He had no answers. All he could do was practice.
Practice.
Practice.
So that when the time came, he’d be ready to act.
He waved his hand through the weaving and the light dissolved. “Again,” he said, and started the drawing all over again, working from the bottom up.
Emylia had shown him the memory of the original weaving. She’d been telling the truth about it being too far away for her to clearly see. The crystal had been resting on a stone in the forest while a pair of hunters held down a gray unicorn with iron chains. Morkai had stood in the shadows far from the crystal—beyond the radius Emylia could project from—while he’d woven his pattern of blood. Unlike Teryn, Morkai didn’t use his hands to manipulate blood. Instead, the blood moved on its own above the sorcerer’s palm. Still, Teryn had been able to make out one important detail: where the pattern started. It began with a straight line across before weaving downward toward Morkai’s hand.
After studying the pattern, Teryn knew it had been forged of a single unbroken line from top to bottom. All Teryn had to do was draw it in reverse. To fully break the spell, he’d need to draw it with the sorcerer’s blood, and to do that he’d need to memorize the pattern.
He had one step down. One step that he was determined to repeat over and over?—
Teryn’s hand froze, his newest drawing only a quarter complete. A sense of pressure eased from around him. It was a sensation he’d only begun to feel since Morkai had blocked him and Emylia from projecting, and he rarely noticed it until it was gone. The only time it dissipated was when Morkai was asleep.
His eyes met Emylia’s, and she gave him a nod.
It was time to practice in a more tangible way. Perhaps this time he’d make it across the room to the vials of blood.
But as he and Emylia projected their etheras outside the crystal, it wasn’t into the dark bedroom at Ridine Castle. It was a clearing in a dense forest blanketed by night, illuminated under shafts of moonlight that stretched pale claws through the treetops. Teryn’s body was hunched on the ground. The sorcerer inhabiting the body curled his fingers, one hand digging into the earth, the other clutching his chest. His head was bent over several pieces of parchment that littered the mossy forest floor. On each page was a pattern inked in red.
Blood weavings.
Morkai’s chest heaved, but it was Teryn who felt those breaths, felt the shallow pulses of air that moved inside him. Morkai sat back on his heels and threw his head back, letting the moonlight wash over his face. His lips twisted in a triumphant smile.
Teryn looked from the sorcerer to the bloodstained papers, then to Emylia. “What has he done?”
Her gaze was locked on something farther away.
Teryn followed her line of sight. His breath caught as he saw a hulking form half hidden in shadow. He stepped closer, noting the silhouette of a pair of antlers, an enormous set of paws. The creature shifted on those paws and took a lumbering step toward Morkai. Moonlight shone on brown fur and claws that dug into the earth. Another step revealed a boar-like snout with curving tusks, nostrils flaring over a mouth of serrated teeth. Teryn saw the antlers clearly now, each tine ending in a deadly point. But that wasn’t nearly as unsettling as what rested below those antlers; where eyes should be, the creature had four fleshy faces.
Four faces with mouths locked open in a silent scream.
Four faces with hollow gazes.
Four faces Teryn knew.
Four faces that had now become a Roizan.
53
The Veil was even more immense up close. Cora stared up at the strange wall, watching it writhe with swirling particles of shadows and mist. When they’d first approached, Fanon had ordered her to walk through the Veil. His smug grin should have been enough to tell her it wouldn’t work, but her hope had been too strong. Just when she was certain the Veil would be as yielding as a fog, she’d found herself against something solid. She’d first suspected Fanon’s magic, but then she noted her hands were suddenly free, her palms pressed against the invisible wall. As realization had dawned, she’d immediately reached for her collar. But before her fingers could make contact, Fanon used his magic to pin her arms to her sides and fling her several feet back from the wall.
“Well, at least we know the wardweaving remains strong,” Fanon had said. After that, he’d approached the Veil, pressed both palms to its swirling surface, and closed his eyes.
Then he’d stood there.
Unmoving.
For hours.
Or had it only been minutes? Now that she knew time moved differently here, she was unable to trust her own estimation. It certainly didn’t help that she had nothing to do but stand painfully idle next to Valorre, Etrix, and Garot while Fanon faced the Veil doing…whatever the hell he was doing. Every second that crawled by was like a knife twisting in her heart. Because each of those seconds were minutes for her world. For Teryn. If day broke, they’d be approaching a week.
Mother Goddess, would Teryn last that long? What could Morkai be doing to her kingdom right now?
“I know you must be anxious to return home,” Etrix said, stepping closer to her, “but we must give Fanon time. He’s extending his skyweaving all along the Veil, seeking the source of a possible tear.”
