Bloodline (Cradle Book 9)

by Will Wight

  She broke them all with a sweep of her sword, but they did push her back. Even Lindon felt like he had crashed into a soft cushion for a moment.

  It was the clearest indication of how much advancement they’d lost. He should have waded through those techniques as though through still water.

  In that second of distraction, the goldsteel chain finished wrapping around. The script-circle completed.

  Instantly, bands wrapped around Lindon’s spirit. It was nothing to him, only mildly unpleasant, but he recognized the feeling of the same script that had bound him at the entrance to the Wei clan.

  He shot out to steady Yerin, who was having trouble even breathing and staying upright. Sweat began to bead on her forehead already, and her Goldsigns hung heavy.

  Blackflame kindled in Lindon’s outstretched hand. “Stop!” he demanded.

  If he released, he was going to kill someone.

  He turned to Heaven’s Glory. “Help us!”

  The Grand Elder folded her hands in front of her, staring blithely over his head. Lindon turned back to the Wei clan, and the Patriarch met his eyes with cold disdain. “Stage three!”

  Fizzing bottles flew through the air and landed beside them. Some were refiner’s work, elixirs that dispersed to gas immediately, but others were venom Ruler techniques. The air filled up with half a dozen types of poisonous gas.

  Yerin flashed into white light. The Moonlight Bridge.

  She reappeared two feet away, staggering and coughing.

  She couldn’t cross the goldsteel script.

  The poison seeped into Lindon’s lungs and crumbled before the might of his Bloodforged Iron body. His breathing would be more troubled by sitting too close to a campfire.

  Dragon’s breath blasted the goldsteel chain.

  It grew red-hot, but that was all. The substance was naturally resistant to all kinds of madra, and the script weakened his techniques even further.

  So he had to try something else.

  But Yerin was coughing, and his solution would take a moment. With brief flicker of his madra, he opened an unsteady rift onto a luxurious house.

  He had found this device in Sophara’s void key, but he hadn’t had a chance to test it yet. Normal void keys wouldn’t close with a living being inside, but this was a home. It obeyed different rules. He hadn’t wanted to rely on this until he tested it more thoroughly, but it was the quickest way he knew of to shelter Yerin if she couldn’t leave.

  Yerin stumbled through the gate, gasping in grateful lungfuls of air.

  With a breath of relief, Lindon let the entrance close. Now he could gather his focus for a working. His authority as the Void Sage should be able to break—

  The space spat Yerin back out.

  She tumbled to the ground out of nowhere, and Lindon simply stared at her for a moment in disbelief. Why hadn’t it worked?

  He sensed a sort of instability from the space, as though it were barely holding together. It must have ejected her as a security measure.

  But when he realized she was hacking and coughing with tears in her eyes, he grabbed her and pulled her to the edge of the circle, where the air was clearest.

  He still wanted to try his Sage powers against the script, but they were untested. The sooner he got Yerin out of this, the better, so he leaned on the abilities he knew.

  It felt like there was an invisible wall over the script, and Lindon ran his white hand down until he rested fingers on the goldsteel. He activated the binding in his arm, Consuming madra from the script.

  [Behind!]

  Lindon turned and slapped three halfsilver-tipped arrows from the air.

  A cloud of venom madra exploded at his feet, and Yerin shouted a warning.

  The Wei Patriarch shouted again, and more arrows flew through the smoke. Lindon swatted them aside, but he felt so sluggish with his power restricted.

  He missed one…and it stuck in his shoulder. The halfsilver penetrated only shallowly, but it disrupted his madra, stinging his body and spirit.

  Through tear-stained eyes, Yerin saw him pull the halfsilver arrow from his arm.

  She raised her sword. A distant bell rang, and was echoed by all the blades nearby. Sword aura erupted, tearing clothes and skin. It was enhanced by blood aura, so the cuts that bit flesh were deeper.

  But the script had weakened her too much. One of the archers staggered back, but the others steadied bleeding hands and took aim.

  At her, this time.

