“Kill him, Greg,” the dark mage said.
“You kill him.”
The dark mage stepped toward me confidently, showing me a mean look. He probably thought himself to be ten times stronger than he really was.
He made a circular motion with both hands. A clear sheet of mana transformed into dteria and arced out from his body to come around behind me. I tried to brace myself, but it caught me before I was completely ready. I instantly knew I had underestimated this mage. I had never seen that kind of control over the dark energy before.
His dteria forced me to stumble forward toward all three enemies. With me unable to stop myself, Shaw swiped at me with the ax. I swung back with my sword at the same time, knocking his weapon out of his hand. I still couldn’t stop myself before running into Jacob and the hammer he was about to swing, so I lowered my shoulder and increased my momentum instead.
Only his wrist hit me in the back as I took him off the floor and slammed him into the door. I felt the hammer fall out of his hands and roll down my back. I was about to stab him in his thigh, but another force of energy tossed me to the side.
I tried to steady myself by grabbing a dresser as I stumbled into it, but I accidentally kicked it and spun around. I had to drop my sword to catch myself as I fell onto my hands.
The dark mage swept the weapon across the floor with another spell.
Damn, my sword.
Shaw and Jacob picked up their own weapons and rushed me as I was starting to get up.
I saw the bloody dinner knife had fallen from the dresser. I grabbed it and motioned like I would throw, both men stopping and turning their shoulders inward as they protected their faces. It gave me enough time to prepare another spell. I used this one to throw Shaw onto the dining table.
Jacob ran at me right after. I leaned back to avoid his hammer strike, then ducked under the next one and countered by stabbing the dinner knife into his leg.
He screamed as he fell to a knee.
The dark mage was rushing toward me with the sword in both hands. I casted Expel at his knee, a firm punch of my mana condensed into energy. Like dteria, dvinia was unfortunately soft, cushiony. It couldn’t do much damage on its own. But both energies were extremely durable, and the force behind my spell was strong, knocking the dark mage off gait. His last steps toward me were stumbles. I moved out of the way of the flailing sword and threw him by his silk shirt into a dresser that exploded beneath his massive body.
He fell among the splintering wood with a loud groan. Jacob pulled the knife from his leg and threw it at me, but I put up a shield of dvinia.
The spinning blade struck the small wall of energy in front of me and slowed as if flung into water. It still hit me, but not with nearly enough strength to do any damage. I bent down and picked it up as Shaw came at me with his little ax.
I motioned as if I would cast at Shaw. Predictably, he tensed as he turned to prepare for the spell, but I did not cast at all. Shaw was clearly shocked, and it was too late for him to strike me with his ax or stop his forward momentum as I jabbed the knife into the top of his arm.
He screamed and still attempted to bury the small ax into my neck. I ducked under it and created some distance, moving toward the center of the room. He cried out in pain as he pulled the knife from his arm.
Jacob grabbed hold of the table to help himself up. “What if it’s not dark energy he’s using?”
“What else…?” The dark mage cursed. “You’re right. It’s him.” He pointed at me. “That’s dvinia he’s using, or I would’ve felt the dteria. This is the bladedancer!”
“How can you be sure?” Shaw asked.
“Because how many bladedancers have you heard of?” shouted the dark mage.
“Could just be dvinia,” Shaw said. “Haven’t seen him wield a sword.”
“How many wizards have you heard of either? There’s only one, and it’s him!” The dark mage was panting in between words. “The bastard’s destroying my house as well! Kill him! Kill him already!” Rage had clearly gotten the better of him, spit escaping his mouth as he spoke.
There had to be some way these dark mages were getting information about me. The other seven sorcerers and I had agreed to a binding oath to protect the king, but I wondered if someone could’ve found a way around the contract of ordia and now was a danger to the king. I didn’t know much about ordia generally, just that there were rules to it that seemed different than the other magical arts.
Whoever betrayed us needed to be found out, and soon. We had enough to worry about even if I could trust everyone who appeared to be an ally.
“This can all be over,” I said. “Come with me for questioning now. If you cooperate, I will allow your attacks against me to be ignored in your sentencing.”
Shaw pointed the dinner knife at me as he cursed the idea of cooperating. Then he pushed Jacob. “Go around. Get behind him.”
Jacob started around the other end of the table as he watched me carefully. I had no weapon left. The sword, which I very much wanted, was in the bloodied hands of the dark mage.
“Just approach him slowly,” Shaw told Jacob.
Shaw dropped the dinner knife, took the sword out of the dark mage’s hands, and started creeping toward me. Jacob did as well, from my other side.
“He can’t keep throwing us both back,” Shaw said. “T, pin him.”
The dark mage, sweating and panting, made a face
