“I do,” Draven replied. “And I also know you will stop at nothing to get them back in one piece. They’re under Azazel’s control now, forced to slither around as Destroyers, but they can be cured if we defeat him. Like you, they deserve to live in a kind and peaceful world, not this boiling pot of darkness and poison, and you know it.”
“We’re rusty,” Ori said. “And we’d barely made it to the Twentieth Circle when Destroyers raided the Grand Temple. We don’t know enough to be effective in a fight against Azazel. He was a Master Druid, after all…”
“We have all the knowledge and spells you need.” I gave them a reassuring wink. “We secured the Druid archives, and we have swamp witch magic on our side as well. We’ve got you covered.”
Another minute passed, during which they looked at each other. I recognized both glimmers of hope and jolts of fear in their eyes. In the end, when they glanced back at us, there was determination settling in among them.
“We don’t even know what’s been happening since we landed here,” Ori replied.
“Oh, we’ll fill you in on the way there.” I smiled.
They inched forward, one by one. Curiosity and the desire to destroy Azazel seemed stronger than their defenses. They’d been here for so long, I couldn’t blame them for desperately wanting to get out.
They looked at each other and nodded firmly.
“That creep ruined our lives. When do we leave?” Dain asked, his chin high.
I couldn’t help but feel relieved. Ecstatic, even. It had taken less than I’d expected to persuade them to join the alliance. Draven had made a good point of it the day before, when he’d said that young Druids are naturally full of energy—the best example he could think of was himself. They weren’t calm and composed and patient enough to settle into a home. Most importantly, they understood that their so-called safety wouldn’t last for much longer.
It was only a matter of time before Azazel’s forces came crashing down on them. Draven had given them all the arguments they needed to react, to stand up and join the fight. They probably would’ve come out fighting sooner, if someone had reached out to them. They’d been left to rot in the desert, with years of energy and hatred toward Azazel simmering beneath the surface. No wonder they were so revitalized once they heard about the alliance. They were itching for a fight about as much as we were, if not more.
Draven took my hand, sending warm pulses through my body. I felt his energy, his determination, and his eagerness to take the Druids home to Antara and bring the fight to Azazel. His mind burned with the many ways in which this could go down.
We both felt the same way—no matter what happened, we would fight together and take that monster down. The world depended on us.
We were on to something very good here.
Aida
A few hours passed, and I’d done my share of physical training in the grand hall, tossing Jovi around a couple of times before he knocked me off my feet. I washed the soreness off with a cold shower and decided to reach out to Vita again.
They were most likely out of Luceria by now.
I sat on the bed and tuned everything out. My projections worked better each time, as I’d finally learned to attune my own body to the universe, and pluck at the connection between us Oracles. I caught the invisible thread of Vita’s heartbeat and allowed the darkness around me to dissipate.
The clearer the image before me became, the colder my blood froze in my veins.
Dread took over, and my heart jumped into my throat, refusing to back down.
I was standing on the dreaded top platform of Luceria, where Azazel kept his Oracles.
Abrille and the other two were just where I’d left them, but a fourth glass sphere had been given an occupant. Vita was suspended in the clear liquid, slowly peeling her eyes open, her gaze finding mine.
“Oh, no, Vita…” My voice trembled, and the tears came up so fast I nearly choked on them. “What… What happened?”
Her eyes widened as she became aware of her surroundings. She called out my name—I could see it on her moving lips, but only a muffled noise came out from beneath the glass.
A loud bang startled me.
I looked around, but saw nothing that could have caused the sound. The platform was clear and the jungles silent around Luceria.
Another bang.
This time I understood it was coming from the physical world, where I’d left my body, in Stonewall.
Vita and I looked at each other, horror draining the color from our faces.
I wanted to stay there and see what had led to her entrapment, but a third bang ripped me back into consciousness.
“Vita, no!” I cried out.
I felt myself unravel, sucked back into my own flesh.
