The Druid's Guise: The Complete Trilogy (The Druid's Guise Trilogy)

by Michael J Sanford

  Ms. Abagail raised an eyebrow and took a swig from the colored can. “You two saving the world together?”

  Wyatt shrugged. “I guess.”

  “Oh?”

  “We didn’t exactly leave on the best terms. And I haven’t saved the world from anything. And without my amulet, I don’t think I ever will.”

  Ms. Abagail reclined in her chair and didn’t say anything, letting silence creep in.

  “I…I have to beat the Regency,” Wyatt said, fearing too long a silence. He wasn’t even sure where the words had come from, or even the idea. After what had happened with the Bad Man, what importance did the Regency hold? And with Athena and Maia…did they even need or want him? But something deep inside stirred and coursed electric though his limbs as he thought of the Realms and his life there. “I just know I have to.” He shook his head, wishing Ms. Abagail would say something, but she didn’t. “I can’t explain it, but ever since I went there, and met Rozen and the others…I knew I had to fight for them. Even without my amulet and my power, I still know it’s what I have to do. It’s like…it’s like something is calling me to do it. They call it the Mother, but I don’t know…sometimes I think it’s something more.” He looked at Ms. Abagail and felt his expression drop. “I know it makes me sound crazy, but it’s true. All of it. I have to fight. And…” He frowned, a new feeling sweeping over him. “And I have to remember. Maybe they’re the same thing? I don’t know.”

  He silently pleaded with Ms. Abagail to say something, and finally she set her can down and sat forward. “Then do it.”

  Warmth swirled in Wyatt’s gut and shivered along his limbs. It was his turn to fall silent and let her fill the void.

  “Then do it,” she repeated.

  Standing, she reached into a pocket and withdrew a closed fist. She held it out and opened her hand. To Wyatt’s surprise, his amulet fell from her grasp and swung suspended from her middle finger. She smiled and set it in his waiting palm.

  “Go fight, Wyatt. Whatever it is that haunts you, whether a Bad Man or the Regency, you have to fight. And if that’s what it takes for you to remember, then fight with everything you have.”

  Wyatt pressed the small green stone to his chest like it was his life. Energy radiated from the amulet and instilled within him a feeling he could never replace. Tears sprung to his eyes as he looked to the young woman with the lock of pink hair. His savior.

  “Thank you,” he said, choking on the words in the most embarrassing fashion.

  Ms. Abagail smiled, sat back in her chair, and waved him on with her hands. “Well, go on. I said fight.”

  The heat in the center of his chest grew and a lone spark shot from between his fingers. It spiraled into the middle of the room, kissed the ceiling, and floated to a rest atop Ms. Abagail’s knee. They both stared at it. Then she laughed and looked up at him.

  “It’s warm,” she said.

  As she spoke, the amulet exploded, filling the room with wondrous light and consuming Wyatt in the same breath.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  THE SMELL OF burning pitch was so strong that Wyatt gagged as the magic from his amulet subsided. The acrid smoke seared his nostrils and instinctively he fell to his hands and knees, coughing, and squinting against the haze. Wyatt could see burning embers through the gloom, but little else. He flexed his fingers against the rough and familiar wood of the elven street, confirming that he had returned to roughly the same spot he had left.

  “Hello?” he called out.

  Unseen fires snapped and crackled in the distance, but nothing else. He crawled forward, not knowing where he was headed, but desperate to find something, anything to shed some light on the situation he had stumbled into.

  He continued to call out as he made his way along the street, the smoke forbidding him see further than a few feet ahead. His eyes burned and his throat was raw. Gagging again, he stopped and sat back on his heels, pressing his hands to his chest. The embedded gem pulsed with latent power and he turned his mind to it, letting his consciousness spread outward into the elven city. Nothing.

  He released the power and resumed crawling, fearing staying still for too long. Where was everyone? We defeated the Fae, didn’t we? He shook his head. That wasn’t in doubt. He had fed on their leader’s life force until she was nothing, and the rest had been cut down by flame and elven deception.

