by LJ Rivers
“So, nine more. Is there a way to signal them? We could use the extra blades for when Auberon’s men return.”
“We already did, Highness,” the Goblin replied. “When we arrived at Halwyn’s, Taryn flew immediately out to alarm the three other posts. Hopefully, they’ll make it here before it’s too late.”
The gravity of his last sentence wasn’t lost on me. Judging by the looks on the other’s faces, they felt the same.
We were greatly outnumbered.
Rowan placed his arrow back in his quiver. “Right, no point wondering about that now. If they come, they come. We should worry more about hiding. Auberon’s soldiers could be here any minute. We’ll make for easy target practice out here in the glow from the fire. Let’s hide and wait.”
“He’s right,” Brendan agreed. “Most likely they don’t know we’re aware of their arrival.”
I swallowed. “Then I have to put him back where he was.” A force field was already on its way out of my palm, and I made it big enough to wrap around the soaked corpse of the Juniper. Using my Telekinesis, I raised the sphere with him inside and pushed it gently out over the water. “Please forgive me,” I whispered to the man who had given his life to protect Queen Morgana’s land. My land, which he might not even have known when his essence had been torn from his body. As I lowered the force field into the water and opened it to let his body slip out, I wondered if he had been a Fae or a Shifter of some kind. Or maybe a—
“Hide!” Jen hissed. “I can smell them!” She had changed back to human and was crouching naked behind the sentries’ hut. “There are bears and wolves among them.”
I looked up. “The wind is blowing towards us.”
“Which means they might not have smelled us,” she agreed. “Yet.”
Within seconds, she had donned her white wolf attire again, and was running a couple of hundred yards along the shoreline, well out of the glow from the suspiciously eager bonfire.
“Sorcerer’s flames,” I whispered to Brendan. “They wanted to keep this area lit for when they came back, in case—”
“Look out!” he shouted and threw himself at me.
I didn’t have time to push a force field underneath us, so we landed hard on the pebbled beach. I caught most of his weight on my chest, and a sharp, stinging pain suggested I might have broken a rib or two. Brendan held his arms around me and rolled the both of us over several times until we were lying behind one of the larger rocks.
“Arrows,” he said. “You OK?”
I drew a deep breath, steeling myself for the pain in my ribs, but it was just a dull throb now. “I—I think so. Nothing broken.” A dark line of blood stretched from Brendan’s temple and down his cheek. “You’re hurt, though.”
“Just a scratch.” He wiped it away and got on his knees, drawing his sword. “I think you might want to get the fireworks ready.”
I moved into a crouch and did as he said. The fire rested underneath my skin in my right hand, with a force field equally ready in my left.
“You are surrounded,” a dark, male voice bellowed. “In the name of King Auberon, I command you to surrender. Obey, and no harm will fall upon you!”
The orange dome of light was empty, save for the actual bonfire itself. Rowan crouched behind the sentries’ hut, and I thought I could just make out the Goblin’s tiny feet behind him. Kit was nowhere to be seen, and neither was Alun.
“Princess Ruby!” The voice filled the night air, amplified by some contraption or magic. “I am Creed of Nidra, Commander of the Eastern Force of Mynydd Dewin. It is my duty to bring you alive before the king. Step forward, and I will spare the lives of your companions.”
“He’s lying,” Brendan whispered.
“I know.” I stood, holding a force field in front of me, in case the archer wanted another go. “I’ll make him eat his words.”
Brendan reached for me, but I was already in front of the rock. “Ru! Don’t!”
“Stay hidden,” I said out of the corner of my mouth. “Trust me.”
I took a few more steps until I stood alone in the open. “Here I am, Creed of Nidra.” I tried to make my voice sound as regal as possible. “Your turn. Step forward, and speak to me in person, like a true commander would.”
“Your archer will pierce my heart if I do,” he responded. A fair assumption.
“He will not. Rowan! Lower your bow.” I didn’t turn in his direction, as if they didn’t already know exactly where he was hiding. “You can’t expect me to surrender without bargaining, Commander. Come into the light and I’ll give you my terms.”
