36. Cleaving the Heart #2
Their numbers seemed to multiply within the dust, grey robes spilling through shattered doorways and broken walls like water through a breached dam.
Magic rained from the sky, but the mana was corrupted — tainted by whatever had been in the blast. The spells misfired, some falling back onto the Solutus while others exploded mid flight.
Gritting his teeth, Kailorien cast another ward over the survivors to protect them from the backlash. They wailed, huddling together, terrified.
A group of men appeared from behind a collapsed stall and lunged for Kailorien’s exposed flank.
A blade flashed from the smoke.
They screamed as one was cut clean in half and another was crushed beneath an earth ward.
Silence.
Kailorien did not turn immediately.
He didn’t need to.
The air behind him shifted with a presence he knew better than his own heartbeat — one that moved through battle like a shadow birthed of war and carnage.
Zarrek the Bloodletter stepped from the smoke, his golden eyes glowing, his mouth moving in chant.
Glowing runelight spilled from his lips, and the earth ward shifted.
The mana gathered into a colossal orb and rolled, crushing more attackers in its wake.
Kailorien watched, transfixed, at the sight of what a master Runetongue could accomplish even in the wake of magical backlash.
Determined, Kailorien raised his hand and summoned a portal again.
“Don’t, Resh,” Zarrek warned. “That kind of magic will break here.”
“The blast,” Kailorien said.
Zarrek nodded, his expression as calm as if he had stepped into a training yard rather than a burning district.
Another wave of Solutus charged.
Kailorien stepped left.
Zarrek stepped right.
Their blades fell together.
As Kailorien cast a compressed shell between the rebels, Zarrek jumped to them and swung his battleaxe at the orb. The magic detonated, blasting the group in all directions.
The rhythm of the battlefield shifted.
Where Kailorien struck, Zarrek covered. When the line surged forward, he slid into position at Kailorien’s back as naturally as breath. The two men stood back-to-back amid the smoke and scattered bodies, their weapons dripping red.
Kailorien allowed himself a brief glance over his shoulder.
“You’re late,” he said.
Zarrek grunted in reply as another wave rushed them.
“Not by much.”
Their blades rose together, and the enemy line began to break.
Kailorien was about to give another command when his heart lurched in his chest, the sensation familiar now but no less disturbing. He kept fighting, kept the lines of Reskala moving along with the survivors shielded within.
Kail…Kailorien…
A whisper through the Bond.
The sound struck through the chaos like freezing water over fire.
Kailorien stiffened.
Impossible.
He could only hear her like this if she was close.
His gaze snapped toward the smoke-choked streets beyond the temple wards.
If Auryn had somehow found her way into this inferno…
“Move!” he ordered. “The temple is close! Advance!”
The Reskala surged forward through the ruined street, driving the last pockets of Solutus away from the temple square.
The great doors of the sanctuary hung crooked on shattered hinges, but the High Priests had already cast protective wards around the structure.
Dwindling Polis light crawled over the cracked stone walls, humming as the Priests ushered the survivors and Reskala inside.
Crafters staggered through the threshold clutching bleeding apprentices. Others carried the wounded between them, their faces streaked with ash and tears. The Reskala formed a perimeter as the last of the civilians were funneled into the sanctuary.
With one last blast of magefire, the Solutus finally signaled a retreat.
“They’ll be back,” Zarrek warned.
Kailorien stepped through the temple gate and turned toward the square.
“Secure the structure,” he told Thrassus. “Double the wards. Barricade all entrances.”
Thrassus nodded and issued commands in swift, clipped signs. Kailorien watched him — the way his Second glared at Zarrek. The stare was too long. Too still. Recognition burned there, and something darker.
Hatred.
Zarrek noticed it, too. He gave Thrassus a calm, measured look.
“If you spent less time staring and more time casting,” Zarrek said, wiping blood from the edge of his axe, “you might have done a better job protecting your Resh’Agar’s back.”
The words landed like stones in still water.
Several nearby Reskala froze.
Thrassus did not.
He stepped forward instead, the gold runes across his face flaring brighter as his magic stirred.
His signs were sharp. Precise.
‘Traitors cannot speak down to Doctrine.’
The words were silent, but the fury behind them needed no voice to burst into flames between the two warriors. Thrassus’s golden eyes locked onto Zarrek.
‘You are the Bloodletter.’
The name moved through the gathered Reskala like a coiled serpent. Recognition spread from one soldier to the next.
‘You should have died in combat beside the Arm,’ Thrassus signed.
His final gesture cut through the air like a blade.
‘Nothing else should have taken you from him.’
For a heartbeat the temple square fell silent except for the distant roar of burning streets.
Zarrek regarded the man with a tilt of his head.
Then he barked a short laugh.
“Well,” he said, rolling his shoulders, “the pup does have teeth, even if he’s too green to fight with the pack.”
Kailorien stepped between them before the tension could sharpen any further.
“Enough. Now’s not the time.”
The runes along Morvane’s plates flared as his gaze moved from one man to the other. Thrassus held the stare for a moment longer before lowering his hands. But the anger did not fade from his eyes. Zarrek rested his battleaxe against his shoulder.
Unbothered. Amused.
Kailorien ignored them both.
Because the whisper in the Bond came again.
Quieter now.
But unmistakable.
Kailorien…
He swore, spitting out a word so hideous Zarrek raised a brow.
“Zar, she’s here…”
“Who?”
“Auryn.”
Somewhere in the burning ruins of the Han.
And if she had come into this chaos…
Kailorien turned sharply toward the shattered streets beyond the temple.
“Zarrek,” he said.
The Bloodletter straightened.
“Follow me.” He looked at Thrassus. “Guard the temple. One way or another, I will return with reinforcements. Do not let them take a single soul.”
Thrassus thumped his chest. Obedient. Devoted. But as Kailorien and Zarrek retreated down the temple steps, Kailorien felt the hatred in his gaze as it followed them into the smoke.