The Amulet (26 page)

“They cannot be seen aiding us, no,” he
replied.

That at least gave Faedra a glimmer of hope.
He hadn’t just said ‘no, end of story’.

As soon as the Valkyries had retreated,
Vivianna flew down and landed on the altar stone towards the center
of the circle.

“Let us have some fun, shall we?” she said as
she lay the Book of Anohs down on the altar stone. “I will give you
the chance to win back the book, Custodian,” she taunted, mumbling
something under her breath. Another sword appeared in Vivianna’s
other hand. She swiveled them around her body in a spectacular
display of sword skills. Even Faedra had to admit she looked
impressive, which certainly didn’t help with the knots that were
tying themselves in her stomach.

“Vivianna,” Faen reprimanded, “Faedra does
not know the way of the sword. You dishonor our race by what you
ask.”

“Do you think I care of honor or dishonor
after I found out about
her
!” Vivianna spat her words that
were full of anger and contempt. She threw one of the swords hilt
first for Faedra to catch.

To Faedra’s surprise she caught the sword
gracefully, and the feeling of holding it in her hands was an oddly
familiar one. She couldn’t understand why; she had never held a
sword before this moment.

She looked up at Vivianna. “I don’t even know
you. What could I have possibly done to offend you?” she asked,
trying in vain to hide the quiver in her voice.

Vivianna looked at her intently, carefully
measuring Faedra’s expression. “You do not know, do you?” Vivianna
narrowed her eyes, but her voice was smooth as silk again.

“Know what?” Faedra questioned.

“Oh, this makes things even better,” Vivianna
laughed, a cold hard cackle that made Faedra shudder. “After I kill
you and retrieve the amulet, I will send you to your grave forever
ignorant of who you are.”

“What is she talking about, Faen?” Faedra
whispered.

“I do not know.”

“Silence!” Vivianna bellowed as she swooped
down from the altar and was standing a few feet in front of Faedra.
“Kill them, leave the
samtero kruwos
for me,” she commanded
in the direction of the redcaps.

Faedra saw Jocelyn and Faen exchange
surprised glances at the foreign sounding words Vivianna had just
spoken. But a second later, the redcaps had surrounded them and
they were busy defending themselves.

“Fight!” Vivianna instructed Faedra, and
slammed hard with her sword. It clashed forcefully with Faedra’s,
knocking her off balance and sending her crashing to the ground.
Vivianna hovered above her, horizontal to the ground, holding her
sword point to Faedra’s throat. “Don’t bore me, Custodian, get up,”
she demanded as she landed back on the ground and stepped back,
allowing Faedra to get to her feet.

Faedra picked up the sword, her heart
pounding. She didn’t know how to fight with a sword. She looked
over to where Faen and Jocelyn were expertly wielding theirs. She
could hear their swords clashing with the redcap’s axe-like
weapons, and so far, could see two of the evil beings dead on the
ground. She gulped, she wouldn’t last five seconds if she were
expected to know how to use a sword to that proficiency.

Vivianna came at her once more with a force
that Faedra could see was going to knock her off her feet again.
She braced herself and held her sword out in front of her tightly
in both hands, trying hard not to close her eyes as Vivianna’s made
contact with hers, sending sparks flying. The swords connected with
such intensity Faedra could feel the vibration fly up her arms and
into her head. Vivianna came at her low the next time, and Faedra
angled her sword to meet the blow and defend her legs.

The redcaps were fast; they were coming at
Faen and Jocelyn from all angles. Jocelyn hovered above the ground
to dodge the axe that was being wielded towards her. Another redcap
grabbed her neck with his invisible hold and threw her violently
against one of the stones. She lay stunned for a few seconds, but
regained her senses just in time to move to the side, narrowly
missing the spear part of the weapon as it came at her head but
made contact with the stone instead. She got up and spun round to
the back of the stone, and leaned against it for a few seconds to
catch her breath before moving around to enter the battle
again.

