Sylph had tears in her eyes, but she still smiled. “That willgive us both something to do until the danger finds us again.”
Taking her hand, Thana sat. “Thank the spirits for that.” Shecouldn’t resist leaning in, giving Sylph the choice of how they were to enjoytheir time together, even if retiring to a tent wasn’t an option.
Sylph brushed her lips softly before she opened her mouth, aninvitation that Thana gladly accepted. When Sylph gasped, Thana put a hand onher back and pulled her closer, pausing only when Sylph made a sound of fear.She pulled back to see an expression of horror and had a moment to hope shewasn’t the cause.
“They’ve come,” Sylph whispered. “And they’ve brought a newpyramid.” Her face creased in pain, but it had a touch of wonder as her gazewent far away. “I’ve never felt…it’s like a hole in the world, a well ofdestruction.”
Only one kind of pyramid fit that bill, one that obliteratedeverything caught in its sphere-like blast: a disintegration pyramid. And bySylph’s expression, they’d made it from the powerful new crystal. “Spirits helpus all.”
* * *
Sylph curled her hands into fists as Thana implored her tobreathe. She sensed her stone pyramid being pressed into her hand, and she wasable to channel some of her desire into it, to fall there instead of into thewell of darkness coming ever closer.
Thana’s voice was gone before it came back again. “Feel for acancelation pyramid, Sylph. Get your focus off that new crystal and see whatelse they have.”
She tried, but she feared abandoning her link with the stone, andshe could not split her focus three ways, nor could she fully ignore thecrystal that yanked at her attention as forcefully as a chain. “I’m trying,”she said with a gasp.
Thana rubbed her back, kissed her cheek, murmured, “I’m withyou,” over and over.
Sylph focused on her presence. The earth began to tremble whileshe leaned her power there and pulled some of herself away from the well ofdarkness. She felt the presence of many crystalline lights. They shone sobrightly in her mind that it was hard to believe they didn’t also light theforest. Mostly destruction, none as powerful as the one she fought against. Shesensed many she’d never encountered, thought they might be mind pyramids, andThana needed one of those.
Pain rocketed through her temples, and her focus was wrenchedfrom the earth. She cried out as pain arced across her palm, leaving her handfeeling empty. She opened her eyes, expecting to see her pyramid gone, but itwas merely dark, its magic fled.
“They canceled it,” Thana said breathlessly. “The bastards.”
And without it, the pressure built again. They were bad people,coming to hurt her, Thana, maybe everyone. They deserved to have theirdisintegrator set off in their midst, ending their lives and gobbling theirpyramids.
Perhaps taking this camp as well. Then it could all end.
“Don’t kill them, Sylph, there has to be a way to resist it.”
Now Thana felt merciful? Had there been a way before, at themanor house? The well of darkness was drawing her in with each breath, makingher hate anyone who kept her from it.
Thana gave her another pyramid. “Here, try this light pyramid.Focus on it.” She kissed Sylph again, but it would not be enough.
Sylph snarled and gripped her dead pyramid, casting the light oneaside. No, she would not bow. Her father would choose death first, and shewould follow his example, but she would also spite him, tired of obeying. Shewould do as Thana suggested and live in the now.
And now, she would fight.
With a new cry, a sound of battle, she flung her power into thetrees, searching out the pyramid that had attacked her own. She ignored theothers and called to the feeling she remembered, the pyramid that felt like thelack of one. She found it quickly and began to snuff those around it, barelyable to focus on destruction pyramids alone.
Someone in the woods cried out in surprise, no stealthy killersthese, and she wondered what their plan had been. They couldn’t stop her in herquest to cancel all their destruction pyramids.
Then she came to the disintegrator.
It sucked her in, begging her to set it off rather than kill it,but there was more at stake than just lives. Thana needed a mind pyramid, soSylph could not consider any future without it.
She would consider no future at all. There was only now.
The disintegrator resisted, no common crystal to be snuffed likea candle, no lesser power to be covered. It wanted her touch, craved her as shecraved it, as inexorable as the tide or as her father’s orders or the queen’swhims.
She screamed. If it wanted her so badly, she’d take it. On herterms.
Her mind hammered at the dead thing in her hand, cursing it intoremembering what it used to be. Her magic kept hold of the cancelation pyramidand vaguely felt the enemy pyradisté trying to use it along with her. Shebrushed him aside and pounced upon the special crystal, the dark well, butinstead of trying to kill it, she commanded its power to be elsewhere, usingthe cancelation pyramid like a lever.
The power inside the disintegrator leaped from its home as ifjoyful to be free. All magic was really the same, she saw, raw power drawn intoa pyramid that had been shaped for a specific purpose. She left the purpose ofthis one behind and drew the raw magic to her.
Her stone pyramid blazed back to life, all the power of thespecial crystal infusing it and leaving its former home naught but a shell.
“Sylph!”
She opened her eyes. People swarmed through the trees, somefalling in pits, but others found their way through. Pyramids sailed throughthe air, but all their destructive powers had been wiped away, and they hit theground to shatter harmlessly. Thana batted one out of the air, keeping it fromcrashing into Sylph.
“Enough,” Sylph said and fell into
