Page 176 of Elven Crown

Holy shit, theyweren’talone in here. The un-diffusible ward bombs had distracted the team just enough that no one else had noticed.

Now, that flashing yellow-brown light spilling from the balcony’s shadows overhead was some other weapon powering up for a major attack from above.

Rebecca’s team was to incapacitated to even prepare themselves.

The only way to successfully handle what came next without sacrificing something she couldn’t afford to lose was if Rebecca Bloodshadow also had the ability to be in multiple places at once.

Unfortunately, she didn’t.

She had mere seconds to pick and choose whose safety and sanity was more important than anyone else’s before she made her next move.

Because she’d already failed them all.

46

Every decision Rebecca could have made came with its own deadly consequences.

With the magitek bomb roaring through their brains, and Diego and Titus screaming to the Blue Hells and back, and that foreboding light growing brighter from the balcony, she had to make a choice, either way.

So she chose to tackle the immediate danger right on top of them.

“Everyone get down!” she screamed before the first blast from that unseen weapon above cracked across the theater hall.

The next second, a buzzing line of yellow-brown energy crashed into the base of a balcony and the wings on the opposite side of the auditorium.

Enormous chunks of plaster, shredded wood, and bits of banister railing cracked away beneath the attack and plummeted to the floor. Fortunately, none of Rebecca’s team stood directly below the falling debris.

It also went entirely unnoticed by every other Shade operative, because no one had heard the giant weapon going off in the balcony or the ensuing wreckage.

No one had even heard Rebecca’s warning shout.

“The balconies!” she shouted, pointing and flailing her arms and unable to get a reaction, because no one was looking at her.

The others were too busy clamping their hands over their ears and hunching over, gritting their teeth against the noise that seemed intent on frying their brains.

Shell had become so disoriented, she’d already stumbled down the sloped floor toward the very front base of the stage. With her fingers in her ears and her balance thrown, she stumbled dangerously close to the first proximity ward and the casting circle at the base of the stage that would blow them all to bits if it activated.

Too close. And it didn’t look like she was going to stop herself.

With a shout she couldn’t hear but which burned her throat on the way out, Rebecca leapt toward the troll woman, reaching out with both hands and ready to snag any piece of the other woman she could get her hands on.

Rebecca’s fingers closed around Shell’s elbow just before she was about to step back onto the casting circle. The troll woman’s cry of surprise also disappeared beneath the bomb’s mind-numbing roar as Rebecca yanked her away from the stage and toward herself.

The other woman was so out of it already, she didn’t even try to stop herself. She hardly seemed aware of her body at all before she crashed into Rebecca with a painful thud and a tangle of limbs.

Rebecca caught her in an unsteady embrace to keep them both from hitting the ground as they staggered backward, made even more difficult by the fact that Rebecca now stumbled backward up the steep incline of the slanted auditorium floor.

Then she felt the searing heat from the next bolt of grotesque yellow-brown light zapping down toward them from the balcony.

Not a second too soon, either.

She threw her full weight sideways, hauling Shell with her in her arms. This time, they both crashed to the chipped, stained auditorium floor as the next weapon blast from the balcony zapped the space where they’d just stood.

Splinters of wood and chunks of the cement foundation beneath exploded on impact, every particle shuddering with electric crackles of yellow-brown light as they tossed through the air, peppering Rebecca and Shell and anyone else close enough to the blast.

Rebecca grimaced at the throbbing pain in her hip where she’d landed sideways with Shell practically on top of her, wishing she’d had a better way to get anyone’s attention than physically tackling them to the ground.

Once again without warning, the torture bomb on the stage finished its unavoidable release of excess energy. The deafening roar fell into a low, warbling growl, then a clinking whine, then nothing but a low click and hiss like an overheated car engine cooling off on a after finally being pulled into the driveway.

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