Faen’s sword was flying in all directions,
clashing fiercely with his enemies’ weapons. Four redcaps
surrounded him, and before they had had a chance to respond, he had
raised himself from the ground and flew over one of them, stabbing
it without mercy in the back. It fell to the ground with a thud.
Another then grabbed him with the same invisible force and held him
up above the ground. Faen struggled in mid air, but the
stranglehold the redcap had on him was so strong it forced Faen to
drop his sword, which landed point down and was standing up in the
earth below him. Jocelyn saw what was happening, and with
lightening speed, crossed to the redcap holding her brother and
slashed it through the chest. It slumped to the ground, and Faen
caught himself just before he hit the ground and was able to land
softly. Faen grabbed his sword and wielded it around as he spun
towards yet another redcap, taking it out with a fatal blow to the
head.

With a move that Faedra didn’t even know her
body knew existed, she spun around wielding her sword over her
head, and brought it crashing to meet Vivianna’s. They hit so hard
that sparks flew on contact.

Vivianna had a satisfied glint to her eye.
“That is more like it, Custodian. This will be so much more fun
than when I killed your mother. I didn’t have any time to play with
her, and I find poison such a boring way to kill.”

Faedra stepped back, reeling from what she
had just heard, and Vivianna caught her off guard again with a
swing to her upper body, slicing through her shirt and into her
arm.

Faedra gritted her teeth as the pain shot up
her arm. Managing to bite back the tears that stung behind her
eyes. She looked down at her arm just as she caught sight of
Vivianna’s blade coming at her again. Somehow she ducked under it
and was now standing behind her. She could feel the blood pouring
down her arm, but now that there was revenge flowing through it, it
didn’t seem to hurt as much. Vivianna spun around so she was facing
her opponent, ready to wield another blow at Faedra. Pure fury
flowed through Faedra. She charged at Vivianna, wielding her sword
around her head. It clashed so hard with her opponent’s that it was
nearly knocked out of her hands.

“Your sword skills are very rudimentary,”
Vivianna said with an undeniable pleasure.

“You don’t say,” Faedra retorted
sarcastically, and slammed her sword hard into Vivianna’s, forcing
the fairy to step back. “Well, considering this is the first time
I’ve ever held one, I would hazard a guess that I’m going to be
good enough to kick your fairy butt all the way back to Azran.”

Vivianna laughed her cold humorless
laugh.

“Why did you kill my mother?” Faedra demanded
between the wielding of swords and the clashing of blades. Their
swords locked at the hand guard so their faces were mere inches
from one another.

“She stumbled upon my redcaps plotting the
execution of my plan and was about to enter Azran to tell my
father. I could not allow that to happen. I was so close to taking
the amulet then, but Faen showed up,” she scowled, “so I have spent
the past eleven of your years biding my time until you became of
age.” Her silken voice did not fool Faedra, she knew the owner of
it was deadly. Vivianna used the hand guard of her sword and pushed
hard on Faedra’s, forcing Faedra to stumble backwards.

“But why would you turn on your father and
your own people, not to mention my people? Everyone is suffering,
Vivianna,” Faedra questioned as she tried desperately to regain her
balance and stay upright.

Vivianna eyed Faedra with vicious intent,
holding her sword out in front of her ready for another attack.

“Revenge, Custodian, pure and simple.” She
came at Faedra faster and more determined than ever. “Let us see
what havoc I can wreak when I have control over weather, too.”

Faedra was desperate to know what Vivianna
wanted revenge for, but Vivianna’s determination caught her off
guard again. Faedra went to make several defensive steps back, but
was blocked by something hard in the small of her back. She looked
around to see it was the altar stone. Vivianna was on her almost
immediately, but Faedra had not managed to adjust her grip on her
sword. With the next blow, it was sent flying from her hands.
Vivianna raised her sword with malevolence and was about to wield a
fatal blow, but Faedra was not ready to die just yet. She had
questions that needed answering, and if that fact alone was giving
her the determination needed to survive, that was just fine with
her.

She was lying half on, half off the altar
stone. With a movement of pure adrenaline, she rolled her body over
and Vivianna’s sword missed her by mere millimeters, clashing with
such a force on the stone beside her, she could feel it vibrate.
She slid off the other end of the stone and moved quickly around
it, putting it between her and Vivianna, looking around her for her
sword as she did. She couldn’t see it.
Oh, God, where did it
go?

