The air stilled, everything coming to a complete halt as a great blanket of Shadow and Darkness descended.
“Alandra.” I tried to move, reaching out. She reached back, but we remained apart. Broken.
Misery consumed me as fingers of bleak terror radiated deep inside, where Alandra should be.
“Enjoy the Night, Wind Mage.” Evil laughter covered Alandra’s shrieks, and as I struggled to free myself from the sudden suffocation of malevolence, I prayed to Tanselm to keep my love safe.
“Come and get her when you’ve got the rest of your family to back you up.” The intruder snickered. “We’ll be playing in the shadows.”
A pop sounded, and I recognized the sound of a Mir charm at work.
My power came back to me, but it was too late.
Alandra was gone, captured by an enemy using Aellein magic.
Sudden worries of my affai soon suffering torture by her own kind, and all because she’d helped protect me and Tanselm from the worst kind of evil, stirred the terrible rage within me to a Dark, thickening mass of power.
The lingering resistance over me vanished. Air hissed its displeasure as trees and grasses flew from the ground, ripped from their roots. Clouds gathered. A funnel of bleak wind loomed while boulders flew as if weighing nothing.
Alandra had been taken from me as easily as if I’d given her away. I’d been unable to protect her in my world, a land that used to stand for peace and prosperity.
Another tree cracked and protested being torn from the ground. I struggled to focus my rage on the ones responsible, on the Dark Lords behind this abduction. Not Tanselm.
I deliberately contained my wrath, feeding it with the retribution I owed the enemy who’d put us all at risk.
I spelled myself in battle dress, armed with a sword strapped to my back and a mage staff in hand while I studied the area. The kidnapper might as well be the walking dead, as far as I was concerned.
Should harm befall my beloved, I would allow none of the enemy to live.
And the Light bless those who thought to stand in my way.
Chapter 24
Arim: Guardian of Storm
Darius frowned at me, but I was doing my best to remain calm. While I engaged Marcus in conversation, his brother scowled like the sun.
I’d seen the impatience on my nephew’s face growing. By the Light, it wasn’t easy for me either. It was all I could do to wait around when two of my nephews had become secretive while dealing with the Dark side of creation.
We were all now dealing not only with the Aellei but the Djinn as well.
Darius scowled. “I was two seconds away from convincing Samantha to leave well enough alone with our defensive perimeter when you ripped me out of there. Do you have any idea what that woman gets up to without me?” He threw up his hands.
Marcus lifted an arrogant brow that had Darius curling his fingers around a fireball. With a smirk, Marcus said, “Perhaps if her mate had any semblance of understanding when it came to women, she wouldn’t feel such a need to interfere with her prince’s work just to get his attention.”
Snarling, Darius aimed a fireball at Marcus, who countered it with a wave of his hand. Water doused the fireball and managed to drench Darius as well.
My patience had worn thin an hour ago, and the worries these two carried weren’t helping. I knew neither liked leaving their brides while the Netharat circled Tanselm, just waiting to strike. But I needed all four Storm Lords together.
All four brothers had to work together if Tanselm had any hope of surviving this Dark influx of invaders. They’d already been separated for too long. I didn’t like it.
“Ah, Arim? Your eyes are doing that weird thing again.” Darius coughed and grudgingly backed down.
“Then distract me before I turn one of you to stone,” I snapped then changed the subject. “What do you think of Alandra?”
I’d told them what I knew of her and her kind, reminding them of her participation in their recent battle with Sin Garu. And of course how Aerolus had nearly killed himself trying to save her from me.
After she’d put herself in harm’s way trying to save him.
