Page 146 of Cast By Flames (Dragon's Breath)
Unlike before, the strain on his face told me he felt the dark power this time. He’d been a full human before and didn’t have to suffer in its presence, but as a slayer, he’d pay the same price as the rest of us, despite being the designated guardian.
“I’ll go first,” I said, taking a deep breath.
I pressed my index and middle fingers to the orb, flinching as pain shot up my arm. It took all my willpower not to let go. How Conrad could hold it in the palm of his hand, I didn’tknow, but he winced a little, so perhaps me touching it made things less comfortable.
Aidan went next. A low growl rumbled in his throat as the orb's effects hit him. Danae went next, trembling for a moment but keeping her arm raised until she got used to it. Phoebe went last. She let out a grunt and scrunched her brows.
Each of us inhaled deeplyandbegan the chant.“Hamisha jismu bilus wa tahdur salmat. Darbu kul sharir lilabad.”
It took a few times before we got into synch. After that, the dusky glass of the orb began to emanate a soft light through the marbled darkness. Next, it started to warm. With each minute that passed, the light brightened a fraction, and the heat increased a few degrees.
Though I kept my gaze on the orb, I couldn’t miss the sounds of battle getting closer. Nothing stirred in my peripheral vision, but I sensed danger inching its way along. The orb wasn’t absorbing power nearly fast enough.
My mouth went dry, and my head started to ache.
I used my free hand to wipe sweat from my brow. The sphere began to pull on me, making my skin itch as tendrils of my inner power crawled through my arm into the artifact. After another five minutes, my knees began to shake.
Still, I couldn’t pull my gaze from the orb and the hazy swirls inside.
“Hamisha jismu bilus wa tahdur salmat. Darbu kul sharir lilabad.”
From the corner of my eye, I caught movement in the sky. The shifters flying defense of our tower were now engaged in battle. Though I couldn’t turn to look directly, I made outenough. They were outnumbered, and we were running out of time.
Javier’s giant cheese grater net—as we fondly called it—flew through my line of vision like glinting chainmail and cut off a group of Kandoran attempting to fly around our defense. The dragon’s pieces rained to the ground, hopefully not landing on any allies.
Xanath was mumbling some unintelligible words I caught when we took a breath between chants. Power began to build up from his direction, crackling across my already-sensitive skin, though I couldn’t tell what he was doing.
A storm rolled over us with monstrous dark wall clouds. It wasn’t like the usual ones Galadon created and didn’t feel like his magical signature. Instead, it was even more powerful. Drops of rain started to fall and pelt our faces. I kept chanting while blinking the dampness from my eyes.
Xanath lifted his hands skyward, and to my shock, a tornado formed in the distance. It sounded like an angry freight train barreling into the enemy more than a mile away. The amount of power he used to generate it was unfathomable and crackled the air all around us.
Kandoran dragons and humans alike were sucked inside before it tossed them like discarded trash far into the distance. My first thought was he’d been holding out on us, but then I realized he’d been saving his strength for this moment.
Now, Xanath revealed precisely how much power he’d amassed in his lifetime.
Cracks of lightning shot down and forked to strike multiple targets. I could barely see Rayna from the corner of my eye, but I couldn’t miss her coppery-brown hair flowing behindher in the wind. Maybe the orb enhanced my senses, but I believed without a doubt the slayer-sorceress had merged her power with the storm.
Her electric bolts struck enemy dragons near and far, filling the air with the scent of charred flesh. All the while, the tornado continued to spin, working its way through the outer circle of our enemy in relentless pursuit like a hungry monster. The debris it also picked up turned into weapons that tore into the Kandoran as if it were a giant blender.
We continued our endless chant.“Hamisha jismu bilus wa tahdur salmat. Darbu kul sharir lilabad.”
Morgan was behind me and to my rightso I couldn’t see him, but I couldn’t miss the sizzling sounds of his charged spheres as he sent them into the air in rapid succession. Kandoran screamed every time they were hit. It shocked me how fast the bodies smashed into the ground from all over the sky, including ones I could spot within my vantage point.
So far, Thatcher hadn’t done anything, but we’d told him to hold back for a while to stay fresh. His primary offense skill was forming ice into weapons. He could draw the moisture from the air and form them quickly into shooting daggers.
A surge of pain ran through my feet, up my body, and across my arm to my fingertips. My hand glowed as power flowed from me, feeding the mystical sphere. The swirls of light inside grew brighter, and the heat intensified. A burning sensation crept through my skin where I had direct contact.
God, how I wanted to let go as the pain ratcheted up another notch. Weakness assailed me next. I gritted my teeth, fighting the urge to collapse to the ground.
To make matters worse, the wind and rain lashed at us, tossing my hair into my eyes. I could barely keep my feet planted on the wet stone as hard bursts of air pushed at my body. Every inch of me was drenched, and the cool air chilled my skin everywhere except where I touched the orb. The temperature must have dropped ten degrees in the last few minutes, bringing us closer to freezing.
Still, no one faltered in the chant, and we stayed in sync.“Hamisha jismu bilus wa tahdur salmat. Darbu kul sharir lilabad.”
I lost sight of the tornado as it continued in its circular path of destruction, but the roar somewhere far behind me indicated that it hadn’t ceased moving. Neither had the cries of the injured nor the dying. We could stop this if only the orb would hurry up and charge.
As if it sensed our urgency, it pulled on us even harder. Screams tore from our mouths as it felt like our very essence was being ripped from our bodies. The agony was so intense that—as one—we dropped to our knees with the orb still between us. It was a blessed relief not to stand anymore, but it didn’t diminish the pain that intensified by the second. It occurred to me then that no one had asked if we’d survive this spell.
As my tears mixed with raindrops, I felt like I was dying, but I knew I couldn’t let go.
