CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Ilain’s grip dropped from her brother’s, her strength gone. She gasped as she began to fall. Auden moved a fraction too slowly, his hands failing to hold her steady.
The clang of metal against marble echoed as Ethenn reached out, his sword clattering to the floor. His hands landed on Ilain’s arms as she crumbled into his chest. Then her eyes went wide, and Ethenn sucked in a sharp inhale.
Simultaneously, the Guardian roared, its screeching bellow piercing as it slammed its paws against the dais once more.
Then it burst apart in a torrent of wind.
It knocked Evylin, Thom, and Rafferty to the floor and drove Deckard and Auden several feet back.
But Ethenn stood steadily, Ilain resting in his immovable arms.
The wind died down, and their clothes and hair slowly settled back into place. The Guardian was gone, presumably defeated by Ilain. Their fight was over, though Deckard couldn’t fully comprehend how the highlady had suddenly managed the connection.
Ilain tensed, pulling away from Ethenn. “Auden,” she murmured even as her eyes remained locked on the young man.
Ethenn tightened his jaw, stepping back.
“Hey!” Rafferty called from the far side of the room. “How are we supposed to get back over there?”
Deckard turned from the confusing scene.
He lifted his hands. The glittering shadows formed a path linking the dais to the entrance.
With a flick of her wrist, Evylin turned the Wind sword back into a necklace and slipped it over her head to hang next to the Night Relic.
Then she hopped on the bridge readily, though Thom and Rafferty tested it before trusting it with their full weight.
The three of them hurried across, Evylin’s gaze meeting Deckard’s. “Thank you,” she said lightly. “For catching me back there.”
Deckard dipped his head, the urge to take her in his arms frightfully severe. He pressed his hands to his sides. “Always,” he said.
With Thom and Rafferty back, Deckard released his hold on his magic as Auden had taught him. A small tug at his mind alerted him to the discharge of power. He now understood Auden’s lesson on magic taking energy. The thing was that this fatigue felt milder than that of a short jog.
Turning to the Calders, Deckard was surprised to find them both staring at Ethenn in shock while the young man looked everywhere but at them.
“What’s going on?” Thom asked warily.
None of them spoke.
Deckard stepped forward, a nagging suspicion coming to his mind.
Then Ilain said, “Give him the Relic.”
Ethenn flinched. “That’s—that’s not necessary,” he said.
Following his instincts, Deckard guided Evylin forward. At her confused look, he gave her a nod. She slipped the Wind Relic over her head and held it out to Ethenn.
He shook his head. “I’m not—I don’t want—”
“Take it,” Ilain commanded.
He met her fierce glare, then wilted. He accepted the Relic reluctantly. Its silver glow brightened, and the necklace shifted form. A beautiful gray birch bow rested in his grasp, twin blades tipping its edges.
They all stared at Ethenn, dumbfounded.
Rafferty let out a low whistle. “Well, well, little Lox,” he said. “Looks like you’ve been holding out on us.”
“You’re a Warrior,” Ilain said it like an accusation.
Ethenn’s head drooped as he shrugged. “I guess.”
“You guess?” Thom repeated. “Bloody hell, kid. This would’ve been nice to know a month ago.”
“I didn’t—” Ethenn cut himself off. He sighed. “I didn’t know.”
“Until when?” Auden asked, eyeing the young man curiously.
“Until now,” Ethenn said.
Auden tipped his head to the side. “You avoided taking the Relic. That suggests you knew, but you didn’t want us to.”
“I didn’t know,” Ethenn insisted. Then he slumped. “I only suspected.”
“For how long?” Evylin asked.
Absently, Ethenn played with the string on the Wind bow. A silver arrow materialized between his fingers, and he let the string slip in his surprise. The arrow fell to the floor before disappearing in a wisp of fog.
“That’s a neat trick,” Rafferty commented.
Ethenn grimaced, holding the bow uncomfortably.
“I started wondering when—” He hesitated.
“When you told us about how it feels when you fight. How your senses heighten and—and everything is easier. That’s how I feel when I’m hunting or when I’m fighting.
Not as strong, but . . . I didn’t have a Warrior uncle training me my entire life. ”
When Evylin shifted tensely beside him, Deckard had to grip the hilt of his sword to keep from reaching to comfort her. She spoke steadily. “When Deckard asked if we felt it, too, you said no.”
“I shrugged,” Ethenn corrected. “I wasn’t sure then. Over time. . . .”
“You’re a bloody Warrior,” Ilain said again, something like horror in her tone.
