Maggie followed her gaze. “Who are you, and what have you done with my sister?”
“About the scales…” Evie said, just as a pair of moose burst through the gloom, eyes rolling.
Evie hesitated but shifted, letting the animals crash into her side. She delicately removed the wire crowns from their heads as Fallon and Maggie gaped. The gigantic creatures stumbled back through the fog. Evie turned around, nerves staticking through the bond. I reassured her the best I could as her best friend and sister took her in for the first time with wide eyes.
“Well, that’s an upgrade,” Maggie said.
“I want a ride!” Fallon screamed.
She quickly shifted back. “We can work out a riding schedule later. Stick close until we stop the relic’s influence.”
Noth recovered enough to disappear into the melee ahead of us and we pressed forward. This part of the valley saw the mid-morning sun burning away the fog—the Shrine sulking at its end. It was easy to see why it used to be a popular summer retreat when it gave out positive revelations. The tall columns had the remnants of gilt and paint on them. The deep stone steps were the perfect place to picnic.
When the shrine maidens handed out all revelations, it started to look as it did now—bleak, crumbling and dusty. Unfortunately, the mist also revealed a large metal contraption that looked like the Soul Drinking Crossbow from the shrine, with metal and wires attached. If I never had a bit of metal in my mouth again, it would be too soon. The bolt was as long as I was and would kill even Evie’s dragon. If it hit the ground, it would steal the soul of everyone in a fifty-foot radius. A mechanical sound cranked the bolt back to the sticking point.
The bolt loosed directly toward Evie before I could plan any sort of attack and my heart sunk in my chest. I might deflect the blow with my colossal body, but only magic would counter the Soul Drinking part of the weapon.
Trust me, my bear said, and I had to. We reached deep into my store of magic and, to my surprise, my bear built the structure of a spell of a corporeal identity. It was the only thing that would counter soul magic. It was a complex structure that always brought my human form to the brink of death. He shocked me as he cast it forth around the bolt, enchantment rippling through the air as a waif of a human girl tumbled to our feet.
I turned to Evie to check if she was alright, and her eyes flared wide as saucers.
I wasn’t dying. No one lost their soul. My eyes did the same. Did my bear just cast magic? He just cast magic! I received the province of dragons.
Have you been hiding this from me?I asked him.
It’s her. The bond. She makes us stronger and you make us smarter… some of the time,he answered.
What else can we do?I asked and showed him a metal structure to call all the wire and metal weapons to us.
My bear executed it perfectly, with so much power that a rain of wire and war instruments pelted down before us. The rush was incredible. Shifters staggered out of the mist, shaking free of the relic’s call. Evie lifted the crossbow’s bolt onto a trembling, lathering Greg. My bear healed him with little effort and magic. The force of it even fixed up old wounds the horse received from the wolves. Then came the rush of human soldiers, weaponless and fleeing back to the Shrine in front of a wave of angry animals. The chaos was almost as bad as the battle itself. Declan appeared from the mist, muzzle bloody.
“Nab one of them as a hostage,” Evie yelled into the scrum.
Declan lunged and missed a black-clad soldier by an inch.
“I’ve got one!” Noth called, as he jogged up, shaking his prize so hard the man’s neck snapped like a twig.
They have to be alive to be a hostage,I said.
“He was a minute ago.” Noth looked down and frowned.
Maggie laughed at Noth’s bewildered expression.
This one is squiggly,Declan said, latched on to a soldier’s ankle. He tore away from the wolf’s grip, leaving a piece of his pants and a chunk of flesh.
We were wasting time with these antics.Enough. We will overwhelm them. The freed shifters can join our ranks in the Shrine.
“To me, shifters!” Evie called into the valley with the Goddess in her voice and our terrible army descended on the Shrine.
Chapter21
Evie
The loose plan to strong-arm our way in, capture the last relic and teach the mysterious Brad a lesson seemed flimsy once we actually got into the shrine. The place loomed huge with a warren of musty hallways that branched off the entryway. Shifters spread out to search the passages and deal with any remaining soldiers.
It looked exactly like all the other temples we had been to, but it seemed different. Boot tracks and paw prints through thick dust told us the soldiers and shifters definitely came in and out regularly. Tapestries rotted on the walls, broken furniture piled up in corners. Crates labeled with the words Sumus Machina looked new and sat open. The evil lair vibes were raising the hair on the back of my neck.
“Is this where you have been hanging out?” I asked Fallon and Mags.