Nothing happened for five seconds. Ten. In my head, I reached seventeen before he appeared. He wasn’t alone, which didn’t surprise me. The soldier moved with a slow gait, towering over the two archers that moved sideways in front of him, both with arrows nocked. One of them aimed straight at me, while the other pointed his in Rowan’s direction.
“That’s close enough,” I said. “Unless you wish to experience what a burnt archer smells like, you will have him point his arrow somewhere else.”
“Eagan,” the seven-foot man said.
The archer inclined his head at his commander. “But sire, you know she will not—”
“Now!”
Eagan rolled his eyes and adjusted his aim ever so slightly to my right. I inhaled sharply, knowing he would hit Brendan if he let loose.
“How can I trust you to keep your word, Nidrian?”
“A fair point, Princess. I don’t have an answer other than that you don’t have any other choice. One word from me, and before Eagan’s arrow runs through your soldier’s heart and lands in the sea, they will all be dead. Gone to see the Light, isn’t that what the Avalonians say?”
“Rowan? Did you hear the Commander’s words?”
“I did, My Queen.”
“On my order, lay down your weapon.”
“My Queen?”
“You heard me, soldier.” I prayed he would understand.
“As you command.”
A twisted smile disturbed Commander Creed’s face. “Don’t wet your garments, soldier.”
Eagan and the other archer chuckled, and there were scattered laughs from the darkness behind the trio.
Inside me, I ordered my magic to action. I had tried this a few times before, on a smaller scale, and could only hope it would work. If not, we might not survive the next few seconds.
I took a deep breath and sighed. “Then I guess I have no choice,” I said with a resigned voice. “Lights out!”
I yanked hard on my fire magic, and the flames of the bonfire rushed across the beach and into my body. I had steeled myself for whatever impact would come, but they found their place inside my core as gently as leaves falling to the ground. The darkness wasn’t total, but it would buy us precious time before our enemies’ eyes adapted to the change.
“What in th—?” was all the Commander managed before his vocal cords, along with a considerable chunk of his throat, were ripped out by one of Rowan’s arrows.
Eagan released his arrow, but it vaporised when one of my fireballs struck it before it had even cleared the string. I threw one more right at his heart, intending to give him the same treatment. The fireball flew straight into the darkness behind where he had stood.
“Another Dodger,” Brendan muttered as he stepped up next to me. “I hate those.”
“And rightly so, Avalonian.”
A swooshing sound accompanied the voice behind us. Brendan spun around, blocking the Dodger’s sword with his own. I loaded another fireball, but before I could throw it, a growling beast slammed into the force field I had held in front of me. I staggered backwards, staring into a pair of giant skewed eyes. A tiger?
No, it was black, but otherwise had all the features of the majestic feline. It bit into the surface of my force field, which I expanded to enclose me. From the corner of my eye, I could see Brendan parry more blows from Eagan’s sword as the Dodger kept vanishing and reappearing arou
nd my boyfriend.
I pushed my force field outward, and the … jaguar? … fell back on all fours. It didn’t hesitate, but jumped straight at me again, as if the Changeling inside it thought he could wear my shield down somehow.
Could it?
I had never pushed the limits of my force fields before. Maybe these guys knew something I didn’t.
Behind the feline, more enemies appeared on the ridge over the beach. There were, as Jen had said, a few animals among them. One of them, a black bear, toppled over as one of my brother’s arrows struck its shoulder. The bear rolled back on its feet, roaring in pain and anger, and changed direction. Another arrow entered its body, but it kept its momentum. I lost sight of it as it bounded behind the gigantic cat that was still biting and clawing at my force field.
I could have killed it with a fireball, but something held me back. An instinctive feeling I couldn’t put my finger on, but which nonetheless told me that as long as I could keep it at bay, I didn’t have to kill it.