Aida
A fourth bang on the door made me shudder as I jumped out of bed. A fifth one followed, as the sound of footsteps rumbled out in the hallway.
“What the hell?” I growled, furious that I’d been torn out of my connection with Vita. She was trapped in a glass bubble, and there’d been no sign of Bijarki or Patrik anywhere. My mind instinctively assumed the worst, and my stomach tightened.
I opened the door and saw Rebel’s protective detail, the full garrison of about forty Bajangs running down the hallway. They kept knocking on the doors, growling as they headed for the cloaking spell’s limestone wall leading outside. They carried weapons and large metal plates on their chests and shoulders. And they looked incredibly pissed off.
Some of the doors they knocked on opened. Bajang cubs came out and ran in the opposite direction. I saw the two little ones that had shown me to my room running toward me from the left, their faces pale with fear.
“What’s happening?” I asked them, my heart thudding already.
“We’re under attack!” one of them said. “There were some of us outside, going out to hunt, and the monsters came out of nowhere! They were hidden beneath the steps, waiting! We have to hide in the grand hall if we’re under attack. There’s an escape hatch there that leads down to the beach!”
“Come with us!” the other one cried out, with tears in his eyes.
I felt a pang in my stomach, but I knew I couldn’t go with them. I shook my head, then grabbed my sword and one of the shields we’d nabbed from the Destroyers.
“I can’t, I’m sorry!” I said. “You go. I’ll come get you as soon as I can!”
They both nodded, then shifted into their feline forms and tumbled up the hallway toward the grand hall along with the rest of the kids.
I ran after the garrison and slipped through the limestone wall with the last of them. My pulse was erratic, and my skin felt hot. We rushed through the courtyard, and I stopped at the top of the stone stairs, staring in disbelief.
My stomach dropped at the sight of about two hundred incubi and succubi attacking Stonewall. Except they weren’t really themselves. Their skin was pale, almost white, their bodies twitching and their eyes black. A chill ran down my spine.
“Sluaghs,” I gasped, realizing what I was looking at.
I looked down and saw some of the Bajangs, Anjani, Jovi, and Field standing at the bottom of the steps along with Jax, his wards, and the mutated shifters, shooting poisoned arrows and chopping limbs with their swords whenever the Sluaghs got too close.
The rest of the Bajangs came down and immediately joined the fight, going forward and slashing left and right. But the Sluaghs weren’t easy to kill. They were fast, and they could keep going even with a stab wound or two.
“Chop off their heads!” I cried out.
It was the only thing they could do to render the bodies useless, leaving the Sluaghs in their weaker, worm form. I drew my sword and mentally prepared myself to join the battle.
Phoenix rushed to my side, loading his crossbow with nervous hand movements.
“Azazel must know we’re here,” he breathed out.
“But how? He can’t feel us anymore!”
“He must have traced
us till here, before we got the Druid’s spell.” he grunted, and ran down the stairs.
I followed, anger simmering in my muscles, quickly replacing the initial feeling of dread. There was no way I was going to let these disgusting fiends ruin our plan or threaten the lives of innocent Bajangs sheltered in Stonewall.
Rebel swiftly ran past me, morphing into a large feline mid-jump. She was huge, and I couldn’t help but admire her graceful sprint. She reached the living wall of Sluaghs trying to break through our defensive ranks and pounced on them, viciously tearing off heads wherever she could.
The others in her garrison quickly took note and changed into their feline forms, following her lead. It left Anjani, Field, Phoenix, Jax, and Hansa to use their swords and fight with all their might, aided by the wards’ mind-bending skills. Phoenix pushed out barriers, while Field flew over and came down with the hatchet, chopping away at the Sluaghs.
Hansa and Anjani were particularly energized, baring their white teeth as they sliced through the Sluaghs, while Jax had his double swords out, his eyes glimmering yellow as he planted suggestions in the hostiles’ heads before he chopped them off.
