On Wings of Chaos (Revenant Wyrd Book 5) (23 page)

Without knowing
how
he knew it, Jovian understood that the figure robed in black was the master of the horse.

Again a glint of gold issued forth from the depths of the hood, and as the figure reached up to pull back the hood, Angelica and Jovian were torn from their vision.

They were cast out of the orb with a sizzling pop. The noise sobered Jovian immediately, and when his vision cleared he saw a great rift had shattered along the top of the Orb of Aldaras, laying it open as if it were nothing more than a geode, filled with crystalline teeth.

Angelica scrambled away from it with a cry on her lips. Jovian stood, his hands clenched at his sides, waiting for yet another attack from the egrigor. When nothing happened, and Angelica had made her reluctant way across the shifting floor to his side, Jovian relaxed.

“You’re the one who’s telling her it broke,” Angelica said. “I didn’t have anything to do with this.” A look of horror contorted her face. The Orb of Aldaras lay in its blue cushioned box, a crack split the surface from which iridescent smoke flowed out like a nimbus of fog, wreathing the bottom reaches of the box.

“Maybe we can get her another one?” Jovian wondered in a panic.

“Where, Jove?!?” Angelica tossed her hands in the air. “I doubt they make ancient artifacts in Underwood!”

Jovian chuckled, and then laughed. Angelica stared at him for a moment in horror, and then her mask melted and she started laughing too.

All their laughter was cut short as the fog coming from the orb pooled larger around the stone, spilling out of the box to puddle on the floor around it. They retreated a step as the puddle of smoke got larger. And then it rippled from the outer edges toward the center. As each ripple reached the orb, the dim light of the ball glowed brighter and brighter until it was lit like a lamp. Jovian couldn’t look directly at it, and averted his eyes.

He watched the ripples until a gasp came from Angelica, and she stepped back further. Jovian looked up to see the fog shaping itself into a familiar form of the egrigor they knew as Wyrders’ Bane.

It stood before them, no taller than a large child. Its head was domed, elongated in a way. Its arms hung limply just below its knees. It stepped toward them, this time no longer a shadow, but a glowing being of radiant light.

Masters,
it whispered.
You’ve beat me in wyrded battle. I am yours to command.

“What do you mean?” Angelica asked.

You have driven out the wyrded command of my previous masters. Now I am just a vessel for you to fill with your desires.

“Like, if we asked you to grant us a boon?” Jovian said.

A ripple of response reached their minds. It was a feeling of confusion, of not understanding what Jovian meant.

“If we asked you to strengthen the wyrd of those within this keep, instead of harming them, could you do that?” Angelica asked.

This I can do for my masters,
the egrigor responded.
Is that what you command?

Angelica looked at Jovian and he shrugged. “It’s as good a command as any.”

And where would you have my energy rest?
the egrigor asked.

“In the Orb of Aldaras,” Angelica told him.

The egrigor nodded.
From now on, I shall be known as Wyrders’ Boon. Thank you for my new direction, masters.

And then the alien form of Wyrders’ Boon began to drip apart, globs of the foggy light sloughing from his form to puddle back up in the fog around the box. As he did so, the fog retreated into the crack of the orb.

When it was all gone, the orb shimmered and the sound Jovian equated with ice freezing reached their ears. When the shimmering stopped, the Orb of Aldaras was once more whole.

“What do we do with it now?” Jovian asked.

Angelica stepped closer to the orb, bent at the waist, her faded blue gown pooling around the box like the smoke had. She reached tentative fingers toward the opalescent glass and traced them over the surface.

“Can you feel it?” she asked in a breathy whisper. “Can you feel the egrigor inside now?”

Jovian stepped forward, knelt before the box, and laid a hand on the surface. There was a vibration underneath, a whisper of consciousness. He felt the power of the being respond to his touch, unfurling and infusing him with power. He shivered.

“I feel it,” he told her.

“We need to get this to Sara,” Angelica said.

Jovian nodded.

He gathered the orb to himself, and they made their slow progress down the stairs. From the second floor they had to go down two flights of stairs to the entrance hall, across the hall and up the left-hand set of stairs all the way to the top of the keep to Sarah’s office.

“You’d think they’d have a better way of getting to the top of the keep,” Angelica complained as they climbed the staircase. “I mean, honestly, we’ve seen some pretty amazing things done with wyrd, why can’t they put in some kind of lift?”

“Like in the Spire of Night,” Jovian said, nodding.

“Jovian,” Angelica said after a time. “That figure in black at the tower bothers me. I feel as though I know it.”

Jovian didn’t say anything for several steps, and then he nodded. “I agree.”

“Who do you think it is?” Angelica asked.

“I suspect that we were right before. It’s probably Arael, and whatever is left over inside of us from mother’s memories recognizes him.”

“Maybe,” Angelica said.

“You think it could be someone else?” Jovian cast a glance over his shoulder.

“I don’t know, I just don’t feel like it’s Arael.”

His legs were on fire, and the normal fatigue and wobbly knees were afflicting him by the time they crested the top. He stopped for a moment, shifting the weight of the box with the stone to his side.

Once they had caught their breath and looked like normal people once more, not like fish out of water, Jovian knocked on the door.

“Come in,” they heard Sara’s muffled welcome from beyond the heavy door.

Jovian pushed the door open and walked in. Sara sat in her wheelchair. She had more color today, and was able to hold her head up with a little more strength. She was looking down at a map. Annbell leaned over her shoulder, looking at the map as well.

