lines tightening as the image of flickering heat flashes inside the blade’s hilt. Valasca is pulling on runic power to weave complicated earth sorcery into a swarm of metallic darts, their translucent auras emanating from the runes on her weapon to hover around her form.
By pure muscle memory, my fingers slide into the corresponding defensive runic combination as they hurl their weapons at me in unison.
Lukas’s fire bursts to searing life around his incoming weapon, and hundreds of spearing darts blink into existence around Valasca’s as their weapons and magic barrel toward me.
I splay my arms out and flip my blades’ gleaming sides toward Lukas’s and Valasca’s incoming power.
Their magic is the first thing that slams into my blades, Lukas’s fire immediately snuffed out in a dramatic puff of steam by my blast of wintry water from one blade, and Valasca’s darts singed to a bright red spray of molten ash by my blaze of concentrated fire from my other weapon, both of their blades hurled off through the sky in opposite directions from the sheer force of my magic.
They both whip out new blades, but before they can charge the weapons, I draw my blades back into my palms and amplify the knives’ sorcery with rapid fingerwork. Then I hurl both blades at Lukas and Valasca, following the Wand’s guiding green lines.
The blades slam into them and ricochet to the side as Lukas and Valasca promptly explode into balls of churning golden flame.
I gape at their twin conflagrations in complete openmouthed astonishment as the fire quickly dissipates against the translucent shields both Lukas and Valasca have thrown up over themselves.
They exchange smiles full of blazing satisfaction before looking to me with obvious pride.
I turn toward Chi Nam, stunned beyond belief. “I did it, didn’t I?” I marvel. “I finally did it. I killed them.”
Chi Nam grins. “You did, Ny’laea. They are both most thoroughly and unequivocally dead.”
* * *
A few nights later, Lukas and I stand just inside Chi Nam’s shield on the cave’s outside ledge and study the six wraith bats that lurk in the trees, silently watching us through merciless eyes.
I managed to suppress my fear and use runic sorcery to startle the beasts into leaving last night, but Lukas feels it’s time to face them without the protection of Vonor’s dome-shield.
Exposed.
To practice holding my fear at bay while we have the chance, since tomorrow we’ll be stepping through the portal and leaving the desert and its wraith creatures behind.
I swallow as Lukas’s hand comes to my arm, his gaze steady on the camouflaged beasts. The desert’s night air is a cool, still embrace around us.
“I’m going to drop part of the shield in a moment,” he says. “So, prepare yourself.”
I pull in a deep breath and force fire into my lines as I clench and unclench my fist around my rune blade and picture the burning away of all emotion. I know that even the smallest rise in fear will be amplified by the monstrous bats and they’ll try to immobilize me with it. But still, a spark of trepidation manages to weave through, and I struggle to tamp it down.
“There’re so many of them,” I say warily. And they’re fast, I’ve found. Unexpectedly fast for their size.
I can sense their aura gathering around my mind, like a poison mist, seeking to stir my emotions into a panic.
I grip the Ash’rion blade tighter and stare them down in turn, battling back the encroaching fear with a steady stream of my invisible fire power as I prepare to startle them into fleeing with lightning.
“You can handle them,” Lukas prods. “You’ve bested both Val and myself.”
His tone is so unexpectedly warm, a rush of affection washes over me. I glance appreciatively at him, drawn to the sight of his lean, rune-marked chest in the garnet moonlight, the red glinting off his skin’s deep-green glimmer. A slim, silvery scar from the scorpio attack transverses his chest and shoulder.
He threw off his tunic during this night’s vigorous sparring, much of it a demonstration in how to deflect a physical attack that required quite a few close holds.
Heat simmers along my lines, hot as a brazier, as I take in his handsome form and consider how our nearness affected the two of us as we grappled with each other. Lukas’s fire escaped his tight hold a number of times this evening, his lines heated to a scald by the time we were done.
Feeling brazen, I resheathe my blade and pivot to