The worms crawled out and scattered into the grass, but there were still many Sluaghs standing, well over a hundred.
I had about twenty steps left. I picked up the pace, nearly flying over them.
I heard hissing above. My stomach churned. I looked up and saw a massive black shadow seconds before it rammed into me.
I screamed as I was picked off the stairs mid-jump, dropping my shield and sword in the impact. A Destroyer riding a flying horse had gotten hold of me, his arm coiled around my ribcage and squeezing tight, cutting off my air supply.
“What the…” I looked up in horror as I recognized Goren, who was sneering at me, his forked tongue flitting in the air.
“Don’t be stupid, little Oracle!” His mocking laughter boomed in my ears. “Azazel knows what you and the other one look like. While he could still sense you, he did a few spells and tracked you here before you fell off the radar. You’re done for!”
“No!” I screamed again, then looked down.
I watched as a second Destroyer plunged down from the sky and knocked Field down, letting him fall in the middle of a knot of bloodthirsty Sluaghs.
This can’t be, my mind screamed at me.
“Field!” I cried out, and struggled against Goren’s hold, but it was no use. I could only feel my ribs cracking, not his arm loosening.
One of our mutated shifters jumped up and morphed into a flying horse, coming after us. I prayed to all the possible gods for it to reach us and get this monster off me before he threw me at Azazel’s feet.
A third Destroyer swooped in and snatched Phoenix before anyone could react. Jax tried—I could see his eyes glowing yellow—but the Destroyer flew upward in a zig-zag, and the Mara couldn’t catch him with his mind-bend in time. Phoenix struggled against his captor before the hilt of the Destroyer’s sword smashed down against his skull, and he went limp.
None of this was okay.
With every step we took forward, Azazel managed to pull us back by two.
Serena
The young Druids came back to the western shore with us and they brought us up to speed with what they’d been doing since they arrived on Marton. The flying horses they’d brought with them didn’t stay for long. They flew back as they couldn’t stand the high noon temperatures of the desert. It turned out that the creatures were dependent on a milder climate and were quite independent, despite the young Druids’ efforts to keep them around.
They met with Jasmine once every full moon, until she stopped coming. When Draven told them she’d been seen hiding on Antara, Malachy and Ori were the first to express their anger and contempt. Had she at least warned them, they would’ve kept the others from checking the western shore and getting killed or taken by Destroyers.
Once we reached the ship, we relieved the two succubi that had been left behind to stand guard. Draven and I gave them our horses so they could reach the rest of the Green Tribe safely.
The stallions galloped down the black stone passage that Draven had pulled out of the ocean to connect the ship to the shore. Once we watched the two succubi vanish behind the palm trees lining the beach, we got on the ship.
The Druids and I followed Draven’s precise instructions in lifting the anchor and setting the sails, after which he muttered under his breath and a flash of white light left his body. The waters around us soon moaned as the shipped was pushed out onto the ocean, stunning the Druids.
“Whoa,” Ori gaped at Draven as he held on to one of the pillars. “Where’d you learn to do that?”
Draven smirked and pulled the Druid scrolls we’d brought from Stonewall out, and tossed them over to them. They anxiously unraveled them, studying the spells with broad smiles.
“It’ll take us a few good hours to reach Stonewall,” he said. “So, you might as well start reading up.”
Draven used the ocean in our favor again, using his newly acquired skills to send the ship cutting across the waters and covering hundreds of miles in one tenth of the time it would’ve normally taken for a vessel of this size to travel from Marton to Antara.
The ship slowed down as we approached Stonewall, the grey citadel rising proudly on the rocky shore, its derelict harbor waiting quietly below. Draven steered and docked the vessel beautifully, with a little help from the foamy waters. I couldn’t help but watch with fascination as he manipulated the waves to get us safely back on dry land.
