Jorgen seems weak, and he keeps mumbling like he has no idea what’s happening around him, calling me Lorena more than a few times while we’re carrying him out. The tigers are snoring loudly, but fear slows me down, and uneasiness fills my gut. Aria keeps watching us, still singing until we climb back towards the terrace.
At the top of the stairs, Edvard nearly falls down while Jorgen pushes him, then starts screaming in agony, arching his back and tangling his air. I don't know what to do, trying to calm him down, but he nearly hits me too. It must be the aftermath of some sort of spell. Panic jolts through me, we’re so close, and Jorgen won't be able to get out of here if he doesn’t calm down and come to his senses.
"Sorry mate, but you're out of control and this is necessary," my uncle says and then swings his arm, punching the duke directly between his eyes. Jorgen slams down on the floor, unconscious, and I feel numb, knowing that I should’ve hit him sooner. The wizard must have poisoned him and I need to figure out an antidote for whatever’s going to happen to him once he wakes up.
On top of that, we still need to find a way out of here. Edvard glances at me and we both realise that Aria stopped singing. Then her terrifying scream spreads over the room. Everything begins happening in slow motion as a bunch of warriors start pouring inside the terrace, led by General Ming. They seem to be using all of the available entrances, surrounding us in mere seconds. They stretch their bows, pointing their sharp arrows towards me and Edvard.
"Well, well, well, I never thought I would live to see the day when I'd catch two Wyvern shifters at once. It's a hell of a treat," says Ming that’s now standing a few meters away from me. Jorgen’s slowly coming around, mumbling incoherent words to himself, while I try not to look like I'm scared to death. Deep down, I'm terrified. We’re all trapped in this bizarre prison, surrounded by humans and hungry tigers that are fully awake now.
"Astri, forget about your fire magic, you may hurt people that you care about. I have another idea," Edvard whispers to me, and I glance at him like he has lost his mind. He can't be serious, he’s risking too many lives, trying to act brave. My knife is still in my hand and Aria’s standing by me, trembling with fear; she doesn't know what’s going to happen. Ming doesn't even notice her, and I have to make sure that it stays that way. Whatever Edvard has in mind, he has to act fast otherwise we’re not going to get out of here alive.
"You’re making a big mistake, Ming. Let us go or your people will learn that you’ve been lying to them for years about who you are. I can always sense one of us nearby," Edvard shouts, smiling with satisfaction and newly found confidence. Then I sense it; dark, twisted power starting to rise all around me, and I have no idea where it’s coming from.
Ming bares his teeth, and pales slightly. He glances at me, then at my uncle like he’s just been struck by lightning, working his jaw intensely. His next sentence causes the blood in my veins to run cold.
"Kill them with your poisonous arrows, warriors. This is what they get for barging inside our temple. "
Chapter Thirteen
It's all magic.
Edvard curses loudly and fear slams into me, coiling tightly inside like an invisible knot. Seconds later, everything starts happening again in slow motion. The warriors release their arrows; I see at least dozen of them flying toward me and I start to realise that I might not get out of here alive.
Ming laughs, but then he must notice the violent energy drifting around and I catch a flash of panic in his eyes. Aria screams and Edvard grabs her, then they both get over the railing. My muscles are locking up in panic and pain. I don't understand what’s happening. Edvard can't jump, otherwise he’ll break his neck or the tigers will tear him apart. Either way, it’s suicide.
Time begins to drag and everything is slowing down around me–the arrows never reach me. Warmth flares and the smell of burning metal wafts through the air.
"Astri, if we get lost in the portal meet us outside your beloved city. The sun must disappear behind the horizon six times after tonight," Edvard shouts, then waves his hand, releasing a stream of golden sparks from his fingertips. He must have found a way to suspend all the arrows, because a second later they turn into ash, blown away by a strong wind.
