Ailin went down first with Seb right on his heels, and the rest of their team quickly followed.
I heard shouts and a few guns going off, but in less than fifteen seconds, Ailin’s voice came over the comms, saying, “Hostages are secure. Shields are up. I’ll work on getting them out once we’re over there.”
I shook my head in amazement. The fact that the cages were on the far back wall, and definitely not close to the stairs, and Ailin was able to shield them from where he was… was phenomenal.
Roman nodded at me. “Let’s go.”
“I’m right behind you,” I said, following Rome down.
He activated a personal shield at the same time I did, snapping a stick in half to bring it over myself. I’d have to drop it once I started fighting since I couldn’t fight through a shield—and I had my dragonscale shield and could cover body parts with scales if need be—but we all definitely needed shields when descending the staircase. No one wanted to be shot in the legs or taken out before we even got down there.
The basement was already in chaos.
Ailin and Sebastian’s green and blue shields were blocking off the entire back half of the basement where the cages were, butthe trafficking soldiers weren’t about to let them walk across the basement without attacking.
And nearly all of them were attacking Seb and Ailin’s team, with only three of them trying to head off everyone coming down the stairs.
As soon as Tan was low enough, he threw a spell at the closest stair attacker, knocking the guy out—I didn’t think he was dead—in one big, silvery blast.
Seb and Ailin’s team all had shields up, and the witches were shooting spells at the soldiers. Magic and bullets were flying everywhere.
Once I realized how well in hand the Ellwoods had their situation, I concentrated on my actual job.
Finding Grand Master Brinik Norfiel and stopping him.
A huge part of me wanted him dead—he deserved that and more after everything he’d done, not only to me but to all of these poor people and who knew how many more—but another part of me wanted him to live and be imprisoned so he could suffer for a very, very long time.
Regardless, we were going to stop the bastard by any means necessary.
I scanned the basement, searching for him.
Jed’s team was already zooming through the chaos and saving the servants—much to the servants’ surprise, since they kept screaming, which I honestly couldn’t blame them for. But I didn’t see Isidore anywhere. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not—I just really hoped she and her brother were safe—but I’d promised I’d do my job today, and I wasn’t going to go back on a promise.
So I took a breath and pushed those worries aside for later.
“There!” I pointed to the corner of the room where a set of doors were.
We hadn’t had a chance to check what was behind those doors—the blueprints showed closets—so I didn’t know where the grand master thought he was going, but I wasn’t about to let him get away or hide in the closet while everyone else fought for his horrible cause.
Basil yelled out, “I see him,” and before I could blink, he threw a big ball of black shadow magic at the blood witch.
I had no idea what the spell did, but Brinik saw it coming and brought up a spell of his own. He lifted his palm, and a blast of red energy shot out and knocked Basil’s shadow magic off course. Bas’s magic flew off to the left and slammed into a wall, leaving a large indent behind.
Thank Scales, it didn’t hit someone it shouldn’t have.
“Fuck,” Bas said.
Roman took off toward the blood witch, and I was right behind him. I ducked under flying spells and bullets, although my shield would protect me, and I almost ran into Beshiro as he grabbed another servant, moving her out of the way of a bullet just in time.
“Shit, sorry,” he said quickly. He was gone and pushing the servant behind someone’s shield before I could respond.
Finally, we were about fifteen feet away from Brinik, and from here, I could see a body lying behind the man, covered in blood. I winced at the sight—an innocent we weren’t able to save.
And a source of power for the evil man.
Shit.
As soon as he saw me, the grand master grinned this maniacal, horrible, terrible grin before he drew a rune on his hand with his victim’s blood and pushed it out toward me, sending a spell right toward my chest.
