Page 68 of Kiss of Magic

Thirty

Arjhan

Kam alighted next to Raya, dissolving his wings as he joined her in the Seal Room. The witches, including Cassia, were still chanting but it was obvious the seal was under a great deal of strain. A myriad of cracks spidered across the pentagram and there were more every minute. He swallowed.

“How’s Shade?”

“With the healers. His injuries are extensive but his spine is intact and his major organs are functioning.”

Raya held onto her emotions with monumental control. Inside, she wanted to shriek and rail and tear out her hair. She wanted to turn on Kam and smash a fist into his face and demand to know why he hadn’t discovered the seal was failing before it was too late.

But that would be unfair. Kam had been trapped in the Forbidden Zone for fifty years. By the time he came back to Arjhan, the seal was already weakened. And no-one else had recognised the danger.

“He’ll be fine, Raya. You know Shade. As stubborn as they come.”

“What about the thermal weapons? Is Darian recalibrating them?”

“Already done, they’re being deployed as we speak. He’s on his way here with a batch from Valkar, he’s confident the new versions will work.”

“Good. Because I don’t think the seal’s going to last much longer.”

Kam agreed with her. It was probably his imagination, but he thought he could sense the movement of hundreds of bodies shifting restlessly beneath his feet.

He wondered what they were waiting for. Then he wondered if they had somehow felt the demise of the first demon and were deciding what to do next.

It wouldn’t take them long to realise they had strength in numbers. That the best bet wasn’t coming out one by one, but en masse like a swarm of rats.

A chill touched his heart.

“Raya, Shade once told me you created a wall of fire which took out several ogurs and elven in one go. Could you do it again?”

“I don’t know. I was under a lot of emotional stress at the time.”

“What, and you’re not now?” Kam took her hands. “So far the only thing that’s worked against a demonicus spirit is you. My power is nowhere strong enough and right now we don’t have a single weapon that can kill them.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“Sometime soon, more demons are going to come crawling out of that seal. You’re going to have to deal with them until the guns get here.”

“Me?” Raya took a step back. “I’m not a soldier. I can’t be responsible for everyone’s lives!”

“I’m sorry, my friend. Right now you’re our only hope.”

“But I have no idea how to control my power. Even when Shade was hurt, I didn’t make a conscious decision to kill that thing. It just happened.”

“Then we’d better hope to the gods it happens again.”

Raya looked at him wildly.

“Seriously, Kam, this is a bad idea…”

“Look, it’s only till the new weapons arrive and my soldiers can take over. Until then, just blast whatever comes out of those cracks.”

Raya glanced at the pentagram again. It only needed to last a few hours longer. Then Darian would be here with the new beefed-up weapons. Surely the witches could hold it till then.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a low groaning sound. Dust plumed into the air. With a suddenness that shocked everyone, the cracks tore into great, jagged trenches. The pentagram disappeared into the crater.

One by one the witches stopped chanting, their terrified eyes on the remnants of the floor. A sickly reddish light seeped from the abyss and the distant sounds of howling grew steadily louder. Kam and Raya looked at each other in horror as the truth sank in.

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