me, the sound of a body hitting the ground, and the sorcerer spun to see Rylan lunging toward him, holding the other guard’s sword, the blade coated in blood. The sorcerer threw the fire at him instead of me, but rather than ducking out of the way, Rylan kept rushing forward, dodging to the side. The edge of the fireball exploded against his non-sword arm. With a bellow of rage and agony, Rylan leaped toward the sorcerer, slashing his blade through the air with so much speed the black sorcerer couldn’t spin out of the way fast enough, and the sword cut through his bicep, deep into the elbow, almost taking his arm clean off.
“Rylan!” I screamed, finally untangling myself enough to jump to my feet and charge forward toward the black sorcerer, who had begun to summon a dark cloud around himself and Rylan. He stumbled back, yanking his sword out of the man’s arm and lifting it once more just as the blackness enveloped them both.
I plunged into the darkness and hit the black sorcerer square in the chest, knocking him to the ground with the force of my inertia. With a sound that was barely even human, he pressed his gloved hand to my chest, right above my breasts, digging his clawed fingernails into my skin. I was immediately unable to move. My entire body felt like it was burning up, as if he’d somehow injected the fire he wielded directly into my blood through his hand on my chest.
And then a sword pierced the darkness, swiping down across the black sorcerer’s throat. His fingers spasmed against my skin, and then his arm dropped to his side on the ground. I threw myself backward, off his body, as the darkness dissipated.
Rylan stood next to us, breathing hard, gripping his sword with both hands.
We both stared down at the black sorcerer, hardly able to believe he was dead. I clambered to my feet and hurried to Rylan’s side. All three guards were dead, and Akio still lay unconscious. But would more be coming? I didn’t know if we could survive another fight. And Rylan was injured. His left arm was a mess of bloody, charred skin, with small pieces of his shirt still visible where it hadn’t burned away. And I was still shackled.
“Are you all right?” he asked, letting the sword in his right hand fall to his side.
“Your arm.” I lifted my hands toward him, but he shrugged me off.
“There’s no time. What’s the rest of your plan? How are we going to get those off of you?”
I stared at his ruined flesh, my heart pounding incessantly beneath my ribs. Then my gaze turned to the guards lying on the ground. “We take their robes and disguise ourselves. We’ll have to fight the other two black sorcerers guarding the door at the end of the hallway, and then take our chances in the tunnel.” I gestured to Akio. “I’m hoping he has the key that will release the irons, since he has the one that unhooked the chain from the floor.”
Rylan stared at me for a long moment, probably hoping for a better plan. Then he clenched his jaw and nodded. He dropped to the ground next to Akio and rolled his body over to search for the keys. He found them hooked to his belt and quickly began trying them on the shackles that still bit into my wrists. Finally, on the third try, the lock popped and the irons opened, releasing me.
As soon as they were gone, I flexed my hands and began to rub my raw wrists. Rylan’s eyes widened at the sight of my abused skin, but I quickly turned away and knelt next to the sorcerer closest to him and began to remove the robe from the sorcerer’s body. He did the same to the others, including the black sorcerer we’d barely managed to defeat together. Eljin would need a robe, too. Once we both wore them, and I had the keys from the guard who had been standing in front of the cell doors in one hand and a curved sword in the other, Rylan turned to Akio once more.
He’d begun to stir, his eyes fluttering, but he hadn’t woken yet.
Rylan stepped toward him, lifting his sword to finish the job, but the memory of Akio bringing me food last night, of the sadness in his eyes when he’d told me he was sorry, surged up, and I jumped forward