by Dean Murray
"It's too late, Selene. They're here. We have to get behind the next ward or we're all dead."
I didn't understand. I tried to pull away and Kat slapped me. Everything came back to me all at once. She was right. I could feel them out there, the eight Awakened that I'd somehow managed to forget about during the last few seconds. They weren't just close, they were right on top of us.
It was amazing that I could still feel them around the pressure from the second ward, the one that had been revealed once Byron finally brought the outer ward down. Maybe that was part of why I'd had such a hard time getting my mind to work.
I turned, making my way into the tunnel under my own power, and Kat let go of me to grab Byron, who was conscious, but obviously having a hard time getting his body and mind to respond to him. He was the last person I would have expected Kat to go back into danger for, but she didn't even flinch as she darted back out of the tunnel and grabbed his arm. She pulled him into the tunnel, dragging all hundred and eighty pounds of him along behind her with an ease that was only possible because of how far up she'd amped up her strength.
She beat the sun lance that would have otherwise killed both of them, but the rock fragments that went flying as the attack hit the mountainside cut into her and Byron both.
Byron shook his head and then struggled to his feet and started leading us deeper into the tunnel as Jace conjured a soft ball of light. "Thanks for getting me out of there, Kat."
Kat sent out half a dozen sun lances, carving away thousands of pounds of rock, and then suddenly the mouth of the tunnel was collapsing with an unimaginable roar as we all sprinted deeper into the darkness so that we wouldn't be caught up in the rubble.
"I didn't have a choice. We need you alive to get us inside the next ward, or none of us are going to make it past the next hour."
Kat was right—the rock between us and the other Awakened wasn't going to save us. I could feel effects snapping into existence on the other side of the debris, hissing, angry expenditures of power that were stronger than anything I could hope to manage in my current state.
Byron led us past several corridors without responding to Kat's dig. It seemed almost like he was counting the passages, which didn't put me at ease regarding his knowledge of our surroundings.
Jace seemed to share at least a little of my concern. "What are all these passages?"
"They lead to other entrances mostly. The space between the first and second wards has several tunnels that run around the entire perimeter of Camelot. We knew once we created the outer ward that there wouldn't be any way to hide the fact that something important was sitting out here, but we wanted to make sure that we had plenty of options when it came to getting in and out of the outer ward without being seen."
Kat was all but pushing Byron on ahead of her. "How much further are we talking? Those guys back there have to be pretty close to breaking through by now and unless you're ready to hold them off all by yourself, none of us have the reserves to even make some kind of fighting retreat."
"We're almost there. Just be patient for a few more seconds."
Jace was suddenly paying a lot more attention to the tunnels we were passing. "How well disguised are all of those other doors, Byron?"
"Pretty well. They were all created so that in order to open them you have to cross the plane of the ward. They probably could have been blown open with the right combination of high explosives, but even the few that were found were never attacked directly because the other side knew there was no point. There wasn't any way to get past the ward."
Jace's knuckles went white on the hilt of his sword. "We've got to move faster than this. Somebody could already be in here with us. If the locations of some doors are common knowledge at the Unseelie Court then they could have come inside as soon as you brought the outer ward down."
We were close to the ward now—I could feel it beating on me with very nearly the same amount of pressure as I'd experienced when I'd been standing only inches away from the first ward. That was good because it meant that we should be just about to our destination.
Byron darted down a side corridor, counted his steps, and then turned and put his hand against a section of the wall with enough force that it should have shattered every bone in his hand. Instead a square of rock moved back, exposing seams in the wall that were so tiny I hadn't been able to see them even when I'd been looking right at them.
Byron grabbed Kat's hand as he turned a lever buried deep inside of the wall, well past the plane of the second ward. "I'm keying the ward to you now."
The entire section of wall that we'd been facing was sliding back out of the way now. Watching it with my time sense still turned up to three and a half times normal meant that it seemed to take forever for the doorway to open enough that a person would be able to walk through it, but I knew it was actually moving quickly for something so large.
I felt something out at the very edge of my range, and flared my signature in an attempt to extend my range. I gasped at what I found, and Bethany grabbed ahold of my ear to stop me from accidentally throwing her off of me as I stumbled into the wall.
"What is it, Selene?"
"The Awakened from behind us have split up. Two of them are still back there trying to get inside, but there's another one already in here with us. It's hard to tell for sure with all of this rock between them and us, but I think they're close."
Jace looked like he wanted to swear. "You're right. They are really close—maybe less than a hundred yards. I'm such an idiot. I should have been flaring my signature this entire time to get enough range to actually know what we were up against. Hurry, Byron! We're out of time."
At that point everything happened so fast that even my amped time sense almost wasn't able to keep up. Byron smiled in relief as the metaphysical tumblers all lined up, and then he pulled on Kat's arm, sending her into the doorway now that it was safe for her to pass through the ward.
A flicker of motion, barely visible out of the corner of one eye, brought me around just in time to see Fenrir come charging out of the darkness. The ward beckoned just inches away, but it still wasn't keyed to Jace, Bethany or me. I screamed—not that it did any good—and shoved Byron, sending him into the ward at the same time that I took off in the other direction, Jace less than a foot behind me and Bethany holding onto my hair for dear life.
