Chapter Twenty-Nine: Morthbrood on the Moors
Guardians of the Twilight Lands -- The Sixth Book of Unexpected Enlightenment
Rachel flipped through the air, spinning end over end. Silver sparkles glittered across her body. She gripped both Vroomie and her wand with all her might. Then, she slammed into something and dropped to the ground. She lay panting on the damp earth, winded and surrounded by mist. The breath had been knocked from her. She gasped, attempting to catch some of it. Where she had struck the standing stone, her back ached with fiery pain.
With a groan, she sat up. Her heart leapt into her mouth as she felt the length of her bristleless. A gasp of relief escaped her lips when she confirmed that the steeplechaser had not been damaged. Still aching, she rolled onto Vroomie and shot back towards Sigfried.
She had left him unguarded! Sigfried lay slumped on the ground. A hunched woman moved out of the fog toward him, knife raised. Rachel had no time to aim her wand. She was breathing too heavily to whistle. Instead, she flew directly at the attacker, slamming into the woman’s abdomen shoulder-first. Rachel was not traveling fast, but she hit hard enough to knock the woman to the ground.
Turned out that she struck fast enough to knock her opponent over but not fast enough to get away. As the woman toppled, she grabbed the haft of Rachel’s broom, pulling it down with her. They ended up on the ground together. The woman lifted her knife and plunged it toward Rachel’s face. Rachel twisted her wrist, pointing her wand at her assailant. Blue sparks struck the woman, accompanied by a burst of fresh-smelling pine scent.
The assailant froze in place, knife still raised. Rachel rolled out from under the blade and jumped to her feet, yanking yanked her steeplechaser out of the woman’s frozen hand. She also took the attacker’s knife and flute for good measure. Then, she leaned over her blood-brother, terrified. Was he still breathing?
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Sigfried was snoring, probably a sleep hex.
“Obë.” Rachel raised her forefinger in the Word of Ending gesture. She cast more beathes, this time remembering to place some of the shields behind them. No one would sneak up on them again.
Siggy jerked awake. He leapt to his feet just in time. Their opponents surged toward them, emboldened by the gap in Siggy’s spray of spells. The Morthbrood moved closer. Sigfried had dropped his trumpet, but he waved his wand from one side of the group to the other, firing spells indiscriminately.
Of the four people rushing them, two were thrown back, one was wrapped in vines, and one ended up—somehow—surrounded by a Glepnir band but hovering horizontally four feet off the ground. Rachel had never seen that happen. The person must have tried to jump out of the way and had dived into the band instead. Rachel paralyzed one of those who had been thrown back before he could rise again. The remaining Morthbrood backpedaled. Rachel again noted the canticler behind them, freeing the frozen from hexes.
The stone circles were thick with mist now. Rachel could hardly see their attackers. Her stomach tightened as she spun to check on the Hobsons. When she made out the shape of the dazed couple through the fog, she released her pent-up breath in a whoosh. They still stood where the Morthbrood had left them, motionless between the two circles.
A hush was falling over the landscape. The hair on the back of Rachel’s neck rose. Something was happening. It felt almost as if something were leaking through from the other world, as if Grey Wethers were suddenly Underhill. She looked left and right but could not discern the cause of this sensation. Close at hand, the Morthbrood still struggled against their spells. There seemed to be more figures in the stone circle than there should have been, or maybe the mist was playing tricks on her eyes. In the distance, the fiery form of the fleeing, burning troll moved across the rolling moors. Rachel could still smell the lingering odor of charred meat.
The fight continued. Rachel and Sigfried were protected on all sides, but she wished they had a proper ward. That would have stopped a lot of these attacks. Lucky was off fighting the troll; however, and it was too dark to draw a circle on the ground. Perhaps she should study warding and carry a pouch of iron dust as Xandra Black did.
Something pale moved out of the corner of Rachel’s eye. A luminescent feminine figure danced through the circle. Then two. Then four. Suddenly, Rachel realized what had been wrong with Sigfried’s trumpet playing and why a hush had fallen over the moors. Sigfried had not played the song for raising a mist. He had played the song for summoning mist sprites.
That was not good. Fey were dangerous.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Roanoke Glass to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.