian than it had ever been.
But the thought of leaving him behind made her realize one simple little truth.
Jessica didn’t want to do this alone. More specifically, she didn’t want to do this without him.
“No.”
Leandras swallowed. “I understand. The Laenmúr on the other side should be more than capable of instructing you in—”
“No, that’s not my answer, Leandras.” She nodded toward the door. “You’re coming with me.”
“I’m...” His eyes widened, and he looked quickly back and forth between her and the Gateway. “Your answer is yes?”
“I have no idea what my answer is. But I’m not leaving you here.”
The fae man’s face danced between a dubious scowl and lighting up in hopeful disbelief. “Are you certain?”
“Yeah, that’s the decision I’m making right now. We’ll get to the other one later. Let’s go.” She headed toward the stairs—which looked more like a death trap, honestly—and didn’t turn around to make sure he was coming.
If the Laen’aroth couldn’t take her at her word, then they were at a whole different kind of impasse.
He sucked in a sharp breath and joined her at the base of the stairs. “Thank you, Jessica.”
“Don’t thank me yet. We’re not anywhere close to the finish line, are we?”
“Closer than we’ve been in the past.” He shot her a daring smile, then they both set foot on the first precarious step and started to climb.
The second they made it halfway up the staircase, the green light around the door grew brighter. The flickering tendrils snapped to attention to stand rigidly straight around the rectangular outline like dozens of glowing spikes. A terrifying rumble filled the air, growing quickly into a vengeful roar that shook the remaining foundation of Cálindor and sent all the precariously perched rubble toppling to the ground.
“Hurry.” Leandras set a lower hand on her back to urge her forward, and they climbed desperately as what was left of the Gateway’s once mighty fortress tore itself apart.
Jessica reached out for the brass doorknob—which was so weirdly out of place in this world—and gritted her teeth against the tremble and bellow of the door threatening to shake her bones loose.
The door burst with a surge of green and black light before she even touched the knob. The intensity of that single bludgeoning force knocked both her and Leandras backward. It knocked all the wind out of her too as she sailed away from the Gateway, watching it grow smaller and farther away from her outstretched hand before she landed painfully in the dirt.
Leandras toppled to his back a few feet beside her and lay momentarily stunned.
“Okay...” With a groan, Jessica pushed herself off her back and glared at the Gateway. “Not exactly the welcome home I was looking forward to.”
“Jessi—” He coughed and climbed to his knees. “They’re here.”
Only then did she see the pockets of green windows lined in flickering black smoke pop into existence all over the wreckage.
Atop what remained of the fortress’ broken wall. Beneath the overhanging boulders. Within the shadowy crevices where the ruined remains had fallen to never be moved again. Dozens of these windows appeared in less than five seconds, shimmering as dark figures moved closer from the other side and emerged to find the shirtless Laen’aroth struggling to stand and the Guardian propped up on her elbows, staring at them all with wide eyes.
“Yeah, I’d call this an ambush.”
Leandras hissed and spread his arms, the violet light returning to his hands as he crouched in preparation to fight their way out. “Get to the Gateway. I’ll hold them off.”
“The hell you will. I said I’m not leaving you here.”
“There may be no other option.”
Jessica left the sack right there on the ground, hoping against all odds that being flung off the top of those steps hadn’t shattered one of the stupidly irreplaceable artifacts, and stood. “We’ll figure it out.”
He nodded once but didn’t look away from the dozens of sneering magicals stepping through those green windows and preparing to take down the Guardian in this world.
Maybe they’d learned it was damn near impossible for their flunkies in the Requiem and the Hakali Hand Corporation and with Jensen Ardis to get the job done for them.
They wouldn’t have any more luck here with the Guardian.
“He is pleased, Vem-da’án.” A Matahg wearing black leathers studded in long, viciously sharp iron spikes stepped forward from around the back of the stone stairway. “Everything he requires right here in one place. We had our doubts, of course. But now...”
The magical’s eyeless face contorted into a nightmarish grin stretching impossibly wide across his flesh, and his black-ribbed wings burst out to their fullest span.
It reminded Jessica instantly of Mickey, but she pushed the memory aside as her magic burned through her and rippled across her flesh. Matahg were nothing new.
Apparently, this was one of those Leandras had experience dealing with before Mickey Hargraves met his end.
“This will not end well for you, Ibron,” Leandras snarled.
“Oh?” The other magicals closed in around them, some of their eyes burning with eerie green light like Leandras’ had once Jessica caught him in his Dalu’Rázj trance. Others merely stared at her with nothing but black pits where eyes should have been, but she had no doubt they could still see. “I’ve heeded my Roth’akán’s command, just like you.”
Jessica fought down the bubbling disgust at hearing that, because she knew it was true.
But the Dalu’Rázj didn’t know. Neither did his henchmen come to take what their master desired, which probably included the Guardian as well.
No one knew Leandras had flipped his allegiance—at least in his heart if not magically speaking.
She turned toward the fae man and stepped away. “What is he talking about?”