Brendan was still busy trying not to get skewered, and I couldn’t risk throwing a fireball at the Dodger for fear of striking Brendan instead. Eagan slashed at Brendan, who again parried the blow. When he tried a thrusting move—one I had seen him score many winning points in training bouts back home—the Dodger vanished again. Brendan stood with his right leg bent and the other stretched out behind him, pointing his blade where Eagan’s torso had been. He jumped back up, turning to face the Dodger behind him, but there was no one there. Instead of appearing behind Brendan, or at least on one of his sides, as Eagan had done so far, he reappeared right where he had been. The Dodger swung his sword, leaving a deep gash across Brendan’s chest.
“No!” I screamed as Brendan dropped to his knees. He turned halfway to meet my gaze, his eyes blank.
And fell face first onto the rocks.
Chapter Nine
Everything stopped.
It was as if I was inside a time bubble, like the ones Blackie had placed me in when we fought back in London. I watched Brendan fall in slow motion, his face twisted in a muted scream. Behind him, Eagan the Dodger raised his sword again, turning the blade downwards, ready to impale it in my boyfriend’s neck. Brendan’s face slammed into the rocks. A spray of blood painted the dark pebbles surrounding him in crimson, and his eyes stared into the void.
Everything hadn’t stopped after all, and my brain registered Eagan’s feral grin as he planted his feet on either side of Brendan.
I raised my hands, aiming my telekinesis power at the Dodger’s sword, but in my desperation to save Brendan, I forgot about the force field. A loud roar sent spikes of dread down my spine when the jaguar ripped through my defence and tackled me sideways before I could stop Eagan from executing Brendan.
I fell hard on my right shoulder and felt something warm splash onto my face. I turned and looked directly into the jaguar’s eyes, inches away from mine. I tried to twist away, but the pain of a thousand knives paralysed me. The jaguar had me locked in its jaws. It shook its head and threw me sideways as if I were a ragdoll. My eyes couldn’t focus; the beast’s face faded into a dark red blur. Something warm and sticky was trickling down my cheek.
The jaguar lifted its head, releasing its death grip on my shoulder for a brief moment. Its right fang, all of three inches long, was covered in my blood.
And the giant black cat prepared to sink its teeth in me once more.
I closed my eyes and called upon my force field again. It surged through my veins like a storm, exploding out of my body. The jaguar flew up and back as the translucent dome expanded around me. I tried to get up, biting down another scream of pain as my shoulder protested wildly at any movement. When I finally managed to get into a sitting position, my eyes searched frantically for Brendan.
The Dodger kneeled over his body, still clasping the hilt of his sword with both hands. The blade pointed at Brendan’s neck, but had stopped a hair’s breadth short of penetrating his skin.
Or a force field’s width.
Behind the dodger, a lanky figure stood, holding his arms out.
Llewellyn!
My grandfather brought his hands closer together, and the force field trapping the Dodger obeyed his command. Eagan’s expression was no longer one of victory, as fear and despair spread from his mouth to his eyes. The force field tightened like cling film around him and forced his arms so close to his chest his sword started pressing on his stomach.
It was the lack of air that finally killed Eagan the Dodger. With two panicky jerks, his body stopped moving. My grandfather retracted the tight-fitting force field, and the lifeless Dodger fell backwards.
“Brendan!” I reached for him as I tried to get back on my feet, but again, the numbing pain from the wound in my shoulder stopped me.
“Stay there, Ruby,” my grandfather said. He dropped to his knees next to Brendan and placed his hands on the blood-soaked Juniper cloak, under which my boyfriend was dying.
Or was already dead.
For what seemed like an eternity, the colours danced from Llewellyn’s hands and into Brendan’s body, but there was no reaction.
I had lost Brendan, too.
Was there no end to the price I had to pay for opening the portal? How was a twenty-year-old girl from Chester expected to take all these blows and still be able to rise and fight?
I surrendered to the pain.
With Brendan joining the seemingly endless list of lost loved ones, I closed my eyes and curled up on the cold, damp rocks. In the distance, I heard a clamour coming from the beach, not knowing who of my friends were left standing.
Or for how long.
