Because it’s made of glass.
Perfect. Beautiful Silvari glass stained with the blood of my Darkness.
It’s all happening so quickly.
The shooter saunters into view, cackling like a wild animal playing with its food, and he’s not alone. More people move out of the darkness, advancing closely behind the lead saunter-er.
Where are all these people coming from?!
Saunter into your face, I think, which makes no sense until his shoe laces tie themselves together, and the guy smashes to the ground face first.
Seth chuckles – and I’m not sure if I caused the Chaos, or he did.
Roarke is trying to defend Pax, but the two women have the upper hand, one kicking him behind the knees and the other clubbing him over the head. He falls hard.
Not-getting-up kind of hard.
I count five new Sabers, plus the four Sabers already underneath me, and the Cataclysm still making the trees turn to dust as they approach – and the only one of my guys still standing.
Seth.
Thane takes over in a flash of light made brighter by the heavy night. His limbs are the same kind of damaged as Pax’s were, though, so all he does is struggle and fail. He growls, snapping at the two nearest women, both holding long swords and moving in wide ready-to-strike arcs.
My gaze darts from place to place, Elorsin to Elorsin and attacker to attacker, unable to take in fine details. Just Sabers, some in common enough clothing, others in sleek, body-contouring armor vests and leg guards and arm guards. It looks like thin black leather polished to an intense shine, but I can feel them, each and every one, and I know they’re made entirely of Silvari glass.
A giddy rush spirals up inside me, but I have no chuckin’ idea why.
Seth settles himself between Killian and Pax. The gap is too wide to defend them all, and the attackers begin circling around and between them. Taunting and playing.
“Eyv, shall we eliminate them?” one of them calls into the trees.
Seth, still in a fighting crouch, turns toward the disappearing trees, toward Eyv – whoever she is. Another flash and Pax is back in control – but the growling is still heavily Thane.
The woman doesn’t disappoint. Typical tall and slender Saber, but her teeth are sharpened, maybe even by a metal file. Her nails are long and pointed, and her body is clad completely in glass.
So much smooth, cool, humming Silvari glass.
“I knew you’d let your guard down,” she sing-songs.
I trace the edges of her armor, each bend, each curve, looking for the reason why it’s calling to me. My eyes stay on the glass, and the only way I know what any of them are doing is through what they’re saying – and through the humming.
Eyv runs her open palms over her armor… my armor.
Mine?
“Yes,” she says, but she’s talking to Pax, and I’ve missed most of the conversation. “It took me a long time to find a material that lets me use my power without ending up naked too, and your Crown was more than happy to oblige. Did you know that, Silvari glass is impervious to all known magics? Not most of them, but all of them. I find that fascinating. Nothing else in this world can resist my power, no matter how strong – or how precious.”
She stretches one arm out, and the instant she touches the nearest tree, it’s turned to dust.
I have a sharp flash of a woman, heavy with child, in a marketplace, and a Saber brushing a finger over the belly and removing the baby.
Pax growls, launching himself forward, but he falls to the ground, pulling at his barely healed legs with anger and frustration.
Eyv ignores him. Ignores Killian spiked to a tree and Roarke on the ground too, as she walks towards Seth. Chaos raises his blade, ready.
The sheen of her armor dances with the change in angle of the moonlight and the shadows.
I feel Roarke stir, then suddenly, time stops. Everyone’s frozen, even Eyv.
Seth rushes forward, sword swinging, ready to end her. I almost cheer, almost – then time slips back and Roarke sags. Seth slashes out, but the blade slips harmlessly over the armor, ringing like a high pitched bell into the forest.
She brushes her fingertips over his clothes – gone. But he doesn’t back off, and the other Sabers watch the show. It’s their enthusiasm that screams the loudest, eager eyes and battle cries.
This is wrong. It’s too dangerous. Seth’s too close.
Pax cries out. Killian growls. Roarke pushes himself to his knees – hugging his head and straining his power.
Time slows again but doesn’t stop. It doesn’t stop – and Seth’s blade is raised high before I realize she can still move. His whole chest is exposed as he tries to cut downward at her neck, a spot the armor has left vulnerable.
But Seth’s too close. I can see it in the reflection on the armor: her hand outstretched toward his bare chest and the hair's breadth between them shining in the glass.
In my glass.
Mine – the word comes from within me. Like a mountain hearing an earthquake – its own rocks rumbling and crashing. But I’m not the mountain, and that word is not my own.
Not mine, but truth.
I accept it, and the knowledge echoes through me. Like my left hand finally realizing my right hand exists.
Do it – that voice inside me rumbles.
I don’t need the prompt because I finally see how I can help.
My desires break free, asking the armor the stupidest question in history… but also the most obvious one.
Can you break?
It shatters.
Can you shrink? Close in? Crush her?
The glass responds – snapping closed. Razor edges mince skin, muscle, and bone before my eyes. Not a beat, or a blink, or a chance to change my mind.
In a shower of blood and gore, the woman is gone. Her head and legs fall to the ground, the rest of her sliced