He shot her a startled look. “Jessica, this isn’t—”
“You know these assholes?” She couldn’t very well give him a wink and a nod with at least two dozen minions of the Dalu’Rázj sneering and chuckling with nothing but venomous greed in their gravelly voices.
But Jesus Christ, she really hoped he’d get the hint.
“We’ve already been through this,” he whispered. “I have—”
“You do.” Jessica backed away even farther and pointed at the enemy closing in. “Are you fucking kidding me? You’re helping them?”
“Time to come home, Vem-da’án,” the Matahg continued. The spikes on his weirdly inefficient armor glinted beneath the light of the stormy sky overhead and the pulsing glow of the Gateway behind him. “Hand over your bounty, and I’ll be sure he knows who is responsible.”
“I can’t believe I trusted you!” Jessica screamed.
Leandras closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, they glowed fiercely with silver light. “I’ve fulfilled my purpose, Jessica. Nothing more.”
A dark chuckle in hundreds of clashing voices rose from the Matahg’s motionless grin. “This witch calling herself the Guardian has a rather large blind spot, doesn’t she? The artifacts, Leandras. Now.”
“No.”
This Ibron asshole stopped short and tilted his head. “You refuse?”
“I’d rather present them myself.”
“That was not his command—”
“Which would have been delivered to me personally.�
� Leandras spread his arms. “So yes. I suppose I refuse.”
The Matahg snarled and leapt forward, lashing out with a blast of red light clawing through the air. Leandras ducked the attack as the rest of the horde surged forward, ready for blood.
“I’ll kill you for this,” Jessica shouted, hoping it was enough of a warning to get the point across before launching a barrage of flaming black pellets from her outstretched hands. Leandras hissed and waited until the last moment to leap aside, tumbling across the ground as the Matahg idiot fell right into Jessica’s line of vestrohím fire.
He roared and staggered sideways, pawing at the hundreds of holes peppering his chest and arms and wings like scattered buckshot. When he turned toward her, Jessica only saw Mickey Hargrave’s snarling Matahg grin instead, and yeah, there was more than a little satisfaction in watching another magical who looked just like her old boss stagger toward her in rage and disbelief as specks of his flesh burned away and crumbled to dust.
What remained of Ibron’s body hit the ground with a thump, throwing up more dissipating specks and a cloud of dust as crackling magic in red, green, and black sizzled through the air toward Jessica and Leandras.
“Vestrohím! A vestrohím!”
The cry rose from dozens of voices, then another shuddering bellow rang out. “Seize the Guardian!”
Great.
She hadn’t expected this to be easy, but now she’d brought down the attention of an entire gaggle of morons onto her instead of Leandras.
Jessica clenched her fists and dove right in, running straight for the orc with massive tusks that nearly blocked his eyes—which were, in fact, two of those eyeless holes she knew could see anyway.
The orc drew a sword—an actual goddamn sword with one wickedly serrated edge—and brandished it at her. But when he swung it, the seemingly solid steel segmented into hundreds of tiny fragments and cracked through the air like a whip instead.
She didn’t have time to completely dodge the lash of so many metal parts lined in tiny spikes before the end of that whip snagged her shoulder and sent her spinning sideways. With a snarl, she dropped into a crouch and unleashed tendrils of black smoke from one hand. They whipped around the orc’s ankle, momentarily making him look down in surprise. Then Jessica forced her magic into her own vestrohím whip, and the orc screamed.
His foot severed at the ankle, and the black lines of her magic moved quickly up his leg as he stumbled forward on one stump that quickly burst apart up to his knee. Black specks of what had been his leg swirled around his head when he dropped face-first into the dust, writhing and bellowing.
Jessica stopped briefly beside him and jerked her hand down, sending another sharp jolt of her wavering black magic piercing through the base of the magical’s skull. His face bounced against the dirt, then he was still.
Two down, only a few dozen more to go.
She was already turning when the spear of red flames shot toward her and struck her squarely in the chest. The blackhorn who’d attacked her grinned, a grotesquely brown substance spewing from his mouth, and summoned another fiery weapon to bring her down.
Yeah, being hit by blackhorn fire hurt like a bitch.
The flames lapped at her flesh, spreading across her clothes, and Jessica slapped her own burning chest as the blood-red fire tried to eat away at what couldn’t be consumed. That was a vestrohím’s job.
The flames snuffed out instantly, replaced by a renewed burst of black this time that rippled across her burnt flesh and the rag of what her shirt had become. When she pulled the flames away from her, the blackhorn’s eyes widened, but he launched his second blazing attack at her anyway.
The black fire peeling away from her body darted into the air like a striking snake, turning the rest of his flames the same lightless, consuming color, and the raging mass of the blackhorn’s magic she’d transformed into her own blazed around her.
The blackhorn turned and fled. Jessica threw half the black fire at him anyway, catching him in the back before he erupted in flames. Before he hit the ground, his body was nothing but a swarm of dark, fluttering specks.
