Sapphire (28 page)

Head high, she quickened her pace to catch up with
Mira and Lula. Orin looked taken-aback as he watched her leave.
Antares had finally composed himself and was loping ahead with Zev.
The rest of the wolves were rarely seen, silently blending into the
foliage around them, and keeping watch for bears, or worse. Shawna
shivered at the thought of one of those giant bears rampaging
towards them like the one from Karuna’s realm.
That wasn’t
really a bear though,
she reminded herself.
That was
Gavan.

Lula flew over.

“What now?” said Lula. “What did he
say?
”

“What?”

“You look like Antares when he doesn’t get to
terrorize some poor defenseless animal.”

Shawna grinned, but didn’t answer.

“So if it’s not that traitor swooning over you with
a rose in his mouth, then what is it?”

“He’s not
swooning
, and he’s not a
traitor.”

“Oh, really. Though you practically lit his
face
on fire the other night. Are you going to answer my
question or not?”

Shawna sighed. “I was thinking about
her,
about how much I
hate
her.” She ground her teeth, and Lula
knew of whom she was talking about. “I just want to…” She gripped
the hilt of her sword. “I don’t know. Never mind.”

But Lula also knew exactly what she wanted to do,
and for the first time saw a glimpse of power in Shawna that
frightened her.

The sun was just beginning to set, and hundreds of
orange-pink blossoms were uncurling their petals, when the path
began to rise steeply towards the clouds. The grassy hills had
slowly given way to boulders and shale covered in lime colored
lichen. The contrast of the green lichen and bright orange flowers
bathed in sunset took Shawna’s breath away. Gray shale scraped and
clacked together under their footsteps as they climbed upward.
Antares and the wolves were waiting for them around a tumble of
giant boulders.

Zev was the only one standing.

When she walked into view, he said into her mind,
with a gruff commanding voice, “Halt guardian.”

She looked behind her then back at Zev. She thought
maybe he was talking to Antares, but Antares was sitting right
behind him, then she realized he meant her. She stopped in her
tracks as a wind began to pick up, whipping her hair around. The
other wolves and Antares backed away from the yellow wolf. Lula was
clinging to Shawna’s belt, sitting on the sword hilt while the wind
grew even more violent. Shawna stepped back, tripped on a rock,
tried to shield her face from her tornado of hair, and felt Orin’s
hand on her elbow. She glanced up, and he grinned at her, probably
remembering the pink beard Lula had accidently given her the first
time they’d met. She hoped he’d forgotten that.

Everyone was staring at Zev now. The wolf was
gleaming ever more brightly in the dying light. As the last rays
hit him, he seemed to glow bright as the sun itself, every point of
hair a spear of radiance, as if he was pulling the light towards
him. He began to grow, double, then triple in size. Zev towered as
tall as Kryos, his fur blinding like spun gold, his amber eyes
flecked with golden flakes. Shawna’s heart beat with excitement,
not fear, for the first time.
Zev
was the third guardian.
This meant they were now very close to the last realm. Adhara had
only one more chance to change the course of things, and Shawna
wasn’t going to allow her that chance.

“Ava,” He said, his voice raspy like the shale
crumbling beneath his enormous paws. “My pack and I join yours in
support. You and Orin truly are the last guardians we have been
awaiting. Your nose is sharp, and your paws swift.” She
unconsciously wrinkled her nose as he told her, “We will defend the
mountain pass to give you time.”

The wolves looked so regal, so fierce and wild, that
she did not fear for their lives, but she still felt a stab of
guilt. Here she was putting others in danger again, whether it was
their duty to defend and help her or not. She hoped the village
would be all right, and thought she’d never forgive herself if
anything happened to them. With that thought, her necklace flared
again, growing warm on her chest. She looked down and saw that
where the third black stone used to be another sapphire had morphed
into existence, shining like the others. Zev threw his head back
and shook the mountain with a thunderous howl. Every wolf joined
in, then as one, Zev’s pack sprinted back down the mountainside,
barking with excitement for the imminent battle.

His giant amber eyes looked down at Shawna, and she
felt swallowed entirely by them.

“Keep your nose to the scent of destiny, and your
ears to the sound of danger,” he said before he too bounded away,
gone in seconds with his long strides.

Lula flew up to Shawna. “You kind of look like a
wolf now.” She giggled. “Scruffy.”

Shawna touched her hair that was sticking in all
directions from the wind like she’d dipped her head in a vat of gel
and blow dried it.

“Here,” said Lula. “I’ll fix it.”

“No!” she yelled, throwing her hands up in self
defense. “No, thanks. I’ll do it. It’s fine.”

Lula looked hurt for a moment. “I wasn’t going to
turn it pink again,” she muttered, flying over to sit between
Mira’s ears.

Shawna climbed onto Mira’s back, and Orin followed,
wrapping his arms around her waist. They took one last look behind
them, then Mira cantered away, her hooves clattering like drumbeats
on the loose shale.