  He reached the charred wall of a building and blindly followed it to a door. Inside, the smoke was thinner and a single torch still glowed, its amber light dancing off the wisps of drifting smoke. He stood and grabbed his chest.

  “How long have I been gone?” he said aloud. The pulsing gem didn’t respond. Neither did the empty dwelling.

  He called out in vain, walking further into the room, searching from some sign of where everyone had gone. In the center, the floor gave way, the edge of the hole a line of glowing embers. Wyatt peered over the edge and nearly fell in at the shock of what he looked down upon. The city below was burning. So engulfed in churning flames was the lower level that Wyatt thought for a moment that he was staring down at the center of Hell.

  He fell back and braced himself against a wall. It crumbled under his weight and he fell solidly on his side amid ash and embers. Spitting charred wood, he rolled upright and sat gasping, his mind racing for answers. And then a familiar thought rolled through his head. It wasn’t one that he gave voice to very often, but in the smoldering gloom he did.

  “What have I done?”

  The city answered with a deep groan and the sound of splintering wood as a large portion of the ceiling fell in, nearly crushing Wyatt. He fell aside just in time to save himself.

  A thick spear of wood burned brightly at his side, immediately wrenching hot sweat from his skin and forcing him to scuttle away. At a safe distance, he stopped and stared at the hungry flame and wondered if he had returned to the Realms just to die.

  “No, I didn’t come to fail again,” he said to the flames. “I came to fight. I’m stronger now.”

  As he spoke, the ever-present voice of the Mother magnified, and he sensed the life of the fire burning in front of him. Was fire alive? Did it have a life to take?

  Desire stirred within him and he stretched a hand toward the flames, seizing its life—if you indeed could call it that—and drew it into his own being. A sharp wind shot through the room and the fire guttered out immediately. Wyatt’s body swelled with power, and he stood, looking for more to consume.

  His senses sharpened and his muscles tingled with anticipation. He walked further into the home and found himself standing on the edge of another hole, staring down at a lake of hungry flames. Was Athena down there? As he thought of her, his mind couldn’t help but conjure the last image he had of her. Athena and Maia. His jaw set and he lashed out with his mind, seeking the power hidden within the fire below him. It crackled with life and called to him, growing more vibrant the longer he watched.

  Having stolen the life for the small bit of fire a moment before had set an energy sparking through him that he had never before tasted. The thought of what the inferno burning on the lower level could hold was too much for him to resist. He was already pulling at it, drawing it into himself, as he fell.

  He struck the wooden street, setting off an implosion of fire and heat and energy. It rushed into him all at once. For a moment Wyatt thought he might be torn apart or consumed, but then it ebbed, and he was left standing in the middle of blackened wood, and pine-scented smoke. He had stolen an entire blaze in an instant.

  Wyatt flexed his hands and looked over himself. He had never felt more empowered or more alive. He turned in a full circle, enjoying the feeling, and reaching out with his heightened awareness.

  Now that the nearby fires had been extinguished, Wyatt could see the bodies strewn along the street. Ahead, he recognized the space at the end where the Sapper had once stood. It was little more than ash now, scattered everywhere. In front of the once proud building laid the charred corpses of
the Fae, along with a handful of elves. It was hard to distinguish individual forms, but he knew what the ash hid. And he could never forget the spot in the street he had stood in as he had ripped Fae’Herot’s life from her, with nothing but his desire to take it for himself.

  He walked over to the spot and savored the memory of what he was now. Unstoppable.

  Wyatt took one last deep breath, smiled, and turned from the charred battlefield. He still didn’t know what had happened since he’d been gone. And still he could not discern any living beings nearby. With all the energy taken from the flame, he was supernatural, but as much as he let his mind wander over the magical tendrils in the air, he arrived at the same realization each time. He was alone.

  He shook his head and made his way to the small dwelling where he had last seen Athena and Maia. It was largely untouched by fire, and it seemed the blaze hadn’t destroyed all of the city as he had first supposed, but still it was vacant.

