I focused my whole concentration on the skinwalker, and waited.
The skinwalker, I realized a moment later, was enormously powerful. I’d known that already, of course, but I hadn’t been able to appreciate the threat it represented beyond the purely physical, even though I’d viewed it through my Sight.
(That memory welled up again, trying to club me unconscious as it had before. It was difficult, but I shoved it away and ignored it.)
Through Demonreach, I could appreciate its presence in a more tactile sense. The skinwalker was virtually its own ley line, its own well of power. It had so much metaphysical mass that the dark river of energy flowing up from beneath the tower was partially disrupted by its presence, in much the same way as the moon causes tidal shifts. The island reflected that disruption in many subtle ways. Animals fled from the naagloshii as they might from the scent of a forest fire. Insects fell silent. Even the trees themselves seemed to grow hushed and quiet, despite the cold wind that should have been causing their branches to creak, their leaves to whisper.
It paced up to the cottage, where Morgan and my apprentice were hiding, and something odd happened.
The stones of the cottage began to glimmer with streamers of fox fire. It wasn’t a lot of light, only enough to be noticeable in the darkness, but as the naagloshii took another step forward, the fox fire brightened and resolved itself into symbols, written on each stone in gentle fire. I had no idea what script it was written in. I had never seen the symbols before.
The naagloshii stopped in its tracks, and another flicker of moonlight showed me that it had bared its teeth. It took another step forward, and the symbols brightened even more. It let out a low, snarling noise, and tried to take another step.
Suddenly, its wiry fur was plastered tight to the front of its body, and it seemed unable to take another step forward. It stood there with one leg lifted and let out a spitting curse in a language I did not know. Then it retreated several steps, snarling, and turned to the tower. It approached the ruined tower a bit more warily than it had the cottage, and once again those flowing sigils appeared upon the stones, somehow seeming to repulse the naagloshii before it could get closer than eight or ten feet to it.
It let out a frustrated sound, muttered something to itself, and flicked out a hand, sending unseen streamers of power fluttering toward the tower. The symbols only seemed to glow brighter for a moment, as if absorbing the magic that the skinwalker had presumably meant to disrupt them.
It cursed again, and then lifted Thomas idly, as though it planned on smashing its way through the stones using Thomas’s skull. Then it glanced at my brother, cursed some more, and shook its head, muttering darkly to itself. It fell back from the tower, clearly frustrated, and just as clearly familiar with the symbols that allowed the stones to shed the power of a skinwalker as swiftly and as easily as they shed rainwater.
Demonreach’s alien presence rarely seemed to convey anything understandable about itself—but for a few instants it did. As the skinwalker retreated, the island’s spirit allowed itself a brief moment of smug satisfaction.
What the hellwas that stuff?
Never mind. It didn’t matter. Or, rather, it could wait for further investigation. The important thing was that the game had just changed.
I no longer had to get Thomas away from the skinwalker and then find a way to defeat it. All I had to do was get Thomas away. If I could grab my brother and drag him into the circle of the broken tower or into the sheltering walls of the cottage, it seemed as though we would be fine. If the very stones of the cottage repulsed the skinwalker’s presence, then all we’d need to do is let Molly activate the crystal and wait the naagloshii out. Regardless of the outcome of this night’s battle, the Council would win the day, eventually—and even the worst thing they might do to us would be a better fate than the skinwalker would mete out.
In an instant of rational clarity, I acknowledged to myself that there were about a million things that could go wrong with that plan. On the other hand, that plan had a significant advantage—there was at least one thing that could go right, which was exactly one more right thing than the previous “take back my brother away and beat the skinwalker up” plan could produce if I tried it unassisted.
I might actually pull this one off.
“Wizard,” the skinwalker called. It faced the cottage and began walking in a slow circle around it. “Wizard. Come forth. Give me the doomed warrior.”
I didn’t answer him, naturally. I was busy changing position. If he kept pacing a circle around the cottage, he would walk between me and the empty doorway. If I timed it right, I might be able to unleash a kinetic blast that would rip Thomas out of its grip and throw him into the cottage.
Of course, it might also
fail to rip Thomas out of the skinwalker’s grip, in which case it might whiplash his limp body severely enough to break his neck. Or it might succeed and hit him hard enough to stop his heart or collapse a lung. And if my aim was off, I might be blasting Thomas out of the skinwalker’s hands and into a stone wall. Given how badly off he looked at the moment, that might well kill him.
Of course, the skinwalker would kill him if I did nothing.
So. I would just have to be perfect.
I got into position and licked my lips nervously. It was harder to work with pure, raw kinetic energy, with force, than almost any other kind of magic. Unlike using fire or lightning, summoning up pure force required that everything in the spell had to come from the wizard’s mind and will. Fire, once called, would behave exactly like fire unless you worked to make it otherwise. Ditto lightning. But raw will had no basis in the natural order, so the visualization of it had to be particularly vivid and intent in the mind of the wizard using it.
That was one reason I usually used my staff, or another article, to help focus my concentration when I worked with force. But my staff was several minutes away, and my kinetic energy rings, while powerful enough to handle the job, were essentially designed to send out lances of destructive energy—to hurt things. And I hadn’t designed the magic that supported them with on-the-fly modifications in mind. I couldn’t soften the blow, so to speak, if I worked with the rings. I could kill Thomas if I used them.
“Wizard!” the naagloshii growled. “I grow weary of this! I have come to honor the exchange of prisoners! Do not force me to take what I want!”
Just a few more steps, and it would be in position.
My legs were shaking. My hands were shaking.
I stared at them in shock for a second, and realized that I was terrified. The mind specter of the skinwalker hammered at the doors of my thoughts and raked savagely at my concentration. I remembered the havoc it had wrought, the lives it had taken, and how easily it had avoided or overcome every threat that had been sent its way.
Anything less than a flawless execution of the spell could cost my brother his life. What if the skinwalker was good enough to sense it coming? What if I misjudged the amount of force I needed to use? What if I missed? I wasn’t even using a tool to help me focus the power—and my control was a little shaky on the best of days.
What about the seconds after the spell? Even if I managed to do it right, it would leave me out in the open, with a vengeful and enraged naagloshii to keep me company. What would it do to me? The image of the half-cooked Lara ripping out Madeline’s intestines burned in my thoughts. Somehow I knew that the naagloshii would do worse. A lot worse.
Then came the nastiest doubt of alclass="underline" what if this had all been for nothing? What if the traitor escaped while I flailed around here? What if the politics of power meant that Morgan would pay the price for LaFortier’s death despite everything?