Rise of Legends (The Kin of Kings Book 2) (34 page)

Terren looked back at her as he continued to lead, his brow furrowed in concern.
Why won’t he look elsewhere?

Soon his worried stare started to annoy her. “What?” she challenged.

The headmaster looked to Warrior Sneary over his other shoulder. “Get Steffen Duroby over here.”

After a quick nod, Sneary was off.
Good, Steffen will end this annoying conversation.
Sneary quickly came back, holding the rather confused chemist by his leather armor.

Terren didn’t let a moment pass. “Fix Effie.”

Reela added, “She doesn’t feel fear or empathy.”

“Oh no.” Steffen grimaced. “You had the tea this morning, didn’t you, Effie?”

“So?” she spat out.

He glanced up at Terren with a guilty look. “As soon as I found out lamwin tea was being served with breakfast, I tried to stop Effie from drinking it, but I couldn’t find her in the dining hall.” He shot a look at Reela. “I was hoping you would remember what I said about lamwin amplifying the effect.”

“How was I supposed to know what tea was in our cups? Anyway, you said the caregelow in the potion would cure the poison soon after it affected her memory. I didn’t think anything she ate after that would make a difference.”

“It does. There are still traces of”—he nervously glanced at Terren, then back—“the substance I gave her in her body. It can react with what she consumes. Don’t you remember I mentioned lamwin leaves yesterday?”

“You’re assuming too much here, Steffen,” Reela argued. “I couldn’t possibly have thought to ask the kitchen staff what tea—”

“What does this mean for Effie?” Terren interrupted.

The chemist moved around the marching men and women to stand beside her. He reached down to take her face in his hands, but Effie jerked away. “Why are you touching me?”

“I want to look at your eyes and skin for any signs of more serious issues.”

She tried to remain patient as he stared, but she felt like kneeing him in the groin. As if sensing her aggression, he stepped back.

“I think she’s still in good health, just not of sound mind.”

“How long will it last?” Terren asked.

“I’d say less than a day if I had to give an answer, but I can’t truly know.”

“Fine, Effie stays for now.” Terren sent Steffen back to his spot with a quick wave of his hand. Everyone kept some distance from Effie after that.

She became bored as she walked. Battle couldn’t come soon enough.

*****

Sanya held her mother’s hand firmly as she hurried through Raywhite Forest. Lori’s grip was loose, her hand always threatening to slip away. At first, Sanya thought her mother was simply fatigued from the exhaustion of running in a body that wasn’t her own. But now she was certain something else was wrong. It was as if she didn’t want to touch Sanya.

Lori went through vicious mood swings as well, from weeping to screaming in anger. She wouldn’t listen to Sanya’s requests to be quiet, acting like a child who couldn’t understand the situation they were in, as much as Sanya tried to explain it.

Half of Tauwin’s men from Trentyre would soon join the others already watching the forest, and some of them already had come far enough north for Sanya and Lori to hear them. It seemed like they were everywhere, pushing her and her mother toward the edge of the forest, and closer and closer to the Academy.

These men couldn’t have received the order to kill her or “Bliss” yet, but they would by the end of the day, so Sanya couldn’t let herself or her mother be captured.

She still needed to figure out somewhere to go. But where? No one loyal to Tauwin would let them live, and neither would anyone from the Academy. The forest was just as dangerous as any of the cities now that Tauwin had ordered so many men to patrol. That left trying to change their identities and settling in one of the cities, or living out in the wild with the threat of being hunted by Krepps, or living in Tenred, which seemed like the best option. The biggest problem was getting there. Sanya would have to take her mother through or around the Fjallejon Mountains, and both routes were guarded heavily.

She wondered if she could make a portal there. She’d only ever made one, and it was to the spiritual world, but making another that led from one place to another in the physical world didn’t seem too different in theory. She just needed a working akorell stone.

It would be night in a few hours, and Lori desperately needed to sleep. “Just a little further,” Sanya told her. She hadn’t yet found somewhere to hide where Tauwin’s troops wouldn’t stumble upon them.

After another hour of looking, she came to an enormous cave with large rocks blocking its entrance. They’d made good time getting there, so they had a good lead on their pursuers.

“Help me clear these rocks,” she told Lori. “And we’ll stay in here.”

But rather than lifting the first of many heavy stones, Lori pushed one from the top of the stack so that it tumbled down noisily and crashed against the dirt.

“Lift them so you don’t make noise,” Sanya said, some of her irritation slipping out in her tone.

She worked quickly while Lori moved slowly and without coordination as she lifted the rocks awkwardly, groaning as she stumbled away from the pile to drop them.

They went on working and nearly had cleared enough for both of them to squeeze through when Sanya heard something coming not from the south, where Tauwin’s men were fast approaching, but from the north—the direction of the Academy.

“Wait, listen,” Sanya said so her noisy mother would stop.

It was more of a feeling than a sound, a deep rumble as if a massive creature shook the ground. She squinted as she looked through the trees. Bodies filled the gaps in the distance.

“It’s the Academy’s army,” she said with horror, then hurried to clear the last few rocks in their way. Her mother stared in the direction of the approaching army and didn’t move.

“The Academy?” Lori asked. “Kyrro Academy?”

The school had existed during Lori’s time, but in her mind, it was probably just a training ground of the enemies of her husband and of her king. These men and women were no threat to her when she was Lori, and they still weren’t a threat to her as Bliss, but they would kill Sanya without question. She’d be safer being captured by Tauwin’s men. At least then, she’d have a chance to escape with her mother.

“We can’t let anyone see me,” Sanya said, then grabbed her mother’s hand. She had to pull Lori toward the cave as if she was stupefied by an amazing sight. Once Lori finally realized she was being dragged into the cave, she ripped her hands out of Sanya’s grasp.