  The world slowed and seemed to freeze.

  Don’t stop me, Dross, Lindon thought, and the world returned to normal speed as the spirit released his grip.

  Just as Lindon released his own.

  Dragon’s breath obliterated one of the men standing over the goldsteel chain. The Striker technique burned arrows from the air, leaving sparkling bright arrowheads falling to the dirt.

  With space cleared, Lindon fell down again, starting the Consume technique once more.

  It was difficult to touch the chain directly, but that resistance was quickly overcome. Madra flooded into his white arm, most of it vented, but he cycled the Heart of Twin Stars and sorted it into its components.

  There were a few different Paths used to fuel this barrier, but he kept only the madra from one of them. The most familiar.

  Dross, Lindon thought.

  [I’m not giving you a combat solution against a bunch of Irons.]

  Break down the Path of the White Fox.

  [Oh, that’s easy. Done.]

  More arrows and techniques poured in until the air was thick, but even unsteady on her feet and blind through tears, Yerin hacked them away herself. He was certain that the only thing keeping her from throwing herself at the enemy was his presence.

  Finally, the script failed.

  He pulled her in front of him, shielding her with his body, and whispered, “Head to the ships.”

  “Bury ‘em,” Yerin choked out.

  In a flash of white, she vanished.

  Leaving Lindon surrounded by enemies.

  Lindon folded back into the poisonous smoke as techniques and arrows flew. When he was hidden, he Forged a disguise next to himself. It felt like molding a rough mannequin, but dream and light madra—guided by tweaks from Dross and Lindon’s own instincts—filled in the details.

  A perfect copy of Lindon stood next to him.

  [They craft every detail themselves, so they can’t get anything wrong. It’s a lot better to stay loose.]

  This was the Fox Mirror.

  Lindon grabbed the aura around him with his White Fox madra, shaping it into a distraction. This time, he didn’t have to fill in any of the details at all, other than ordering the illusion to make people look away from him. Their minds would fill in the details themselves.

  He left the smoke, the Fox Dream hanging around him. The Irons who rushed in close, carrying weapons, were affected by the Dream and screamed or stared off in the distance or simply ignored him.

  He walked through the crowd. This modification had been his own; he hadn’t needed Dross’ help with this one. He had worked enough with dream and light aura, and his own experience with shaping aura showed him that he could hold the Fox Dream as a continuous Ruler technique rather than a one-use ability that he simply cast on someone.

  If anything, he was mimicking the same boundary field that the Wei clan had put up around him only a minute before.

  The Patriarch and the Elder surrounding him were too far to be fooled by the Fox Dream, so they shouted orders.

  Following their instructions, a steel-haired Jade with a pair of blades and a shield badge closed the distance with Lindon. One of the Elders, maybe the Seventh. Lindon didn’t care.

  A sword flashed at Lindon, but his real weapon went lower. This was the Foxtail, an Enforcer attack technique that bent light and perception to hide movement.

  In a fight between equals, it was a huge advantage. Lindon had once been proud of the way other clans avoided duels with Wei Enforcers. />
  Lindon slid past the real strike, letting the illusion pass through him, and seized the man by the neck.

  He Consumed enough White Fox madra to replenish the amount that already moved through his veins; he couldn’t hold much without taking it into his core.

  The man’s madra was weak, diffuse, dirty, and he was using it wrong.

  A wave of attacks had pierced the decoy Lindon behind him, and his Forged madra dissipated, but Heaven’s Glory had gotten in on the action now. A wall of golden glass madra was Forged in front of him.

  He conjured purple flickering Foxfire, and the Striker technique burned a doorway-shaped hole in the wall. They used their Striker technique only to inflict the illusion of pain, but it was a spiritual attack. It could fight against other spiritual energies, just like pure madra could.

  Two Iron Enforcers waited for him on the other side, using the Foxtail, but he used the technique on his whole body at once.

  His image lagged behind, and their real spears clashed in the middle of his afterimage. Lindon had never stopped walking up the hill where the elders stood.

  Foxfire brought them both down.

