Shroud us, Res.
The tree’s shadows enveloped us. I’d meant for him just to conceal us, but I felt the ground ripped away beneath my feet. The world turned, blurring to black. A second later, it re-formed. Except we were no longer at the edge of the wood.
Res had teleported us to the glowing tree.
The portal’s light had changed, growing darker, forming shapes with heads and arms and legs. It was the doorway between our world and the prison—and it was opening. It brightened in a burst of light. Then a hand reached out.
“Destroy it, Res!” I yelled, lifting my bow to catch the blow of a Vykryn’s sword. Wind funneled past me, striking the soldier in the chest and sending him flying into the pond. I turned, nocked an arrow, and released it at Valis. He discharged a flame that incinerated the bolt in a flash, then moved to Razel’s side, defending her.
Confusion pulsed down the cord. Res didn’t know what he was doing any more than I did. But Estrel had said that the shadow crow’s power had created that prison. Maybe Res’s could reseal it.
The flames sparked by Res’s lightning licked around the far side of the island.
When we teleported, it felt like space opening, I told him.Try closing the space in the tree.
Resolve pulsed through the bond. I fell back, bow lifted to defend him. Ericen moved to my side. He’d taken down the remaining Vykryn, leaving only Shearen and Razel among the Sellas.
“Stop them,” Razel ordered.
Shearen didn’t move. He was staring at Ericen as if he’d never seen him before. But Valis stepped forward, the other Sellas around the edge of the clearing closing in.
Power burst free of Res, lightning erupting in the sky. Valis’s fire snuffed out like a candle flame. Something pulled at me along the cord, Res’s power tugging at me as he consumed massive amounts of it.
The tree’s light flickered.
“No!” Razel screamed. The air shifted, as if space were collapsing in on itself. The island shivered and fell still.
The light went out as the prison doorway closed.
I seized Ericen’s hand, pulling him close to Res. Exhaustion echoed through our bond.
“I know, I know,” I whispered. “But you can do this.”
The shadows curled around us. Razel lurched. Then the darkness whisked us away.
We tumbled out of the shadows just beyond the forest’s edge. Res stumbled, letting out a weak caw. This was as far as he could take us.
Ahead, the shrine sat bathed in a pool of moonlight, the door wide open.
“This way!” I yelled. We sprinted for the shrine. Inside, the second door was already open, the strange road visible beyond.
I shoved Ericen in after it. “Don’t look down. Don’t step off the path.”
“What path?”
“Go!”
Ericen lurched forward, Res and I on his tail. The same disorienting feeling as last time threatened my senses, but I pushed forward, and we burst into the Eselin shrine. I paused, turning back.
“I know you’re tired,” I told Res, “but we can’t let them follow us. Can you collapse this like you did the prison opening?”
Res trilled softly. I backed away, feeling his power surge. Exhaustion pulled along the cord, then something else. I lurched slightly, gasping, and Ericen reached out to steady me.
It felt like the opposite of that day in Caylus’s workshop when I’d pushed the magic free of Res. This felt like he was pullingfrom me.
Beyond the road and through the open door, the Sellador shrine began to shudder. The air shifted. The ground churned, the stone of the building crumbling. Then it collapsed.
The road dissolved in a flash of light. When my vision cleared, only stone filled the doorway we’d come through.
