Page 51 of Enchanted Shadows
I looked to my watch. “You haveoneminute to form a plan. You won’t always have an abundance of time to plan things on guard duty, so I will force you to think quickly for this also.”
They ignored me as they circled up and formed a plan. Yes, there were enough Enchanted women on the team that they could just suspend it in the air for the ten minutes. But I added the participation part just to see what they came up with.
They got to work. The non-Enchanted stood under the barrel while Vivian used her magic to move the barrel into their hands. Molly’s magic was targeted around the water, making sure it wouldn’t slosh. A smart plan.
And then each of the other Enchanted added their power in, wrapping around the barrel and helping to hold it in place, lifting up on it and making it less heavy also. All that remained was Fern.
I started the clock and listened to them talk each other through it.
Emric leaned in and said quietly. “Did you specify that they all had to be touching it the entire ten minutes?”
“No.”
“Well, are you going to tell them now?”
“Also no.”
Emric snorted. “You’re brave. A couple of these women have a look about them that if looks could kill, we’d beextracrispy.”
“They need to learn to listen to all directions,” I told him. “They’ll figure it out soon enough.”
Vivian, Wren, and Pippa took turns using their magic to hold the barrel in place, to ensure they didn’t tire. None of them were even breaking a sweat. It was easy. Far too easy.
“Em.”
“Yeah?”
“Start throwing things at them.”
I hadn’t used a sound barrier, and Zara had apparently heard as she said to the team, “Get ready! I told you it wasn’t this easy.”
For the last five minutes Emric tried to use a strong breeze to knock the women over and threw rocks and various logs that Wren had to fight off.
With Wren focusing most of her power on defense, the non-Enchanted had more of the weight of the barrel to hold now, and they were starting to have to use their legs. Likewise, theEnchanted had to have laser focus to keep their magic on the barrel and not on the attacks from Emric.
With under a minute to go, just when I assumed that they were going to lose because Fern had yet to use her Enchantment, Fern moved from where she was helping hold the barrel and dipped her hand into the water. “Molly,” she called.
Molly’s power immediately dropped.
Fern had one hand in the water while the other was directing it to move, the droplets of water forming a flower in the sky.
Emric sent a huge gust of wind at Fern, trying to get her hands to falter. He sent another at the flower, trying to get it to fall.
Molly wasn’t a fan of that, and she sent one of her own at him at the same time that Wren sent a vine of magic at his feet. The result that Emric went tumbling just as all the droplets of water made it back into the barrel, Molly’s magic sealing it in.
“Time,” I told them. “You passed.”
As soon as the words were out of my mouth, a shot of water came flying at me. I ducked, so it didn’t hit my face, but it still somehow managed to hit me in the chest.
I sent Fern a glare. My magic had barely even flared. She was that quick.
“We planned that,” she said with an evil little smile, “in celebration.”
“Bold of you to assume you’d win this challenge.” I put my hands up. “Besides, I didn’t even do anything to you. It was General Whitman.”
Zara shot me a look that said she knew exactly what had prompted Emric to do it.
“Don’t worry, you look good wet!” Sam called to me.
