Curse Of The Dark Wind (Book 6) (45 page)

Stephen notices a shimmer of movement out the corner of his eye and turns in time to see Luke a few feet away. He only has enough time to lean back, so the tip of the saber runs across his exposed neck. The thin cut burns and blood trickles down his throat, but the wound is not deep enough to be fatal.

“The weak one tries to hurt me,” the nobleman arrogantly says. He wills his magic to erase the injury, but blood continues dripping down his skin. Eyes widening in panic, he slaps at the wound and grimaces in pain. “This isn’t healing. Why is this not healing? I haven’t been truly injured in centuries. You don’t have magic blades or knowledge of spells. How did you hurt me, Callindor? What power did you get from Gabriel? I can’t even smell your power because you’re so weak. Why are you a threat to me!?”

Luke jumps back when Stephen takes a wild swing at him, the immortal crazed with fear and anger. Seeing an opening, the forest tracker spins his sabers and darts forward. Trinity is faster as she tackles her companion off the wall and they plummet toward the Widowhorn. Luke is about to dive after them, but stops when the pair vanish in a puff of violet smoke.

*****

Sari sits on the corner of the wall with her legs dangling over the edge and Fizzle napping in her lap. With a grimace, she forces herself to watch Nyx cremate the ladder of dead titans, their thick ashes drifting to mix with the snowy ground below. The caster has only been conscious for ten minutes, so Timoran and Delvin stand by to catch her if she collapses. Turning away from the burning corpses, Sari sees Luke is still arguing with the Brocken Dragon. It is not a conversation of actual words, but the two intricately manipulate the wind to communicate. The strong gusts and her friend’s wild arm movements make it obvious that they are not agreeing on something. A powerful snort knocks the half-elf over and the dragon flies away to tend to the Garden.

“It would be my luck to have a guardian that doesn’t like me,” Luke says as he takes a seat next to the gypsy. He puts an arm around her shoulders and hugs her as if he has not done so in years. “She thinks I’m an idiot for not accepting my true power. That’s why she refused to do anything about Stephen and Trinity. I had to prove I was worth her service by protecting the Garden.”

“You did drive them away, so why is she still angry?” Sari asks, placing her head on the warrior’s shoulder.

“Nyx did more fighting than me, which means I hide behind women. It doesn’t help that I can’t explain why Stephen panicked,” the half-elf groans, suppressing a chuckle. He kisses the girl on the head and enjoys the smell of her hair. “I feel like I should say something after all of this. Thank you isn’t really enough.”

“What about saying that you love me?”

“I love you, Sari.”

“And you love Kira.”

“I’m suddenly missing the Dark Wind.”

Sari removes his arm and smiles warmly at him, which is a look he knows means he is in trouble. She places Fizzle next to her and stands, placing a hand on Luke’s shoulder. He is already sprouting fur and feathers around his body in anticipation of getting playfully pushed off the wall. Instead, the gypsy hugs him from behind and places her forehead against his hair. The gentle act makes him worried about what she wants to talk about.

“I don’t know how much longer I can play this game,” she whispers, a few tears dropping onto the back of his neck. “It was fun when I didn’t want to win your heart, but now I fear the pain that we’ll put each other through. It’s worse because I don’t know where Kira stands on this. I once said she was the alpha, but her absence makes me feel like I should be the one who wins. If that’s the case then I don’t know if I’m winning because you love me more than her or because I’m simply here.”

“I wish I had an answer. If I had to choose now then it would-”

“Don’t say it,” Sari interrupts, pressing an icy finger to his lips. “Please don’t say anything that will make this worse. It’s already a mess and the two of us know it. Kira might even think so and there’s no way for us to know.”

“She slept with Caspar to get her father’s blessing and I’m in love with you. All of us are immoral bastards by my culture’s standards, but we’re fine by the traditions of Bor’daruk,” Luke carefully explains in a voice that betrays his anguish. He slips out of Sari’s arms by sliding off the wall, grabbing the edge, and flipping back up. “This isn’t even the real tradition because you and Kira have never met. I should have forced the issue in Gaia, but I was scared of what would happen. Now we’re at the point where someone is definitely going to get hurt.”