I open my mouth to ask him what he’s doing, but I can't speak. My eyes are rolling into the back of my head and the same dark energy that I sensed earlier raises every small hair on my body. More vicious power cracks down my arms, fusing into my bones, at the same time heating up my bloodstream. Allowing a rush of energy to swell through me once more, I finally embrace it. It's the same spell that the Warlock witch used in the old mill when she created a magical portal to escape from Pollock and his men. Then right in front of my eyes, Edvard creates a magical passage. It's suspended directly above the vicious tigers.
The masses of bright, green light blind me for a split second, forcing me to shut my eyes. The heat becomes unbearable, and even in my pain-clouded mind and confusion, I know that Edvard’s helping us to escape.
Once I open my eyes and spot Ming, he seems to be completely paralysed by the stream of lights exploding in the room, but then he manages to snap out of it. Rage and fury envelopes his features, and he starts barking at his people to take me down.
"Edvard, what’s going on?" I ask, looking at my uncle who’s holding the spell.
"Just follow me, it's the only way, Astri. Remember what I said earlier," he finally says, and a second later they both jump over the balustrade, vanishing into the magical portal. Static electricity starts connecting with my fire magic, and my hands are shaking. The humans are too scared to make a move, even with Ming screaming at them to use their swords. A mass of bright red and purple light keeps exploding all around us. The strong wind nearly knocks me off my feet, and Jorgen finally wakes up from his wizard-induced sleep.
I don't know what to do, hesitating for a second, knowing that Ming’s going to kill me if I don’t jump. The Warlock witch vanished too, but no one else was able to go through it afterwards. This has to be different somehow.
Then I see Ming as he grabs a sword from one of the warriors, and he’s heading towards me. He’s going to kill me; I'm not ready to die just yet. I push Jorgen off the balustrade, then I jump right after him too, getting lost in the masses of light just as Ming swings his sword, cutting my arm. Then the portal sucks me in and everything goes dark. I keep falling, knowing that I’m either going to die, get mutilated in this wormhole or pulled through this gateway. Any of these options are fine, as long as I can get away from Ming and his dogs… Well, except for dying. I’d rather not.
I wake up sometime later, hearing someone's heavy breathing only to realise it's my own. Every muscle in my body is numb and stiff. I'm surprised that I haven't broken any bones when I slammed on the ground, falling through the portal. The only thing that matters is that I'm alive and I managed to get Jorgen out as well.
Silence descends all around me, and I hear someone moving. Slowly, I open my eyes feeling relieved that we’re no longer inside that damn temple, but somewhere in a forest, lying in a thick mass of underbrush. Jorgen’s on the ground too, laying a few meters away from me.
Memories are slowly coming back, and when I lift myself up, I feel a stinging pain in my arm. The wound is small but deep, yet some of the blood’s already dried along the edges of the cut. Ming struck me with his sword, just before I vanished in the portal.
I wipe the dirt from my face and crawl towards the duke, hoping that he’s not going to start acting crazy again. He seems to be coming around slowly. Things got out of control in the temple, and we were nearly trapped inside. Edvard used his own magic and opened a portal to get us out of there, but we must have gotten separated.
"Jorgen, are you all right?" I ask, truly hoping that we’re still in the Asian World. Jorgen sighs loudly and then opens his blue eyes, staring at me for several seconds.
"Astri, what the hell happened?" he asks and then his face contracts with pain. He must be feeling the
effects of travelling through the portal too. "Are you all right?"
"Yep, pretty much. What's the last thing that you remember?"
"I was captured by some human warriors, and I killed two of them in self-defense when they attacked me," he explains.
"Yeah, you were taken by the people of General Ming and luckily I followed you all the way to the temple. It's quite a long story," I say, feeling relieved that he seems to be all right, and that all his bones aren't broken. The potion from the wizard must have affected him temporally as soon as he woke up in his cell.