As we sprinted down the hallway with Fenrir lumbering along behind us I took solace in the fact that Byron and Kat had made it to safety—hopefully they would be smart enough to stay behind the ward. Even as I thought that, part of me was rooting for them to come back out and attack Fenrir, but I knew that would be stupid.
We were in long halls that were barely wide enough for Fenrir to run through, which would have been great if not for the fact that he was something like two tons of iron-hard flesh that was the next best thing to impossible to stop.
I no longer had enough emotional reserves to power even a peak-memory attack, and even if Jace was in better shape than I was, he wasn't going to be able to get off two such attacks before Fenrir ran him over, and I was nearly positive Fenrir couldn't be felled with a single strike.
My augmentations started flickering as I reached the point where my reserves were too depleted even to maintain the effects I already had up. As long as we were both amped up and charging in a straight line there was a good chance that we would be able to stay ahead of Fenrir, but if we had to change directions then his four points of contact with the ground would give him the advantage.
We were racing against the clock, which would have been bad enough all by itself, but we were also racing directly towards the other Awakened I'd sensed just seconds before. I was pretty sure that we were screwed no matter what, but Jace apparently wasn't willing to give up on our chances yet.
I felt a tingling surge of power and realized that he'd burned a peak memory. I wanted to yell at him not to stop, but before I could get the words out past my gasps for more air, I realized that his
footsteps had never faltered.
He'd attacked blindly, throwing a sun lance back behind him without looking back to ensure that he would be able to hit. It actually wasn't a terrible idea given just how little room there was for Fenrir to dodge, but Jace had done the unexpected and aimed his attack not at Fenrir, but at the ceiling.
I felt the rumble of crashing rock as the top of the tunnel started caving in, and I started to slow down. I was desperate for a chance to let my lungs and circulatory system catch up with the ruinous demands I'd put on them, but Jace didn't let me.
"There's no time, Selene. I probably only slowed Fenrir down slightly, and even if I stopped him completely, we still have a hostile up ahead to worry about. We need to take a turn up here soon or we'll definitely run into whoever is up there."
I nodded weakly, too out of breath to manage anything more than that, and forced my body to pick the pace back up. Within a few steps, I could hear Fenrir working himself free of the rubble that I'd been so hopeful would disembody him.
Bethany seemed to sense my concern because she turned around so that she could report on his progress.
"His back legs are trapped, but not for much longer—it doesn't look like he's broken anything."
We ran down the tunnel for several more seconds, and every spare bit of attention I had was focused on trying to figure out where exactly the other Awakened was. Jace was right—we needed a cross tunnel soon or we weren't going to have any kind of chance of avoiding another fight.
"He's free, guys, and he looks pretty pissed."
I wanted to tell Bethany to fly ahead of us and scout for a way around whoever was up there waiting for us, but I knew that would be a suicide mission. Bethany might have absorbed the equivalent of several centuries' worth of power outside of the ward today, but she was still no match for any Awakened.
The tunnel we were in abruptly opened up into a massive space, and a surge of relief flashed through me right up until the point where I saw Kyle standing off to the side of the cavern.
Chapter 16
None of us were particularly surprised at the sun lance that shot away from Kyle a split second after we exited the tunnel. I wasn't even really all that surprised by the diameter of the beam or the intensity of the golden light it emitted.
Kyle was the bearer of not one, but at least two artifacts. His necklace gave him the emotional reserves of two Awakened, and Excalibur made it so that he didn't consume memories as quickly as the rest of us.
I could have managed a similar attack if I'd been willing to burn another peak memory. Jace probably could have bettered Kyle's attack by using a peak memory, but neither of us could possibly hope to produce anything even close using only baseline memories.
I fully expected to die in that instant. I'd been living on borrowed time ever since Fenrir had attacked Kat, Ari and me the first time, thrown into one life-threatening situation after another, and it only seemed right that all of the violence was about to catch up with me. Once I realized that it was Kyle who'd been waiting to ambush us, the only thing that really surprised me was the fact that his devastating, unstoppable attack was directed not at Jace, Bethany and me, but rather at the ceiling of the tunnel we'd just left.
The ceiling came down with a thunderous crash that made Kat's earlier effort look like child's play. Initially the dust was so thick that I couldn't even see my hand two inches away from my face, but then a strong wind kicked up and before I knew it we were no longer coughing.
Kyle hadn't moved from where he'd been standing when he'd caused the cave in, which was a testament to just how convinced he was that he completely outclassed both of us. Unfortunately—right now at least—he wasn't wrong.
"You should have stayed holed up in Cold Springs. You would have been safe there."
The idea that we would be safer behind the puny, still-maturing wards at Jace and Kat's house than we would be with the Lady and the entire Seelie court was crazy. I started to shake my head, and then suddenly it all made sense.
"You were going to let us sit out the war."
