Prisoner (The Scarred Mage of Roseward #2) - Sylvia Mercedes Page 0,108

Rose Book on his arm, his legs braced and his shoulders back. The spell poured out from the pages in which it had been captured, channeled through his mouth and his mind and into this world.

When he reached the end of the spell, he felt the surging thrill of power almost beyond his ability to control. It wanted to tear out from him, to split him in two and leave him behind, like a butterfly crawling from its chrysalis.

No! He firmed his stance and held on to his sanity, to his mastery. This was his spell. The Thorn Maiden was great and dreadful, but for as long as the Rose Book lasted, she belonged to him.

He blinked down at the volume. The spell was spoken now, complete. And the book? It held together. He could feel the weakness, the frailty of the paper that wanted to erupt in flames as the energy of the quinsatra seared across the precisely inked lines of spell. But it held. For the time being.

Soran closed the book and looked up, lifting his gaze to see what he had done. Ninthalor still stood on its craggy heights, but smoke rose from it in a cloud. Smoke, or debris. Walls were toppled, towers teetered. And even here, with the murmur of the ocean at his back and the Hinter winds teasing through his hair and robes, he heard screams.

“What have I done?” he whispered.

How many lives lost?

How many deaths now added to the long ledger seared into his conscience?

This was an act of war. Nothing less. Word would get back to Lodírhal. News of this attack would spread throughout Eledria like wildfire. And how would the King of Aurelis respond?

Swiftly, that’s how. And with finality.

Soran’s jaw clenched. His hand holding the closed Rose Book trembled. Perhaps he ought to begin the binding now. Try to rein her back in before this horror got any worse.

But he couldn’t yet. Not until he knew . . . Not until he saw . . . Not until . . .

Did his eyes deceive him? He shook his head, rubbed at his face with his free hand. Then he looked again, desperate hope swelling in his heart. Was that the slim figure of a young woman running along the empty stretch of land between Ninthalor’s road and the desolate beach? Was that long hair flowing behind her as red as fire, even here in Noxaur’s gloom? Was that . . .?

He didn’t wait to know for sure. Shoving the Rose Book inside his robes, he set out at a run. He hadn’t realized he had strength enough left in his limbs to move so fast. His long legs tore up the space, sending up spurts of sand, and his robes billowed out behind him.

It was Nelle! Staggering, bleeding. But alive.

“Soran!”

Her voice reached out to him like a dream. And perhaps it was a dream. Perhaps he’d miscalculated the spell, perhaps he’d let something slip. Perhaps this was nothing more than an illusion planted in his mind by the Thorn Maiden. A worthy punishment for his crime, if so.

He didn’t care.

“Nelle!” he shouted back. His eyes drank in the sight of her fear-stricken face streaked with blood. Then she was in his arms, pressed close to his heart. Her body quaked, wracked with sobs, shivering so hard that she might shatter in his grasp and disperse like a cloud of rose petals. He held her tighter, tighter, refusing to let this moment be a dream.

“Nelle,” he gasped, one hand holding the back of her head, pressing her to his breast. But that wasn’t enough. He had to see her, had to look into her eyes. More roughly than he intended, he pushed her back a pace, gripping her by the shoulders. Her very bare shoulders.

For the first time he took in her attire—and how little of it there was.

“Soran!” Nelle caught hold of the front of his robes. Tears streaked through the grime on her cheeks, and her hair hung in snarls over her forehead, in her eyes. “The Thorn Maiden! The Thorn Maiden is free!”

“I know,” he said grimly. Though reluctant to let her go for fear she would dissolve into nothing, he wrenched his hands from her shoulders, hastily shrugged out of his outer robe, and slung it around her, its folds covering her naked flesh. She looked down at herself and seemed to realize what she wore. A hot flush of shame stained her cheeks before she clutched