Phile snorted. “No, they don’t. Haven’t you seen what Rakel did to Bluff whenever the poor boy got it in his head to create a storm? In fact, I think we should back up. Who knows what she’ll do to him—or what Farrin will do when he realizes someone is touching her.”
Rakel glanced at Farrin—who was still battling it out with the air magic user—although the other magic user was worse-for-wear, and Farrin was just as sharp and clear moving as always. She could still feel a trickle of her magic, but it was like a snowflake among a blizzard. Hardly noticeable.
“You want my magic? Very well,” Rakel turned back to her opponent and started gathering her powers. She could feel the vastness of her magic, and as she took more and more, she grewawareof it. She could feel her castle on Ensom Peak, and the wall she had built on the Mullberg border.
The magic-drainer’s smile flickered. “What are you doing?”
“Giving you more,” Rakel said. She felt for the stream he was leeching off, and then pushed more of her magic through the line, turning it into a frothing, whitewater river.
He yelped and dropped to his knees—even though he clung to her hand still. “S-s-stop!” he begged. He shivered, and his skin was cool—though not as cold as hers.
“You were the one who wanted my magic,” Rakel said.
He shouted and yanked his hand away. Rakel—thinking of Farrin’s move on the archer—created an ice sword and swung it hilt first, hitting him in the head and sending him sprawling to the slushy ground. She flipped him over on his back and nudged him, but he was out cold.
General Halvor bellowed over the fight as he shouted orders to the various teams. “Frodi—leave the alchemist to Eydìs and Tollak, and get on those golems! Use your fire—make it hot enough, and you should be able to bake them. Angry owls, I want you on those wolves—drive them to Phile, Dryden, and Bunny. Blue Fire, back Frodi up—and stay out of range of the alchemist!”
Rakel swiveled, intending to help Farrin, but froze. Her body wouldn’t move. It was as if she had been enclosed in a block of ice.
“There, there,” a coarse voice chuckled. “Loreto is an idiot, but at least he distracted you long enough formypowers to bind you.” The air at her side shimmered, then shattered. A hulking man stepped out of the broken illusion and brushed off his clothes. His nose was smashed flat, his eyes were small and beady, and his coarse hair was pulled into a knot on the top of his head.
Unable to move her neck to see, Rakel caught a glimpse of him out of the corner of her eye. She couldn’t even open her mouth to scream for help.
“Good job.” Kavon joined them, stepping out of thin air. “I have wanted to look at you for a long time, Your Highness,” he purred in a voice that was velvety and pleasant. “You are such a curious thing. Even when I first paid off your guard to kill you and heard Farrin—Tenebris’s lapdog—had tried to intercept you, I was interested. What kind of a person can take a man somindlessly loyalas Farrin and convince them to change sides?”
Kavon ran a finger down her cheek. Rakel would have shivered if she could. Instead, her insides curdled, and she felt dirty where he had touched her.
“Sir,” the man holding Rakel into place started. He was interrupted by Farrin—who flipped Kavon over his shoulder and then turned on the binder.
“Rocco,” Kavon shouted.
The air magic user slid between Farrin and the binder. He blocked an attack and then aimed a gust of wind at Rakel—which Farrin intercepted and reflected. However, when he lunged forward to block Rakel, he stepped into the range of the alchemist, who threw a vial at him.
Farrin raised his cape so it shattered and splattered on the black cloth, then ripped it from his neck and threw it away from him just as the cloak burst into flames.
“Tollak, Eydìs, stop sleeping and take out that alchemist!” Halvor barked as he plunged his sword through one of the smaller golems.
“We’re trying, sir,” Tollak said.
Ropes coiled around the alchemist’s arms and legs, yanking her backwards.
The air magic user drove Farrin off to the side, and Kavon approached Rakel again—though this time he kept his distance.
Rakel poured her anger into her eyes and tried to glower at him even though she was still incapacitated.I swear when all of this is over, I will train with Farrin every day to help me overcome deflecting and manipulating magics!
Kavon tapped his chin. “So strange. Tenebris hates you with a fury I have never seen. He must see something in you…but what? Himself, perhaps?”
Rakel’s heart squeezed in her chest.Why would he say that? I’m not—he can’t think I’m like Tenebris!
“Farrin—catch!” Phile—still fighting wolves—threw Foedus to him, snipping off a lock of his black-tea-colored hair and embedding the dagger in a board near his head.
Farrin shot the Robber Maiden a glower but ripped the dagger from the wood and threw it at the air user’s shoulder.
The dagger pierced the globe of air and kept going, hitting its mark. Before the man could react, Farrin attacked, coming in low and cracking the magic user’s knees with the scabbard of his two-handed sword.
The man shouted and collapsed, and the two fell out of Rakel’s eyesight.
The flute music faltered, and the wolves stumbled like puppets cut loose from their strings. Snorri had found the flute-player.
