Soul Guard (Elemental Book 5) (32 page)

“Did you find out how he got through my ward?” Hunt
asked.

I shook my head.

“Because he’s more powerful than you, obviously,”
Langril said. “Although that’s not saying much. A shadow bunny could make it
past your wards.”

Hunt raised his hand in a threatening gesture and a
spark of green lit in his hand. Before he could do anything, however, both
Henry and Flagstone reacted simultaneously. Henry shoved Langril back, put
himself in front of the professor, and snarled at Hunt. Flagstone, predicting
Henry’s response, smacked Hunt’s hand down and stepped in between them.

With a small spark of light, the black leather couch
became hot pink. Hunt gaped at his couch in horror and the room was suddenly as
silent as a grave. “Sorry,” Darwin finally said, blushing.

“That is… fine,” Hunt said slowly, obviously lying.
“I was getting tired of the black anyway. Can you change it back?”

“Not until everyone chills out. Dev, what else did
you learn about the shadow man?”

“I figured out why he wants to bring all four keys
together.”

“He told you?” Langril asked.

“The gnomes did.”

“There were gnomes there?” Vincent asked.

“No. When the gnome led me to my test to get the key,
he said that the gods created four keys to control all six worlds.”

“But there are only five worlds,” Flagstone said.

“That we know of.”

“So one of the worlds is inaccessible?” Henry asked.

“It’s not inaccessible, though. Langril found out and
tried to destroy the tower with him in it so that the four keys couldn’t be brought
together.”

“I was going to get Astrid and Heather out first,”
Langril said. I just wasn’t expecting Kea to be prepared. Then I had to stick
around to make sure he didn’t destroy earth. Had I not gotten stuck in that
prison, I would have been back and defeated him by now.”

“So what the hell happens when the keys are brought
together?” Flagstone asked.

“It opens a fifth door, duh,” Darwin said.

Henry tucked his hand in his sleeve and slapped it
over Darwin’s mouth. “Not helping. How does this change the plan, Devon?”

“I imagine whatever is on that other world, we don’t
want the shadow man getting it. The advantage we have is that he thinks I have
the key. How we can use that advantage, I’m not sure yet. Do you think the
cuffs would work on him?”

“They use the person’s power against him, so it
should,” Darwin said.

We had to explain the magical, power-neutralizing
shackles to Langril and he thought it had a good possibility of working.

“So, I’ve got a plan, but there are a million ways
for it to go wrong.”

“Sounds about normal,” Darwin said.

*          *          *

When I finished explaining the plan, everyone in the
room had about the same amount of apprehensiveness on their faces, except for
Langril, who didn’t appear to be bothered at all. Darwin poked him in the arm.
“Professor, you need to look scareder than that or Devon’ll think you ain’t
taking him seriously.”

“On the contrary, I think Devon’s plan is bound to be
at least partially successful. I mean, what is the probability that
everything
will go wrong?”

“From a strictly mathematical standpoint, it’s
fourteen points six percent. It’s indeterminate from a realistic perspective,
because most of the components are dependent and how much they…” he trailed off
when everyone stared at him. “That was a rhetorical question, wasn’t it?”

At that point, Ghost appeared on the back of the
couch, looking even better than he had in my room. Vincent gaped. “What did you
do to my familiar?”

The cat was almost calico in the way his fur ranged
in different shades of brown. His fur had completely lost its patchiness and
was now long and silky. Although his eyes were still mismatched, the scar on
his face was gone. He purred and licked his paw.

“It was your healing potion that helped him.” When I
pet him, he didn’t try to scratch me. “Ghost, can you get a letter to someone?”
I sensed his mind trying to connect with mine and let him in.

“
You know, nobody has ever
asked
me to do
something. I would be glad to help. Thank you for saving my wizard
;
I
know he was so lost and scared without me
.”

Hunt gave me a small roll of paper and an old
fountain pen. I wrote the letter as quickly and neatly as I could, which was
neither quick nor neat, and handed it to Ghost. He took it in his mouth and
vanished.

