Legon Awakening: Book One in the Legon Series (32 page)

Keither tried to get up but Kovos held him down.
“It’s ok,” he said.

“No it’s not, no it’s not! I looked into its eyes! We
are not ok!”

So much for hoping Keither wouldn’t remember.

“It’s going to be fine,” Kovos said soothingly.

“No it’s not, Kovos. I’m going to die out here and
it’s your fault—your fault I came with you to warn Legon, your
fault we left Salmont.”

“Keither, I’m-”

“You’re what? Sorry? You’re sorry for me getting
beaten, sorry for me watching someone die, sorry for all this?”

“I don’t know what to say other than-”

“There is no ‘other than’! This is your fault that I
am out here! If you want to go get yourself killed for Legon and
Sasha that’s fine, but you didn’t need to bring me into it!”
Presumably, Keither was only kept from yelling due to a massive
headache.

Kovos looked hurt. “Look, I can’t change what has
happened, and I told you that I was warning Legon about
danger.”

“Then why did you drag me along? Couldn’t you tell
that I didn’t want to be there? Or did you want proof for Emma that
you weren’t a horrible person and that you cared about people other
than yourself?”

Kovos’ face flushed and he gritted his teeth. “No, I
didn’t drag you along so I could make my girlfriend like me,
Keither. You wanted to come and then changed your mind. I wasn’t
going to let you go walking around in town with royal guard
around.”

“Oh yeah, and why is that?”

“Because you are helpless, that’s why. You don’t
think before you act, you don’t worry about consequences. How many
times have I had to pull you out of a sticky situation that you put
yourself in, huh? How many?”

“You only care about yourself. Don’t blame me.”

Kovos laughed coldly. “Only care for myself huh? Is
that what you think? What have you ever done for someone else,
Keither? Tell me, when have you helped at home? When have you ever
tried to pull your weight? This has been the most I’ve seen you
work in your life, and even then it’s what, taking down a tent? Oh,
never mind, you gave up some fat to help Legon keep your ungrateful
hide alive.”

* * * * *

Kovos felt anger seething in his body. He wanted to
hit Keither, wanted to smack him in the mouth. After all the
sacrifices he’d made for his younger brother…. But still, it was
his fault that Keither was out here, and he hadn’t been a good
person. He felt himself deflating. Kovos knew he was hard on the
boy, and it was obvious that Keither hated him. His own brother
hated him. It was etched in his face. But how could he change that
now? How could he show him that he did care and that he loved him?
Legon brought him back to reality.

“Shut up you two,” he hissed.

“But…” Keither was cut off by a hand to his
mouth.

“We have company.”

Kovos heard the sound of many feet coming their way.
From the trees in front of them, men in full armor spilled into
their little clearing. They were found. Their training took over.
Arkin and Legon took their places up front while Sara frantically
readied arrows for Sasha. As they approached, he felt Legon’s magic
making his muscles tighten with extra strength. Light glinted off
his sword as it was unsheathed and he saw out of the corner of his
eyes the shine of the fenrra.

An arrow hissed by him and buried itself deep in a
soldier’s shoulder. He felt the animal inside him coming to life,
the one that obliterated thought and feeling. The one that felt no
pain. The berserker. Before he let it take him one thought bubbled
in his mind
, “You will never see Emma again
.”

With that, the rage took over and he lunged forward
with a yell and brought the blade across his front with incredible
speed and force. It sliced the man in front of him across the
belly, spilling his intestines on the forest floor. The world was
in slow motion with the enhancements being made by the two Venefica
flanking him. He pushed the falling man aside and closed in on
another.

* * * * *

Keither stumbled over to the horses and retrieved
Legon’s giant cleaver. His job was simple: keep enemies away from
Sasha and Sara. He came lumbering back up, still feeling dizzy from
hitting the tree. Sara was handing arrows to Sasha at break-neck
speed, and Sasha in turn was shooting them at the oncomers. Keither
noticed that she wasn’t shooting to kill, but rather to injure and
incapacitate. He started as flashes of emerald and purple
illuminated the clearing. Legon and Arkin were fighting with magic.
He looked to see Arkin snap a man’s neck with a bolt of green
magic. Legon followed suit by firing a blast of amethyst light,
obliterating half of a man’s pelvis.