As soon as we climbed off the ship and rushed up the stone steps leading to the eastern terrace, I got a whiff of burnt wood and flesh. My stomach instantly churned, and I looked over my shoulder to find Draven frowning.
“You can smell it too?” I muttered.
He nodded and we picked up the pace, followed by the young Druids.
We reached the terrace above and I could see threads of black smoke rising from the other side of the citadel. I couldn’t push the anxiousness back so I stopped and used my True Sight to look through the stone walls and identify the source of the smoke and its unpleasantly familiar smell.
I saw Jax, Field, Hansa, Anjani and the others on top of the front steps leading into Stonewall, with hundreds of incubi and succubi bodies burning at their feet. Dread came over me in waves of hot and cold as I ran into the citadel and rushed through the maze of corridors leading to the front side.
“Serena, what did you see?” Draven called out from behind.
“Something’s horribly wrong,” I replied, breathless as we crossed the courtyard.
I caught glimpses of Eva and Bajang cubs watching from the open windows, their faces shadowed by frowns. I didn’t like any of the feelings I was getting from the atmosphere.
We reached the steps and I stopped next to Anjani and Hansa, looking down at the massacred bodies blazing in the afternoon sun. Worms crawled from the piles, squealing and flailing. Some succumbed to the flames, while others made it out and vanished below the tall meadow grass.
“Oh, no,” I gasped, realizing what I was looking at.
“Sluaghs,” Draven breathed out next to me.
I looked at Anjani and Hansa first, and noticed the charcoal smudges and the deep cuts on their arms and legs. Hansa was holding her right shoulder, where a deeper wound pushed out silver blood.
Jax paced around furiously, while Field was slumped on one side against the wall as Rebel nursed his bleeding side with wet cloths. Several Bajangs were left from her garrison – I counted about a dozen. They’d just finished burning all the bodies and they all carried deep wounds on their arms and legs. Jax’s wards helped them up as well.
I didn’t see Phoenix or Aida anywhere, and the thought alone made my heart constrict in my chest. There were four shifters left, licking their wounds in front of the fire below, occasionally snapping their fangs around an escaping Sluagh and tearing it to shreds before spitting it out.
Jovi came running
back from the meadow, sword and shield in his hand. He was livid.
“What happened?” I managed to ask as soon as he reached us.
He ignored me completely, dropping his gear and ramming his fist into the wall with a thunderous growl. He punched the stone over and over again, cracking its surface.
“They found us,” Field mumbled, his voice barely a whisper. He was too weak to move and, judging by his pale complexion, he’d lost a considerable amount of blood.
“They took them,” Anjani’s voice trembled as she looked away, unable to face me.
“What… What do you mean?” I whispered, breaking into a cold sweat. Somehow, I already knew what they were going to tell me. “Where are Phoenix and Aida?”
“They took them!” Jovi shouted and threw another punch into the wall, leaving blood smears behind.
“Azazel must’ve tracked the Oracles here before you put them under the concealment spell,” Hansa said, a vein jumping in her temple as she looked down at the burning bodies. “They sent Sluaghs through the front, waiting beneath the stairs for some of the Bajangs to go out hunting. They attacked in large numbers, forcing the rest of us to come out and fight. It was a ruse, meant to throw us off and had Destroyers swoop in and snatch Phoenix and Aida…”
“I tried to mind-bend them, so did my wards, but they moved fast. They knew what they were dealing with,” Jax muttered, fists balled at his sides.
“I’m sorry, we tried… We tried to get them back,” Anjani said, tears streaming down her cheeks. “We tried…”
She fell to her knees and shuddered, no longer able to hold it in.
I lost my footing altogether and nearly fell backwards, but Draven caught me and held me up. I couldn’t feel my legs anymore. I should have screamed. I should have cried. But I couldn’t.
A catatonic state swallowed me whole and put me in a deep state of shock. My blood chilled as I struggled to stay conscious.
My brother had been taken. Aida had been taken.