Shadowborn Page 36

  Stone and ice layered Center’s edge into walls several feet high. The shadow pooled against it, building, rising. Long rings of flame proved most effective, the shadow burning like the now-ended midnight fire. Bree strafed the land, one long burst of fire projecting from her gauntlet. When it ended, she pulled up, needing a moment to recover. The crawling darkness twisted and curled, recoiling from the barrier of flame she’d created, then simply flowed to either side, bypassing it entirely. The sign of intelligent control only heightened her already growing terror. Bree moved to extend the barrier and cut off the flow but a brilliant flash of white light pulled her attention away.

  Kael streaked along the edge, his wings shining bright even against the sun’s glow. His gauntlet hung low, arm braced with the other hand, as its center streamed out a steady beam of light. It shone upon the crawling darkness, and at its mere contact the shadow recoiled and shriveled. Large swaths sparked orange and red like paper curling into ash. Not even the walls of flame performed such damage against L’adim’s flood.

  Bree pumped a fist into the air as Kael flew overhead, his back arching him into a U-turn. He waved in greeting as he raced in the other direction, another pass of his element searing the shadow and curling it back toward the edge. Bree turned her attention to her own responsibilities, her strength recovered and her prism recharged by her blood.

  Walls of ice, flame, and stone lined the landscape, but it seemed only Kael’s passes accomplished any real damage. Knights and Seraphim burned through their prisms, but they built minuscule barriers against an unstoppable flood. The shadow kept coming. New paths were always available to it. The best they could do was stall the flow, but to what end? For twenty minutes they slowed its spread, new walls replacing broken ones, the initial barriers rising higher and higher to combat the growing size of the shadowborn’s presence. Bree prayed those twenty minutes were enough for the people to evacuate to safety … if there was anywhere safe left on Center.

  Olivia fired three bolts of lightning straight into the air, signaling for the rest of the Weshern Seraphim to join her. Bree thought to stay, solidifying her section of wall, but it was clearly a hopeless task. No matter how much she burned, more flowed around it, testing the other walls and slipping through the cracks. Bree flew to join their commander, and as she flew over the defenses she could not see a single stretch of grass or rock. Despite all their efforts, the island’s edge was overwhelmed with the crawling darkness.

  “We can’t hold such a wide area,” Olivia shouted to the gathered mass of Weshern Seraphs. “We’ll have to retreat inward. Save who you can, but do not tarry. We’ll form up a second defense along the inner cities. We’ll try again with a smaller defense line.”

  “You’re dooming everyone along the edges,” Kael protested.

  “They’re already doomed,” Olivia snapped. “I’m saving what lives I can. Now obey your orders, Seraph, or I’ll cut you down for insubordination.”

  She waited to see if Kael would challenge her. He did not.

  “Very well,” she said. “Stall the shadow if you wish, but do not cease moving toward the center. Our final stand is yet to come.”

  The rest scattered, joining the other islands in a massive exodus toward Heavenstone. Only Kael, Bree, and Clara hesitated behind.

  “You were right about your prism,” Bree said, forcing a smile to her face. It didn’t last long. No amount of hope or humor could endure the tragedy unfolding below.

  “Yeah,” Kael said. “Not that it’s helped any. The shadow keeps coming. It swallowed the world, remember? What’s my little beam going to accomplish?”

  Clara jabbed him in the side with her elbow.

  “You, of all people, don’t get to talk that way,” she said. “People are still in danger, and no matter what Olivia says, we should still save who we can as we fly toward Center’s inner cities.”

  Bree looked to the flood of darkness covering the landscape below.

  “I’m not sure there’s saving anyone from this,” she said.

  “Maybe,” Clara said. “But if we think like that we’re already dead.”

  She waved good-bye to Bree and her brother, taking up a path toward one of the distant villages. Kael popped the prism in his gauntlet free, cut across the top of his hand with his sword, and used his blood to refresh the cloudy gray prism to its full shine.