  The door was open and hanging from a single hinge, but the interior was largely as he had left it.

  “Hello?” he called out from the doorway, knowing he’d received no response.

  He waited several seconds before moving to the back room. The door was shut and Wyatt stood in front of it, his heart hammering in his chest, his mind finding it harder and harder to forget what he had seen before. He reached for the handle several times before finally grabbing it and pushing the door open.

  The bed was neatly made and the furniture in the room precisely arranged. Wyatt took a single step forward and saw that the floor had been swept and a sweet smell of perfume hung in the air. On the center of the bed was a folded piece of parchment. On the parchment was a familiar bracelet of woven string.

  Feeling his legs about the give out, Wyatt found the edge of the bed. He picked up the bracelet and examined it. A jagged stripe of yellow raced around a belt of black and indigo—a never ending bolt of lightning. It looked strange not being around Athena’s wrist, along with the dozens of other elaborate colors that always cuffed the teen’s wrists and forearms.

  So dazed by finding her bracelet left behind, Wyatt almost forgot the folded note that was there as well. He set aside the bracelet and carefully unfolded the parchment, wary of the brittle material, fearing he would lose whatever words Athena had left for him.

  Written in charcoal, Athena’s neat script filled the page.

  Dear Wyatt,

  First off, I didn’t want to write you this letter, but Maia said I should, though I’m not even sure what to say, so I guess I’ll just keep going and see what happens. I want to be mad at you, I really do, and sometimes I think I am, but then it’s something else. You scare me. Don’t you remember what Omman said about keeping your magic in balance? I know this is your world or whatever, and I don’t know anything about it, but I can tell you’ve changed. I know I’ve always given you a hard time, but that’s because we were friends. As much as you drove me crazy with all your weird talk and stuff, you were my best friend. I guess I’m sorry I didn’t show that more, but I’m telling you now. But whatever you’re doing now, whatever you did to Fae’Herot, it scares me. I thought you were a hero here, fighting for good and all that heroic shit. I thought you cared about me, and I thought you cared about helping others, saving them. But now it seems you only care about yourself. And that’s bullshit. I know you’re a magical Druid or whatever, but that doesn’t mean you have to be a selfish prick.

  Look, I don’t know where you are or if you’re even going to come back and see this letter, and part of me hopes you won’t see it. I don’t know. Anyway, D’orca says we have to leave the forest. A lot of it was destroyed in the fight with the Fae, and some scouts came back this morning saying that some Regents were coming through from Hagion. I told D’orca about how they attacked us and the Gazarians at the temple. I think it’s the same ones. Well, with Maia’s help, we convinced the Coven to go with us to Gazaria, and do what you wanted to do in the first place, before you went all scary. I know you probably don’t even care anymore, but I still think we should try and do something for the people here. I’ve seen enough fucked up things to know things aren’t right. And if fighting the Regency can fix it, then that’s what I’m going to do. I guess you were right about that.

  I’m not telling you when we’re leaving or how we’re going. Please don’t try and find us. Whatever is going on with you, I know it’s just going to fuck things up. And I just don’t want to see you like that again. Try and get yourself straight and get your head out of your ass. Please.

  Love,

  Athena

  Wyatt stared at the letter long after completing it. Then he read it again, fixating on the line near the end, please don’t try and find us. How dare she take up his quest? And tell him to just stay behind.

  Wyatt balled up the letter and threw it across the room with a growl. She wouldn’t even know the Realms if not for him. She wouldn’t have met Maia and she wouldn’t be going after the Regency. And how did she get the elves to side with her?

  “I’m the Druid. I’m the hero. Not her!”

  He spun and kicked the stool Athena had sat in while watching over Maia. It clattered off the wall and fell to the floor in pieces.

  “How dare they leave me?!” he bellowed, turning and pulling at the bed covers. They came away in a cloud of fine ash, and he tossed them behind him, snarling like a caged beast.

