Page 12 of Lies Within the Darkest Tower

I took a little longer than normal to check our surroundings to give Sawyer time to catch his breath, all the while my mind screaming that we couldn’t stop, we didn’t have any time to wait. Then we hurried through the underbrush to a nearby game trail. It would be faster and easier to take the road, but that would also make it easier for Edred’s men to catch us. That, and we’d have to climb up the rocky slope that currently protected us from an easy capture to get to it.

I let Sawyer set our pace despite the fear twisting my insides. After reminding him that collapsing wouldn’t help us, he kept to a steady march, but even then, he was gasping and coughing by the time we broke through the underbrush into the large clearing just outside of Olinon where the fae ring sat.

The ring, a large silver and bronze circle that was partially buried in the ground, was wide enough for a carriage to pass through. Swirly fae writing traced up one side of the arc, stretching from my knees to my head, and while I didn’t know what it said, I knew pressing the words in different combinations linked the ring’s magic to other rings across the Great Five Kingdoms joined in the human-fae treaty to defend the Gates of the Realms.

It sat about fifty yards from the town’s tall, wooden wall, and about a hundred yards from us. The town’s gates were wide open, inviting in what little trade that came through the ring and up the road, and I could see all the way through from one open gate to the other and the couple dozen people inside going about their business despite it being the hottest hours of the day.

My pulse raced and sweat plastered my dress to my back. Sawyer, sweat also dripping down his forehead, started to slow, each gasp sounding harder than the last.

“Just a little farther,” I said, grabbing his arm and tugging him along.

“I know—” He stumbled and I caught him.

Fire flickered up my arm — the arm that had the spell binding me to the Black Tower — and I fought to ignore the sensation. It was just a remnant of the magic that had swept into me when the spell had been awakened. I was sure I’d be feeling flickers of that fire for days.

But as we got closer to the ring, the heat grew stronger. It burned over my hand and up my forearm, growing just as painful as the first time it had blazed into me. When we were a dozen steps away, white light flared from four of the words on the ring, and the fire in my arm surged.

“Someone’s coming through,” Sawyer gasped.

“No,” I forced out between clenched teeth. “It’s the binding spell.” It had to be.

Lord Quill hadn’t given Sawyer the pattern to connect to the ring in the Gray, and very few people knew the pattern. Which meant the pattern had to be part of the binding spell, a way of guaranteeing sacrifices couldn’t avoid their duty by using the rings. “It’s activated the ring.”

Sawyer swore. “If you move away, will the ring go back to sleep?”

He pushed out of my arms and I took a step back. The words still glowed.

Damn. Would the ring stay like that until I’d stepped through? If Sawyer and I went through into the Gray, would we be able to travel somewhere else right away or would we be stuck there? I didn’t know if the ring in the Gray had magic that restricted who could use it. The binding spell might kill someone if they left the Black Tower, but was there another level of security to stop the sacrifices from leaving without permission.

I took another step back and another while Sawyer hurried forward to the ring. The fire in my arm dimmed then flickered and went out, and so did the light in the ring.

Sawyer frowned at me. I was all the way to the edge of the clearing again and was going to have to run when Sawyer entered the pattern for Gastow to make it to the ring before it went back to sleep.

“Let’s see if it will stay connected to the ring in Gastow or if when I come closer, it switches back to the Gray,” I called out.

Sawyer opened his mouth to respond, but the sound of hooves pounding up the road stopped him. His eyes widened. There was no time to check to see if the binding spell would change the connection or even to see if this ring could connect with the ring in Gastow. We had to go now.

“Do it,” I said, fighting to stay where I was until Sawyer had completed the pattern.

Sawyer pressed the pattern, making white light flare around the words and his hand. Then the light blossomed in the center of the ring, a small white flower that slowly unfurled and grew.

The pounding hooves drew closer and Pylos galloped around the bend in the road.

I didn’t have time to wait for the spell to fully encompass the ring. I wouldn’t make it there before Pylos came into the clearing.

The ring had connected to the ring in Gastow — or the ring’s magic wouldn’t have blossomed to life — and I just had to pray the spell wouldn’t jump to the ring in the Gray once I was close.

I barreled toward the ring, my attention locked on the glowing words at its edge. The binding spell in my arm exploded into fiery agony and Pylos yelled at us to stop. Light flickered through all the words in the ring and the flower in the center of the ring flared brighter, filling the entire space with blinding light.

“Get back here, girl,” Pylos yelled, charging toward me.

He leaned in his saddle, grabbed a handful of my hair, and jerked me back as Sawyer leaped through and disappeared. Except I had no idea if he’d gone through to Gastow or into the Gray and had to get free of Pylos to follow before the ring went back to sleep.

CHAPTER 9

Sage

I twisted,Pylos’s grasp painfully pulling at my hair, and bashed my still-sheathed short sword against his hand as hard as I could. With a yelp, he let go and I dove through the ring after Sawyer.

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