  “See you soon, sis,” Kael said as he slid the prism back into the compartment. “And stay safe, all right?”

  He flew a similar path to Clara, only steeper to the east, another distant village his goal. Despite her aching back, Bree tilted forward and gently increased the throttle. With numb heart and broken spirit she flew over the sprawling shadow. It was Galen all over again. Men, women, and children ran through the streets toward the heart of Center. The faster among them could outrun the steady flow, but the elderly? The children? Bree saw a woman with a babe trip mere feet ahead of the flood. The crawling darkness washed over them both. Bree prayed their death was quick.

  A group of nine rushed farther ahead, two of them carrying little children. An older man lagged behind with a limp. One of the family ahead turned away despite the cries of those with him, running back to the limping man and flinging an arm around his shoulder. Bree knew neither would escape in time, nor would the little group holding the children. She dropped from the sky, refusing to watch them all be buried by the flood. Fire roared from her gauntlet, and a wall of flame stretched dozens of yards to either side, blocking off the road as well as several buildings. The shadow touched the flames and curled away.

  “Run!” Bree screamed at nine. “Run, and never stop!”

  Two knights flew overhead, ice lashing the ground from their gauntlets to secure other parts of the town. Bree rested a moment. Already that day she’d used more flame than she ever had before. Was her strength growing, or was she merely learning her limits were greater than she believed? It didn’t matter, not really. Bree would continue bathing the land in flame no matter how terrible the cost. Breath regained, she took to the air and continued on.

  Bree crossed over a deep forest. So far the darkness had only reached the very edge of the tree line. The thin pine needles of the touched trees withered and fell, their green sapped away and replaced with a sickly white. Stories told of the entire world swallowed by that shadow. Bree didn’t want to imagine what it looked like.

  Beyond the forest was a massive city with population surpassing anything she’d ever seen on Weshern. The roads were thick with people fleeing toward Heavenstone. Bree took up position at the forest’s edge and waited. First came the animals, deer and hounds, little squirrels and puffy-chested birds. After them came the people, slower, weighted down by loved ones and the last vestiges of their homes. They were tired despite their panic, the miles they were forced to cover too much for many. The trickle of humans slowed. The dying trees neared.

  “God damn you, Johan,” Bree hissed.

  She flew to the far edge of the forest, drawing one of her swords on the way. She had to control her flame somehow. If not, she’d be exhausted before ever reaching the other side. Fire wreathed the blade. Bree imagined it in her mind, demanded it obey her control. Dropping low, she extended the sword and released her flame. A thin jet dripped off the tip of her sword and lashed the tree line. Bree didn’t need to stop it if she could only control it. The prism burned out slowly as the stream flowed from her blade. The strain was terrible on her mind but she endured. Five minutes later the entire tree line burned red and yellow.

  The blazing forest delayed the spread for another twenty minutes. Smoke billowed from distant fires to the north and south. It seemed other Seraphs had come up with the same idea. The forest, though, could be bypassed. The first thin rivers of darkness spilled around the sides, rapidly growing in thickness. Bree wished to halt it, but how? She could block a street or two, but what did that compare to a city of a dozen roads? Already the shadow was curling around the buildings on the outer edges of
the city, trapping people in like a hunting pack of dogs. Her only hope was that she’d bought the people enough time.

  It seemed the theotechs were not content to hope.

  The shaking of the land turned Bree to the west. She recognized that terrible explosion. She knew that darkening of the skies. Whatever weapon had leveled Glensbee had now been unleashed upon the very heart of the crawling shadow in the fields beyond the city. Fire enveloped it. Stone smashed it. Lightning struck from hellish clouds. It was like a hammer smashing a puddle. The darkness splashed in all directions, only a small portion of it burned away completely. From such a high vantage point Bree could see the shadow retreating, like the receding tides of an ocean. Fresh waves from the island’s edge surged forward to replace it, but at least it offered more time for the fleeing crowds. Bree watched the recession, noting something curious. The darkness moved like water, and when it retreated she saw there was a distinct point it retreated toward.

