Balanced on the Blade's Edge (Dragon Blood, Book 1)

by Lindsay Buroker

  Chapter 14

  Sardelle crept down the hallway toward the front door of the prison building. She had left the young guard slumped on the floor outside her cell, snoozing in a deep slumber. It would take a cannon going off in his ear to wake him. Making him drowsy had taken time, but it had been a better alternative than giving him a rash.

  Missing Jaxi’s usual commentary on the subject, Sardelle cracked open the door to peer into the courtyard. It was surprisingly empty.

  A cannon boomed from atop the wall, and she had her answer as to why. The fort was under attack.

  Usually, she wouldn’t root for that, but it gave her the opportunity she needed. She didn’t have to throw illusions around or camouflage herself to trot unnoticed to the headquarters building. She did falter for a moment when she realized the dragon flier wasn’t perched near the creek as it had been for days. A hasty sweep of the fort revealed that Ridge wasn’t around either. The buzz of a flier’s propellers drifted on the breeze, and she spotted the craft near the mountains south of the fort, a dark shadow against the snowy peaks. At first, she couldn’t guess why he was there when the airship was floating in from the north. Then she spotted a second shadow. That shaman’s overgrown owl.

  Sardelle chomped on her lip, torn between going for her sword and trying to help Ridge from there. Seeing a soldier jogging down the stairs from the wall and turning in her direction made up her mind. He was heading toward the armory, but he would see her if she didn’t duck inside. She pushed through the door, vowing to return shortly. With Jaxi’s help, she would be able to do more damage, maybe even stop that shaman, not just his pet. She prayed Ridge could survive against the owl for a few minutes on his own.

  Sardelle jogged straight up to Ridge’s—now the general’s—office without seeing anyone. It was so easy that she paused with her hand on the knob, half suspecting a trap. No, she didn’t believe Ridge would do that to her. It was more that she worried she would open the door and find Jaxi had been moved. What if the general, knowing the soulblade’s value, had taken it with him when he ran out to command the fort defense?

  “Look first before worrying,” Sardelle grumbled, and tried to turn the knob. It was locked. Well, someone must have had her in mind.

  An explosion sounded. It hadn’t come from the cannons on the wall but from somewhere above, and she sensed the approach of dozens of people—and one shaman. He wasn’t talking to her this time. Maybe he was up to something more important. Like planning how to raze the fortress, destroy her, and take Jaxi.

  “Not happening.”

  Another boom rang out. The floor quaked beneath her feet, and for a moment, she clutched her chest, remembering the disaster in the tunnels below. Something clanked to the floor on the other side of the door. The sword case? That brought her back to the moment, filled her with urgency.

  Sardelle’s first thought had been to carefully disable the lock, but with the Cofah floating ever closer, she simply blasted the hinges off the door. Let the general scratch his head over that later.

  The office hadn’t changed much, and she spotted the out-of-place iron box on top of a bookcase right away. Several books and a filing cabinet drawer had been dumped to the floor from the quakes, but the long box remained in place. When she climbed on the desk to reach it, it reminded her of the day she had walked in on Ridge cleaning, and another twinge of worry for him ran through her. She tugged the box down, hardly caring that it was too heavy for her. She let it clank to the floor, jumped down, and tried to tug it open. Of course it was locked. She hissed in frustration at all the delays and tore off another set of hinges. The general wouldn’t know if a sorceress or a tornado had swept into his office.

  Sardelle yanked open the lid on the box.

  It’s about time.

  She sank to her knees on the floor in relief. After three hundred years of being trapped, that half hour shouldn’t have fazed you.

  It was well over an hour, thank you.

  There was a piece of paper tied around the blade. Sardelle yanked it free, opened it, and found an address. She snorted. Nax had the blade all ready to ship off to some military research facility, did he?

  Cannons boomed outside the window. Reminded that Ridge and the rest of the fort were in trouble, Sardelle stuffed the paper in her pocket, grabbed the soulblade, and raced back into the hallway. At the bottom of the stairs, she thrust open the front door and almost ran into a rain of fire.

  The air sizzled with heat—and magic. Screams of pain erupted on the ramparts.

  “Cover,” someone cried, “find cover!”

  “Stay where you are, soldier!” That was General Nax. Bastard.

  Sardelle backed into the doorway to give herself a moment to think. A shield. That was what they needed. Yes.

  Around the whole fort?

  It has to be. Sardelle took a deep breath and concentrated. She created a translucent dome, so subtle that the fiery rain continued through it at first, slowed down but not extinguished. Gradually, she added more energy until the burning pellets bounced off instead of falling through.

