Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 92996 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92996 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Allow the unclean passage, all will be made clear, I said.
The unclean cannot pass, the land replied.
Have faith in your guardian, I pleaded.
Remain and there shall be judgment, the land said.
It walks with the man, I said.
There was no answer, but I hadn’t expected one. Corvus was waiting, and so was I. It was smart of the demon to keep a hand on Lorne, the land far less likely to attack while that connection remained.
As they moved forward, stepping onto the grass that ran alongside the path, Kamosh proceeded slowly, stopping, then walking again.
Wailing outrage and anger from the ground tore through me, shaking me to my core, the icy blast running through my blood causing me to physically tremble.
Lead only one path, the land said. A small one.
Precisely as Elen had guided us, which made sense. She was the goddess of the pathways, after all.
Rising fast, I stood and watched as the Tanner glamour, for the second time that day, fell away. Kamosh continued walking, fully a shadow now, leading Lorne toward me.
“Show me the passage—the rift, as the chief calls it,” Kamosh demanded.
I began the walk toward the rift, moving as I never did, in a straight line, not diverting at all, with only one purpose in mind: reaching it as quickly as possible.
“Run now, witch, or I’ll put this man in his grave. You move too slowly for my taste.”
I had been checking on them over my shoulder every few feet, but now I sprinted around the cottage, rushing by the back door. I bolted by what Lorne was right in saying had become a vegetable garden for my forest friends.
“Faster, witch!” Kamosh goaded me, but that was fine. As long as it kept coming, following me, engaged, I would have my moment. I just needed it to let go of Lorne.
The scream startled me, and when I turned, there was only Lorne there, staring at me with unfamiliar red eyes.
“No,” I whispered.
“This way you won’t be tempted to do something rash,” Kamosh informed me with a smile that normally charmed me.
We were closing in on the rift now, four steps more, three, and I saw an elder shrub, much like the one my lady Elen had stood near when she graced Corvus with her presence.
I pretended to fall, rolling in the grass, gasping before I sat up, holding my arm, a bird with a broken wing.
“Xander Corey,” Kamosh called to me, charging forward. “You and I will be bound together from now until the end of your days, and you will have the land bury the rift deep while I take you here in this place.”
I was to submit to Kamosh and drown the rift in the land so nothing could cross through ever again. Neither of those things could be allowed to happen.
I shoved my hands into the earth and called on Corvus again.
Sift the man from the unclean, I said.
This is your love, the land declared.
I was shaking as Kamosh closed in.
The unclean is inside the man, I said.
That cannot be, the land replied. The unclean is gone.
It had never once occurred to me that my magic, that lived in Lorne, could camouflage the demon. Corvus had perceived a man and a demon, and now, as far as it could tell, the demon was gone. What I was saying made no sense because all Corvus saw in him, was the magic.
Take him in, make him whole, I pleaded.
There was no answer. It didn’t understand. Earlier it had, discerning the demon from Lorne. But now, the essence of the man was unchanged.
And then I remembered what I’d learned, what my lord Arawn knew the first time he saw Lorne, the same thing Elen saw in a flash of complete understanding.
A piece of my magic lived in Lorne.
It didn’t live in his body, his blood, or his bones. It wasn’t anywhere that the demon would touch. It lived in his soul. And the soul belonged to the man.
Lorne’s hand, now the demon’s, filled my vision as he reached for my throat.
I knew in those seconds that there was more than the land that could aid me.
Because I wasn’t alone. I was never alone.
Yes, on my land I was strongest, but within me, in my blood, in my soul, I carried centuries of those who would come when called, who would give anything, make any sacrifice to protect me, because we were one. They loved me, and their love was the greatest gift of all.
My family.
“Please!” I called on my ancestors to strengthen my connection to the land. “Help me convince Corvus of the truth, to claim what is mine!”
It was like time stopped.
The sudden roar was like a sonic boom. Dirt and leaves, flowers and branches, as well as the demon, all rose into the air at once, holding, suspended.