  “Is that you, L’adim?” Bree asked.

  A fresh surge of shadow crossed the emptied field, thin and narrow like a spear instead of the wide wave it normally spread. It smashed into a neighborhood near the outer edge of the city. The location of the weapon, Bree surmised. Knights hovered overhead, their frantic work not enough to spare the theotechs below. Fear wormed its way deep into her mind. The greatest weapon she’d ever witnessed had still meant nothing to the shadowborn. Could there be victory? Was it even possible, or would the crawling darkness eventually swallow them all like it had the rest of the world?

  Eyes locked on that center point, Bree kicked her wings back to full strength and soared over the graying Center landscape. After those first few waves it seemed like the shadow was completely retreating. Bree didn’t dare allow herself to hope. She raced overhead, careful not to lose sight of her goal. The receding waves of shadow seemed to lead toward that same point. Her gut tightened. L’adim. That’s where he had to be.

  The landscape turned bleaker and darker the closer she neared her objective. No tree survived. No building stood tall and proud. Everything had rotted and broken. The shadowborn did not create. He did not build. He only ruined what was once good.

  Not far now. The shadow roared beneath at a terrific pace, making a mockery of even the speed of her wings. It all pooled toward one area, amassing in size with frightening speed. Bree saw a faint ghost light ahead shining in the center of a swirling maelstrom of darkness and shadow. Johan stood in its center, and he smiled up at Bree as if she were a welcome guest.

  “Breanna!” he called to her as she slowed to a hover. “How great to see you’ve made it this far. I’d have been disappointed if you fell before my arrival.”

  Bree pointed her gauntlet at him. Johan tsked at her as he wagged his finger.

  “Do not insult me,” he said. “I have endured the wrath of nations. What are you compared to that?”

  The shadow pooled beneath him, lifting him higher and higher into the air. The crawling slowed, the substance solidifying. Rivers built about him, encasing him up to the waist. Bree felt her skin crawl at the sight. She wanted to release her flame, but what might she hope for when he was so protected by the shadow? Giant hands rose and fell in the darkness, each one reaching toward her before sinking back down into the murk.

  Johan melted into the darkness. His laughter faded to a haunting memory. The rivers rushed together, forming arms, legs, and hands. She could stay and fight. She could die like all the others in a futile gesture to halt the unstoppable.

  Bree turned and fled.

  CHAPTER

  32

  Liam flew through one of the grand windows of Heavenstone and landed. The knight didn’t give a damn that he was abandoning the battle outside, not that there even was a proper battle. The knights and soldiers were frantic children battling against a tide of shadow beyond all their comprehension. The ancient evil walked upon the holy ground of Center. They didn’t need soldiers and knights. They needed the divine intervention of the angels themselves.

  Liam went to Marius’s private quarters, found them empty. A lone guard stood before the open door of the room.

  “Where is the Speaker?” Liam shouted at him.

  “He’s not to be disturbed,” the guard said, taken aback.

  “Our island is at stake,” Liam said, grabbing him by the front of his armor and yanking him close. “Now where the hell is Marius?”

  The guard hesitated. Liam could tell he was terrified. Not of Liam, but of all that was happening beyond Heavenstone’s walls.

  “He’s gone to speak with the angels,” he said.

  Liam shoved him away and used his wings to zip down the halls. There was no time. Servants fled this way and that, interspersed with panicked guards and knights. Never before had Liam seen Heavenstone in such chaos. Did it speak to the level of danger they faced, or the lack of control Marius exercised over the people?

  His flight took him straight to the unassuming door they’d passed through on his previous visit with the angels. Liam flung open the door, expecting the room to be empty. Instead Marius sat at his desk, head in his hands. Tears trickled down his wrists as he silently prayed.

  “My Lord?” Liam said, feeling guilty. “Please, I must speak with you.”

  Marius looked up with red eyes.

