Page 76 of Master of Storms
“On this bloody knife!” She gestured toward Scorpius. “Can we use it?”
Marduk hauled his thoughts out of the bedchamber and leaned closer. “It’s embedded in his heart, but he’s still breathing, which makes me think the blade isn’t entirely corporeal.”
“It’s magic?”
“It’s forged of raw Chaos, I think.” Ishtar would have a better idea than he did. But how was he going to get her down here? “Chaos transcends space and time and matter, so it might be embedded in his chest, but physically, it might alsonotbe. If his soul is trapped in that jewel, then maybe the blade itself is merely a link between them.”
“And to remove it—”
“Would break the link. We’d either kill him and leave his soul trapped in the emerald, or we’d break the connection and maybe wake him.”
Solveig stared down at the prince. “We need to—”
The sudden echo of footsteps drifted down the stairwell.
Marduk froze, his gaze locking on Solveig’s.
They weren’t alone.
She reacted faster than he did, waving a hand toward the torch and snuffing it with her magic, before spinning toward the arch that led deeper into the cellars. “Thisway!”
The sudden shock of darkness left him blind. Marduk groped along the wall, finding the small arch that led to the left.
Blinking, he gradually began to make out shapes, and started hurrying along the enormous cellars.
“Can you see them?” someone demanded behind him.
“Nothing,” another voice called.
“Is that smoke?”
Solveig bumped into him and Marduk hauled her behind a column, and pressed her against the wall, clapping his hand over her mouth. His vision was starting to adjust to the lack of light, and he could just make out the aquiline edge of her nose. He linked with her. “Don’t make a sound.”
He squinted in the direction of the guards.
“What are you doing?”
“Creating a diversion.”
Fire spun to life in his breath, his heart, and he channeled the magic into pure flame—a glimpse of lights flickering in the distance. He held the flames as long as he could from this distance, as the guards shouted and pointed. Marduk eased away from her as the guards hammered after the twinkling lights in the distance. Tension locked his body into a hard line, and as he glanced down, he saw an odd expression on Solveig’s face. “What?”
“That was an exquisitely controlled piece of magic.”
It was almost as if she’d doubted his abilities. “I could burn your drawers right off your body if I wanted to.”
The hot little glare that answered that conjured a grin on his lips.
“Come,” he breathed, tugging at her fingers. “They’ll chase my lights for a while.”
It took them ten minutes before they found another set of stairs. The cellar system seemed riddled with tunnels.
Solveig slipped up them like a wraith ahead of him, his hand occasionally resting in the middle of her back.
Almost there….
He could see light beckoning, and the crushing weight in his chest was starting to lift.
And then a shadow loomed in the light. More footsteps. The rasp of armor.
