Reign of Shadows (9 page)

Chapter Twenty-one

Aern

Aern shoved back at the force that was rushing him, spinning free of the blast in time to see Brianna tossed to the ground. Her eyes were glowing, burning dangerously below the green, her windswept hair and violent expression giving her the appearance of a mad woman. He kept running for her, but glanced back at Emily, hair just as wild but gaze focused like he’d never seen. The danger in her eyes was not below the green, it flared bright, intent on scorching everything in its path.

Aern hit Brianna’s attacker a moment before Emily, grasping the man’s shoulders to spin him back, away from Brianna and open for their strike. Emily crashed into the shadow, knocking
him and Aern farther back, and they grappled for one short instant before Brianna was free. Emily burned through his powers, panting with the effort, and two more shadows launched themselves at Brianna. Aern knew what Brianna wanted, understood why it was so important to her, but he was afraid they were risking too much. They were losing time by trying to save them, and they would lose their men.

Brianna screamed, a roar of pain
that cut through the din of battle, and Aern looked away from his task to find her in the grip of the two shadows, their power tearing into her as they held her by either arm. He shoved free of the shadow he held, releasing his hold to one of Logan’s men, and got his footing in time to see Eric thrown to the ground, his own knife lodged into the base of his ribcage. Logan ripped one shadow’s grasp from Brianna, but his blood-slicked hand slid away too soon. The force of the shadow’s blow knocked him back just as Seth smashed into the ground at their feet. There were bodies everywhere. They were losing, their men being tossed about like ragdolls while the shadows closed in on Brianna.

Logan shifted forward, gaze connecting
with Aern, and in that brief instant, Aern could see the other man’s intent. They moved, hitting the shadow low and as a team, to throw him back just as Daniels slammed a spike from the underground security system into the man’s back. It shouldn’t have worked, given the body armor their opponents were wearing, but it appeared Daniels had some sort of affinity for metal.

Kara
—hair pulling free of its compact knot in mangled clumps, blood running from her nose and the base of her ear—latched onto Brianna’s second attacker. The three of them were taken to their knees by the force of each other’s energy, and another shadow joined the fray. The lawn was crowded with the fight, wind pelting the lot of them with crumbling block and bits of earth, all of it raining down in bursts from above, or the side, or below—every direction the gusts were catching it. The ground was wet from the busted sprinkler system, mud beneath their feet. The air was filled with the stench of burned hair, of smoking leaves, of blood.

Aern ran again for Brianna,
and the water began to creep across the lawn, worm-like tendrils coiling their way toward Seth where he lay on what was left of the grass. Aern sensed Emily moving toward them, apparently done with the second of seven shadows they had to defeat, and hoped Logan and Daniels had finished the third. There was evidently one with Wesley and Ellin, but the remaining three were attached to Brianna.

Something snapped within Kara and she crumpled to the ground, taking one of Logan’s men with her. He shoved her off unceremoniously
, fighting against a force Aern couldn’t see. Three more of Logan’s men laid hands on the nearest shadow, sparks flying as they thrust fire and electricity into her lean frame and she retaliated with her own electrical energy. A few dozen of the unchanged soldiers were moving in, circling the mass of fighting to open fire if they somehow got a clear shot. They were being battered by wayward debris, several already bleeding from the exploded gatehouse and flying trees.

Aern reached for a shadow
just as Brianna cut loose with her power, throwing six of the men back and onto the ground. She collapsed, one shadow still clinging to her, and crawled forward in the mud, arms digging into earth as she dragged the man behind her. Aern took hold of the man’s leg, the only spot he could get purchase, and thrust the sway with a command to release her. The man did, or at least he faltered to an extent, just as Emily hurled herself on top of him.

Brianna kept crawling, the second shadow rising with untamed speed to drive into her. He’d crossed the bodies of several downed men in the process, and Aern released his hold on the man beneath Emily to help her sister. But Brianna’s outstretched hand touched Seth, and suddenly the water he’d been
gathering shifted form, shaping into a thick line before it molded itself as a spike that flew into the shadow, only changing to ice an instant before piercing the base of his neck. Blood rushed forward, coating Brianna as the shard speared the man down and through his chest. Aern hoisted the shadow’s body, tossing it aside to free Brianna and deal with the last two opponents who remained standing.

He helped to her feet and t
he wind swirled, thrashing around them, suddenly too hot. Aern brought up an arm to cover his face instinctively as fire flared in the churning gust surrounding them. It was spinning too fast, a mass of debris and flame concentrated in only the area around them, a cyclone of fire that was getting hotter, blistering their exposed skin. He felt Brianna push against it, but the force was too strong as it eddied around them. She reached out blindly and he pulled her against his chest, covering her face and arms from the damage that—if they made it out alive—he could heal from faster. Her eyes were closed, face buried in his blood- and mud-damped shirt, when he felt the change in her.

