Tristan had been in the city.
Unless that had been Cyran as well.
The t’ranth had brought Jayna to the city.
A Toral ring.
Not hers, though Cyran was after it.
They were both still being manipulated.
Gavin focused on his core reserves, trying to summon the power inside himself. He could feel the energy there, just within reach. All he had to do was call upon it, then he could break free. He could be the Chain Breaker.
Only, this time, he felt as if it were even more significant than every other time before. He felt as if what he was doing now mattered much more than when he had stopped Cyran last time.
The power was there, and he just needed to reach for it. But he heard Cyran laughing.
“You think I’m not aware of what you’re doing?”
“I was hoping you weren’t,” Gavin said.
“I’d heard the stories of the Chain Breaker when I returned to the city. I’d started to hear rumors about how you had defeated the Mistress of Vines, and I realized something. You had tapped into magic. I’d always known you had potential. The way you healed faster than anyone else and the way you were able to become the Chain Breaker suggested you were far more powerful than Tristan ever acknowledged, but I had never expected you to be quite as powerful as you proved to be.”
“I’m not that powerful,” Gavin said.
Cyran chuckled. “No, you are not.”
Gavin tried to get his arms free. All he needed was one hand, and he could go for the powder. If he could get the sh’rasn, he could use it to break free, but even as he tried, Gavin couldn’t do anything. His hand slipped and touched the sword, but there wasn’t anything Gavin could do with it.
He tried to raise the blade.
Cyran twisted his hands in a pattern. A stream of pale yellow power struck Gavin in the chest, knocking him back. The sword scraped a rock, fraying the leather wrapped around the hilt of the blade.
Gavin strained against the bindings Cyran used against him.
He couldn’t move.
If only he could get free.
The sword.
As his hand rested on the frayed leather along the hilt of the sword, Gavin felt something he’d never noticed before. There was a sphere on the end of the hilt. He traced his thumb around it, and the leather that wrapped around the hilt started to come loose. He pried it off, then flicked his gaze down.
A Toral ring.
The t’ranth.
Jayna had detected something.
She’d gone to the lair. She’d followed him.
And he’d had it on him the entire time.
The sounds of fighting around him grew distant.
How many of his friends had been lost already? How many more would suffer?
This was why the sword had been held inside the case before.
This would save his friends.
Gavin started laughing.
Cyran eyed him. “What do you think is so funny?”
“You. You were in Yoran for how many years? All that time, you were in search of the Toral ring you believed was in the city, and you never found it.”
“There was no Toral ring here,” Cyran snapped. “I used that rumor to draw her out.”
“Are you so certain? She followed it. She knew there was something here.”
That was the difference.
Cyran had started rumors, but the Toral had real power.
Only… he’d still defeated her.
Cyran grinned at him. “I’m completely sure. You forget, I was the one who called you to Yoran.”
Gavin chuckled again. “That’s right. And I found your little hiding place.”
“Of course you did. I intended for you to find it.”
“And I opened the chamber.”
Cyran glared at him.
He needed to buy time. If he could distract Cyran, he might have the time he needed and might be able to overpower him.
The easiest way he knew to distract him was taunting him.
Cyran was proud. He thought himself smarter than Gavin.
Gavin would use that.
“I got the sword you couldn’t get,” Gavin said. He held his hand on the hilt, trying to remove the Toral ring. Would there be any power within it that he might be able to use?
All the time that he had been holding the sword, there had been something more to it. When he had first found it, Gavin had known there was something different about it, but he hadn’t known just how special it was. Now that he had the blade, now that he had the ring, he could feel the unique energy within it.
“It doesn’t matter. It was just a sword,” Cyran said.
“An El’aras sword, held within a case you could not open.”
El’aras.
Gavin frowned as his own words echoed. That had to matter. Somehow, the fact that this sword had been made by the El’aras, had been protected within a shield of El’aras magic…
And he was El’aras.
The t’ranth.
This wasn’t just any Toral ring.
It was attached to an El’aras sword.
It was an El’aras Toral ring.
Gavin worked his thumb around the leather wrappings, and he finally managed to pry the ring free and shift it to his palm. It was slightly warm and smooth, much like how Jayna’s looked like it would be.
“You can have your sword,” Cyran said. “Unfortunately, the sword is no good to you against someone like me—somebody with real power.”
“What makes you think I don’t have real power?” Gavin asked.
“Because you are nothing but the Chain Breaker. And soon, I will be—”
Gavin didn’t give him the chance to finish. He had slipped the ring on his finger and pushed his core reserves through it. Power exploded out of him very differently than it had before, unleashing a torrent of energy that was beyond what Gavin could fathom. When it poured out of him, it slammed into the barrier Cyran held and tossed him back.
Gavin started forward, but Cyran had already begun to move his hand in a tight pattern. Sorcery built from him, and Gavin had to push his core reserves outward through the ring. The combination granted him even more strength than he had managed before. It blasted and struck Cyran once again.
Gavin darted toward him and brought the sword
