79. Chapter 79
CHAPTER 79
Lucenna
“ I don’t understand why I cannot go with you!” Tavin’s angry voice filtered into the hallway as Lucenna reached Klyde’s chambers.
A tired frown had settled on his face, and he pressed on the knot between his brows. She was surprised to see him in an Elite Ranger uniform. The black leather armor fit him well and he wore a new sword at his hip.
Zev and Von stood with him as he tried to calm the boy down.
Tavin spotted her and scowled. “Why can the witch and dainty fairy go but I must stay behind? That’s a load a bollocks!”
“Dainty?” Keena huffed where she sat on Lucenna’s shoulder and crossed her arms.
Klyde sighed. “Tavin?—”
“Aye, he’s right,” Von interjected with a shrug. “The lad can hold his own.”
Tavin’s face lit up. “There, see. The Commander thinks I can go.”
Klyde glowered at Von. “I don’t care what he thinks.”
“If the lad is old enough to hold his drink, he’s old enough to fight with us.” Von reached in his coat and handed a small wineskin to the boy. “Go on, lad. Show him.”
Before Klyde could object, Tavin snatched the wineskin and chugged it all. He made a face of disgust but forced himself to swallow and flashed them a grin.
Klyde grabbed Von’s coat. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Putting him out harm’s way.”
Before either of them could question what that meant, Tavin stumbled back.
“Why do I … feel strange?” he garbled, pressing on his head. Then his eyes rolled. Klyde lurched and caught the boy as he fell unconscious.
“What did you give him?” Lucenna asked.
“Dreamshade oil.” Von returned the wineskin to his coat. “Don’t worry. He will sleep it off by tomorrow.”
With that, he strode out of the room. Klyde stared after him a moment, then down at Tavin. He may not have liked it but at least they knew he would be safe.
“Ready?” Zev asked her as Klyde tucked his nephew into bed.
Lucenna nodded. “They are about to set out.”
She moved on in the hall where Von waited. The Castle Guards sent to make sure they didn’t follow the delegation now sat up against the wall, their heads lolled as they slept soundly.
“Nice work,” Von said.
They quickly left the castle together. With a wave of her hands, Lucenna cast an invisibility spell over all of them. It fell like a tickling electrical mist on her skin.
She led them to the castle courtyard and the cold night greeted them. They lingered near the gardens and mounted the horses placed there for them.
King Leif, Raiden, Eldred, and seventy armed elves on horses lined up in front of the Elder Tree. The torches they held illumined the night as the old magi master began to chant a spell.
“Gateways are tricky,” Eldred had explained to her earlier in private. “It should open at East Wall, but the brief seconds between us crossing could cause our groups to be separated. If that comes to pass, you will be near. Make your way to West Wall, the borders of Red Highland. It lies across the Covenant Pass. You cannot miss it. If you do not arrive at the wall by dawn, you will need to find a way into the Blood Keep on your own.”
Lucenna glanced up at the rooftop of the castle. She couldn’t see Dyna or the Valkyrie. Dyna already veiled them with invisibility. It was a spell they had been training her to cast since she got her magic back.
Lucenna pictured Dyna in her armor, sitting on a Pegasus with her Valkyrie behind her, and she smiled.
The red king didn’t know what awaited him.
We’re coming, Rawn.
Bracing herself, she gripped the reins of her horse.
Eldred’s voice rose into the crisp night air as he chanted a spell in elvish. He placed Moonstones into the groves on the ground and runes light up in a circle on the floor. A pale gold light emerged from the Elder Tree and its center began to glow with light.
Raiden switched his reins from the left hand to the right.
“That’s the signal,” Lucenna murmured to the others. “Eldred will keep the gateway open for only fifteen seconds once they cross. Be ready.”
The king and his delegation cantered into the gateway. Lucenna’s heart pounded.
When the last elf passed through, she shouted, “Now!”
She heard the beat of their shoes on stone as they rode for the glowing light. The wind whipped against them with the sound of beating wings. They jumped in and the world whisked them away.
The shift in temperature changed and Lucenna’s horse landed cantered on over hard earth. It was dark with nothing but the moon and stars to light their way. Dropping her invisibility spell, Zev, Von, and Klyde appeared beside her on their mounts.
“Where are we?” Keena asked from Von’s coat pocket.
Lucenna studied the rocky terrain. Froom what she could tell, it was a barren stretch of land and some sparse vegetation. Nothing like the knolls of Greenwood.
“I think we landed on the tail end of the Anduir Mountains,” Klyde said. “North of East Wall.”
“How do you know?” Lucenna asked.
Klyde pointed ahead. Lucenna wasn’t sure what he was pointing at first until she could just distinguish what appeared to be an obelisk catching the moonlight. “That is what the elves all the Covenant. Thirty miles of barren dessert between Red Highland and Greenwood. We will need to cross it tonight to reach West Wall by morning.”
“And the Maiden?” Von asked.
Lucenna searched the night sky and saw only wispy clouds. If they had landed with them, Dyna would have dropped her spell by now. “I think the Gateway must have dropped her somewhere else when she crossed.”
