Page 211 of The Shadow Wand

I’m drilled in this new identity until I’m fluent in my fictional history and answer to the name Ny’laea, speaking almost exclusively now in the Elfhollen language and outfitted in gray Elfhollen garb that’s internally warded with Noi military runes.

Ever since Lukas’s blazing declaration of love, I feel different around all of them, their aloof severity no longer a source of chafing pain, no matter how hard they drive me. Lukas has remained closed off to me, but I fully understand, both rationally and emotionally, why he’s being harsh, and I accept it.

But every now and then, I catch him giving me a stray ardent look and sense the heated arc of his power reaching toward me before he carefully reins it all back in.

On my thirty-sixth day here, the sun blazes fiercely down on the world, pouring heat into the motionless desert air. The shade cast over me offers only a slim respite from the unforgiving heat.

I tighten my grip on the rune blades in my hands, the charged runes prickling under my fingers as they draw on my affinity auras.

Rivulets of sweat drip down my scorching neck as I face off with both Lukas and Valasca on the crimson sands of the desert plain, the air like a kiln, my gray Elfhollen garb oppressively hot. Chi Nam calmly watches from the sidelines as she leans into her rune staff. A great arc of red stone rises behind her and swoops over Lukas, Valasca, and me before descending to the sands.

Lukas and Valasca attack from opposite sides.

They draw their weapons in a blur, and I sense, immediately, the affinities they’re powering up—

Lukas is drawing fire into his blade. I can both see it and sense it if I look at his weapon, my fire affinity 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’sdome-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.”

---