Langril had disappeared sometime while I was writing
the letter. I expected him to try to change something in my plan and not tell
me until it was too late. I wasn’t terribly worried, though; he wouldn’t cross
me until his daughter was safe.

“What do you want us to do?” Henry asked, referring
to Darwin and himself.

“You’re support. We can’t do much until---” I was
interrupted as Rocky forced an image into my mind of Felicity. “Okay, she’s
already here.”

Henry, Vincent, Hunt, and I got into Hunt’s SUV and
drove to the edge of the campus. Felicity scowled at us as we got out. “I have
a life, you know,” she said.

“What happens to that life if the shadow man
returns?” When she didn’t say anything, I continued. “The four keys cannot come
together before the tower. I want you to disguise yourself as Vincent to fool
the shadow man.”

“Seriously? No way! He would kill me!”

“By the time he realizes it, we’ll be ready.”

She didn’t look convinced. “Ready how?”

*          *          *

It took a little convincing, and plenty of
threatening, but Felicity finally gave in and spent the rest of the day
learning to act like Vincent. The reason I chose my uncle to be the one to sit
out was because Krechea spent months learning all there was to know about Hunt.
Neither Hunt nor Vincent appreciated me pointing that out, but they agreed
anyway.

I spent the day trying to prepare myself to test out
my new immortality. Nevertheless, putting myself in a deadly, no-win situation
was not something I could really prepare for.

Vincent found me in the library. I wasn’t looking at
any books, I just didn’t think anyone would find me there. I wanted a moment
alone before the war began, because I still wasn’t sure whose side I should be
on. “I thought Felicity was learning to mimic you,” I said.

He nodded. “She can do that without me for a while. I
wanted to see how you were doing.”

“It’s a little weird finding out that the shadow man
has been impersonating you since I got the key. I should have asked more questions,
I guess.”

“I should have been more open with you from the
start,” he said. “Not even Logan knew it wasn’t me. I’m a very private person,
and that wasn’t fair to you or Logan. I’m not saying I’m going to change. It’s
still who I am. It doesn’t mean I don’t care about you or trust you.”

“I know.” I thought I knew him more than a stranger,
though.

“Not to change the subject or anything, but why did
you give up the key?”

“It wasn’t worth the sacrifice,” I said. He looked
relieved. “Why did you think I gave it up?”

“I always felt different after getting the key. Logan
told me it was just that I was more powerful, but it was like there was a
sinister presence sometimes. Since you got the full range of my father’s power,
I worried that you might have developed some new powers that you would be
better off without.”

“Like what?”

He hesitated before answering. “It doesn’t really
matter now. If you hadn’t developed any when you had the key, you’re not going
to now that you got rid of it.”

After everything he went through in the last few
months, I didn’t want to push, so I let it go.

*          *          *

The time finally came for us to face Krechea. It
wasn’t so much a set time as a mutual realization that there was no point in
stalling. Hunt took me, Darwin, Henry, Flagstone, and Felicity to the tower.
Darwin, having never killed a person, was at risk. Since Langril said he was
able to hide Astrid when she was a baby, we did what we could to hide Darwin;
we taped a blanket over him and Henry carried him over his shoulder. It seemed
to work; there were no extra monsters reaching for us or rivers of lava. When I
pulled the blanket off and asked Darwin if he was okay, he didn’t seem any
worse for wear.

“I’m good. I don’t feel like I lost my soul or
anything.”

“Why did you bring
them
?” Krechea asked,
suddenly appearing in front of us. He
still
looked like Vincent.

“Because they’re my friends and they came to make
sure you don’t try to kill me once you get what you want.”

He narrowed his eyes. “You’re really going to do it?”

“You want to kill Langril and leave, right? If I
fight you and lose, you’re going to kill Langril and leave. If I fight you and
win, I’m going to absorb your power and then Langril will turn on me in order
to get that power. You may be my enemy, but Langril is always going to be the
bigger threat. I’m not opposed to you taking out that threat and leaving.”

He looked at Vincent and then Hunt. “And you agree
with this?”