Zev’s fur receded as he shifted on too feet behind a set of bushes. “Don’t worry.” His glowing yellow eyes fixed on the horizon, a proud smirk on his face. “We expected this to happen, so we follow to Dyna’s plan. She must already be flying ahead to the Blood Keep.”
He had confidence in his cousin, and Lucenna let it infect her too, because Dyna could do anything she set her mind to.
“She will get the other half of the key,” Lucenna stated, internally wishing her luck. “We will take care of our part.”
It wasn’t only because Dyna needed it to release herself from the Druid’s geas.
The key opened a door on Mount Ida.
They were going to need it.
Zev nodded. “Von and I will steal into the dungeons and break Rawn free.”
“And the rest of us will make sure his son isn’t traded,” Keena chimed in, landing on his head. “What could possibly go wrong?”
“Let’s not curse ourselves quite yet, shimmer bug,” Klyde retorted.
“I am not a bug!” She tossed a tiny ball of gold dust at his cheek then flew away with a huff, following the black wolf down the mountain.
“Let’s make haste and catch up with Raiden before he reaches West Wall,” Von said, tugging on his reins.
“First I should return this to you.” Klyde handed him a knife with clover beads embedded in the hilt. “It’s yours right? You left it behind in the Blue Capitol.”
Von accepted it, bewildered. “Aye, thank you...”
Klyde nodded and Von rode onward next, leaving them alone.
Lucenna fleetingly glanced at him. She didn’t mean to. It was instinct, really. His gaze met hers and she turned to go. She had nothing to say to him.
“Wait.” Klyde dismounted and went to her. “May I?”
At her nod, he tightened the loose belts of her greaves, adjusting them properly. He tightened the belts of her leather chest plate then nodded. Then he adjusted the armored plates on her hips, making her face warm. “I know now is not the time to speak of it,” Klyde murmured as he worked. “But I do plan to explain myself for last night. If you will permit me…”
The moonlight caught his eyes as they met hers.
Gods, why did he have to look at her like that? As if only she existed for him in this pocket of time.
It was wrong.
She shouldn’t want him as much as she did. She shouldn’t fantasize about him taking her in his arms and continuing what they started in Avandia. She wanted his lips on hers again. Wanted his lips all over her. How could he do this to her? Make her feel so much only to call it a mistake? It pissed her off.
Lucenna hated that she wanted him.
Hated even more that he knew.
Reaching for the holster at his hip, Klyde drew out a large knife and it spun in his hand as he handed it to her. “Here. Take this.”
Lucenna arched a brow at the glinting blade. “You’re not very bright are you? Give me a weapon and I am likely to stab you with it.”
A faint smile edged his mouth. “If you manage to cut me with it, I’m not worth my own merit then, lass” The knife flipped to his other hand with graceful speed. “We have been in situations where magic has failed you before. It is better to have it and not need it, than need it and be left wanting.”
Lucenna snatched the knife from him.
“Hold it like that and you’d sooner hurt yourself.” Klyde adjusted her fingers for a firmer grip on the hilt. “If you’re ever cornered and have no other choice, slash here, here, or here.” His finger stroked her kidney, the side of her neck, then across her ribs. Each touch sent scatters across her skin. His gaze locked on hers as his voice lowered. “Go for the heart through the ribs. Stab straight up with enough force.”
She studied his face, annoyed that even the night favored him. “What if I miss?”
“Then go for the eyes. Your enemies can’t hurt what they can’t see.”
“Hmm.” Lucenna crossed her arms and nodded at the elvish weapon strapped to his hip. “And what have you got there?”
“Oh, this?”
Klyde stepped back as he drew out the sword. The blade was black, shinning like ink in the moonlight. Lucenna felt her Essence react with the magic imbued into the steel and faint shimmers of white light glittered off the enchanted blade, like smoke infused with stardust. She could see the giddy excitement on his face as he wielded it with expert ease.
“Courtesy of Eldred. It’s called Shadowbane.”
She smirked. “You named it?”
“All great swords have a name, lass.” Klyde mounted Onyx’s saddle. “So their deeds are remembered.”
It was a jest as is his way, but that word made her think of that morning. It must have done the same for him because his smile faded.
“Are we bad people,” Lucenna whispered, “for not noticing how far gone he was?”
Shame and guilt weighed on her for kicking Cassiel down when he was already on the ground. She had cried when he screamed because she felt how much pain he bore. They all felt it.
“No…” Klyde sighed, looking out at the sea of rock and sand. “Sometimes, that sort of despair can be hidden away. They can drown right in front of you, and you would know until they sank too far beneath the surface to pull them out.”
None of them had noticed anything wrong. Except for Zev. Perhaps because he, too, had lived with a voice in his head.
“I don’t say he did the right thing, but I don’t think we realize how much we love something until we have to give it up. It must have haunted him...”
As Lucenna looked at him she realized she could easily be in Cassiel’s position too.
Perhaps that’s why she overreacted when Klyde wanted to slow things down. She had been waiting for any excuse or sign to not to be with him.
When he turned to go, she asked, “When we ran into each other in the witch’s den, why where you there?”
The moon shone against his eyes as he looked at her. “I was searching for answers.”
“Did you find them?”
A soft smile touched his lips. “I found you.”