“That’s also my fault,” Sari says while she slowly spins and dances. Her skirts flow in the caressing wind as she lets the fluid movements calm her. “If I broke this off before I fell in love with you or never pushed you to admit your feelings then I’d be a fling. I took advantage of your situation and I let it go too far. So both of us are to blame for this. Well, all three of us because Kira could have told you to stop once she found out about me. She wanted this to be a competition and now she gets her wish. By the gods, Gabriel is probably having a lot of fun at our expense.”

Luke shoots her a sour expression and rubs his eyes, a feeling of exhaustion rolling over him. “This isn’t Gabriel. The three of us are to blame and we’re idiots. Every chance one of us has had to prevent this from getting messy was cast aside.”

“Well we’re stuck until we meet up with Kira again,” the gypsy says with a yawn. She stops dancing and crouches next to the warrior, staring into his eyes. “I don’t want to give you up, but I think we need to behave for a while. Understand that it pains me to suggest this and I’m doing it solely to put my own fears at ease. We no longer share a bed or kiss until we meet with Kira and put everything on the table. Brief hugs and playful flirting is all we can do. Maybe a kiss on the cheek if the situation is appropriate.”

“Where did this come from, Sari?”

She leans over to give Luke a gentle kiss on the mouth, the act making him worry that this will be the last time their lips touch. Part of him is also disappointed that he would think such a thing when he is engaged to Kira. When the warrior reaches out to caress her cheek, Sari pulls away and moves out of reach. Her eyes dart to the others, which he notices before she can glance in a random direction.

“Somebody said something,” he drones in disbelief.

“Yes, but not knowing that it would make me think of doing this,” Sari explains, stopping herself from putting her hands on his chest. She wiggles her fingers as if trying to think what to do with them. “Nyx pointed out that Kira isn’t here, which gives me the advantage. If there was bad blood between me and her then I’d be fine with this, but I have no personal issue with your fiancée. I’ve never even met her. Ever since I woke up with my champion powers, part of me has wanted to fight for you. I mean pounce on an enemy and wail on them type of fighting. Maybe it’s a side-effect that I have to learn to control, but it caused me to see Nyx as a threat. She shouldn’t be involved in this.”

“I agree,” Luke replies staring in the caster’s direction. He is stunned when the gypsy painfully jabs her finger into his chest. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Don’t you dare get angry at her. Nyx didn’t do anything wrong. This is all you and me. We’ve been avoiding making a decision and expecting things to sort themselves out. That has to end.”

“You’re right,” the half-elf sighs, forcing a crooked smile. “So we’re still together, but no couple stuff? This puts you on even footing with Kira since she’s absent, right? I can do that if you can.”

“It might take some time, but I can do it. I’m allowed one or two slip ups a week though because I’m only human . . . mostly,” Sari replies before taking a deep breath. She notices a flash of light by their friends and sees Timoran waving toward them. “Looks like something is happening. Just act natural and we’ll be fine.”

“Natural is us kissing and being openly touchy-feely with each other.”

The gypsy rolls her eyes and scratches Luke behind the ear, causing him to stomp his feet and blissfully stretch. “Then learn how to behave or I’ll treat you like a dog. Seems doing this brings Stiletto to the surface. I could get Nyx to play this game too.”

The half-elf raises his hands in surrender and waits for Sari to pick Fizzle up before leading the way to the others. Another burst of light erupts, but Timoran’s large frame is blocking their view of the source. It is only when they step around the barbarian that they see Nyx holding the Compass Key while Delvin secures a splint on her broken arm. The image hovering above the central pearl of the relic is of another mountain, smoke drifting from the top and a rolling expanse around the base.

“Where is that?” Luke asks as he gets closer to the image. He runs a finger along the mountain’s side, sensing heat from the vivid illusion. “I’m guessing a volcano, but the open space confuses me. Is that how areas around volcanoes typically look? I thought they were rockier.”

“Keep watching. This illusion has a surprise in a few seconds,” Delvin replies, finishing the splint and gently easing the caster’s arm down.

Luke leaps back with a yelp when an illusionary scorpion leaps out of the image and crawls along his chest. Sari slaps at the creature, but her hands pass through to strike the flailing forest tracker. The scorpion vanishes when Nyx hands the Compass Key to Timoran and snaps her fingers. She yawns and nearly collapses, Delvin being the only thing keeping the exhausted caster on her feet.

