running through his compound with a savage intensity. His hand stretched out, and a violent ball of magic wreathed his fingers, gold and red, dripping with sparkles. Silent, he physically flung it at the wall. I tensed as it hit with a soft pop—but nothing happened. Gold and red slithered over the back of the fireplace until slowly it began to disappear. My shoulders slumped. Whatever it was, it hadn’t worked.
But Trent was gritting his teeth, his expression tight in determination. He wasn’t done yet, and his hand, still outstretched, held a faint ribbon of his power running from him to the wall.
My lips parted as I realized that his spell was in the cracks of the wall. “Get down!” I shouted, launching myself at Zack as the oblivious kid stood to investigate.
“Cum gladio et sale!” Trent shouted, his hand gathering up ribbons of strength and pushing them down the trace to the wall to force it in.
I hit Zack. Together we fell into the chair, sending it over backward as Trent’s magic exploded among the mortared stones with a sharp crack and thump that shook the room’s floor.
Rock chips and chunks of masonry rolled past with the scent of dust and stale Brimstone. “You okay?” I asked Zack as I got up, but the kid was faster than me and was already staring at the fist-size hole in the back of the fireplace. Jenks darted from me to Trent like a deranged hummingbird, finally vanishing into the hole when his curiosity became too much.
Trent’s anger shifted to quick anticipation as he strode forward to pull more rock free. There was darkness beyond, and the sound of falling stone echoed in a small space.
“Sa’han,” Quen protested, but his head was bowed and he looked beaten.
“You don’t have to help, but you will stay out of the way,” Trent said, and with a resolved reluctance, Quen sat down. Shocked, I stared at the pain the older man was trying to hide, his expression riven as Trent pried more rocks to tumble from the opening. Quen was sitting down?
“Quen?” Trent tried again, hope making his word soft, but Quen didn’t move.
“There’s nothing in there but heartache. Don’t draw it into your future by disturbing it,” Quen said, catching Zack’s arm and pulling him back from the opening.
Pulse fast, I met Trent’s eyes. The green of them held danger and drive, dropping to my core and setting something burning. Of course there would be heartache. Great knowledge always hurt. “Leno cinis,” I said softly, and Trent caught the blossoming globe of light as it formed.
A cool breath smelling of stale Brimstone sifted from the opening, and I carefully picked my barefoot way through the rubble to peer into the new Brimstone-scented darkness. “I’m sorry, Quen,” I said, then followed Trent through the broken opening and into the dark, still air beyond.
They were Trent’s mother’s rooms, and I wouldn’t let him go in there alone.
CHAPTER
27
The darkness was warm and absolute as I picked my way over the broken stones, wincing at the sharp edges under my bare feet. I wasn’t going to take even five minutes to find my shoes. Fortunately, the farther I went, the smaller the shards got until there was only light grit between me and a slate floor. The light from Trent’s great room made a small spot of gray, doing nothing to light the silence broken only by the rasping of Jenks’s wings and Trent’s slow breathing.
Not a hint of movement stirred the air. I funneled more energy into the globe, pushing back the dark to see that we were in a hallway. It looked like any other hallway I’d seen in Trent’s compound. Perhaps a little higher in the ceiling . . . maybe a little brighter color on the wall. The floors were slate tile—and now that we were away from the broken rock, clean.
“No dust,” I said softly, hearing my voice come back flat of any echo.
A door opened up onto what was probably an office. To the right, the hall dead-ended with two waiting room chairs and a table, but it continued on to the left. The light dimmed as Trent went into the office, his shoes faintly scuffing. I turned, my gaze drawn to the bright hole in the wall.
“Oh . . . ,” I breathed, lips parting in awe at the original archway showing behind the stone wall of the fireplace. It was beautiful, the carved, polished wood lifting high with its smooth