Shield of Winter by Aaron Hodges

Author:Aaron Hodges [Hodges, Aaron]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780995105683
Published: 2018-06-21T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 24

“Are you ready, Braidon?” Enala asked, her eyes shining in the moonlight.

Braidon sat across from the old woman, seeing the compassion in the softness of her face, the deepening of the wrinkles around her lips. Idly he wondered what had driven her to take him under her wing. There were other Magickers in the city, Magickers less important to the city than she was, who could have been spared to teach him. Yet Enala had never so much as suggested the idea. Perhaps it was their shared journey, their flight across the Three Nations that had bound them together.

Either way, he wasn’t about to question it now.

Rubbing the exhaustion from his eyes, he forced his fear back into its cage. They were sitting out under the stars, the cold kept at bay by the flames burning in Enala’s palms.

“Okay.”

He nodded, and closing his eyes, Braidon sought out his calm centre. It was not an easy task—not after having his entire life turned upside down. Delving down into the darkness, he found himself questioning every memory, every thought. How did he know this was really the right course of action? Was this what he would have done before, in that other life he could not remember?

For a moment, confusion swamped him and he started to panic. His chest constricted, and he found himself hardly able to breathe. Gasping, he sucked in another lungful of air, his hands gripping hard to the rock beneath him.

“Focus, Braidon. I believe in you.”

Her words sliced through the panic, though he still felt lost, alone amongst the chaos of his mind. Who was he? What was true, what was false?

His sister’s face sprang into his thoughts, crisp and clear, a smile on her pale lips, her eyes shining.

I love you, little brother.

Braidon’s shoulders swelled as the words swept through him. He clung to them like a lifeline, the one immovable fact in his unstable past. Instinctively, he sensed the truth behind the words, that their love for one another had in fact been real. Everything else might be false, but Alana was truly his sister.

Holding the image of her in his mind, he allowed all other thoughts to fall away. Slowly he found himself drifting, and a strange otherworldliness came over him, as though his spirit were no longer weighed down by the trappings of his body. Opening his eyes, he looked on the familiar darkness, his spirit a flickering light alone in the void.

Except he wasn’t alone.

Turning his eyes outwards, he saw the distant white glowing in the distance, and felt the old fear return.

I need you, Braidon…

He could no longer tell whether his sister’s words were real or imagined, but her voice gave him courage, and he shot towards the distant light. It swelled before him, as though it already sensed his approach, could taste its victory. He watched as it shifted, growing larger, changing, until the awful Feline stood, jaws wide, its roar sending ripples through his very soul.

The need to flee rose within him.

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