“I’ve had a long day and need to heal,” Nyx says in a hoarse voice. She walks over to hug Luke and Sari, wincing at the pain in her arm. “We’re heading for Bor’daruk. There’s rumored to be an ancient volcano in the desert, but the legend puts it deep in nomad territory. So we’ll be needing to talk to the Grasdon family for supplies, guides, and mounts.”

“So we’re going to visit Kira?” Sari asks, shooting a smile of relief at Luke. “I finally get to meet her?”

“We know this will be hard for you two,” Delvin answers. He notices Nyx slump and hurries to help the others with the snoring caster. “We want to stay here until the Day of Darkness passes. This will give us time to heal, fix the Garden of Uli, restock supplies, and prepare for the future.”

“Kira isn’t going to require too much preparation,” Luke states with a laugh. He sees the angry look on Sari’s face and rolls his eyes. “They’ll figure it out pretty quickly. Sari and I are taking a break until we can talk with Kira. So the sooner we get to Bor’daruk, the better. We can even leave earlier.”

Timoran shakes his head and approaches the forest tracker, placing a large hand on his friend’s shoulder. “You wounded Stephen and he appeared to be going into hysterics. We fear that he will be out for your blood and we are in no condition to fight him. This might be a situation where we are in trouble no matter what we do, but it is better to stay here where you can train. You are the only one of us who has truly wounded Stephen, which means we need you at your peak.”

Luke is about to protest when he sees the haggard look on his friends’ faces. After so much time defending him and struggling to keep the Dark Wind at bay, they are barely able to stay on their feet. He nods to Timoran and manipulates the wind to summon the Brocken Dragon, which takes longer than he would have liked. As if called from an urgent task, the emerald beast lazily flies to the champions and lands with her head on the ground.

“Climb on my disgruntled guardian and she’ll take you to get some rest,” Luke tells everyone, ignoring the snort from the dragon. “I’ll do my best to figure out what happened to my sabers and try to train myself to kill Stephen. Thanks for everything and let me do the hard work until we leave. I’ll even find a shield for Delvin.”

His friends climb onto the head of the guardian and the beast flies them to the glittering castle. The half-elf watches them go and holds up his hand with the Ring of Uli. The wooden jewelry does not do anything, but he is not surprised since he has a gut feeling that it has nothing to do with what actually happened. There was no surge of aura when he cut Stephen like when he struck the Lich with the undead killing powers of the ring.

“I didn’t even notice what had happened until he panicked,” Luke says to himself while he examines his dirt-covered hands. He replays the memory in his mind, but nothing strikes him as out of place. “I rejected my true power, so how did that happen? What did I do to myself by rejecting you?”

“Something that nobody expected,”
the griffin answers from deep within his mind.

*****

Standing atop the Widowhorn, an invisible Isaiah peers through the clouds to watch Luke practice. He never flinches when Gabriel appears next to him, the god’s ebony cape billowing in the whipping winds. The horned spiders retreat from the presence of the deity whose barely contained rage creates a visible aura of red around his body. Gabriel takes a deep breath and exhales, unleashing a bitter wind that whips up the distant piles of titan ashes. Standing still with his staff on his shoulder, Isaiah patiently waits for the god to speak.

“You know the fool better than me, my trusted hand,” Gabriel says in a surprisingly kind voice. “Please explain why he rejected his power and hurled part of my plan into the Chaos Void. Centuries of forging the perfect weapons for this prophecy and that idiot decides to stay weak. Who refuses power?”

“A Callindor, which is something you should have expected, my lord,” the fireskin replies with a respectful bow. He faces the god, daring only to stare at his master’s chest. “Remember that this has happened before with Callindors refusing to step onto the prophetic path in the first place. Luke is the first to go in the right direction, but he still comes from the line that you nurtured outside of this game. There were bound to be some surprises by inserting one of their breed into these events.”

“He’s too weak to survive. He may have gained some power, but it won’t be enough.”

“As you said, I know Luke Callindor better than you,” the fireskin states, choosing his words carefully. “You acknowledge that free will plays a part in these events and he has proven that more than the other champions. I trust Luke to do what we never dreamed would happen. Will he survive? I doubt it too, but I feel that he will do great things before his time comes to an end.”