I pushed myself up onto my knees and turned away from the scene in front of me. Around us, more priests dressed like Caelan had entered the field and were getting ready to attack. Caelan stalked over to me and cut through the ropes binding my hands.
“Hide.” He ordered stiffly. He didn’t have to tell me twice.
I backed away towards the barn and watched in horror as the priests attacked my captors with long swords and daggers. In my mind, priests were supposed to be calm, kind and… holy? But these people here were anything but. They were warriors and killed with a precision that I had believed only soldiers possessed.
My captors fought back with fury, but the priests held the upper hand. They were sharper, faster, and clearly more skilled. For a moment, it looked like we might win. Then I saw it: a flash of light in one captor’s hand. He drew a small orb and with a single flick of his wrist, the orb exploded in a burst of blinding light. The priests were thrown back like rag dolls, groaning as they hit the ground.
Panic tightened in my chest. This wasn’t brute force anymore—they had magic.
My heka recognized it before my brain could even make the connection and began straining under my skin. I needed to do something, or we’d lose this fight and I wasn’t ready to get kidnapped. But I wouldn’t make this decision on my own. Should I attack or lay low?
Tap, tap, tap, tap.
Red for the roses, white for the veil,
one to remember, one to betray.
Attack.
I reached into my bag, pulling out pen and paper. There was a commotion behind me, the fight had drawn out spectators from the surrounding farms. Screams and whispers echoed across the field, the onlookers were equally fascinated and appalled by what they were seeing. Magic wasn’t part of their reality, and although they knew that it had once existed in our realm, most of them had never seen it being used. I tried to focus on my spell.
The priests had recovered quickly and had drawn up whatlooked to be some kind of translucent shield around them so the magic of the orb couldn’t reach them anymore. But my captors had still managed to get in a few hits, because two of the priests were laying on the ground, unmoving. I closed my eyes and the world around me faded away.
One breath. One act. One choice.
Do good. Stay clean. Hold steady.
I scribbled down on my paper:
“Fates, I call upon your old age wisdom.
Slow down my captors’ movements and disable the orb.
As I command, so it goes.”
The ink settled on the page and a ripple of power erupted from my palms. The onlooking farmers gasped, and I felt a heady rush of pleasure and excitement pumping through my veins. My captors’ eyes widened as my magic hit them, only allowing them to move in agonizing slowness. The priests quickly caught on and went into offense. One by one, they took my captors down with their swords until complete silence fell over the field.
A silence I had only ever heard once, and it was deafening.
The sound of death.
Caelan rushed towards me. “Are you all right, Maelis?” he asked quickly, eyeing me from head to toe.
“What happened here, Caelan? Are they all dead, did you kill them?”
The shock in my voice must have been apparent, because when Caelan spoke again, his voice was softer and calm.
“I came by your house earlier, wanting to speak with you again. Your mother told me you had already left to meet with someone. She had assumed that someone was me. I am sorry I wasn’t here on time to prevent them from hurting you.”
Caelan grabbed a water bottle and held the cold glass against my swollen throat.
The magical rush hit me, but slower this time. Maybe it was the shock that kept the high at bay or the spell simply hadn’t cost as much as other spells had, but I managed to stay in control of my emotions for once.
“Who were they?” I whispered, not wanting to look over there and see my captors bleeding on the ground.
“They are called the Heralds of the Forsaken. We know very little about their organization, but we assume that they are planning to raise an army. They probably knew I was here to take you to Auretheos so they decided to make their move. Are you all right to stand on your own?”
I nodded, but felt quite wobbly in the knees when I walked over to gather my things.