Her body went limp for one long moment, the heat and dirt and metal hammering into them, battering and lashing every piece of him as he tried to hold her upright, tried to protect her from the flame.
He reached for the shadows with his gift, but he wasn’t strong enough; he needed the touch to make it work. They were burning alive, he and Brianna, and he could do nothing to fight it. He squeezed his arms tighter, pressing his face into her hair, the ends of it lashing them both, and shouted her name.

S
he sucked in a breath, suddenly alive, every part of her pulsing with an energy that buzzed over Aern despite his ravaged skin. The air changed, as if they rested within the eye of a tornado as it howled around them. The winds blew backward, and the flames choked, dying so that the air turned from black and orange to clear, a bright blue that was the noon sky and nothing else as the field around them was flattened by the discharge of her energy. The pulse she’d let loose was deafening, though Aern wasn’t certain he’d actually
heard
it. The only sound above the silence was the pattering of tiny chunks of dirt and rock landing on the bodies of downed men. So many men.

Brianna still clinging to him, Aern stared at the
figures on the lawn, searching for some sign of what the blast had done. Emily had apparently been knocked on her backside, and sat up, wiping the back of her hand across a mud-stained face. She seemed fine, aside from the adrenaline of the fight and some minor nicks and bumps, but she was a shadow, and Aern didn’t breathe until the others moved. He finally saw Logan unharmed as well, pushing himself up from the body of a shadow with no more than a slight limp and a few deep cuts. Brianna gasped, pulling herself free of Aern’s embrace to stare at the field around them. A shadow moved and Daniels dug a knife into his side, three other men jumping in to help restrain him, and then Emily was on her feet, demanding they free his armor so she could end the power inside.

“Wesley,” Brianna croaked, falling back into Aern with a heaviness that meant she wouldn’t be standing if on her own, and he
motioned to his men, sending them for the walls near the second gatehouse to check.

He glanced down at Brianna, a question in his gaze, and she nodded. They’d done it. They would be okay.
“Take care of the others,” she whispered, and he felt her weight pull away. He wouldn’t have let her, but there were so few left standing. He had to do as she wished. Because he knew she’d seen it.

Two more injured shadows rose,
and though their healing was not as fast as the Seven, it appeared they weren’t exactly easy to take out. Logan was on the first, fighting despite his wounded hip, and Aern ran for the other. He wrapped a raw, blistered hand around the shadow’s neck, gripping tight regardless of the surge of electricity that was forced through his body, and thrust the impulse to sleep into the shadow. It was incredibly difficult, despite the fact that he’d been able to sway a room full of Seven when Brianna had first given him the ability, but eventually the man gave, falling onto the ground to wait for Emily. Aern turned, finding Logan locked in a fiery hold with the other shadow, and ran to help. Logan roared, heaving the man from the ground to slam him full out on the earth behind them with unreal strength, and both men were on top of him as Emily leapt over Eric and Seth’s spent forms to reach him.

It was minutes later when the last threat of the shadows was removed, when Wesley and Ellin had rejoined the group with new scars of their own, the men on the lawn being helped inside, injur
ies tended, when Logan stood, glancing around the field as if he’d just come out of a daze, and said, “Where’s Brianna?”

Chapter Twenty-two

Brianna

Brianna stared at the figure in the shadows. She had known it was him, had felt the pull and seen the way the entire field of men had been oblivious to her departure. Aern had a gift, the strongest any of the Seven had seen, but the dark-haired man possessed an entirely different level of skill. He was a shadow. He had kept the whole of them from even looking. She was dead on her feet, in no way capable of defending herself from this man, but she had come regardless. She had come to keep him away from the others, to keep them safe. Because she knew the dark-haired man was stronger than the seven shadows they’d sent to find her.

Her words had not been a
lie; she didn’t trust him at all. But he had warned her.

There was another reason Brianna had come, if she was being honest, a reason great enough to make it worth the risk. Because something had happened on the muddy, blood-slicked ground of the lawn. Something had changed in her, for one brief flash of an instant, and she’d felt
different.

She’d felt free.

Come to me
, the tug said.
Closer
.

“Why?” Brianna asked into the darkness. “Why are you doing this?”

The dark-haired man didn’t step from beneath the shadows, but she could feel his smile. “To save you, Brianna.”