"Yes. Achieving that goal got harder after Byron made it all of the way across country and ended up at your doorstep, but I still managed to convince Fenrir and the others that there was no reason to go looking for a fight with the four of you. That's no longer possible, now that you're actively helping her."
Jace shifted me around behind him, shielding me with his own body. I was touched; it was incredibly gallant and completely useless. Bethany was shifting around like she wanted to say something, but I reached up with my free hand and gently patted her legs, hoping that would keep her quiet.
"So what now, brother? You'll just kill us and take the Scepter of Storms?"
"I made myself a promise, Jace. I'm not going to kill Selene—not unless she gives me no other choice—but I've made no such promise where you are concerned."
Kyle brought his hands up as though planning on lashing out with some kind of long-distance attack, but I darted around in front of Jace, denying Kyle a target.
"Don't do that. I'm not going to let you kill him."
I could feel the anger beating at me, anger that was as familiar as my own pulse. Kyle looked at me, and for once I could tell exactly what he was thinking. He was angry, but also oddly pleased. My standing aside and letting him kill Jace would have simplified his life in dozens of ways, but he preferred me to be the proud, unbending woman he'd known for so many centuries. If I'd cowered and simpered he would have lost respect for me, and I was suddenly aware just how important that respect was.
"Step aside, Selene. He's not worth risking your life."
"No. If you try to kill him then we'll fight you—all three of us."
I could see just how little my threats worried Kyle, but before I could open my mouth and say anything else he nodded.
"Very well. I was going to let you keep the scepter—it's obvious that you don't know the first thing about using it—but instead I'll give you a choice. Jace or the artifact. You can't leave here with both."
There it was. He was giving me 'options,' but I wasn't going to let him dictate my choices like that. I had no choice but to refuse both, but even as I prepared to tell him he was going to have to kill all three of us, I wondered if I was making a mistake.
I didn't want Jace to die, but Jace's death was a single—short-term—problem. In twenty years or so he'd be back and we could pick up where we'd left off. Letting Kyle get his hands on yet another artifact, on the other hand, would affect people all over the world. The Lady had seemed confident that we couldn't win without the Scepter of Storms—otherwise she never would have agreed to place it in my custody. If I handed it over to Kyle then I was guaranteeing the destruction of anyone who even thought about trying to resist Kyle.
I would do almost anything to keep the scepter out of Kyle's hand, but it was the almost part of that statement that was the problem. If I had the chance to trade Jace's life for the scepter, then not doing so was putting his life above the lives of billions of other people. Maybe I was making the wrong decision, but that didn't change the fact that it was the only decision I could make and still be me.
"That's not a choice, Kyle. If that's your position, then I guess we're going to see how much oomph Jace and I have left."
Even as I said it, I reached inside to check my emotional reserves. It was a reflexive, pointless action. I'd just checked them a few seconds before and they'd been guttering—ready to give way at any moment. I'd checked them knowing that nothing could have changed in such a short period of time…only something had changed.
The deep, calm pool of happiness that I found waiting for me felt limitless. It took me a second to realize what I was feeling. I was happy because I was about to prove to Kyle, Jace and the rest of the world that I valued Jace more than anything or anyone else. It was irrevocable proof that I really had chosen Jace.
It was like the last seventeen years of my life had all been aimed at enabling this one moment, a
nd I suddenly realized that this was the depth of emotion that would be required to create a fairy. I'd been astonished at what I'd felt while fighting Sandra to a standstill, but that was nothing compared to this. My only regret was that I didn't have more years of experience—more raw fuel—to throw into the fight I was about to be sucked into.
Even as I had that thought, I realized that I was wrong. I had one other regret, but it was a regret that I could still do something about.
"Bethany, when the fight starts I want you to make a run for it. Don't stay around here and try to help Jace and me. You have to get away."
"No, Selene. I'm still small, but I'm bigger than I was, and much stronger than you would expect for my size. I can help!"
"The best thing you can do to help us would be to hide away somewhere safe for the next seventeen years. Once Jace and I are old enough to be identified you can bring us together and tell both of us that I picked Jace again, that I'll always pick Jace."
I'd only thought that the anger coming off of Kyle had been intense. It was nothing compared to what I was seeing in his eyes now, but that was okay. Giving Bethany that order had been the last missing piece. The pond of happiness, deeper than anything I'd ever encountered before, was now an ocean.
I couldn't survive this fight, but I could make sure that Kyle didn't get away. He was angry, but his anger couldn't possibly be as strong as my happiness—if it had been, he wouldn't have been able to stop himself from lunging forward and snapping my neck.
Kyle's necklace made his emotions twice as strong as mine under normal circumstances, but this was anything but normal. I instinctively knew that I could power effects that would erase years of my life in an instant. Kyle had more years of experience to throw into the fight, but that just meant that I was going to have to kill him in the first second or two of the conflict.
As he and I locked gazes, I realized that the pain in my face was coming from the huge smile that refused to leave me. Kyle looked at my expression and I realized that he knew just how strong my emotions were in that instant. He looked into my eyes, and he saw his death—both of our deaths—and he was the one to flinch first.
