The Destiny of Ren Crown by Anne Zoelle

Author:Anne Zoelle [Zoelle, Anne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy
Publisher: Excelsine Press
Published: 2017-11-17T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eighteen: Three Man Sneak

It had taken an additional twelve hours to prepare.

Another ping sounded, and I looked at the dome. “They are close to breaking through.”

When next I entered, this small world would look nothing like this. The dome would be swarmed, and the magic twisted into something else.

“You’ll make another,” Constantine murmured.

Our supplies and personal menagerie were assembled, and the three of us looked nothing like ourselves. We now wore the downtrodden forms of three mercenaries who were far beyond their prime.

“Ready?”

I gathered them close, then took out the marble and threw it into the air. A shimmering field fell like a released curtain, and we stepped through, into the scientists’ empty tent—empty, since all hands were working on the dome.

The marble that I’d kept in my pocket for months cracked, expelling a cascade of spells. It had been designed that way—as a one-way trip that hastened all other spells, but it still felt like the loss of a lucky totem.

“We are in! We are in!” Came the excited and fearful calls of the men breaching the dome.

There was no flash of gold, but I knew Raphael was out there.

~*~

We drove the Ophidians’ vehicle to a tense rendezvous with hooded combat competitors from the Second and Third Layer who replenished the weapons combat mages normally carried, then drove to an even tenser meeting with members of Patrick’s extended “family,” who provided us with additional supplies we would need.

We had then navigated through the water mirror on a harrowing trip which stretched far deeper than I’d been led to believe, and were finally at the “easy part.”

Right.

I wiped the dripping sweat on my brow along the cuff of my sleeve, and hung on for dear life to the edge of a mountain.

I wasn't used to being the worst at something. Socializing, maybe, but I felt that was improving nowadays with me smiling and nodding and generally keeping my mouth shut.

But as Constantine reached for another good hand hold way above my reach, I sighed and resigned myself to making two moves to his one with a quick scramble not to be left behind.

“You coming?” he said lazily, right fingers tucked into a healthy crack on the face of the mountain we were free climbing without the aid of internal magic. The null cuff glinted on his wrist as his knees bent in an upward lunge, right hip pressed against rock, left fingers hanging loose at his side, waiting to extend skyward.

“You suck,” I said morosely, through the passive, closed-loop, silent communication that he had set up between the three of us while we climbed. Even the mountain rats couldn’t hear us speak, though one was eyeing me judgmentally as I resignedly looked for my next hold.

Constantine looked down, eyes glinting silver with the spelled lenses he’d made that allowed us to see in the dark. “You're short.”

His amusement over my vertical predicament seemed to have eased the last of his anger.

“You're lazy,” I shot back. “I'm doing twice the work.

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