Soulceress (The Mythean Arcana 2) - Page 93

She walked next to Aurora as they made their way to the temple, and though she could hear Warren’s footsteps behind her, she didn’t look back. When this was all over, she’d have to make up her mind. But even this small task of destroying the temple—which she doubted would be all that dangerous—made her skin tighten with fear for Warren’s mortal life.

Could she face that for all of her days? No. She shook the thought away and went to work plotting with Aurora how they would destroy the temple.

“Do you think you could make the floor crack like you did back in your world?” Esha asked her sister.

“Nay. I could do it because I created the world. The ground beneath the temple is too great a space for me to modify if it’s no’ already my creation.”

“What about forces of nature?” Esha asked.

“Well, lightning and fire are out because it’s made of stone.”

“So is flood. These days, it’s just bad form to melt a glacier.” Esha couldn’t laugh at her own dark joke.

“And I doona think I can muster enough wind to blow it over.”

“What if you think smaller,” Warren said from behind. “Remove key stones from the temple so that it topples over.”

His voice sent a pang through her, but her mind latched onto the idea. “That could work.”

They arrived at the square a few minutes later and took up positions. Esha and Aurora stood about fifteen yards back from the temple at the north and west corners. Going into the alleys on either side had been deemed too dangerous once the building started to collapse, so they stood in the square.

Warren took up a position just behind her, no doubt to protect her from whatever might come at her, and she tried to ignore him. She looked up to check the sky, pleased to see that a great grouping of winter clouds had begun to fill the blue. It gave the whole square a gloomy feel, but they’d be perfect.

“Ready?” Aurora yelled.

“Yes. North corner first!” Esha returned her attention to the sky. Once she felt the Chairman’s warm little body lean against her leg and saw Aurora’s familiar do the same, she focused all her energy and power on the clouds. When she could feel Aurora doing the same, she yelled, “Now!”

She forced a great blast of wind toward the clouds. Her breath grew short with the strain, but eventually the clouds gathered together in a group so dense and heavy that they turned the color of charcoal. Together, she and Aurora forced them into a whirling funnel, smaller than a tornado but just as deadly.

When the sky shrieked with the force of it, she and Aurora directed their cloud tornado toward the north corner of the building. It collided with the stone and great chunks of granite exploded into the air. Esha’s chest vibrated with the reverberation.

Aurora dodged, barely escaping a huge boulder that crashed down next to her, cracking the ground. Her broken concentration withdrew her power and the tornado faltered. Esha pushed everything she had into keeping it going, and finally Aurora scrambled to her feet and rejoined her.

“West corner!” Esha yelled. It’d been stupid to start with the side closest to them, but they were no demolition experts, and hindsight was twenty-twenty.

With a heave of joined power, they directed their tornado to the far west corner. A great crash sounded and one whole side of the temple began to collapse in on itself, blocks of stone tumbling as great plumes of dust rose into the sky, blending with their clouds.

They’d turned their cloud tornado to the east corner when a great shrieking flowed through the streets, growing in volume and ferocity. Her attention broke from the tornado just long enough to see a horde of souls flowing through the streets into the square.

Shit. They couldn’t stop the tornado or they’d never get it started again.

Warren cursed when he saw the mass of souls rushing toward them, clearly intent on saving the temple. They were a surging wave of black shadow, a force of destruction racing toward them.

Didn’t they know the soulceresses were trying to help them? Or were they just shadows of themselves acting on ancient instinct, as they had at the museum?

“Aurora! Get closer to Esha!” he yelled and drew the dagger that had freed Aurora from her souls.

Aurora ran toward Esha, still controlling the tornado, and he clashed with the first of the souls, protecting the soulceresses while they destroyed the east corner of the temple. The shade joined him, along with several other shadows. He got the impression that they’d died more recently and still had their minds instead of merely

instinct.

When the dagger passed through the shades, they flew off into the sky as Aurora’s had done, freed to go on to their afterworld. But it didn’t stop the horrible too-wrong chill when they touched him or the force of their determination that pushed him back toward the soulceresses.

“Warren! Stop! Too dangerous!” Esha yelled.

She feared for his mortal life. And she was wise to. Contact with the souls weakened him, as if they sucked out his life force. But he hadn’t a choice. They’d be on Esha in seconds if he quit.

He struck harder and faster, sending souls toward the sky with every swipe of his blade. But a new soul always filled in the gap left by one he’d freed, and dozens pressed in on him and the souls who fought by his side. With every brush of their shadowy forms, a chill raced through him, followed by a shot of weakness.

Tags: Linsey Hall The Mythean Arcana Paranormal
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