“How did he get there?” Kaleo asked, taking Rielle by her shoulders.
“A Blood Stone,” Eila replied, standing beside her sister. “I made them. One for each of us.”
“Did you make one for Navid?”
The girls nodded then looked at each other. They shared another silent conversation, a thing that only they two did, and finally padded themselves down until finding what they sought - a small, stone roughly the size of a coin with a rune etched into its center.
“I’m sorry,” Kaleo said, looking to his cousins and then to the bard. “I’m sorry. This is my fault. I can’t leave him there.”
“I’m going with you,” Lara said, taking firm hold of his hand. Kaleo frowned, looking at her but saw that she would not accept any argument.
“Are you insane?” Reven barked. “Are you even looking at that child on the ground? And you want to go where he was!”
“I have to,” Kaleo answered.
“No you don’t,” Reven pleaded, taking on a
firmer tone. “Urchin, don’t you dare. Kaleo!”
Kaleo did not listen. He was good at that - not listening. He shut his eyes just as the bard reached for him and squeezed the stone tightly, the sharp edges slicing into his palm until he felt a sharp tug just behind his naval, ripping him away from the world he’d come to love to a hell hole in the making.
***
"What in all the Hells were you thinking?” Reven roared. His voice did not carry far, dampened by the insane amount of ash that fell from the sky. It was as dark as night, black clouds roiling in ominous waves above their heads, each one streaked with wicked forks of red lightning. Reven felt the Power of the Hex Storm as soon as he was able to blink. It caused a wretched pounding in his head and triggered his ire - ire he directed at his apprentice.
“I didn’t ask you to come!” Kaleo argued back, wings tented above him. Lara stood with him, her hand still firmly held in his even as she looked around with fear in her big amber eyes. This was not what she signed up for. Reven could see that plainly on her face.
“Damn you, child!” Reven cursed. “It won’t actually kill you to listen for a change!”
Fury was too kind a word to describe what the bard felt. He could not put it into words, only growl and curse and glare at the idiotic child that stood before him; his child as his mind so pointedly reminded him. He had half a mind to grab the two teens and immediately return to Azucena, with or without Kaleo’s obedience. The Hex Storm made him take pause, however. Focus was needed for Travel; clear, refined focus. Between his roiling emotions and the pounding in his skull, he’d be lucky to get to the next town, let alone across the continent. He growled instead, turning away from Kaleo to look at their surroundings. The ash fell like snow, blanketing land that might have once been green. It was too cold for summer, the chill making the flesh on the bard’s arms prickle and the hairs on his neck stand on end. The buildings that remained were wooden structures, mostly single-story, with piqued roofs made of thatch. He heard screaming and the booming sounds of canons or blasts of rifles though, much like his voice, the noise did not carry as far as it should, making it difficult to determine its origin point.
…ady Dischord, please help us!
Reven shook the voice from his mind. It was not the only one, but it was by far the loudest and most desperate. Kaleo heard them too just based on how often the boy twitched. He was not prepared for the onslaught of war, for the pleas of salvation that would never be silenced.
“Kaleo,” Lara said, crouching near a mass of busted wood, what might have been a home at one point. Kaleo looked at Reven with a frown of disgust but moved to Lara’s side. Reven rolled his eyes and followed. Leaving was not an option.
Lara dug through the debris, clearing away enough to reveal the body of a man who held his arms across his stomach, blood soaking the clothes he wore down to the smallest fiber. There was a sword nearby - and the hand of a child from beneath more debris. Lara stopped digging.
“Take the sword,” Reven instructed. “Seriously?” Kaleo retorted with disgust. Reven glared at him.
“He won’t need it, but if you expect to survive this, urchin, we will. Take. The sword.” He repeated, punctuating his words to drive his point home. Lara did not argue. She lived a different life than Kaleo, quickly bending down to retrieve the weapon before looking for more. She found a pistol with two shots left and a crossbow without bolts. No matter. Reven took the bow; it would help him focus his natural firepower.
The smell of sulfur suddenly overpowered the smoky scent of ash and brimstone. It accosted his nostrils like acid might burn his skin. He felt their presence, the spot between his shoulder blades itching terribly. Kaleo went so far as to turn around to look behind him, feeling the same thing. It was a difficult thing to miss. Reven watched the color drain from the boy’s face as three hell hounds stalked out from around a low building.
“Great,” Reven grumbled. He took aim at the leader, Power welling up inside of him like molten lava. He focused on the edge of the crossbow, envisioning a bolt of pure, brilliant light until the thing actually coalesced onto the crossbow itself. As soon as it did, he let it fly, forcing even more Power into it to turn it from a small bolt to a wide spread of searing light. It hit two, but the third dodged and charged straight for Kaleo, who took to the sky in a flourish of ash
