120. Ayres
Ayres and the Guard turned a corner on the wagon path that led straight to the Old Volcano, and nearly ran into Jia who was pushing her horse, galloping fast toward them, away from it.
Ayres could feel the book. It was there, with Jia.
Jia pulled the reins to stop her horse so sharply it caused her horse to rear up in protest. When the horse settled, Ayres saw that Jia’s eyes were wild and bright with fear, and tears streaked down her face. “Ayres, gods Ayres, hurry. She’s back there. They summoned a draugr army.”
“Where is the book?” Even if this was Rorax’s friend, Ayres didn’t know if he trusted this woman enough to leave her with one of the Books of Sumavari, or if he believed her enough to know it all wasn’t a giant trap for him and the Guard. Jia lifted her shirt, and there it was, the red and gold cover gleaming in the twilight sun.
Splattered with blood and tied around the book in a double knot was the ribbon Ayres had given Rorax.
Ayres’s heart gave a painful, panicked squeeze as he reached out and yanked the ribbon off the book. “Where is she?”
“At the ruins of the old volcano, two miles. Hurry, Ayres, she’s there and she’s fighting them all alone—” A little sob of panic burst out of Jia’s mouth, and she had to look away from him, pressing her wrist against her mouth.
Ayres looked over his shoulder to Milla, Kaiya, Cannon, and Piers. “Go,” he demanded them. “Hurry. There is one more book there and Rorax is alone.”
His four guards pushed their horses forward as Ayres focused upon Jia again. “Jia, listen carefully to me. This book needs to get back to Surmalinn or thousands of people’s lives will be at risk. Do not stop, do not wait, do not talk to anyone. We will get Rorax out of this alive, I promise you. Focus on the book.”
Jia took a ragged, steadying breath. “Go, I can do this.” Then she spurred her horse back to a breakneck speed.
Ayres caught up to his Guard in time to see Piers, Milla, and Cannon disappear into a short, squatty tower. Kaiya stood frozen, a giant battle ax dangling in her hand, at the edge of the cliff.
“What are you doing?” Ayres battled his irritation at Kaiya’s hesitation, but as he stepped onto the ledge next to her, he froze, too.
Rorax was there, shooting ice picks and knives made of earth, decapitating the draugr apparitions left and right like she was felling dominos, using fire whips to corral and control them, and using thick walls of black darkness to section off the soldiers around her to thoroughly mow through the rest facing her.
She was a twirling black blur of lethal majesty.
Never in his life had he seen someone move like that; never had he seen so many different magick types being worked so symbiotically as weapons.
Rorax flipped a section of earth over, squashing at least twenty-five draugr warriors. She pivoted, sending vines to support her dark wall, before holding her hand up to level a small section of soldiers with loud, crackling lightning. One soldier broke through, charging at her, but she skewered him through with a large shard of ice.
A flaming arrow streaked in the sky hurtling towards her back.
Ayres’s heart squeezed. He opened his mouth to scream her name, but before he could, the arrow stopped moving three feet from her and dropped to the ground.
He sagged with relief.
Of course.
Of course, she was thorough enough to remember an air shield. They had drilled into her time and time again that when she was in the middle of a battlefield you needed someone at your back.
She was out there alone because she knew she was powerful enough to be that person for herself.
“Marras above,” Kaiya whispered.
Ayres looked over at Kaiya to find tears streaking down her dark brown skin.
Ayres hadn”t known until Kaiya looked up at him, her dark eyes glimmering with grief and sorrowful acceptance—and the truth struck him like a bolt of lightning. Enna Mistvalley, Kaiya”s friend and lover, would never have the opportunity to become the new Northern Guardian of the Realms.
In another world. In another lifetime, Enna would have been the perfect Guardian to rule with a just and gentle hand. She would have looked over the Realms with the same care and charisma that she looked over her friends with.
But on the brink of destruction, the Realms didn’t need a just and gentle hand. They needed a protector. A warrior.
They needed that brutal, true, ferocious heart beating in the middle of a battlefield, facing hundreds of draugr soldiers all by herself so that she could buy her friends enough time to find the Books of Sumavari.
Rorax Greywood was destined to be the next Guardian of the Realm.
The door to the tower behind them burst apart as Cannon and Piers barreled through.
“We got it!” Piers panted, holding a leather-bound book up for Ayres to see. “We’re here.”
Ayres turned to Cannon and began to sign furiously. Take the book, take my horse, and ride to Surmalinn. Do not stop for anything. Meet us back at the Northern Castle.
Piers thrust the book into Cannon’s arms, who snatched it and sprinted away to Ayres’s horse.
“As for the rest of you,” Ayres gave the two remaining members of his Guard a bloodthirsty smile. “To the Spine Cleaver.”