Truthwitch (The Witchlands 1)

Then he was close enough to the tower to see two girls burst around the side. They hopped up steps Merik hadn’t seen were there.

One was a girl in black with a short blade.

And the other was a girl in silvery white …

A girl Merik recognized instantly, even from this distance. Even with half her gown slashed off. He had just enough time to curse Noden—and His coral throne too—before all his attention went into slowing his descent …

And crushing any blighted monk who dared get near his passenger.

FIFTEEN

As Lady Fate would have it, Aeduan was the only Carawen who couldn’t find a horse. His magic had led him and the other Carawens to the outskirts of Veñaza City. Then, at a cluster of inns, the Truthwitch had ridden into the street ahead. With a simple point of Aeduan’s finger, the four monks moved into formation and the real pursuit had begun—or it had for the other Carawens who’d easily found “borrowed” steeds at the first two inns.

By the time Aeduan finally found a piebald mare outside a tavern, he was at least five minutes behind the others. Fortunately, Aeduan was a good rider, and the piebald trusted him. Horses always did.

Soon enough, he was galloping down the long coastal highway, the arrows in his chest bouncing uncomfortably. They were barbed, and if he removed them, he would only shred his flesh further—and then his body would automatically heal. A waste of energy better used in this chase.

Aeduan caught up to a cart barreling north at wheel-shattering speed. It smelled faintly of the Truthwitch, and Aeduan glimpsed a blanket beneath sunflower stalks.

A satisfied smirk pulled at his lips. It was a blanket made of salamander fiber, and if the girl had only remained beneath the blanket, Aeduan might never have caught her scent again.

Her mistake.

Soon Aeduan was past the cart and the panicked driver, and it was only he and the piebald for several minutes of maximum, exhilarating speed.

Then a tower appeared, a dark blotch against a night sky. Aeduan would have missed it were it not for the four white figures beside the stone ruins—or the riderless horses galloping toward him.

Just as Aeduan aimed into the waves, his mare decided the other horses had the right idea. Aeduan gave up on her. With a splash, his boots hit the water and he kicked into a jog.

Yet he only made it halfway to the tower before the four Carawens wheeled around it and out of sight. Moments later, a figure plummeted from the sky. Windwitch.

Aeduan rounded the tower … and a gale slammed into him. He barely managed to grab hold of the lighthouse stones before two monks hurled past in a tornado of air and water. Twenty paces, fifty … They crashed limply to the beach—and they probably wouldn’t rise for a long while.

As the wind died down, swirling over the shallow waves, Aeduan clawed himself back to his feet and sprinted onward, to a set of steps. The Truthwitch’s scent had ascended, so Aeduan would as well.

But he’d only circled one set of barnacle-laden stairs when two monks staggered into his path. Aeduan grabbed at the first man’s cloak. “What is it?”

The monk jolted, as if woken from a daze. “Cahr Awen,” he rasped. “I saw them. We must stand down.”

“What?” Aeduan reared back. “That’s impossible—”

“Cahr Awen,” the monk insisted. Then in a bellow that blasted over Aeduan, over the sounds of winds and waves, “Stand down, men!” The monk wrenched his cloak from Aeduan’s grasp and pushed down the remaining steps.

Aeduan watched in horror as the second monk followed.

“Fools,” Aeduan growled. “Fools!” He leaped up the last few steps, reached the top floor … and skittered to a stop.

The Nomatsi girl was there, dressed in black and sunk low in her stance. She held a cutlass, arced up in a stream of silver steel, while her black Threadwitch gown swept in the same direction … And beside her, standing tall, was the white-gowned Safiya with a pitchfork swooping in a blur of dark iron, her white, shorn skirts swinging downward.

It was the circle of perfect motion. Of the light-bringer and dark-giver, the world-starter and shadow-ender. Of initiation and completion.

It was the symbol of the Cahr Awen.

Cahr Awen.

In that tenth of a frozen heartbeat as all the images clamored for space in Aeduan’s brain, he allowed himself to wonder if it was possible—if these two girls of moonlight and sunshine could be the mythical pair that his Monastery had once protected.

But then the girls moved apart—and a Windwitch appeared behind them. The man, wearing a Nubrevnan naval uniform, was hunched over as if too exhausted to fight. His face was hidden in shadows, his fingers flexed, and wind gathered slowly toward him.

Aeduan cursed himself. Of course these girls would look like the Cahr Awen with air currents spiraling around them.

“Stay back!” the Truthwitch shouted. “Don’t move!”

“Or what?” Aeduan muttered. He lifted his foot to move forward—

But the Nomatsi girl actually answered. “Or we will decapitate you, Bloodwitch.”

“Good luck with that.” He stepped forward, and Safiya darted at him, pitchfork out. “Get away from us—”

Her voice ripped off as Aeduan took control of her blood.

It was his secret weapon. A blood-manipulation he only used in the most dire of situations. He had to isolate the components of Safiya’s blood—the mountain ranges and the dandelions, the cliffsides and the snowdrifts—and then he had to pin them down. It was exhausting work, and took even more energy and focus than the high-intensity sprint. Aeduan couldn’t maintain this control for long.