Part 36 (1/2)
Nika urged Tori's eyes open, ordered her sister's muscles to move so she would look around and show Nika where she was and how to get her out. What she saw was far from comforting.
”Zillah's with her. So is Maura.”
From behind her, Nika heard Gilda suck in a harsh breath.
”There are”a”she counted fasta””at least thirty Synestryn in there. They know we're coming; they're on either side of the opening.”
Nika sent the information to Madoc with a thought, so he could see what she did.
”Drake, take the right side. I've got the left,” said Madoc.
The two men hurried ahead, swords drawn. Helen was right behind them, and Nika did her best to keep up. She could feel the heat of Angus's hand at her elbow. He didn't touch her, but he was ready to catch her if she fell.
Nika sent what rea.s.surance she could to her sister, watching through her eyes as Drake and Madoc cleared the tunnel and attacked the guards waiting for them.
Another contraction hit Tori and a portion of Nika's consciousness went blind as her sister closed her eyes. She stumbled into the wall and felt the burn of Angus's touch as he steadied her.
She needed to sever the connection with Tori if she was going to have any chance of concentrating enough to save her.
We're coming. Love you, she said to Tori; then she let the connection fade until she could feel Tori, but could no longer hear her thoughts or see through her eyes.
By the time Nika was able to move, Helen was already in the cavern opening, fighting. A column of flame as thick as Helen's arm shot from her hand. Nika stepped up behind her just in time to see that flame set a group of three Synestryn on fire. They burned hot and fast, dropping to the ground before their screams had finished echoing off the walls.
As well as fire seemed to work, Nika wasn't going to chance it again. She sent her mind searching for sgath or any other creature here who might have ingested her blooda”one she could control.
A kind of resonance s.h.i.+mmered around one of them, telling her it was her target. It wasn't a sgath. It was tall, stood on two legs, and gripped a bent sword in its hand, which was tipped with long, black fingernails. She'd never seen anything like it, but that hardly mattered. What mattered was that her blood flowed inside its veins and that made its mind hers.
Nika stepped back into the tunnel so she wouldn't be in the way, shed her body, and hurled herself inside the thing's head.
Its mind was a hot, alien place. The hunger for blood consumed its thoughts, but its fear of Zillah held it in place. Only when he ordered it to move would it dare set out for the food that had walked in.
Nika wasn't going to wait for an order like that. She took control of the thing's body, shoving herself between thoughts and actions. The monster roared in defiance, but the only sound it made was inside its own mind.
She propelled the thing forward, moving its odd, spindly body clumsily toward Zillah.
She was going to kill him with his own miniona”cut him down before he had time to even figure out what had happened.
Zillah was bent over Tori, unfastening the restraints they'd used to hold her down. He didn't see her coming inside the borrowed body of the Synestryn. She lifted the crooked sword, preparing to plunge it into his back.
From a few feet away, Maura cried out a warning.
Zillah jerked to the side just as Nika struck. The sword hit the metal table, sliding along the edge. The movement knocked the monster Nika was inhabiting off balance, and she didn't have enough practice moving its body to recover from it. The monster fell to the ground in an awkward heap.
Nika pushed it back to its feet, but by the time she turned to strike out at Zillah again, he'd already drawn his own blade. With one powerful swing, he lopped off the monster's head.
Nika shoved herself out of its mind before the head hit the ground. She couldn't see, couldn't feel. Energy floated around her, warm and sparking against her wherever it touched.
The disorientation lasted a while before she realized she hadn't gone back into her own body. Jumping out of the monster so suddenly had left her reeling and without an anchor.
And then she felt him. Madoc. His power radiated out, glowing like a beacon. She followed that power until she could reach him.
His mind was a familiar place. Comforting. Even in the midst of battle, when his body was working hard and his thoughts were on the tactics of killing, he still eased her soul. She wanted to stay inside him, huddled in his warmth, but there was something she was supposed to do.
Tori. Tori was here and she was in trouble. Nika had to get back into her body so she could save her baby sister.
Using the luceria's link as a frame of reference, Nika followed the pathway between her and Madoc, found her body, and eased back where she belonged. It took her a moment to acclimate to her own skin and take in her surroundings again. The ground beneath her was cold and hard. The battle waged on. Smoke billowed along the rough, high ceiling of the chamber, proof of Helen's work. Bleeding Synestryn bodies cluttered the floor near the tunnel. Angus, Drake, and Madoc were slas.h.i.+ng at demons, dropping them one by one.
Tynan was working his way toward Tori. His sole job tonight was making sure she lived through the birth, and if anything happened to him, Tori's chances for survival would plummet.
Nika struggled to stand. Dizziness plagued her, making her sweat and her stomach roll with a sickening twist.
She leaned against the rock wall, letting it hold her up. She'd been in Andra's mind enough times to know what she could do. Nika wasn't sure if her strengths would lie in the same area as Andra's, or if trying to create a s.h.i.+eld would hurt as much as playing with fire had. Either way, it was worth a shot.
Nika pulled on Madoc's power, letting it fill her. She kept her eyes on Tynan and imagined a giant bubble forming around his body.
A second later, Tynan slammed into an invisible wall.
Right. Nika needed to let him move, taking the bubble with him.
A Synestryn's blade came down toward Tynan's head. It skittered off the wavering surface of the s.h.i.+eld Nika had created, but that blow rang through her head, as if a giant bell had been struck against her ear.
The shock of the blow rattled her, and it took every bit of concentration she had to hold the barrier steady.
A few feet away, Zillah wrapped his too-long fingers around Tori's ankle. He grabbed one of his own demons and slit his chest open. Blood poured from the beast. Something s.h.i.+ny glinted in Zillah's fist as he shoved it into the bleeding demon's chest.
A blinding light flared inside the cavern, and a wave of stagnant air washed over Nika. When she could see again, Zillah was gone. The table where Tori had lain was empty.
”Tori!” screamed Nika, stumbling toward where her sister had been only a second ago.
Gilda's strong hand grabbed her arm, stopping her from flinging herself into combat. ”He teleported away with her. They're gone.”
”We have to go after them. Follow them.”
Gilda's black eyes slid away, filled with shame. ”I'm too weak. I'm sorry.”
Nika wasn't going to let this happen. She wasn't going to get this close to having her sister back only to lose her like this.
She took Gilda's head in her hands and plowed her way into the other woman's mind. ”Show me,” she demanded. ”Show me how to find her. I'll do it myself.”
The knowledge was there inside Gilda's cluttered mind, along with a mountain of other information. There wasn't time to linger over any of it, as tempting as the notion was. Instead, Nika went straight for the knowledge she needed and ripped it from the woman.
Gilda's eyes flew wide and a shocked gasp froze on her lips.
Nika had what she needed. The bright kernel of knowledge was pulsing inside her, ready to be used.
She needed to be closer to Madoc and Tynan so she could take them with her. She couldn't do this on her own. She sent a call to Madoc's mind, screaming at him to grab Tynan. Trusting that he'd do as she asked, she flung her mind out, searching for some sign of her baby sister.