  “Liam,” he said. “I’m so glad to see you. I prayed to God for the strength to do what must be done, but I fear I am not strong enough. I’m weak, Liam, frightened and weak, but you are here. You’ll be my strength.”

  “I don’t understand,” Liam said. He had come to urge Marius to save them all. The war against L’adim would not be won by knights and Seraphim. It would be won by the power of the angels deep within Heavenstone, and harnessed by the holy Speaker’s hand. “What task do you lack the strength for that I myself possess?”

  Marius rose from his seat and wiped at his eyes.

  “L’adim has reached our lands,” he said. “The shadow that swallowed the world will soon swallow us, too. I have failed the only task that ever mattered. Only one recourse remains, Liam. One last, desperate course.”

  The Speaker’s words were dire, and they carried a prophetic air that frightened Liam greatly.

  “What is that?” he asked.

  Marius reached out and lovingly placed a hand on Liam’s face.

  “Come with me to the angels,” he said. “Slay them, and let Center be swallowed by the ocean.”

  Liam’s entire body locked tight. It felt like he’d been stabbed in the heart.

  “Slay them?” he asked, his mind reeling. “But … but they are God’s messengers. And what of the people here? Hundreds of thousands will die.”

  “Hundreds of thousands have already died,” Marius said. His lips quivered, and his hands shook at his sides. “The rest are doomed. Don’t you see, Liam? The shadowborn is here. There is no defeating him. Even the Spear of God only chased away his shadow for a moment. Great armies of the old world all failed against his might and cunning. Who are we compared to those ancient empires? Little children hiding on a small speck of rock, that is what we are.”

  “But why slay the angels?” Liam asked. “Why not fight?”

  Marius lowered his head, and he stared into his desk as if it were the most important thing in all the world.

  “Did you witness Galen’s fall?” he asked quietly.

  “I did not,” Liam said.

  “I did,” Marius said. “The moment I heard the Beam was faltering I had my knights fly me close enough to watch the rescue attempts. I didn’t believe it would happen, Liam. I thought the Beam might weaken but the lightborn within would recover. The people would survive. The island would endure.”

  He slammed a fist atop the desk, startling the quiet with its thud. “But our world is not one of fairy tales, Liam. We wrap ourselves in the divine as if it means we are invincible, assured of survival no matter the terrors. Even I swallowed that lie, and it was only when I watched Galen crash to the ground that I reali
zed how precarious our lives are. No golden hands of God reached out to stop the island’s destruction. The Beam failed, and the island fell. It was that simple. That cruel.”

  Liam wished he knew what to say, but his faith was profoundly shaken. This was the Speaker for God and his angels, broken down and overwhelmed with doubt and fear. Everything Liam had ever trusted, that he’d ever believed, he’d given over to the man who was meant to save humanity.

  “Why do we speak of Galen?” he asked softly.

  “When Galen hit the water I felt the impact in the clouds,” Marius said. “It was as if the entire world quaked with sorrow and fury. That power … that power is the only thing I believe might have a chance to slay the shadowborn. No matter the cost, we must take it. We must send Center crashing down in an eruption so grand not even the betrayer may survive.”

  “All to slay the shadowborn?” Liam asked. “What does it matter if there are none left to live in his absence?”

  “You forget our place,” Marius said, rising up. “We are the protectors of humanity, not just those on Center. The other four islands will endure. Humanity will limp on, bloodied and small but alive. It is the only hope I have left to cling to, Liam. Now will you help me? Will you, with your blade, bring salvation and freedom to the outer islands? To your homeland, Weshern?”

  Liam’s insides coiled with uncontrolled fury. Confusion and terror lashed his soul with icy whips. What could he say? What was even right? Was this sacrifice truly worth so much?

  “Why must you ask this of me?”

  “Because I have not the strength,” Marius said. “But you do. You always have. That’s why I chose you, Liam. That’s what made you special. Now let go of your fear and follow me.”