Warriors rushed toward him, valnetium chains in their hands. The chains whistled as they wrapped around Lachlan until his entire body was chained. The emperor glided closer but faltered as Lachlan laughed—low, dark, mocking, and dangerous.
Her mouth dried.
The chains shattered and dropped to his feet. The display of power shook her. All Darkans in the dungeon were held with fewer chains and they hadn’t been able to move.
“Take him,” the Emperor snapped to the hovering warriors.
Shilah rushed to her sister’s side, expanding her aura, and holding it in place to create a barrier around them. Sound waves rippled into the room, curving around her shield, and slammed into her body. Kala screamed as her rib
s cracked from the pressure, and Shilah struggled to breathe through the pain battering her insides.
And then the pain was no more, for, with a blink, more than a dozen warriors littered the ground. All dead. She hadn’t seen Lachlan move. Yet he stood amid the bodies, blood dripping from his claws. The door was flung open, and more than one hundred warriors rushed into the throne room.
Powerful soundwaves poured from the Mevian warriors. Vibrations ran through the air, sinking into every crevice and shadow, battering Lachlan. With casual speed and strength, he moved through the force trying to pin him, went behind the lead warrior, grabbed hold of the man’s hair and, with one sharp move, snapped his neck.
Then he ravaged. Shadows danced in the room, blood-spattered and arched in several directions. Jumbled thoughts filled with rage and terror filled her senses as the warriors battled with a force they did not comprehend.
The grand general drew his swords, the aura around him glowing red. Then he screamed. The beauty and energy from his voice roiled the earth, shaking her with its purity. Shilah pushed her skills to their limit further, building the strength of her barriers to protect herself and her sister from their terrible strengths. The sound waves slammed into her force field, and with a grunt she braced against it, digging her heels and toes into the cracked tiles.
The attack from the grand general had broken several of Lachlan’s bones, and right before their eyes, he healed, the blackest of chakras twisting around his body. Then the tattoo slid sinuously along his body as if alive. No! He was summoning whatever demon he possessed, and Shilah knew if he were allowed to so do, everyone in the palace would die. “He is summoning his beast!”
Lachlan’s snarl trembled on the air and vibrated with menace. She took no satisfaction from the unease that rushed from the emperor. Acting on instincts, Shilah closed her eyes and pushed the sounds of the battle, the snarls, and the screams of the Mevians as they fell under his claws. The cruelty and the unadulterated blood-thirstiness crawled through her body like a nasty poison. The pain of enduring such terrible rage dragged a whimper from her. She trapped all the emotions inside of her and dug deep into the immeasurable well of her abilities, seeking his mental barriers. A violent, gnawing need to slaughter and devour tore through Lachlan’s soul and beat at her shields. She could feel the urgency of his needs beating at him. The beast had been caged for years, and it hungered.
The monster in him sensed her presence. And it paused. It was that slight hesitation which allowed her to sink deep inside her to the absolute stillness and blast out her telepathy. She tried to rebuild the barrier, but the beast gave her no quarter. Serpentine eyes snapped open in her mind, and his darkness slid against her light.
The profound savagery of his demon beast’s chakra took her breath. Every part of him seemed dark and shadowed, and Shilah fought back her rising dread.
The creature in him froze, then inhaled deeply.
Mine...
A possessive roar rose from man and beast she did not understand. What was his? She felt its vile chakra pressing against her natural shields as if he wanted to enter her mind, and terror filled Shilah’s soul. She hadn’t expected it to try and reverse the pathway she sent her telepathy on. Death brushed against her mind, creating a chill in her soul. The violent wave of bloodthirstiness made her heave and sweat broke out on her skin. The pathway widened, and his chakra churned around him.
The ground cracked beneath her feet, and the walls of the throne room expanded as a wild blast of energy swarmed the air. Then another insidious probe at her mind came from him. Shilah dropped on her ass as if she had been kicked, while the wave of violence swamped her, and a white-hot pain exploded through her head, the mass of rage and brutal intensity too much of a sensory overload to her psychic senses.
A scream ripped from her throat, and she grabbed her head. White spots danced in front of her eyes. Energy rushed through her as she tried to escape the raw, swirling force threatening to form a connection with her. Desperation burned through her. Why it wanted to connect with her, she did not know or care to discover, but every instinct screamed that if she allowed it in she would irrevocably lose all sense of herself.
Shilah flinched as pitiless eyes opened inside of her mind and malicious laughter echoed.
Too late.
Abandoning creating the shield wall, she built an intricate illusion, one of rampant destruction for the beast, and one of calm and serenity for the man. For she could sense the profound depth of Lachlan’s pain that he was losing control of the force within him. Energy so strong and sure surged inside of her as she tried to build the illusion to entrap him. She only needed a few precious seconds.
“I need the witch,” she screamed hoarsely, not daring to open her eyes to see if anyone obeyed.
The sounds of a battle raged on, the clash of swords, the awful drip, and scent of blood, and the screams. She closed her eyes even tighter, trying to drown out the cry of pain and terror. She ruthlessly built the images, feeding the construct to his mind, coaxing him to believe the memories she planted were real.
A wash of breeze caressed her face.
“Here is the witch,” General Shenzhen snapped, strain evident in his tone.
Ignoring him, Shilah concentrated on the mental pathway of the witch. Amirah’s thoughts crowded her mind, and Shilah absorbed the knowledge that this Darkan had been the witch’s avenue of escape.
“I need a binding spell, one effective enough to suppress his powers.”
A slight hesitation, then a whiff of magic burned along her senses as the witch responded, “I will try. I need his blood.”
“It is on my arms.”