I had lost. We had lost. The question was no longer whether my father’s army would outnumber mine. His soldiers had already proven the fact. Even the pain in my shoulder vanished as I gave in to resignation. It was as if I was floating atop the rocky surface, my body heating up. Was I dying?
I’m sorry! I wasn’t strong enough, after all.
“Get up, Ru,” Brendan’s voice seemed to whisper in the distance. “Get up.”
I opened my eyes, and there he was. Those stunning blue eyes that had caught my attention way back in September of last year, looked into mine. His voice sounded ethereal, as if he were talking to me from Nimue’s side of death. There was a glow around him, shining through his hair and beard, creating an orange halo. Was he in The Light? And who was that silhouette hunched next to him, with the orange and yellow rays flowing from their hands? The silhouette rose, and a flash of light passed across its face. Llewellyn?
“Get up,” Brendan barked again, tugging at my arm.
I steeled myself for the inevitable pain, but none came. “Brendan? What’s happening?”
He shook me. “For feck’s sake, Ruby! We have to keep fighting. It’s not over yet.”
As Brendan picked me up, I shook myself and glanced behind him. Rowan had dropped his bow and was using his sword to fight a familiar jaguar. Next to them, a white wolf was ripping the head off another one of Auberon’s soldiers. Jen tossed the head aside and sprung at the giant cat attacking my brother.
“Right,” I said, shaking myself back to reality. “Let’s go.” My heart was still racing, the remains of the shock of losing Brendan still reverberating inside me.
We ran side by side towards a trio of black-clad soldiers, two of which carried spears with blue sparks at the end. The third was loading fireballs into his palms.
“I’ll take those,” I said, commanding both his orbs into my hands. I kept them for less than the blink of an eye, before sending them back. The Sorcerer held his hands up as if to catch them, but he wasn’t my target. Just before the fireballs struck his outstretched palms, I ordered them to change directions. They obeyed, plunging into the chests of the spear-carrying soldiers. Both dropped to the ground as sparks and flames erupted from their scorched bodies.
The Sorcerer stepped over one of them and smiled at me. “So, you’re Auberon’s daughter. It will be an honour
to bring you before him, Princess.” He dipped his hands into the pockets on each side of his foot-long robe, which carried a flaming staff symbol on its chest. My father’s sigil. When the Sorcerer’s hands reappeared, they had thick gloves on. A mydredd snake twisted and turned in each.
“If you know who I am,” I began, “surely you know those can no longer hurt me?”
A shadow of doubt swept over his face. “That’s impossible.”
“Not for the combined blood of Morgana and Merlin,” I lied. I figured I could buy more time. He had yet to spot what I had seen in the air behind him. I held my arms out, as if I were already handcuffed by the mydredds. “Go ahead, try for yourself.”
He shook his head. “B—but—it cannot be.”
When he noticed what was coming, it was too late. The eagle alighted behind him, changing into my newly appointed Master of War. The Sorcerer managed half a turn before Taryn grabbed his head and snapped his neck with a sickening crack.
“I’m very pleased to see you, Master Taryn,” I said.
“And I you, My Queen. I feared we would not make it in time.”
“We?”
He stepped aside, his naked body glistening in the shine from the bonfire. Three Juniper-clad soldiers sprinted out of the darkness. One of them tossed a bundle at Taryn, who quickly unwrapped it and put on his Crimson uniform.
There was no time for introductions. The soldiers ran past me and straight into the ongoing fight.
We might stand a chance, after all.
One of Auberon’s men had spotted Goff hiding behind the sentries’ hut, and was gaining on him, spear raised. As he approached the horrified Goblin, something jumped from the roof of the hut and onto the soldier’s back.
Kit hissed and growled, tearing with extended claws at the soldier. The man screamed and shook, sending Kit head-first into the hut. But my Faeguard wasn’t done. He leapt straight back, this time clutching onto the man’s chest. Kit slashed his paws at the soldier’s face, scratching deeply into his skin. And into the soldier’s eyes.
The soldier screamed and dropped his spear, throwing his hands to his face. “My eyes!”