Moments later, I go over everything that happened once I followed him to the village hidden in the mountain. Jorgen doesn't seem to grasp the fact that now I have an uncle and a cousin. I can't hide what Edvard said about his brother, so I go over his story briefly, not mentioning my uncle's mistrust towards the whole Lindworm clan. I'm not ready to believe that the duke could have anything to do with murdering all of the Wyverns. It just doesn't make any sense.
Jorgen’s silent for several minutes, probably trying to digest everything that I said. It's getting cold and we need to start figuring out where the hell we are right now.
"My brother and father still hate each other, but it’s a long and complicated story. Your uncle missed a few of the details," Jorgen says, dragging his hands through his hair. He seems uncomfortable talking about his evil twin brother, and I understand completely.
For a second, I wonder if we should look for Edvard and Aria. They could be anywhere by now, and I remember that he asked me to meet him on the outskirts of the city in exactly six days from today. It seems that he was very optimistic, because I still have no idea how we are going to locate the druid.
"I understand why you didn't want to talk about it before, but Ruscal’s always going to be connected to me, because of my scar. He went after my parents because of this absurd prophecy, and he’s not going to stop now," I say, staring up, aware that my arm’s throbbing in pain. I need to clean the wound, otherwise it might get infected. We wasted too much time in the temple, and have a job to do.” Anyway, we shouldn’t be sitting around here. The humans might be close by, and we need to find the druid."
Jorgen nods, and forces himself to stand up. Beads of sweat roll down his face. The wizard must have used a strong potion, to figure out if Jorgen was a shifter or not. His body was already weakened by the cutting of the mage ritual, so I need to keep a close eye on him.
"Are you sure you’re all right?" I ask, trying not to think about what happened in the temple. Edvard and Aria are all right. And I know we’ll see each other again.
"I’ve been better, my mind seems blank. I don't remember much after I was taken inside the temple. Someone must have knocked me out, because when I woke up in the cell, I was barely able to function," Jorgen says, and I know that a lot of things went wrong, but my own energy didn't sense any humans until it was too late. And I suspect that I landed near the mountain because of the nymphs. They must have sensed me flying above.
I look inside my rucksack, thinking that I'm very lucky that I still have it with me. I find an energy boost potion and hand it to Jorgen. I was saving for later, but Jorgen really needs more than I do it right now. He’s going to slow me down, and we need to pick up the pace.
"When my cousin was leading us to the cells, we had to hide in one of the rooms and we overheard Ming while he was talking to one of his people. Apparently, his wizard used some kind of magical potion to assess your abilities. Then later on, when you woke up, Edvard had to punch you because you were out of control, screaming and incoherent," I say and then proceed to tell him about Ming and his deal with Ruscal.
Jorgen shakes his head, looking disturbed by this new revelation.
"My brother’s going to pay for all of his crimes. My father was so close to bringing him in front of the tribunal, then everything fell apart when he became ill," Jorgen says clenching his fists. "But we can't worry about that now, we need to find the druid. Ruscal might be on his way here, but he has no idea what we’re planning. Ming made a mistake and now he’s probably panicking because we managed to escape. We bought ourselves a little time."
I already know what I'm going to do to Ruscal once I face him again. He needs to experience the same pain that I went through and I'm planning to torture him until he begs me to end his life.
Jorgen distracts me from my thoughts about his twin brother when he drinks the potion. His colour returns and he’s finally able to keep up with me. After about a mile of constant marching, we reach an unknown town. We both exhale with relief, realising that we’re still in the Asian World, but this time it’s only inhabited by shifters.
The Asian World has always been divided and we were unlucky earlier on, because we landed straight in a human populated area. I still believe that the nymphs had a lot to do with it.
"Someone here must know about the druid," I say, still feeling a little apprehensive entering this new territory. A bunch of humans were ready to slaughter us, and we still have no idea how we’re going to be received here.
Jorgen looks at me and grabs my hand, and heat start enveloping my veins. My body hasn’t forgotten about the heat season and new waves of desire start tormenting me once again. It's almost dawn now, which means that we must have been unconscious for a few hours, straight after we crossed through the portal.
