Spellbreaker (Spellbreaker Duology #1) - Charlie N. Holmberg Page 0,103

could offer her a hand. Her pulse thundered through her limbs. She took off immediately in the direction Ogden’s shadow had gone, and Bacchus followed without complaint. Bless him. Sentimentality aside, after seeing what he did in the duke’s dining room, Elsie was grateful to have him with her.

She wondered as she wrenched open an unlocked door—perhaps a lock-picked one—if she should call out to Ogden. She’d spent nine years in his household. She didn’t understand him, now that she knew the truth, but this was the same man who’d consoled her when she was sad, who’d put money away into her savings account, who’d teased her at dinnertime. Would the sound of her voice be enough to make him pause, or would he flee all the faster?

The only lights in the warehouse came from the glow of gaslights through the windows. The air smelled slightly of mold, and as Elsie dashed down a long hallway, her footsteps almost in rhythm with Bacchus’s, she noted stacks of linen, or perhaps cotton, bundled and ready to ship.

They paused at an intersection. The faintest sound of footsteps echoed in another hall.

“This way,” Bacchus murmured, taking her hand and pulling her to the left. Despite the limp, he was fast and surprisingly nimble as he ran; Elsie sprinted on her toes to keep up. They were getting close now. They were the pursuers, while Ogden was trying to find a path to flee or somewhere to hide. That would slow him down. It would—

She sensed it only a moment before they reached it. “Bacchus, stop!” She yanked back on his hand, but his momentum was too great. Their fingers pulled apart, sending Elsie sprawling onto her backside. Meanwhile, Bacchus nearly flew out of his boots when his shoes, of their own volition, slowed down significantly.

“What on earth?” He waved his arms to keep balance.

Elsie’s chest heaved with heavy breaths. That spell could have broken his leg.

“Let me find it.” She hurried forward on her hands and knees, sniffing for the earthy spell. Not here, but . . . up and to the left?

She found the temporal spell on a support beam against the wall. She’d never seen one set like a trap before—

As she unraveled the spells, her stomach sank. “Opuses. Bacchus, he’s using opus spells.” Yet more damning evidence against him.

Bacchus stumbled forward when the magic released him. “Perhaps you should go first.”

She nodded, fearful to run, but too anxious for caution. They didn’t get far before she felt a crackle in the air, just like with Nash’s lightning staff. Turning the corner, she saw a bead of lightning shoot out from the right edge of the ceiling.

“Go under it.” She hugged the wall. Avoidance would be quicker than asking for a boost so she could reach the rune. The lightning zipped through the air again, causing her hair to stand on end, but it didn’t hit her.

Bacchus followed without question.

She heard a door slam ahead and took off running, only to smash into the wall to her left.

“Damn it, Ogden!” she blurted as the wind sputtering up from the floor pinned her in place. Air swirled around her like she was in the eye of a cyclone. Bacchus used the exact same spell to push the wind in a different direction, allowing Elsie to push past the trap. He followed.

“I don’t suppose,” she managed between breaths, “that you can do that in reverse? Suck him toward us?”

“No.”

Elsie made out the outline of a door up ahead. She searched for runes but saw none—

“Stop!” she shouted, digging in her heels. Bacchus ran into her, nearly bumping her into a wooden crate against the wall. Elsie had just recognized the symbol glimmering atop it.

“A mobile spell. This would have crushed us.” She crouched and pulled the rune apart, then pushed past the bin unscathed. She cursed. “We have to find another path. He’s getting away!”

Her toe hit something metal on the ground—a crowbar. Elsie considered it for only a moment before snatching it up. She couldn’t cast spells, but she could certainly swing this.

“It will be easier once we’re outside.” Bacchus moved past her and grabbed the door handle, opening it just as Elsie spied the slightest glimmer of a spell.

The ground shifted upward like a giant mouth, knocking Elsie into the crate. Cement, stone, and wood contorted and surged up and around Bacchus—a giant version of the spell he’d once laid for her at the duke’s estate. The one that had seized