AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Lio had one chance to steal into Pakhne’s mind and take her back. Once he made a move to free her, he would betray his presence to the Old Master. Lio couldn’t give the Collector the chance to turn this into a duel—or to cut his losses.
A heartbeat passed. Deep within his concealments, Lio spun the mind magic inside him into a precise spell.
The bloodless heart hunter rose to its feet, its head reattached. It turned to join the battle.
Another heartbeat. Lio aimed the thelemantic attack.
Suddenly heat bathed his skin. The arcane heat of a fire spell about to be unleashed.
His gaze snapped to the battle again. Solia knocked Callen’s sword aside and took hold of his collar. With a shove that must have magic behind it, she tossed him out of the melee. Out of range of her fire spells.
One strike from Solia was about to make quick work of all these undead.
Then the Collector’s pawns would be off the board. And he would bring his better pieces into play.
Who would he possess first? What would he do to the child?
Callen staggered back toward Perita’s cot, into Mak’s circle of blood. Beside Lio, Lyros chanted one more word with blood-stained lips, and his spell sealed around them.
Lio probed the ward with his mind magic. But the spell structure resisted him. It wasn’t ready for thelemancy. If he poured his power into it now, he would only weaken Mak and Lyros’s hard-won defenses.
“We need more time!” Lio called to Solia. “Don’t destroy the bloodless yet.”
“You must be mad!” Solia scoffed over the rising notes of Pakhne’s lullaby.
She hacked through the wrist of another bloodless. But behind her, a different soldier rubbed the ragged flesh around its own wrist, adjusting its reattached hand. It made a swing at her with no less strength than before.
Solia parried the blow. “They’re too well made! Blades won’t be enough.” The heat grew in the air.
Goddess, let her understand. Let her trust him, just this once. “Distract them. Disable them. But leave him his pawns!”
Seven fires sprang to life. Her spell consumed each bloodless with beautiful, deadly precision.
With a cry of frustration, Lio cast his own spell deep into Pakhne’s mind.
The Collector inhabited her every thought and vein. He was in her memories, bantering with Benedict and discussing books with Ariadne. He was in her tears, trailing down her face at her sister’s promise dance.
Death magic spidered through the paths of her spirit that had been made for healing. Threads of necromancy spun out from her, cut strings that had been tugging the bloodless to and fro.
Lio traced every thread, seeking more of the necromancer’s victims. Through Pakhne, the Collector and Lio held every soul in Lord Hadrian’s camp in the palms of their hands.
The undead were the only stain of death in the camp, this woman the necromancer’s only foothold. If Lio could reclaim her, everyone would be safe.
She was strong. A lesser mage would have died already. But she was crumbling. Lio could feel the Old Master eating away at her to feed one more spell.
The Collector’s sickening magic reached out of Pakhne, ready to consume the other mortal spirits in the tent. Callen’s steadfast heart. Perita’s aura, fighting for life. The brave young woman beside her.
Lio spun thelemancy through the mortals and hardened his power into a mind ward.
The Collector’s grip closed around their minds and Lio’s, three blows at once. Pain erupted in his skull.
But the attack recoiled from his power. The necromancer retreated, chased by the slivers of Lio’s shattered ward.
There you are, Deukalion, the Collector said.
LIFE AND DEATH
All Cassia could do was cling to Perita’s hand from within Mak’s ward, while on the other side of the tent, her Grace dueled the Collector.