"Astri, you're amazing, and I don't know what I would have done without you. You risked your life to get me out of Ming's hands. I owe you a lot."
I smile weakly, aware that my heart’s pounding loudly in my chest, and my body temperature’s soaring at an alarming rate. The sudden arousal is making me weak and I'm going to lose my head if Jorgen doesn’t stop paying me compliments.
"I couldn't leave you out there, we’re in this together," I say, meeting his azure blue eyes that are filled with flaming desire. I can almost taste the lust on my tongue–this is madness.
"I know, that’s why I’ve fallen for you," he whispers. "We should head to town, and find a tavern. We need to rest before we start asking about the druid. We’re both exhausted."
I nod, thinking about a hot shower and warm food on the table. My stomach’s growling and I keep moving, only now realising that we haven't eaten since yesterday. We don't want to get into any more trouble today.
"Before we vanished inside the portal, Edvard gave me a message, and I'm sure he and Aria are going to be fine. At least they’re together now. Ruscal’s going to track us down, so we need to find the druid soon."
"It's a good plan, and I wish that I could’ve been more useful, but now without my magic, I’ve become more of a burden," he tells me, squeezing my hand harder. This guilt inside of me is never going to go away and he’s going to hate me once he learns that I didn't do anything to protect him from Bratlav. I need to stop thinking about it and work on a solution and deal with the consequences as they come.
I assure him that he doesn't have to worry about anything. Then we reach the end of the forest, entering a paved road, and passing several tall buildings. It's such a contrast to the small village on the mountain, inhabited by humans who’d adapted to the harsh climate, but this town seems to be embracing the Western culture. All the buildings look modern, and there are odd looking vehicles parked on the streets.
We cross over the main square and the large town clock shows four am; that explains why the town’s so quiet. Everyone’s mostly still asleep, but a few elders can still be seen walking around with papers in their hand. None of them pay much attention to us, and in a way, I'm relieved.
I keep looking behind me, anxious that someone might be following us, but we must be quite a distance away from the temple. Humans and shifters are still at war, so this town has to be one of many where shifters and mages live together.
Now Ruscal will figure out that Jorgen left Rivenna and he’s travelling with me. Hans was left in charge of the castle, and he knows how to protect his people.
We wander around the town for a little w
hile, finally locating an old tavern. We wait an hour before a short shifter lets us inside, complaining that he never checks anyone in at this hour.
I sigh with relief when we’re finally given our key. Everything’s perfectly fine until we get inside and I realised it's a marriage suite with only one large bed, situated in the middle of the room. For Hommis!
Chapter Fourteen
Unexpected move.
Suddenly, I have this unexplained need to look at Jorgen once the smouldering heat’s back; sparking up inside of me like a flame. My heart starts pounding loudly in my chest. We didn’t make it clear to the shifter downstairs that we needed two separate rooms. Unless Jorgen simply asked for a room without going into any other unnecessary details. The shifter simply assumed that we were married, so it was an easy mistake.
"Don't stress, Astri. We can make this work, the bed’s big enough for both of us. You go and have a shower, just relax a little," Jorgen breaks the silence first, and my insides start melting. Uneasiness starts growing between us, becoming as thick as the heat-clogged air.
I don't know what to say or how to answer him, so instead I simply nod. I shouldn't be experiencing all these emotions, especially not after what we both just went through. This isn't even fair, but my hormones don't give a flying monkey that once in a while I need to act and feel like a normal human being. Shifter hormones suck!
"And your uncle and cousin, they’re going to be fine. We’re miles away from Ming and his people. We’re right back on track, we just need to locate the druid and I don't think it’ll be difficult," he adds, placing his hand on my shoulder. Heat jolts through me and Jorgen's innocent touch is making me incredibly aroused. I'm aware that he has good intentions, but this is just not going to work. He needs to stay away from me and keep his hands to himself. I can’t take it.
Wyvern's Passion (Mage Chronicles Book 3) Page 10