“Don’t pull!” she snapped. Then she looked ready to cry. “I’m sorry.”

Sanya was used to these strange reactions by now. “It’s fine, just hurry and keep quiet.” She hoped no one had heard Lori. But more than that, she hoped whatever her mother’s affliction was, it would fade with time.
She just needs rest,
Sanya told herself.

She looked over her shoulder to find a woman from the Academy’s army had begun sprinting toward them. There was no time to put the rocks back.

Sanya ran, but Lori fought her to slow down. Her mother had one hand pressed against her forehead and grimaced as if in pain. Sanya used psyche to try to determine the problem. She was shocked at the agony within Lori’s mind. Quickly, she soothed her mother as best she could. However, most of her concentration went into drawing in bastial energy from the ground, the dirt around them, and from her own body. She clustered it in a small sphere in front of them, far enough so her skin wouldn’t burn as the sphere provided much needed light.

The cave had one path to follow, and it was big enough for a giant. It sloped down steeply, making it difficult to run without falling, especially while she was managing her mother’s pain and keeping control of the white ball of bastial energy in front of them.

It wasn’t long before she faintly heard aggressive shouting through the walls, telling her the battle had begun. Not too distant explosions shook the walls of the cave, shaking out dust from overhead. Tauwin’s army in the forest must’ve been closer than she realized and had gathered after spotting the Academy’s army. Out of all the noise, the familiar voice of a woman seemed closer than the rest.

“Stop!”

“She went down here!” yelled another familiar voice.

“You’re not yourself, remember?” screamed the first. They were coming closer. “Stop, Effie!”

Effie and Reela,
Sanya realized, her heart now thumping against her chest. It seemed that Effie was chasing after her and wouldn’t stop no matter what. Sanya might be able to kill them both, but it would be a tough battle. She had no blade and no hope that her mother was capable of fighting. She could pain them both with psyche, maybe choke them to death one at a time, but Effie might be able to get a fireball off as she almost had the last time they’d faced each other. And Reela was certainly no foe Sanya ever wanted to face, with her psyche being second best at the Academy and her years of training at resisting psyche.

Sanya could disrupt the bastial energy in the air as she had last time, making any mage or psychic incapable of controlling it. But that would also prevent her from using psyche, as well as leave them in complete darkness. She was far more skilled than the two women in melee combat, but anything could happen in the dark. It was better to run.

Reela continued to yell for Effie to stop. Sanya hoped that Reela could talk some sense into her friend. It was insane for Effie to want to battle Sanya here, just as much as it was insane for Sanya to face them.

“We have to go back and help our army!” Reela continued. “They’re fighting
right
now
.”

“I know and I don’t care. Sanya is going to die first, then all of Tauwin’s.”

Sanya hadn’t gotten to know Effie well, but the small mage hadn’t ever seemed this confident. Had Alex, in the dog’s body, not yet gotten to her in the Academy? Sanya had hoped that would make Effie feel at least a little better.

Sanya barely could make out the end of the long passageway, unable to tell what was beyond. This clearly wasn’t naturally made.
The Slugari colony,
she realized
. Of course
. Sanya had never met a Slugari, but she knew their history. They no longer dwelled beneath Kyrro, and they probably had closed off the route they took to the north so they couldn’t be followed. But there must be somewhere to hide among the connecting caverns.

No wonder this tunnel is so large. Their dajrik must’ve made it.

“Who is out there who wants you dead?” Lori asked, panting heavily.

“Someone from the Academy.” Her mother slowed considerably. “What are you doing?”

“I can’t keep running.”

“We have to.” Sanya pulled harder, but her mother fell and lost all effort of standing.

“I can’t,” she pouted. “Leave me.”

Before Sanya could think of what to do, a great silhouette filled the yawning opening at the bottom. The creature, three times the size of a man, let out a deep roar. It ran toward them, rumbling the ground and startling Sanya. She lost her concentration on the bastial energy, but they didn’t fall into complete darkness as her light went out. Effie and Reela were close by with a light of their own.

The tip of Effie’s wand began to glow—the gathering of bastial energy. Sanya jumped on top of her mother. The hot fireball flew over her back and crashed into the sloped roof of dirt. A bright explosion erupted as it struck, loosening enough dirt to form two tall mounds between Sanya and the dajrik.

It slowed the beast enough for Sanya to read his bastial energy. This was not the tranquil dajrik living with the Slugari but some other one, driven by rage.

She hurt him severely with psyche, causing him to collapse and bellow in agony. But he’d fallen more out of shock than anything else, and he’d already gotten back on one foot.

Without a blade, Sanya was as helpless against him as an ant against a man. Her mother screamed and ran toward Effie and Reela the moment Sanya got off her.

“Effie, run,” Reela said, grabbing her arm and spinning her around.

Effie tried to shove her friend away, but Reela seemed ready for it and just held on tighter. Sanya looked back at the dajrik. She could mostly hold him in place with all of her concentration, but eventually she would tire, and he would get his other foot up. Her only hope was running, but Effie was in her way.

Sanya thought of one other option, then began shaping his bastial energy accordingly. He was infinitely harder to tame than Tauwin, but fortunately he was less complicated a creature. There was no hope of calming him—his anger was as powerful as his beating heart, but she might be able to use that to escape.

“I can keep him from killing us,” Sanya said, “but I need your help, Reela and Effie.” Sanya shot a quick look over her shoulder. The two of them were close, barely more than shadows in this dark cave, but she could tell that they were wrestling. Lori hurried in their direction to flee the dajrik. She couldn’t believe her mother had run without her. “I need light, Effie.”

“Give me back my wand, Reela! I can kill her.”