As dusk slid into night, Zev and all one hundred and
eighty of his pack melded into the amber and gray rocks they stood
upon. The scent of fear was close. The molochs were following
Shawna’s trail as predicted. The wolves would bar their advance
through the high pass, hopefully giving Shawna’s company more time
to locate the last realm. Zev sniffed the air. He smelled his human
pack, the villagers, in hiding and ready to fight if needed. He
smelled the autumn spice of decay, the leaves turning into earth as
the trees prepared for new growth in spring. He smelled darkness
and malevolence. The air was acidic with it. Every pair of yellow,
brown, and blue eyes turned towards this new stench of acrid
animosity.

These creatures, they were not born of clay and
stone like the wolves, not water and soil as the humans, or even
lightning and sky as Antares; these were beasts of vaporous
thought, more mist and air than solid form, and far more dangerous.
The wolves tensed, ready to die fighting. Zev gave a rumbling
growl. From the ridge above the town poured a wave of decaying
human bodies, and beasts of black fur, burning eyes, and glinting
tusks. The molochs were upon them.

There were hundreds of them, then thousands of them,
perhaps millions. They oozed down the hillside, then through the
town, weaving around buildings like tarry sludge while the
villagers hid safely in the forests. Good, the villagers need not
fight; at least the humans of his pack would be safe. Then all the
wolves bristled. The molochs halted. As one mind they turned their
monstrous heads to peer into the surrounding forest. As one they
shifted and began streaming towards the trees.

Zev heard a yell answered by a thousand more. Faolan
suddenly led his attack on the molochs. The wolves snarled and
howled in anger, racing down the mountain to aid their people. This
wasn’t supposed to happen. The molochs scattered as the giant wolf
guardian leapt into their midst, shattering many of them into
nothingness, but there were so many of them. The battle was valiant
but swift. The villagers, both men and women, fought with
pitchforks, axes, and crude swords. Faolan hacked many of them
down, but always there were more. The wolf pack howled, snarled,
and rampaged with teeth bared, sacrificing themselves for the sake
of the humans they loved and vowed to protect. Yet, no matter how
valiant they were, the molochs still swarmed like ants.

Faolan fell, a moloch devouring him from within. His
eyes turned red with fury, and his body morphed into something
unrecognizable, something dark, and gruesome. His wife screamed,
holding a sobbing Mia close. The women and children in hiding had
turned for the hills, but the monsters were upon them, snapping,
salivating, changing them into what they feared most. Mia fell from
her mother’s arms, dropping her fur and cloth wolf. She cried in
terror for her parents, for her Ant-aewy, then she too was
silenced. Every villager, every wolf, was no more. They were
overwhelmed. Zev let out one last desperate howl before his golden
light diminished.

The molochs surged forward again, their purpose
fulfilled. Over two thousand twisted, gruesome shadows of wolves
and people followed with hate in their clouded minds, death in
their hands, and fire in their eyes. The monsters continued to flow
through the town. Their numbers had swollen by the thousands and
thousands of victims during their relentless pursuit across the
land. A little wolf doll lay trampled and forgotten in the dirt. It
quickly disintegrated into fragments under the flood of shadows and
was blown away by the rising wind.

Mira galloped all night then all the next day up and
over the mountain pass. Orin had remained awake and kept Shawna
from falling when she could no longer keep her eyes open. She had
awakened the next morning to find herself clutching to him as Mira
still smoothly loped on. She quickly let go and rearranged herself
to clutch Mira’s mane instead.

“My whole body hurts. Aren’t you tired?” Shawna
said, leaning over Mira’s neck.

Night was beginning to fall again as they reached
the forested foothills.

Mira shook her mane, breaths blasting from her
flared nostrils, her neck wet with foam. “There are more important
matters than my lack of strength, or your sore end. We’re close. I
can feel it. The air pricks my skin like thorns. It is full of
magic.”

Shawna could feel it to. She wanted to rub her arms,
then she felt hands slide from her waist to wrap around them. She
turned her head to see Orin staring at her. Her heart
flip-flopped.

“Whatever happens,” he said, “I hold to my promise
from when we first met. I
will
protect you.”

She swallowed, lips pursed tight, but didn’t say
anything. She didn’t have to. He saw the disbelief and mistrust in
her eyes.

“I know you don’t believe me,” he said, “but that
was before I understood everything.” His lips almost brushed her
ear. “I’ll do whatever it takes to keep that promise.” His breath
was warm on her neck. “I think of it every night, and I know you do
too.”

She knew exactly what that ‘it’ was.

They were suddenly jerked out of their romantic
memory when Mira slid to a stop, snorting. Antares was growling,
fixated on the descending dark beneath the tall trees.

“Hold tightly,” Mira said in their minds.

Shawna wanted to ask her why, but the way Antares
was snarling made the hair rise on her neck.

“Orin,” Mira said, using his name for the first
time. “Honor your oath.”

“What is it?” said Shawna as he slid off.

Lula flew over to her usual comforting perch on
Shawna’s shoulder. Orin unsheathed his axe and walked over to
Antares. Shawna tried to see what they were staring at, but all she
saw were shadows until she heard the voice.
His
voice.

“Looking for something?”

Gavan materialized from the dark tree trunks, his
fists clenched, his eyes shining from the scant light.

“You won’t stop us,” Orin said, raising his axe.
“There’s nothing you can do, Gavan.”