She looked up just in time to see Vivianna
fly up on top of the stone and was now standing above her with her
sword poised to swipe at Faedra’s head. It was a knee-jerk
reaction; Faedra held her hands up and closed her eyes as two balls
of blue light thrust themselves forcefully from her palms, knocking
both her and Vivianna off their feet with the intensity, but not
for long enough. Faedra hadn’t had the time to focus on her energy
to make it powerful enough to do much damage.

Vivianna was on her feet again in seconds and
was flying towards Faedra who scrabbled backwards on the ground,
using her legs and feet to push her backwards with all her might.
She scanned the ground around her and could see her sword a few
feet out of her reach. Her heart sank; she knew she would not be
able to reach it in time.

Her eyes widened as she saw the sword turn
and skim along the ground hilt first until it reached her hand. She
looked up just in time to see the Valkyrie nearest to her return
her spear to her side and look away with an innocent expression on
her face. Grabbing her sword, she held it above her head
defensively just as Vivianna’s came crashing down with another blow
to try and take her head off.

Faedra’s phone rang. She could tell it was
her father, she had a specific ring tone for him.

“Oh, crap,” she groaned.
Great timing
Dad
, she thought as she defended against an onslaught of blows
from Vivianna. If she didn’t answer her phone he would just call
Amy, and she really didn’t want her friend to have to lie for her,
if at all possible. She shot another energy ball at Vivianna,
knocking her backwards, and grabbed the phone from her pocket.

“Hi, Dad,” she grunted breathlessly, “you
kind of caught me at a bad time, can I call you back?”

“Sure, darling, what on earth is all that
commotion?”

“Err, we’re playing
Dungeons and
Dragons
on Amy’s video game – Urgh,” she groaned as she shot
another energy ball and sent Vivianna reeling backwards again.

“You sound pretty out of breath, hun.”

“Well, it’s one of those remotes you have to
use like the real thing. At the moment, I’m having an – argh –
swordfight with an – urgh – evil fairy princess, it’s really
interactive.”

“Oh, okay, darling, well have fun. I hope you
win.”

“Me, too, Dad, me, too.” She rang off and
moved her head to one side just in time to dodge another blow that
came crashing to the ground. She looked at her phone that she was
still clutching and threw it away as she grabbed for her sword .
She held her sword with one hand and threw another energy ball with
the other, forcing Vivianna back just long enough for Faedra to get
to her feet. Then she saw the book, it was still sitting on the end
of the altar stone where Vivianna had laid it before they had
started their fight. She had to think of a way to get her hands on
it, but right now she was being well and truly out-sworded by her
opponent, and it was all she could do to keep herself from getting
killed.

Use the amulet, Faedra
.

“Mum?” Faedra called out, looking all around
her. Vivianna stopped for just a second and gave her a questioning
glance, then continued with her onslaught.

The amulet, Faedra, use the
amulet
.

She couldn’t quite believe she was having a
Star Wars
moment with her mother, but went with it. “How do
I use the amulet, Mum?” she cried out into the darkness as she sent
another energy ball into Vivianna’s chest to distract her for
another few seconds.

Think, Faedra, the book is near. Use your
power to use the amulet.

“That’s all I need right now, riddles,” she
mumbled under her breath. How on earth could she get hold of the
book when she was fighting for her life? Vivianna was not giving
her any respite, where did this woman get her energy? Faedra looked
around her in the split seconds she had between parries and
shooting energy balls. The red eyes of the winged horses shone in
the darkness. The Valkyries were sitting motionless, watching
intently, but with no movement to imply that they would help
again.

Faen and Jocelyn were still wielding their
swords valiantly. There were fewer redcaps now, which gave Faedra
an idea. It was a long shot, but if Jocelyn could hold off the
redcaps and Faen could distract Vivianna, maybe it would give her
enough time to figure out how to use the book and the amulet.

“Faen!” she shouted across the circle. Her
sword clashed with Vivianna’s sending more sparks flying.