  Then he stopped, as if someone had yanked the rage from him as easily as he had pulled away Fae’Herot’s life. He couldn’t even remember his previous emotion as a new one slid into place as he stared at what had been hidden beneath the thin blankets.

  There, lying on the bare straw mattress, not a few inches from where he had been sitting was a bone-handled dagger. The dark metal of the blade was curved and sharpened to an edge that showed the care of its master. Wyatt staggered and fell against a wall, barely staying upright. There was no doubt who the dagger had once belonged to, and he had seen it and its matching companions spill the blood of more than one Regent, most notably when Rozen had saved his life with them, even though it had nearly cost the Draygan her own life.

  But worse than seeing the dagger placed so deliberately for him to find were the words scrawled in blood next to the blade.

  I still have her.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  WYATT STOOD ROOTED and unfeeling. His mind and heart both raced.

  I still have her.

  He stared at the words and tried to make sense of everything. Her had to be Rozen. It was her dagger that was left with the message, after all. And if it meant Rozen, then the I, and author of the message, had to be the Lord Regent.

  But how?

  Had the Lord Regent been following them since he brought Athena into the Realms? How could he? Even Wyatt couldn’t have predicted where he was to end up when he crossed with her, and it certainly ended up being a lot further than he had last encountered the Lord Regent. And to place such a note in the very spot Athena and Maia had been, in the same place Athena had left her letter, in the same place the universe seemed to know he would return.

  Wyatt’s legs lost their battle with gravity and he slumped to his knees at the bed’s side. He grabbed the dagger, running his fingers along every inch, praying that he had been wrong. Hoping that it wasn’t Rozen’s, but deep down, he knew it was. And it was more than just a blade. It was a reminder of his failure. It was a reminder of his fault in losing Rozen in the first place.

  Wyatt thought back to Athena’s words, scribbled in charcoal, and he retrieved the crumpled parchment. He smoothed it out as best he could, to read the words again. Words he had already memorized, but needed to see again.

  Athena said that Regents had come into the forest. She had thought them the same group as had descended upon the Gazarians, but were they? Wyatt glanced back to the second note he had received, and shook his head. It was the natural assumption, especially for Athena, having little contact with the Regency, but Wyatt knew a second force
must have found them. Just as it did in Ouranos.

  He shakily stood, still holding the dagger, as if it would protect him from the haunting realization that was beginning to surface.

  I still have her.

  “Rozen never escaped…” Wyatt whispered to himself, needing to hear the startling revelation aloud. “And if she never escaped, then the stories we heard about her were wrong. And if the stories were wrong, then Rozen isn’t in Gazaria. And if she’s not in Gazaria, like D’orca said, and somehow the Lord Regent is here, then…”

  He wasn’t one for cursing, but he wished Athena were beside him to give voice to what he was thinking. Wyatt couldn’t be sure if the elves had betrayed him somehow, or even Omman back in the sands, for they had each spoken of Lady Rozen. Perhaps it was propaganda spread by the Regency. But to what end? To torture him? The thought brought him back to the same conclusion, the same similarity between each thread. Wyatt.

  “This is my fault,” he said, needing once again to hear the hard truth aloud. “The Regency is going after Athena now, like it did Rozen and the others. Because of me.”

  His eyes found the blood message again and he felt his teeth grind together.

  “He’s toying with me. He thinks this is some game.”

  Wyatt tossed the bedding back into place, obscuring the taunting words. As he did, Athena’s bracelet jumped up into the air and landed at his feet. He picked it up and carefully put in on his wrist. Then he brandished Rozen’s dagger at the empty room, setting his resolve.

  “I thought it was a game, too, for a while, but not anymore. I was weaker back then, but now I’m strong. Lord Regent, wherever you are…” He was screaming now. “You’ll wish you had taken me more seriously. Because now I’m coming for you.”

  He took one last look at the empty room, listening to his own ragged breath. Athena may not want me around anymore, but I won’t let that maniac take away another person I love. I was weak before. But now I’m much more. And I won’t fail her.