“I have always hated him. You have never done
anything to me,” Hunt said. “You did impersonate my friend, but it was Keigan
who trapped him in the first place. You could have killed me and you never
did.”

He didn’t look convinced. “Then where is he?”

“He should be back any minute. He’s actually
fulfilling a promise to me to return Astrid if I help him save Heather.”

“So you’re trying to trick me?”

“Not at all. You don’t intend to kill Heather, do
you?”

“I don’t need to, no.”

“Then by showing up here, in front of the tower, I’m
helping get him Heather back. Even if he dies in the process. Or, he might
defeat you.”

“What about your friend?”

Henry pulled the scorpion pendant out of his shirt.
“I’ll need to wear this until I can become someone else’s familiar, like
Vincent’s familiar.”

“So, bring us Heather, because I’m not going to let
you have him until he gives me Astrid.”

She appeared beside him. He grasped her arm and
pulled her flush against his side. “I’ll hand her over when the master
appears.”

One of the doors of the tower burst open. From the
black abyss, we heard, “Then rejoice, for your master has arrived.” Both
Langril and Astrid emerged. Astrid didn’t look a bit different than she had
when I last saw her. I took her hand and pulled her away from Langril. “How
long has it been for you?” I asked.

“It’s been two minutes since you saved Heather. You?”

“Three months. It was hell knowing you had to go
through those six months alone.”

I learned right before Langril took Vincent to Kadin
that when three of the keys were in front of the tower, they had a strange
effect. This began as the symbols on Langril’s, Hunt’s, and Heather’s palms
started glowing white. Three of the doors began opening on their own.
Fortunately, Krechea didn’t know that this wasn’t the full thing and he didn’t
see that one of the glowing symbols was on Heather’s hand instead of mine.

“Now hand over my daughter.”

Believing that he had all four keys together, Krechea
let her go. An instant later, more people emerged from the doorway. Over fifty
to be exact. “What’s this?” I asked.

“You can’t call a handful of soul guards an army.
This is an army.”

“What about the blood control?”

“It wears off when you are on a different world from
your subjects.”

The plan clicked into gear all of a sudden. Felicity
dropped her disguise, the soul guards and freed shadow walkers appeared, and
Henry passed me the scorpion pendent. As soon as he handed it over, the
disguising magic fell away to reveal the power-stealing amulet that Gale had
used to take the magic of so many paranormals.

“I thought you destroyed that,” Felicity said.

“That’s what we wanted people to think.” It was
decided that instead of using the cuffs, we would use the amulet. The reason I
needed Darwin with me was because he could control it through me. If we wanted
to win whatever the cost, Henry would have given it to Darwin, but we knew that
was a bad idea. Darwin knew how to use my powers to spread the limit of the
amulet to every paranormal in the world and control everyone’s mind. The worst
part was that when he got ahold of that much power, his personality drastically
changed. If Darwin touched the amulet, he wouldn’t care whether we were friend
or foe. However, he knew how to use my magic through me when I let him into my
mind. He could help me channel the power of the amulet without touching it
himself.

We had Langril call for the soul guards and freed
shadow walkers so that they could subdue Krechea while Darwin focused the
amulet to draw away Krechea’s power. With Langril leading, the shadow walker
army created a ring of red fire around Krechea. “You dare to challenge me like
this?” Krechea asked.

“Hell yes. You took Langril’s daughter, my friend, my
brothers, and poisoned my uncle’s familiar.” I opened my mind to Darwin and was
almost surprised by how well he knew his way around my head. He bypassed all
personal information to reach what felt like the core of my magic itself. I let
him in, but it wasn’t pleasant.

There were several gasps in the cave as Darwin began
sucking the shadow walkers’ power into me through the amulet. I knew the
sensation they were feeling was somewhat akin to being underwater and still
able to breathe. “Sorry,” Darwin said before adjusting it so that it only took
power from Krechea.

Yet Krechea seemed to have better defenses. No matter
how much Darwin focused on drawing power from Krechea, I barely felt a trickle.
Krechea made a motion with his hands like he was pushing against the circle.
Three of the shadow walkers dropped, and two more broke out in serious burns.