  He Forged a paper-thin illusion behind him according to the Fox Mirror. It was literally a huge blank wall. An Iron stumbled through it almost immediately, tearing the illusion apart.

  But it did its job. It just needed to interrupt the view of the people behind him.

  A pair of Akura Golds soared in on clouds, demanding to know what was happening, striking down a few who dared to launch techniques at them. They could handle themselves.

  Lindon advanced on the two men who hadn’t run.

  The Patriarch and the First Elder.

  The elder looked regretful, sighing into his long white beard. The Patriarch remained stone-faced.

  “Why?” Lindon asked.

  “You may have learned powerful sacred arts,” the Patriarch said, “but you haven’t learned how the world works. You do not have absolute power. You tire. You will run out of madra. You cannot take the Wei clan from us so easily.”

  In disbelief, Lindon turned to the First Elder. Was that really what they thought he was doing?

  The First Elder regarded him with sad eyes. “Revenge does not become you, Lindon. If you had come to us with this talent, we would have welcomed you with open arms. But this…scheme…” He shook his head. “You never learned the real lessons you needed to.”

  “You…” Lindon didn’t even know what to say. “…have you lied for so long that you are blind to the truth?”

  The First Elder shook his sleeves out. “You may have great power, but we have honed our techniques over many years. You have never seen the true Path of the White Fox.”

  The aura in Lindon’s mind was pinched with a deft touch. The First Elder was smoother, subtler, more skilled than anyone else Lindon had seen use the Fox Dream.

  [He wants to distort our eyes so we see him to the right of where he actually is,] Dross reported. [Too bad his technique is…hm. Is it bad that I want to say “his technique is dross”?]

  The Fox Dream technique itself was flawed. From the pathways the madra took through the First Elder’s spirit to the way he moved the aura, every step was clunky and inefficient. He had developed great skill with the technique, but the tool itself was lacking.

  He was a self-taught swordsman who didn’t realize he was using a stick. No matter how skilled he became, he would never be as dangerous as someone with a real weapon.

  At the same time, the First Elder Forged the image of a sword. He drew a three-foot blade from a sheath at his side, but the Forged image was a few inches shorter.

  Between the Ruler technique and the Forger technique, anyone relying solely on their senses would be skewered before they realized what happened.

  The elder twisted his sword through the air, lunging at Lindon in a practiced motion.

  Lindon stepped to one side, seizing the First Elder’s arm in his white hand.

  “No,” he said, “this is the Path of the White Fox. Pay attention.”

  Madra leaked into Lindon, refilling his channels again. The elder broke his grip, and Lindon allowed it.

  He left an image of himself standing still while he ran invisibly toward the First Elder and cast the Fox Dream over the man’s mind. The older man broke the Ruler technique, but Lindon had already caught him in the chest and shoved him back.

  “One,” Lindon said.

  He threw a punch, and the Elder twisted to one side to avoid it, but Lindon had concealed his movements with the Foxtail technique. His real punch clipped the Elder on the chin.

  Lindon held back so he didn’t shatter the man’s jaw. The Elder only missed a step.

  “Two.”

  A sword came flashing in, but Lindon hurled a purple fireball and allowed the sword to land.

  It stabbed into his shoulder…and stuck. With such little strength behind it, the blade couldn’t penetrate his Underlord body any deeper than the skin.

  The Elder dispersed the first ball of Foxfire, and the second, but then Lindon used the rest of his White Fox madra. A barrage of Striker techniques struck the Elder all over, sending him falling to his knees in a cry of pain.

  The ground rumbled. Earth aura flashed.

  “Three,” Lindon announced. “I killed you three times.”

  With that, he returned his attention to the Patriarch. Wei Jin Sairus scowled at him. “You disrespect your elders, Shi Lindon.”

  His image stayed standing where it was. A Fox Mirror. But really, he crept invisibly to Lindon’s other side, a dagger clutched in his hand.