Keither was having a hard time following the magic
battle. Arkin, Kovos, and Legon were like blurs and they easily
felled ten men, but more came. One made it by Legon and ran at
Sasha. She didn’t see him coming. Keither needed to hit him with
the cleaver, but he couldn’t. He was too afraid. He dropped the
cleaver and fell back away from the oncoming soldier. Sasha turned
to see the man raise his battle axe. It started forward. Keither
couldn’t look and covered his face. Then came the sound of someone
hitting the ground… was she dead? He looked to see the man lying on
the ground, Kovos’ hunting knife protruding from the side of his
neck. A voice came.

“Keither!” It was Sara. He looked at her very red and
angry face. “Time to be a man. Do your job, got it?”

He stood and took the cleaver in his hands.

* * * * *

Sasha was aware that she had nearly been killed, but
thankfully she was almost in a full Mahann state and wasn’t feeling
emotion right now. She was taking full advantage of the Mahann and
the magic making her stronger. She was acting as the center of the
mental network with everyone connected through her. She could sense
the changes Legon and Arkin were making to spells, and who Kovos
was going to decapitate next. Sara was keeping her busy with a
steady amount of arrows which were quickly running out. Keither,
however, was not connected. He was too scared; his mind was closed.
Not that Sasha would have let him in with his current level of
fear. She couldn’t have an unstable emotion clogging her
network.

Sasha was aiming for major joints like shoulders and
hips. They were debilitating injuries and made the men scream
bloody murder. Hopefully there were a lot of conscripts in this
group and the screams of their comrades would take the fight out of
them. However, the strategy didn’t seem to be working, and a steady
stream of new soldiers was filling the clearing. She told Kovos to
move over a foot. As he did, she let an arrow go. It flew past the
man he was fighting but hit another square in the shoulder,
embedding itself in the joint. She continued to fire but paused as
she saw a new figure entering the clearing. Not even the Mahann
could stop the emotion this time.

A tall man in all black jumped into the clearing. His
long silver hair, thin face, grey skin, and yellow eyes struck fear
deep into her. The Iumenta had two fenrra in his hands and looked
at her. He was about fifty yards away,—well within range. He came
forward, covering ten yards in a few steps. She began to rapid fire
the arrows at him, not caring about hitting joints, just going for
a hit. He flicked the arrows away lazily with the fenrra as he
came. Kovos moved in his path, swinging his sword hard. The Iumenta
parried the blow and lashed out at Kovos.

* * * * *

Legon was aware that for the second time in his life
he was slicking the surrounding trees and landscape with other
people’s blood. This came to him after cutting a man’s throat with
the tip of the fenrra in his left hand. They now shined crimson
with their new coating. He moved forward coming, down close to the
ground in between two men. He pivoted on his right foot, swinging a
fenrra at a man’s leg, chopping the femur in half and severing the
femoral artery. More blood sprayed everywhere. As the leg came free
of its howling owner, Legon turned and with the other blade stabbed
the other man. He turned the tip of the fenrra so it effortlessly
passed through the man’s ribs, slicing lung and heart.

The soldier’s armor seemed to have little to no
effect on Arkin, Kovos, and himself. With the magical enhancements
to their bodies, they even cut through chainmail without issue.
Still, he was feeling a definite drain on his magic. In the
beginning he had been sure that there would only be a few of them,
but they didn’t seem to stop. Arkin was using his magic to fortify
their bodies from injury, so if a major vein was cut, the bleeding
would stop instantly. Sasha was managing the whole thing from a
distance, tapping into their minds and using logic to decide the
best amount of energy to be used and where.

Suddenly, on the other side of the clearing an
Iumenta stepped into view, and Legon felt his body go cold. Even
with magic helping them he wasn’t sure they could stop and Iumenta.
What if it was a Venefica? He felt Arkin’s emotions boil up in the
connection.

