Page 19 of The Shadow Wand

Raz’zor peeks up at Sparrow, the hope in the beast’s sharp face mirroring Effrey’s, and Sparrow allows herself one joyful smile. Because this moment is a staggeringly, unexpectedly, blessedly good one.

Sparrow has done the math—a young Urisk seamstress and a male Urisk child disguised as a female escaping the Fae Islands to make a break for Gardneria. And from Gardneria headed for Gardnerian-controlled Verpacia, then to the treacherous eastern desert and from there to the Noi lands.

Their chances are close to nil.

It breaks her heart, the hope in Effrey’s eyes. The hope in the bad-luck dragon’s eyes. There are likely to be Gardnerians patrolling the shore, border guards or volunteer bands of angry Mages eager to torment refugees.

But at least they have this blessed moment, and isn’t that all there is, anyway? A terrifying kraken shepherding them toward the shore. A bad-luck pit dragon saving Effrey from the cold. The storm moving off to the east as gray, scudding clouds thin to reveal a gibbous moon. A wilderness of stars shining down from the widening gaps, the ocean awash in silvery moonlight.

Sparrow breathes in the cold, salty air and savors their brief moment of freedom.

Yes, let Effrey have his hope.That will be Sparrow’s gift to him.

But as they grow closer to the shore and the kraken slips away and disappears into the Voltic Sea’s great depths, a burrowing vulnerability takes hold. Sparrow takes up the oars, her eyes scanning the black shore, looking for potential attackers as freedom fades and the prison of Gardneria begins to reclaim its hold.

She knows she’s only buying herself and Effrey some time. Titanic forces are gathering, and their days are numbered.

Because of Fallon Bane. The next Black Witch.

Next to Marcus Vogel, she’s perhaps the cruelest one of them all.

Why does it have to be Fallon Bane?Sparrow agonizes. But does it matter, really? She’s heard the soldiers gloating about the flimsy Resistance. And the Icaral of Prophecy, the Urisk people’s only hope, is a helpless babe in his mother’s arms, the Mage Guard tight on his heels. It’s only a matter of time before the Icaral babe is killed, the Prophecy is fulfilled, and all hope dies as the Black Witch rises.

A cold fear enfolds Sparrow in its dark wings.

A Black Witch, in her full power, with Marcus Vogel’s forces by her side, will bring the Crows’ Reaping Times to even the farthest reaches of Erthia. Eventually, they’ll kill or enslave everyone who isn’t Gardnerian.

Sparrow looks to Effrey, despair tightening her chest as she takes in the foolish hope on the child’s face. She will try to save Effrey and his dragon. And she will try to save herself.

She will try.

Sparrow jumps out of the boat just before they hit the black rocks of the shore. She guides their small vessel into a small, sheltered cove as icy water sloshes around her like ink, the moonlight’s illumination now a threat as the clouds continue to break apart and dissipate. She motions urgently for Effrey to be quiet as she helps the child out of the boat and Effrey conceals the pearl-skinned dragon beneath his cloak.

The sound of boot heels scuffing up sand freezes Sparrow in her crouch behind boulders.

“Stop right there!” a hard, masculine voice yells, just past the large rock to their right.

Trembling, Sparrow dares a look between boulders as she and Effrey cower in the night’s shadows.

There’s a young Urisk woman on her knees on the sand, blue hands raised in surrender, head down, body shaking.

In one fearful sweep of her gaze, Sparrow takes in the three male Mages that surround the woman—two young Level Three soldiers and one older, black-bearded Level Four with a lantern in hand. All pointing their wands at the young woman’s head, movable bars of lantern light strafing her cowed figure.

“Papers?” the Level Four Mage demands.

The woman doesn’t move.

The bearded Mage huffs out a sound of contempt and murmurs a spell. Sparrow flinches as black vines shoot out of his wand to collide with the woman’s body. She gives a brief, strangled cry as the vine netting wraps around her mouth and then her entire form, wrenching her down onto the wet beach.

Outrage bolts through Sparrow as well as the desire to launch herself at the Mages as they drag the woman away, but she knows there’s no winning. Not against three Mages with wand power. And Sparrow has never actually wielded a knife.

Lit up by a feral desire to survive and remain free, Sparrow grabs Effrey by the arm and they bolt in the opposite direction, the men’s throaty laughs and the woman’s muffled cries kindling Sparrow’s panic as they run through the beach grass, ignoring their bone-deep cold.

Eventually, they spot what looks like an abandoned structure atop a small bluff.

Sparrow and Effrey scramble up the bluff and make for what turns out to be a ramshackle stable, Sparrow’s heart picking up speed as men yell to each other down on the beach.

They round the weathered Ironwood structure, duck into the darkened, deserted stable, then run through it into the last stall and slide the stall’s door closed.

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