AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I looked desperately for Kai, just wanting to see my mate. I could feel through my bond that he was alive and he was safe, but I still wanted the assurance of his presence. However, as much as I scanned the line of our fighters back and forth, I couldn't see him anywhere. In fact, although I could smell a small number of shifters, I couldn't see a single one.
That was most certainly strange.
Then I noticed a strange shimmer to the air—one that’d only been the barest of a suggestion in my peripheral vision before but now stood out like rippling, translucent water across the sand. Oh, I was quite certain that was fae magic, but why was I able to see it so much more clearly?
Had being mated really altered me so much? I knew Kai had spoken about the boost it would give him that would allow him to face his father, but I'd never thought the effect would be so pronounced for both of us. Yet as I stood on the beach, facing off against an army bigger than any that’d attacked Fort Canid, after healing dozens of people and hauling them out of the rubble, I still felt like I had enough power within me to make a difference. Who knew? Maybe if I had done this long ago instead of fighting so much, I might have had the strength to break my curse all on my own.
“What do we do?” Darla asked, and I understood why her tone was so bleak. The coming battle was not going to be easy. Many of us would die. But I would do my best to try to stop as many Vekan’s forces as I could. I didn't want any more fae blood spilled for us. Already, there was too much red across the ground of Blath.
“I think the fae are up to something,” I answered quietly, trying to ignore the way my heart beat in my chest. “I can see they're using their magic to obscure something.”
Fae magic was such an interesting thing. What I'd learned while being on the islands was that not every single fae could wield the magic and cast the illusions that their kind were so famous for, but every fae could feel magic and had a connection to it.
“What do you think it is?”
I had an idea, but I didn't get chance to even verbalize it before the Vekan forces increased the speed of their charge and reached whatever target the fae had set. They hadn't quite reached the line of civilians, but they were most certainly close: a full line of cryptids and armor, shifters in their animal forms, and all sorts of other magical creatures who were there to spill blood. There were just so many of them; an impossible number. This wasn't a situation we could run away from or one where we could outsmart them. If we didn't want to abandon the citizens of Blath, we would have to fight here and now, and while Kai was worth one hundred Vekan soldiers, even before the boost from completing our mating bond, the ratio was so much worse than that. Thousands to one.
How could we hope to win?
After everything we’d done, everything we’d been through, would our entire journey end on a beach on an island far away from the home we were trying to save?
I wouldn’t allow that to happen. Not when I had just gotten the ability to live, and there was more at stake than just getting to experience so many things that’d been walled off from me for so long. There was the future to think about. All those children we’d help find a parent or guardian to get them to safety while the island was being attacked. Didn’t they deserve a chance? Didn’t they deserve to live? Not to mention people like me, where their cruel circumstances had locked them away from so many things for too long. They all deserved a life free of the tyranny of the king and free of the war.
So, we couldn’t lose. Somehow, despite the impossibility of it all, we had to persevere.
“Look!” Darla cried, pointing as several things happened all at once.
First was that the shimmering, mirage-like magic disappeared entirely, revealing about a dozen different clusters of Blath citizens, each cluster having about thirty or so people. These ones were far more armed, and if they weren’t, it was because they were in animal form.
Shifters! I knew I’d scented them.
Then there, at the center, stood none other than Kai. He looked so majestic in his wolf form, coat shining in the tropical sun. Was he… bigger? No. That couldn’t be true, yet as he charged forward toward the advancing Vekan soldiers, it certainly seemed that way.
I should have expected something like that, as we’d used similar techniques at Fort Canid, but never with fae magic before, and even though it wasn’t something that could singlehandedly turn the tide of battle, it certainly would help our much smaller forces.
But a telltale crackle in the air tore my gaze away from my beloved mate. Although my enhanced sight wasn't sharp enough to make out individual faces on the still-docked warships, I could make out what were obviously groups of magic users on each of the boats.
And that wouldn't do at all.
“Darla," I said as calmly as I could. “Can you use your mental influence on the boats?”
The psychic looked studiously toward the nearest vessels. “I want to say yes, but that will be the longest range I've ever tried. I really need to get closer.”
“Then, get closer,” I said. “I'll cover you.”
“What do you want me to put in their brains?”
“How about that the other ships are full of enemies?”
Despite the dire circumstances, Darla sent me a brilliant, bloodthirsty grin. “Oh, I do so like the way you think. All right, Healing Hermit. You have my back.”
With a jaunty salute, Darla ran closer to the docks. I didn't follow her, instead climbing up a beautiful garden lattice to get an even higher vantage point on a tall building. It would be easier if I were closer, but I just didn't have time. Every delay allowed the Vekan forces to get closer and put the citizens of Blath in much more danger.
Reaching deep within myself, I grabbed the churning magic I had inside and ordered it into the shape of protection. With another look at the battlefield to make sure my aim was true, I thrust my hands out and threw the hardest, strongest line of shielding I could down the entire beach.
It burned my finger slightly as it left my body, but I hardly even noticed it as I watched the line of brilliant blue blitz its way through the sand. It wasn't anything with staying power, lasting less than ten seconds or so, but it was just enough for the charging line of Vekan soldiers to run face first into the suddenly solid object. It was like something out of a slapstick movie, the way they splatted against the hard shield, then crumpled.
For a moment, the air was filled with the clattering sound of their armor slamming against my barrier, then falling to the ground. My shield disappeared, but that was all right, because the line of charging enemy soldiers near the front promptly tripped over the fallen forces in front of them. It was a mass of bodies that forced the middle bulk of the attacking forces to slow down. The shield put them on their toes, letting them know they didn't have quite the advantage they thought they would. That we, the downtrodden, the people they were trying to massacre, had teeth. They would not come out of this unscathed.