Sasha was shooting as fast as she could. He felt more
emotions, but this time from Kovos. They were ones of finality and
sorrow. His best friend stepped in the path of the Iumenta,
slashing hard at him. He was no match, but Legon and Arkin both
started dumping copious amounts of magic into Kovos, who was
fighting as hard as he could. He was starting to acquire minor
nicks and cuts but didn’t seem to care. The Iumenta was backing
away. Kovos was winning!

Still more and more men entered the area. Their camp
must be somewhere nearby. Legon could only see one way out. It was
going to knock him out, but it was their only hope. He felt magic
building in him and also sensed Sasha’s apprehension. The spell was
simple, really; it was just going to shred twenty or so men in the
area. In the pause Arkin could help Kovos and kill the Iumenta. If
they were lucky, when others arrived to see so many of their own
dead and a slain Iumenta, they wouldn’t pursue.

He felt the magic hit a point that it hadn’t ever
reached before, even more than the other day when blocking the
dragon. He released the spell, pointing the palm of his hand at the
rushing soldiers. Time stopped in that instant. He saw an orb of
lavender magic form in his hand and start to leave. It was size of
his head and tear-shaped. The tear was a translucent purple with
bright veins of lilac glowing around it. The smaller end stayed
connected to his palm. He’d never seen magic like this before. It
always had moved so fast; this was beautiful. It continued to
stretch, the tiny bit connected to him. Then, moving like water, it
snapped back to him, covering his hand and moving up his arm.

He tried to scream as he felt his skin tear and bone
shatter. His eyes were on fire. All he could see was magenta light.
He felt all of his spells failing as Sasha franticly attempted to
disconnect his mind from the others. The pain was unimaginable. He
wanted to die. He tried to cry out, but time was going too slow and
he couldn’t open his mouth. He opened his scorched eyes to see the
smoke that must be his own body burning from the magic. He begged
for mercy in his mind and felt something tugging at his
consciousness. A deep voice told him that he was worthless, but
that he would be made better. He remembered his dreams then, and
felt for hope, felt for Sasha and her love. The smoke in front of
his eyes cleared to reveal a massive wall of glittering diamonds.
They where white and radiated light. A horizontal seam in the wall
opened to reveal a violet blue eye the size of a shield.

“
When people look at my sister, they often don’t
see the pain of those early days, the days without comfort or
solace; but I do, and I love her for them. Had she not had the
strength to endure then, where would we be now?”

Sasha frantically worked to disconnect Legon from the
others. The moment the spell reverberated back on him she felt raw
magic course down the connection and with it, pain. All of Legon’s
spells failed simultaneously. She needed to disconnect him so that
Arkin could adjust for being one Venefica less than before. She
severed Sara’s connection, seeing her friend fall to the ground.
Lastly she cut her own. She looked at where Legon was supposed to
be, but all she saw was blinding lavender light. She covered her
face with her arm and fell back. She hit the ground, causing the
back of her head to buzz.

The light faded, and in front of her stood a figure
that resembled her brother, but it couldn’t be. He was the same
size as Legon with the same clothes and hair, but his skin seemed
to have a slight glow to it. Or maybe it was the light. She looked
to his ears, which were rounded before but now were tapered at the
tops, and from the side his eyes looked slightly larger and more
almond shaped. More . . . Elven.

She marveled at the Elf Legon standing in front of
her. Perhaps it was the sound of men screaming ‘Elf!’ that made her
look. She didn’t know. She turned to look at Kovos and the Iumenta,
who both stood stalk still, mouths gaping. Then, at the same time,
they seemed to realize that there was no longer magic protecting
Kovos. He slashed out at the Iumenta, who caught the blade with a
flick. She saw Kovos’ muscles twitch with magic as Legon
reestablished the connection with him, but too late. She could only
watch in horror as the Iumenta’s other fenrra came across Kovos at
his neck. Time ceased as Kovos’ head separated from his body as he
fell to the ground.

* * * * *

Keither watched in horror as his brother’s body fell
to the earth. Pain erupted from his knees as he hit the ground
himself. Legon cut a man in half and was now on the Iumenta, but
the outcome of their fight did not matter.