  Lindon had seen him use this technique in the same way before, but not so clearly. The Patriarch had done this against Li Markuth, the winged terror that Suriel had banished. Markuth had not been fooled either.

  Lindon dipped his head to the Mirror. “Patriarch.”

  The Forger technique returned the gesture. Sairus really was skilled. “Unsouled,” his illusion said.

  Lindon turned his head to meet the eyes of the “invisible” Patriarch. “Not anymore.”

  As Sairus tried to plunge the dagger into Lindon’s side, Lindon ducked and drove his palm into the Patriarch’s core.

  Pure madra flashed blue-white in a massive handprint that covered Sairus’ entire midsection. The Empty Palm wiped out his madra, flooding his system…and the power of Lindon’s spirit overwhelmed his.

  Channels broke, his core cracked, and he convulsed with the pain in his soul. He made a choking sound and his eyes rolled up into his skull.

  Without a word, the Patriarch fell to the ground as a spiritual cripple.

  The First Elder straightened himself up in a display of dignity. “You will still not have your way. We will resist you to the death.”

  Lindon felt like his bones had turned to lead. The Heaven’s Glory School had surrounded the hill. They were putting down more scripts. They still wouldn’t listen. They wouldn’t listen to reason, and they wouldn’t listen to force.

  He had accomplished nothing.

  The ground was shaking constantly now, and he finally realized that the power of the earth aura had not subsided. Instead of ebbing and flowing, as it had been doing for days, it had grown and grown without cease.

  He felt what was about to happen and looked up to the sky. Suriel had shown him how to prevent this from happening, but he had to wonder if she had foreseen this. Was this why she hadn’t saved Sacred Valley herself? Because it was futile?

  Why had she even saved Lindon?

  One of the Akura clan shouted down to Lindon. “Honored Sage, we must leave! The Titan!”

  Lindon nodded. Only a few more days, and they would have been able to evacuate everyone.

  But what did it matter? These people didn’t want help.

  He seized the First Elder by the scruff of the neck, hauling him up bodily with one hand. He spun the old man around facing west and shook him.

  “Look at the aura!” Lindon demanded. “Look at it!�
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  Around Mount Venture, the squat red-tinged peak to the west, the earth aura was growing brighter and brighter as the ground shook. So much that it began to bleed into visibility.

  The elder squirmed in his grip. “How are you doing this? What are you showing me?”

  Lindon shoved him forward, and the elder caught himself only a few steps away. He turned, but Lindon pointed a finger west.

  “Walk. Take that with you.” Lindon nudged the Patriarch with the tip of his toe. “You don’t want me to save you? Maybe he will.”

  To the west, the Wandering Titan’s power waxed like a rising sun. The Dreadgod was slow, making its way ponderously through the mountains, and its head wasn’t visible yet.

  But as the First Elder cast a nervous glance in that direction, the sky turned gold.

  He opened his mouth, and Lindon didn’t care to hear what he had to say. A thin bar of Blackflame scorched a line in the ground in front of the man’s feet.

  “I said walk.”

  Lindon’s vision swayed as the willpower flooded out of him. He had stretched himself too far with that working, and he wasn’t even sure it would do what he wanted.

  But, dragging the Patriarch behind him, the First Elder began to walk.

  12

  Mercy was in the middle of negotiations when the sky changed color.

  One moment, she was demanding to see the Matriarch of the Li clan again. The clan’s Fourth Elder, manning the wall, repeatedly apologized and promised that the Matriarch would surely be on her way back soon. But they had been promising that for almost two days now.

  When the sky turned gold, Mercy first felt panic. They were out of time. Even the smooth wooden walls of the Li clan shook with the quake that passed through Sacred Valley. Some of the guards lost their footing.

  After the panic came relief. Now, surely, the Li clan would listen to her.

  From her side, the Truegold Kashi fell to one knee to get her attention. “Please forgive me, Lady Mercy, but we must leave you now. Sage Charity’s orders.”

  Some of the other Golds from the Akura clan had taken to their clouds, though none had left yet. They wouldn’t want to flee without permission from a member of the head family.