Jessica hurled the rest of his transmuted attack at a troll woman running toward her with a massive glowing axe throwing green sparks. With a scream of fury, the troll swung the axe and buffeted the flames aside like she was trying to hit a homerun. The flames sailed up and over the battle to land in the wasteland behind them before finding nothing to consume and snuffing out in a puff of dust.
Okay, so someone had figured out how to enchant anti-vestrohím weapons.
Whatever smartass came up with that bright idea, they obviously hadn’t counted on a vestrohím getting too close.
With a sneer, Jessica ran toward the troll and ducked another massive swing. The weight of the axe made the other magical stumble forward, and Jessica spun around the troll before landing a swift uppercut blow into the other woman’s lower back.
The troll threw her head back and screamed, her unbound hair whipping Jessica in the face as the force of Jessica’s magic behind her punch speared her adversary straight through. When she jerked her hand away, she had to flick aside more than a little leftover troll coating her fist before her opponent dropped, and Jessica turned to find the next snarling, stubborn idiot who thought they could take her.
Another violent tremble wracked the ruins of Cálindor that had become a battlefield once again. The glowing green doorway in the sky pulsed with dark light, another bellowing roar split through the air, and even more boulders and rubble toppled down into the loose dirt. Lightning flashed across the sky, lighting up the grotesque grin of an unconscionably hulking changeling storming toward her.
Jessica blasted the changeling in the face before he’d had time to slash at her with whatever shape he’d intended to make of his hand.
He dropped, his face completely gone, and when Jessica looked up to find Leandras, she realized the green glow of the lightning above them hadn’t faded.
And there was no thunder.
The very sky was brightening, one massive slash of green light cutting through the storm clouds and piercing the gloom of this world with more light, yes. But it all looked a hell of a lot like something was about to come through that light.
She whirled around to find the sack of artifacts completely undisturbed beside the pile of black ash that had been the Matahg. Ducking another crackling magical attack from some idiot who tried to take her down with a bolt of sparking purple ice, Jessica took off toward the artifacts.
When she snatched up the bag, she whirled around to see Leandras holding his own against half a dozen magicals closing in on him. Bolts of silver light pierced through the green glow covering everything now, shattering the circle of those who used to be his allies.
He’d be fine. He could handle himself. Except the weird way he twisted at the waist to launch spells at the attackers inching closer behind him was particularly awkward for a fight against so many.
Then she saw the snaking lines of green light that had somehow burst from the ruptured earth. They coiled around the fae man’s feet and ankles, climbing all the way up to his knees and holding on tight.
The forces that had wanted Leandras Vilafor to return to Xahar’áhsh so badly apparently didn’t want him to leave. That, or the Dalu’Rázj knew his right-hand fae far too well and didn’t want to be screwed over again by the Laen’aroth’s duplicity.
Another tremor ripped through the ground, and a flicker of silver light rippled across the stairway Leandras had built for their escape. Bits of the stone cracked away from the stairs and crumbled into the dirt.
If they didn’t get out of here now, they’d lose the last chance they had.
Which meant Jessica had to go for the throat. All of them at once.
And that included the fae man who’d pretended to betray her again just now so the asshole these magicals called Master wouldn’t suspect everything had changed.
If she gave away that little secret, who knew
what else would come for them? Leandras was still bound to the Dalu’Rázj, and that probably meant the world-destroying asshole could find him anywhere.
Everything inside her screamed to go to him, to help him out of there so they could fly up those stairs on the verge of collapse and hope none of their attackers got in a lucky shot. But she stayed where she was, launching black smoke and dark, shattering spikes at anyone who charged within range.
Maybe she didn’t have to give away Leandras’ betrayal.
Maybe she could keep the secret and make it look like something else.
Because nothing was as it seemed, right?
She just hoped that stairway lasted as long as it took for Jessica to bring out the big guns.
Chapter 17
If there had been more in this wasteland of a world to draw from, Jessica would have used it all to fuel her magic. All she had to work with were less than a few dozen greedy servants of the Dalu’Rázj, and that had to be enough.
She dropped the sack of artifacts at her feet again and raised her hands, hoping she looked terrified enough to play a convincing surrender. Not that hard when she was already terrified this wouldn’t work.
The magicals blasting spells at her stopped when they saw her give up, and an Umbál with matted hair and lines of thick silver rings pierced through both ears snickered before heading toward her. His form flickered in an out and streaked across the dust in a blur before he stopped right in front of her and brought his giant fist cracking against Jessica’s face.
She cried out and dropped to her knees. The fighting momentarily stopped, and five more magicals surged forward to circle her, destructive magic summoned in their hands to keep her at bay if she tried anything.
The more the merrier, right? Six would work just fine.
“Take her to the next,” the Umbál snarled.
“Nifaro, don’t you dare,” Leandras snarled, straining against the green tendrils coiled around his legs and holding him in place. He launched a blast of violet-crackling light at the snickering Nifaro, who flittered out of this plane and into another at the last second. Leandras’ attack went right through him and crashed into the dirt, sending up chunks of rock and loose soil. The fae man roared in frustration. “The Guardian’s mine!”
The Spellcast Gate (Accessory to Magic Book 5) Page 17