Page 32 of The Shadow Wand

“How’s it feel?” one of my Mage Guards suddenly booms out at the fleeing refugees, causing the little girl to flinch and blink fearfully up at him. “This is what you did to us!” he snarls. “Forced us out of our homes! Took our land! How’s it feel?”

The Kelts avert their eyes as we speed up and the little girl is whisked from sight.

I’m overcome by an acute sense of the jaws of Gardneria snapping shut over the little girl. Over all these people. And the titanic forces at work all around me, disrupting the entire world.

But there are titanic forces inside me as well, I suddenly remember, swept up in the overpowering yearning to wrest control of my power and wield it to stop this cruelty.

My body shudders as magic fires through my affinity lines in a heated rush, along with a flash of awareness of the wooden frame of the carriage.

My wand hand clenches involuntarily. Wanting it.

Wanting the dead wood.

Wanting the power.

You can’t control it!I desperately caution myself as I fight off the compulsion to grasp hold of the wood at the edge of my seat, voice a spell, and send my magic straight through it.You’ll be pulled under your power’s thrall and kill everyone in sight! Don’t touch the wood!

I yank the window’s dark velvet curtains closed and grasp my wand hand, pulling in a deep, quavering breath as Magefire ripples through my lines.

You need to be patient,I remind myself with each measured breath as fear edging toward panic makes a merciless play for me.

Fear of myself.

You need to stay alive, or you won’t be able to fight them, I insist, battling my raging emotions and equally raging power.

I rub my wand hand, first wringing it as the fiery power courses through me, then caressing it as my breathing slows and the fire power draws down, rapidly dissipating. I pull in a deep, wavering breath and force myself to take stock of my situation.

I need to survive.

Because I’m a weapon, whether I want to be or not.

A weapon the Resistance needs.

Soon I’ll be back in the luxurious, rotted heart of Gardneria and deep in hiding. Sheltered by my connection to Lukas Grey.

Until the Resistance comes to claim me and wield me.

CHAPTER THREE

WYVERNGUARD MAGE

TRYSTAN GARDNER

ANDVOTHENDRILE XANTHILE

SixthMonth

Eastern Realm,

the Wyvernguard’s North Twin Island

Vothendrile Xanthile watches the rune ship soar toward the Wyvernguard through the night sky. The ship’s huge, whirring flank runes and base runes cast the vessel in a penumbra of sapphire light that’s reflected off the choppy current of the Vo River.

Every one of Vothe’s predatory, Wyvern-shifter senses is on heightened alert, every sight and smell sharpened.

Blue light from runic torches encased in glass orbs gutters over Vothe and the other sapphire-uniformed Vu Trin military apprentices as they stand at attention and wait on the broad landing balcony, all eyes fixed on the incoming ship, an explosive tension—that’s at full odds with their blank military bearing—crackling on the air.

A brisk wind whips against Vothendrile’s strong, honed body and he pulls in a reflexive breath, his own wind magic stirring to meet the Wyvern-crafted air current that’s coursing down the river. He spares a glance over his shoulder toward the towering pinnacle of the Wyvernguard’s North Twin Island, the colossal, vertical island one of two towering landmasses that form the Vu Trin Wyvernguard, the huge, ore-dark Vo River splayed out all around them.

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