Deckard wasn’t sure what made the woman’s face scrunch like that, but after nearly blacking out, he was worried about her. “Ilain,” he said, barely catching her attention as she continued to glare at Ethenn. “Are you all right? Can you safely make it back through the Keep?”
Clamping her jaw, Ilain finally turned from their newly discovered Warrior.
“Yes. If it weren’t for—” She flexed her hands.
“If it weren’t for Ethenn, I’d be unconscious right now.
When I killed the Guardian, I was able to channel his magic enough to use his energy and not mine.
However, that’s the extent of my magic. I’m depleted. ”
“You’re sure?” Auden asked worriedly.
Ilain nodded. “I can run out of here, but Allore help us if I need to use more magic.”
“What if you carried the Relic?” Ethenn asked, voice thin.
Ilain eyed the Wind bow he proffered toward her. “Relics give power, not strength,” she said. “Utilizing its power would drain me faster, and I’d black out more quickly with it than without.”
Ethenn dropped the bow to his side.
“Guess you’ve got a new toy, eh, Loxley?” Rafferty said.
“This—” Auden scoffed as he stared in awe. “This is impossible. Three Warriors and a Mage in a group of six. The odds. . . .”
Deckard met Evylin’s skeptical stare. The odds were impossible. With the supposed rarity of magical beings, there shouldn’t have been more than one with magic in their ranks. Perhaps, there shouldn’t have even been that.
But the truth was clear: Hewitt, Evylin, and Ethenn were Warriors. Deckard was a Mage. How had such an impossibility become a reality?
“This is a topic to discuss once we’re safely out of the Keep and back on the road,” Deckard said to the whole troop, putting a pause on their wondering. “Ethenn, I want you to stay with Ilain—”
The pair, separated by several feet, straightened and glanced at one another dubiously.
Deckard ignored their discomfort. “As a Warrior, you can protect her best. Don’t let those Shades get near her.”
Ethenn nodded, then looked to Evylin. “You should try using a bow out there,” he suggested. “It’ll keep them back so the wind won’t knock us off.”
“I’m not trained with a bow,” Evylin said. “And with all that wind, how are we supposed to aim?”
The hunter hesitated, then shrugged. “I think the magic takes care of that.”
Suddenly, Deckard realized that during their run across the bridge, Ethenn’s arrows had all hit true. A miraculous feat that was, in all actuality, a Warrior’s magic.
Evylin took the Night Relic from her neck. It beamed deep purple in her hand, shifting into a recurve bow. Its shiny metal frame was rich amethyst, reflecting light violet in the gray atmosphere. She drew back the string, and a shadow formed into an arrow of the same purple metal.
With these revelations on their minds, the troop headed for the staircase, out of the Chamber.
They worked up the stairs slowly, conserving their energy and preparing for another exhausting sprint across the narrow stone path.
Deckard took the lead, with Evylin and Thom right behind him.
They chose to put Ilain and Ethenn in the middle to ensure the defenseless Mage had the most protection. Auden and Rafferty took the back.
At the top of the staircase, Deckard looked back at them.
Their faces were haggard, their bodies tense as they prepared for the treacherous journey.
“We run,” he told them, hand on the door.
“We’re too tired to fight these Shades the whole way back.
We run, and we get out of this Keep as fast as possible. Got it?”
A wave of grateful nods passed over the group.
With a final deep breath, Deckard drew his sword, opened the door, and tore across the narrow bridge and into the fog.
The hum of the Wind Shades was no longer the gentle whoosh from before.
It screamed in a torrent around them, bursting forth as Shades assailed the team.
They ducked their heads, dodging carefully as they rushed over the path.
Deckard’s orders were impossible to follow.
Even he had to stop and slice down a cluster of Shades as they ripped at his arms, legs, hair, and face.
When the cluster disintegrated in a blast of wind, Evylin and Thom held Deckard steady.
They resumed their run, boots pounding on the stone. Evylin and Ethenn picked off dozens of Shades with their bows. While the wind still rolled and blustered around them, the Warriors managed to keep enough Shades back to ease their path.
The fog grew denser, shortening their range of vision.
Deckard kept his eyes locked on the path ahead, alert for the appearance of the stone entrance.
A Shade swooped over his head, and he ducked, the Wind creature’s fingers tugging at his grown-out hair.
He grimaced as it ripped at him but jerked away despite the pain.
He determined then and there to find a way to cut his hair before the next Keep.
Wind erupted all around them, giant blasts of air slamming into their sides. They struggled to maintain their footing. Ilain let out a cry behind him, but Deckard trusted Ethenn to keep her safe. He kept his eyes ahead, desperate to find the door.