Her name rolled off his tongue with a familiarity that made her want to go to him and run from him at the same time.
He didn’t know her, he didn’t need her, and yet those feelings were there, a caress in his tone that sent unease to the pit of her stomach. She had moved closer without intending to, his low voice drawing her in, and she planted her feet to stare at him. He shifted within the shadows of the thick leaves, the same dark clothing, simple and nondescript. She suspected they were not even close to his normal attire.

“Why?” she repeated.

“Because they will kill you.” He shoved forward, one aggressive step to bring himself within arm’s reach of her, but Brianna didn’t move.

“Who?”

“The others,” the dark-haired man said. “Ancient shadows who want you and your sister removed.”

She leaned closer, a threat, or to entice him, or because she couldn’t help herself, she didn’t know. “
Why
?”

He sighed, breathing
her in, but she was running out of time, her body drained to the point of exhaustion. His hand twitched, a sudden urge to touch her, and then his fingers tightened decisively into fists. His dark eyes came up to meet hers, his tone unexpectedly dropped, solemn. “Because of the prophecy, Brianna. Because you are the daughter of great power.”

Brianna stared at
him; all thought of the prophecy dismissed when they’d taken Morgan out of the picture. None of that mattered anymore… none of it except the idea of where the prediction had come from.

The dark-haired man straightened, sliding ever so clos
er to her. “My name is Callan, Brianna. My father was Acacius; we take our descent from Eadmaer, son of Desiderius.” The name struck Brianna. She couldn’t say why, where she had heard it before, but she
had
heard it. The dark-haired man let her comprehend that, his gaze tightening on her as he prepared to deliver the final blow. “He was one of the creators of the Seven, Brianna. Father of the dragon line.”

Callan.
His forebear is the shadow who created the dragon line, gave them their power. The prophecy. The dragon
. Brianna felt her eyelids flutter and bit down hard, refusing to pass out. She breathed through her nose, knowing with absolute certainty that this man was sending her the words, the
understanding
, with his ability. “Stop that,” she said. “It hurts me.”

An emotion passed over the dark-haired man’s face, but it wasn’t concern.

“The prophecy,” Brianna said. “You’re telling me that it’s you, the heir to the dragon’s name?”

“Yes,” he said, his tongue rolling through the words in the ancient language, the prophecy the way it was written, the way it sounded in her head. But he stopped before the last line. He stopped before the one that mattered.

“But you already know,” she said, eyes narrowing in confusion. “The chosen one isn’t me. The true power is in Emily.”

The corner of the dark-haired man’s mouth shifted, sliding into a
deliberately suggestive smile. It said she was mistaken, it said he knew exactly which sister he wanted.

“Why would I help you?” she said, the que
stion coming out in her fatigue. She might have otherwise thought better of voicing such a dangerous denial.

He leaned closer, eyes dropping to her lips, curving back up to meet her gaze. “You felt it, didn’t you?”

Brianna knew exactly what the words meant. There was no question as to the
it
he referred to. What she didn’t know was everything else. The feral rage was in her, something that belonged to her because she was a shadow, something that helped her fight, told her when to run. But the other feeling, the one that had come as she thrust out a pulse to end the fight, the freedom, the absolute power of it—she didn’t have the slightest idea about that one. And what she saw in that instant of clarity made absolutely no sense to her.

“What was it?” she said.

“That is what we could have, Brianna, if you would just let yourself accept it. I can help you,” he said, voice falling into something that was not entirely a request. “Let me help you.”

Her skin prickled, the idea of a bo
nd with him so foreign that she recoiled, foot sliding back over the concrete walkway that surrounded the property. His jaw tightened, his feet moving with hers, and then a voice called her name, somewhere in the distance behind her.

“Brianna,” Wesley said again, running toward her.
Brianna glanced over her shoulder at the boy; when her eyes returned to the dark-haired man, his head was tilted at the slightest angle.

She lowered her chin, voice even. “Don’t hurt him.” It was an order, an outright demand, and the shadow knew it.

He watched her for a long moment before his head bowed lower, a farewell, and she sensed he’d counted this as a favor, Wesley’s life another gift. She sensed that he wanted her to know, that she owed him for it.

“Brianna,” Wesley repeated, grateful to finally have reached her, the fear in his voice replaced by uncertainty, a touch of relief. He brushed her arm and she was suddenly weak, her knees giving to fall into him.
The prophecy
, she thought,
all of this for the prophecy
. And it wasn’t Wesley’s murmured assurance, not his call for help that echoed through her mind as she drifted into unconsciousness. It was the words that had been foretold. The words the dark-haired man hadn’t said.

And they will rule with
their union
.