Tears streaming down his face, Darric charged.
He was nearly there when a pale shadow shot out of the mountain doorway, knocking Urlun to the ground, and leaped. It hit Hweilan and they both tumbled backward. Its enraged growl drowned out all other sound. It was Hweilan’s wolf, and his eyes blazed with a feral light. Uncle’s jaws closed around Hweilan’s forearm. Green light leaked from the wound, and the wolf’s fur glowed with more than moonlight. The demon in Hweilan shrieked, cutting through even the sound of the wolf’s growls, and she thrashed and punched, trying to break free.
Darric came to his senses and ran for the talisman that Valsun had lost. He was scrambling on the ground, his hands feeling for it in the dark, when the wolf’s growls turned to a high shriek. His frantic searching hit the small steel gauntlet and knocked it away, but his other hand closed over it. He pulled it to him and turned.
Hweilan had regained her feet. She held her arm out, the wolf still latched to it. But with her other hand she had grabbed the wolf’s side and her fingers were tearing through the flesh between the beast’s ribs.
Darric pushed himself to his feet.
Hweilan’s hand disappeared up to the elbow inside the wolf’s body.
Uncle released her arm, his forepaws leaning on her chest, and let loose a cry, high-pitched enough to hurt Darric’s ears. The cry became a wail, then a keening-a shriek that went on and on, unending and echoing off the mountainside. Darric and the others covered their heads and fell to the ground.
Hweilan could feel her mind tearing apart. Something like this had happened once before, on the night Lendri had died and she first saw Nendawen. The Hunter had taken off his mask, and Hweilan had screamed in horror, for the primal instincts of her mind saw her own future in that face.
You are mine, Hweilan, he said. You were always mine. But her spirit had recognized the true meaning behind those words: This is what you will be. I am both your salvation and your damnation.
And then his mind had been inside hers, ripping through her essence, consuming every memory, every hope, every secret shame. But the Hunter had intended to take them as his own, to meld his essence to hers. To make them one.
But with Jagun Ghen, there was no sharing, no communion. The burning hunger wanted only to take. When his terrible will penetrated her own, he devoured her to taste. There was no nourishment. For every bit of Hweilan he swallowed, his hunger for more only intensified. He swallowed and spat and raged. He took what he wanted and tore the rest, simply out of the pure joy of destruction.
Still, Hweilan could see. As she felt her sanity being torn away, she could see everything around her, as if in a dream. Darric running out of the doorway, casting aside his torch. Urlun and Jaden backing away when they understood what she’d become. Valsun stepping forward, clinging to his faith and defying Jagun Ghen. She even felt Mandan’s club trap her in a crushing embrace. She could feel, but she could not move. Like a dream … able to behold everything, feel everything, but her will given over, like a leaf being swept down a river, inevitably, toward the waterfall ahead. Hweilan knew that when she reached that point, there would be no going back.
And through all this, Jagun Ghen continued to tear through her spirit, infecting every vein of her essence. She saw images of her family and friends as if through bloody water. The hugs from her father, the embraces from her mother, every time Scith had tugged playfully on her braid … she felt them all burned by fire. Every scent and taste she had ever cherished now had the flavor of smoke and corruption.
But Jagun Ghen was still not satisfied. The burning hunger burned deeper, consuming and rending.
Hweilan saw a light blaze in the darkness of the mountain doorway. A wolf-her wolf-blazing like unstained moonlight, leaped out of the darkness. In that new light, Hweilan saw it. Jagun Ghen’s pact circle had indeed trapped the Hunter’s ghost, but it was still here, still fighting, unable to break free. But as the wolf leaped over the pact circle, Hweilan saw a tiny crack open in the Hunter’s bonds.
And then Uncle’s jaws closed over her arm. She felt every tooth tear through her flesh, cracking the bone, but the deeper pain was far worse. The Master’s power inside the wolf hit Jagun Ghen, like cold water thrown on the hot stones of a campfire. In her mind, Hweilan felt the hiss and steam and the shattering like stones cracking and the Hunter’s power found a way inside.
Still, Jagun Ghen proved stronger.
Hweilan felt her left arm rise, the wolf’s jaws still locked around it, his immense weight pulling on her. She felt her right hand-
– She carries death in her right hand-
– strike, her fingers digging into the flesh between the wolf’s ribs. She heard his shriek of pain, felt him struggling, his claws rending at her shirt and the skin beneath, but his grip on her arm did not lessen, and still the power of the Hunter found ways into her mind, like the tiniest roots slowly shattering rock.
– There’s something in you, something I suspect has made even the Master wary-
She felt her hand close around the wolf’s unbeating heart and squeeze. For a moment there was nothing, but then Jagun Ghen funneled his unholy power through her grip.
The wolf’s jaws let go of her arm, and he threw back his head, and howled.
But it was not a howl. It went far beyond that. This cry was wolf, Lendri, and the power that had brought him back altogether. The last of Jagun’s power binding the Hunter’s ghost shattered at that cry. He was free.
Free but bodiless, no more than a raging will in the wind.
Hweilan flung the wolf away. He was still moving, but broken and hurt, unable to stand.
The threads of power from the Master burned away in Hweilan’s mind, and Jagun Ghen continued tearing through her. Almost done now. Soon, the tiny leaf that was Hweilan would be swept over the cataract, to drown in darkness.
She heard laughter, like the roar of fire, as Jagun Ghen tore through her, going deeper, to the very heart-
The destroyer bit-
– and something bit back.
Something hidden. Something that had been dormant in the life and spirit that was Hweilan. But it was dormant no longer. It blazed. Not a light of flame like Jagun Ghen, full of smoke and ash and destruction. This was the light of a newborn star, shining purest white, bringing light and life to the darkness.
The destroyer screamed, a shriek of a shattered spirit.
Jagun Ghen fled, burning in his own fire.
In the emptiness he left behind, Hweilan heard the music that had haunted her dreams. She followed it.
Free from Jagun Ghen, and free from Nendawen, she saw the light and song for what it was. Her grandfather. His countenance had the sad wisdom of ages, but he still had the face and strong gait of a man in his prime. And then she saw his eyes.
Golden. He had golden eyes, and she realized that they saw her.
You remind me of your mother, he said. I felt her passing. I am so sorry. Still, I weep for her at night. I have been searching for you ever since. But something has kept you from me.
What are you?
I am your mother’s father. My name is Jalan.
No. What are you? Your eyes … and the light around you, like the sun …
He smiled. You see truly. What I am is a long story. Suffice to say that my father was … not of this world. That thing trying to hurt you, it has no power over me.
You can defeat him?
No. That is not my calling. But you can. I can sense it in you. You know the way, Hweilan. You know what to do. And after, come to me. I am in the east, beyond the Sunrise Mountains. There are things here I cannot leave undone. Find me, Hweilan. When tonight is over, I may be your only hope.