CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
A winged creature made of shadows and onyx flames. Its essence, destruction, its power unmatched. I was the only one left standing against it. We need to prepare. We need more power, all of us.
—Hidden correspondence from Bayne to Khato. 24thof Summer, 071.3E.
Abright clearing opened before my eyes as muggy Lotrennian air filled my lungs. Trees and boulders sat uprooted, their previous resting places dark and damp. Splintered branches made way for a view of the Eye of the Wood in the distance.
Tiberius’s left hock ached, and a steady stream of blood trickled from his shoulder. A vicious smile stretched across Queen Antares’s petal pink lips as she raised her arms, locking an invisible shield into place. Her palms flipped to the bright sky, small shards of sharp rock lifting from the ground to follow the movement.
Ti!I screamed into the cast.I can’t stay! We’re being attacked!Somewhere, fire and pain and death beckoned, but the queen’s words locked me into this shared cage of consciousness.
“Speak to me, Tiberius. Let me in,” the queen purred.
Lyvia. Ti pleaded, exhaustion and panic making his mind’s voice weak. His ears pinned against his head as he readied a blast of shadows.
Dread sliced through me. What had she done? We never should have parted…
The queen’s light brows narrowed, and her lips curved upward. As her porcelain hands twitched, a volley of shards sped toward Tiberius. He bolted, sending his own wave of Obscura hurtling toward the rocks and bucking against the queen’s shield.
Pain lanced through his flank, warm wetness dripping down his side.
“You’re strong, Tiberius. Too strong for a human. Lyvia does not have what it takes,” she urged, dropping her hands and turning to a small pack settled in the nearby bushes. “You need an elf to bond with. A mystic. Aqueen.” She knelt as she removed something. A flash of silver drew Ti’s eye as he caught his breath.
She turned and stood.
“And if you do not bend, you shall break,” she declared in soft threat, as she let the object unravel from her hands. A thick, leather whip loosened itself from the handle. Thinly braided fortissa chain wrapped around the whip from its handle to its tip, where it met with a sharp iron point.
A stillness came over me as rage pounded through my body, wherever it was. Tiberius sent a blast of Obscura, obliterating the leather base of the whip, but the fortissa remained.
FLY!I screamed at Ti as the queen’s toned arm lifted the whip above her head and slashed at a diagonal for my caeluma’s withers. White-hot pain lanced through his shoulder as thesharpened tip cut through his smooth coat. Muscles strained as he spread his wings.
“BEND!” the queen bellowed as her arm raised once more. “Or you will bleed!”
Ti faltered as pain seared across his wing. My heart pounded, my hysteria rising as my mind frantically searched for a way to help Tiberius. Far. I was too far to protect him...
Shield, Ti! We need a shield!I screamed as his wave of darkness reached for the queen and bucked against her wall of wind.
Darkness is all I have, he heaved.Death is all I have.
His wings were injured. He flapped again and staggered. I clung to our connection with desperation, my mind racing as fast as Ti’s breaths.
It’s not!I called back as that small tune of transformation pricked my consciousness.
“Come to me, Tiberius,” Queen Antares commanded as she lifted the fortissa whip once more.
I love you.
CHANGE IT!I screamed.TRANSFORM THE DARKNESS!
Tiberius’s mind raced against my own as he processed the words, the iron tip of the whip arching in a long, silver line against the blue sky. I shoved that song-like power down our bond from miles away, sending every bit of love I had for my caeluma—my horse, my shared soul—with it.
A surge of energy buzzed out of my being and into his, colliding with a strange, powerful force. He gathered it in his chest, and I sent an image of a ship’s sail sliding down our casting connection.
Dark power erupted from him in a blast of black, tiny sparks of golden energy hovering at its edge as hestretchedthat darkness into an impenetrable sail, separating himself from the queen.
The iron whip clanged against the dark shield, its tip bouncing back and ripping across the queen’s cheek. She staggered back, her delicate hand flying to the blood dripping down her face and the whites of her eyes flashing.
Tiberius funneled the darkness into the shield of death, and I poured my love down our connection. The two of us shared a fleeting moment of triumph.