“What are you looking at?” Angelica asked.

“Wondering how long it will take for Joya’s reinforcements to get here. We’ve been able to push the dwarves back from the wall, and now they’re just standing in the center of their camp, not doing much of anything.” Sara looked up at them, smiled, and then her eyes found the box, and her smile melted.

“I don’t think there’s anything to fear now,” Jovian said, halting his progress.

“We’ve used it, and something rather . . . interesting happened,” Angelica continued.

“We didn’t see the Beast. There
was
another useless vision of the Turquoise Tower, but this time we fought something.” Jovian set the box on the desk. Sara leaned back in her chair, folding her fingers together. She didn’t want to be close to it, but she didn’t precisely act afraid of it either.

“The egrigor, Wyrders’ Bane,” Angelica said.

“You
fought
it?” Annbell asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Yes, and we beat it,” Jovian said, looking up at the Realm Guardian in her normal black fur cloak.

“But how?” Annbell wondered.

Angelica shrugged. “We aren’t really sure.”

“No human is able to best the egrigor,” Annbell argued. She closed her eyes and shook her head. “No wyrd in all the realms, human or nephilim, is able to best that stone.”

“Well, we did,” Jovian shrugged.

“Because their wyrd isn’t anything the Realms has ever seen before,” Sara said. All eyes turned to her. “Grace has told me you are the Two.”

“What does that mean, precisely?” Annbell wondered aloud.

“It means that when Mother sacrificed herself so that we could live, she changed our wyrd,” Angelica tried to explain. “When Aunt Pharoh taught us through the medallion, we found that our wyrd doesn’t come from the Well of Wyrding, but instead directly from the earth around us.”

“Ah,” Annbell said, tilting her head back slightly. “So, your wyrd comes from a different place, and therefore Wyrders’ Bane can’t effect you.”

“What about what you just went through? When Shelara washed your wound, Wyrders’ Bane affected you,” Sara pointed out.

“We think something else was happening then,” Jovian said.

“We had a vision that we have yet to share with Grace and Joya, something that’s happened in the past.”

“We think the vision was waiting for a way to slip in, and when Angelica was rendered unconscious, it worked its will.”

Sara shook her head. “I’m completely confused, but I won’t ask for you to explain further. What happened with the egrigor once you defeated him?”

“Let’s just say, you won’t ever have to worry about Wyrders’ Bane again,” Jovian told them.

“When you defeat an egrigor,” Annbell said, “their essence isn’t destroyed. They stick around, awaiting new direction from their new masters.”

“We recreated it as the direct opposite of what it was before.” Angelica motioned to the box. Jovian worked the hook clasp, and then tilted back the lid. The opalescent orb shimmered in the depths of the blue velvet box, casting filtered light around the inside of its confinements and painting Sara’s face in rainbow relief. “It required a new home, so we placed it in the Orb of Aldaras.”

Sara looked up at them, wonder in her eyes.

“It also gave us its new name,” Jovian told her. “It is now called Wyrders’ Boon.”

“Wyrders’ Boon,” Sara mouthed the name, as if testing it out on her tongue. She reached for the orb, but Annbell restrained her hand.

“Remember what Mag told you she saw last time?” Annbell cautioned.

“But that was last time,” Sara said, pulling her hand away from Annbell. “Can’t you feel the power coming from it now?”

Annbell rolled her shoulders. She nodded her head, indicating that she could, in fact, feel the new power within the orb.

Sara slipped her fingers over the orb, like she was touching the skin of a dear lover. Clasping the top of the orb tight, she slid the box closer to herself and reached out with her other hand.

When her other hand touched the surface, her back arched, her mouth opened in a silent scream, and light poured forth from the orb, spilling up her arms and traveling through her veins. Her skin shone with the light of her veins through her skin, like a spider web of crimson light. A moan escaped her lips, and when it stopped, she tilted her head back and opened her eyes. Her eyes glowed white with the power of the orb.

There was a pulse in the air from the orb, striking them all in their wyrd, unsteadying their feet and making them stumble. Annbell gripped the edge of the desk, and then righted herself. Jovian and Angelica sank into the chairs across the desk from Sara.

They watched as the light of the orb formed into the familiar shape of the egrigor. Its small frame crouched on the desk before Sara. It reached out oddly large hands, and cradled her head in its palms, even as she was holding the orb. Its long fingers nearly circled her head.

It leaned forward, pressing its head to hers, and then it was gone, merged with Sara.

As Jovian watched, Sara’s hair became fuller, shinier. Her skin filled out, muscles reforming from their wasted state. The wrinkled skin all over her body became pliant and supple once more. The paleness she had shown before touching the orb was replaced with a healthy blush of skin.

The light slowly faded from her eyes, receded from her veins and ebbed back down her arms and into the orb. When the transfer was complete, the orb dimmed, and Sara came back to herself with a gasp.

She reached shaky hands toward her face, tentatively touching her cheek. Her hand snapped back as if burned. When Sara realized that her skin was whole once more, she flattened both hands to her face, and rubbed them over her youthful skin.

She smiled, tears dancing in her eyes.

“Annbell,” she said in a breathy whisper. “Get me a cane.”

“Why not use your wyrd?” Annbell asked.

“I’ve felt my wyrd all my life, but have taken for granted the flesh and blood that comprise me. I want to feel the burn of my muscles once more.”