  Someone cheered from the wall. She doubted the soldier had any idea what was going on, other than the fact that fire wasn’t falling onto his head, but Sardelle let herself feel bolstered—appreciated—nonetheless.

  They’re going to want to shoot through your shield. In fact, they’re about to try now.

  Sardelle grimaced. Ricocheting cannonballs would not be good. Let me see if I can tinker with it and—

  I’ll handle it. You look for a way to deal with the shaman. He’ll know right where we are now.

  Understood.

  She would have preferred to search for Ridge and see how he was doing with that owl, but the shaman had to be the priority.

  He found her first. With a mental attack. Something like a harpoon blasted into her mind. Pressure erupted from it, until her eyeballs felt like they would burst from her head. Sardelle dropped to a knee, pressing her fist into the cold earth for support. If not for Jaxi, the shield would have fallen. For a moment, all Sardelle could focus on was building her own shield, one around herself, one that could repel his attack. She gathered the strength to thrust him away, to return the assault, but paused before deploying it.

  What if she played dead? Lured him down? She couldn’t physically touch him as long as he was up on that ship, but if he came down, looking for Jaxi…

  Yes, use me as bait. We invaluable swords love that.

  Sardelle’s head was still throbbing—if she fought him off completely, he would get a feel for how much power she had, and he wouldn’t come down—but she managed a quick response. Who told you that you were invaluable?

  All of the truly wise people who have known me. Go on. Crumple to the ground with theatrical flair. I won’t give you away.

  Sardelle opted for slumping against the doorjamb. She quieted her mind, as if she were unconscious. The attack continued to batter at her, but she gritted her teeth and endured it. If this didn’t work in the next few seconds, though, she was going to get angry and start looking for ways to rip his hinges off, whether he was a hundred meters above her or not.

  The flames have stopped, Jaxi reported. Should I drop the shield?

  Yes, he’ll be distracted with me for the moment. She hoped. Besides, to further the illusion, she had to stop doing anything that showed off her power. Just be prepared to raise it again.

  Got it.

  Then the shaman was probing her, the mental equivalent of checking her pulse at her throat. Neither she nor Jaxi thought a word lest he feel it. The sensation of letting him investigate without putting up defensive shields was like having ants crawling all over her skin, but she endured it, as she had the pain.

  Eventually, he withdrew. The cannons were firing again—both from the fort and the ship—but Sardelle and the shaman had other concerns.

  He’s coming.

  Flying? Sardelle had never heard of a sorcerer who could, at least not
without the help of some sort of apparatus. Or did someone drop a rope? Was the airship close enough for that? Surely the soldiers would object…

  He’s bringing down a hot air balloon. Must be the airship equivalent of a lifeboat.

  Are our soldiers attacking it?

  Jaxi paused. Yes, but the shaman is shielding it, just as you did, and he’s protecting the airship, too, though it looks like your flying friend did some damage before the shaman was prepared.

  Ridge? Good. Sardelle felt a swell of pride for him. Though it quickly turned to worry. Would the shaman sense it if she stretched out, trying to locate him?

  Stay still. He’s landed. And he’s walking this way.

  Sardelle cracked an eyelid. She was surprised there weren’t any soldiers racing down from the walls to attack the shaman.

  Ah, but he wasn’t alone. The bronze-skinned man who strode toward her in a cloak of black fur, his long white hair startling in contrast, was surrounded by no less than two dozen other men, shaven-headed Cofah warriors wielding short-swords and long double-barreled firearms that they shot one-handed from their hips. The soldiers inside the fort were shooting at them, but the shaman was shielding them.

  Jaxi’s hilt grew warm, ready for a fight. You drew them in. Do you have a plan? I don’t think he’ll be bothered by a rash.

  Sardelle’s plan had been to throw everything she had at the shaman and hope to take him by surprise, but if she could force his shield down, that might be enough. A sorcerer was as susceptible to bullets as the next person.

  The Cofah warriors smiled as bullets bounced away from them and grew confident enough to launch their own attacks. They started shooting at the men on the walls. The shaman raised a hand toward the mountainside, and the doors Ridge had ordered built over the tram shafts flew open amongst squeals of metal.

  Sardelle cursed at herself. Inviting the bastard down hadn’t been a good idea after all. If all those miners streamed out and started attacking their captors…

  Time for her own attack. The shaman was less than ten meters away. Sardelle summoned her energy and blasted it at him, targeting his mind, just as he had done to her. She could only hope it was enough.