the runes.
Saul pointed his dagger at me and Amalia. “Ori astra feriant.”
The blade rippled with yellow light and a spray of glowing two-inch half-moons blasted out of the tip. I threw my arms over my face. Tearing pain lanced my forearm. Beside me, Amalia screamed.
I staggered backward, half lowering my arms as wetness soaked into my sweater. My leather jacket had blunted the strikes, but one had cut my arm deep.
Saul flipped his dagger over, the opposite edge of the blade pointed skyward. “Ori ignes sid—ori duo!”
He bellowed the new incantation, and a rippling barrier formed in front of him an instant before a spinning disc of crimson magic struck it. The attack rebounded across the platform—toward Zylas, who in the middle of his own fight had thrown a spell to help me and Amalia.
“Ori sex!” one of the twins shouted.
I whirled at the shouted incantation—number six. A spell I hadn’t seen yet.
Zylas lurched, almost falling. Bands of green magic were tangled around his lower leg, wrapped on top of his protective clothing, and the ends had fused to the ground. The spell locked him in place, stealing his best advantage—his speed.
The twins, ten feet away on either side of him, raised their right arms. “Ori novem!”
Four-foot-long harpoons of violet light formed in their hands. They drew their arms back and hurled the weapons.
Zylas!
“Indura,” he snarled.
The harpoons struck his torso and the abjuration magic shattered against his cantrip-protected garments. The twins exchanged shocked looks, then raised their hands again.
“Ori decem.”
Their tenth spell.
Blue light flashed in their hands, then solidified into pale blades, two feet long and blazing with light. They lunged for the trapped demon, and I knew his cantrip garments wouldn’t stop those blades.
Daimon, hesychaze!
The blades slashed as Zylas dissolved into red light. The sorcerers’ weapons caught on the cantrip clothing, whipping it sideways as the demon’s body dissolved. His power streaked toward me, hit the infernus, and bounced out again.
Zylas formed beside me, gasping. Blood spattered the ground.
A slice ran across his chest, parting his leather gear and scoring the plate on his chest—an impossible feat for blades made solely with abjuration Arcana. A matching slash across his lower back wept blood.
Panic squeezed my throat and I grabbed his arm.
“Ori quinque!”
A silvery blast hit our backs. Zylas hurtled forward and I was yanked with him, our arms tangled. He landed in a roll, pulling me against his chest, and we came to a stop with him poised protectively over me.
The concrete pad shivered as the pink glow of the array brightened. The heavy buzz of arcane power in the air was thickening, clogging my lungs. Saul wasn’t chanting anymore; he’d completed his job. The spell was active. The portal was opening.
Despair choked me more than the magic. We couldn’t defeat the sorcerers. We hadn’t stopped the spell. We’d failed.
Not yet, vayanin.
Zylas’s gleaming red eyes met mine. A crimson-and-shadow presence swept into my mind, sharp with wild ferocity and intense determination. He hadn’t survived by surrendering. He hadn’t lived this long by handing victory to his enemies.
If he still breathed, he could still fight. He could still win.
Vh’renith vē thāit, he whispered in my mind. Victory or death.
Alien warmth scorched my center as power flowed into my body. His determination infected me, and my doubts disappeared.
He rolled, sweeping me with him as he lunged onto his feet. I landed beside him, my fingers curling as heat burned through them. Crimson power snaked up Zylas’s arms, reforming his phantom talons.
The three sorcerers circled us, ready to cast their neutralizing or reflective spells. Nothing Zylas could cast would penetrate their defenses.
I stretched my arm out, fingers spread. Shock widened the brothers’ eyes at the sight of my hand—at the crimson power radiating from my fingers and veining my wrist.
His mind threading mine, Zylas steadied the image I was drawing forth, his experience in this form of casting bolstering my lack. A simple rune took shape in front of me, formed in an instant—and as tall as me. The crimson lines glowed eerily.
“Ventos!” I yelled.
“Ori tres!” the twin facing me roared.
My demonic cantrip flashed and a gale of wind exploded outward. Green sparkles formed in front of the sorcerer—the spell that could erase Zylas’s demonic attacks. The howling wind hit it.
The sorcerer was blasted off his feet. He flew ten yards and slammed down on his back.
“No!” the other twin shouted.
I grinned tightly. Abjuration was limited. It had to be tailored to the magic it was defending against—and my magic was neither