"Unleash your creativity and unlock your potential with MsgBrains.Com - the innovative platform for nurturing your intellect." » English Books » ,,The Fragment of Power'' by Ben Hale

Add to favorite ,,The Fragment of Power'' by Ben Hale

Select the language in which you want the text you are reading to be translated, then select the words you don't know with the cursor to get the translation above the selected word!




Go to page:
Text Size:

“Done,” Shadow said.

He sprinted over the steps and dropped into the courtyard, landing as Bartoth reached the outer portcullis. The rock troll leaned his shoulder into the blow and slammed into the steel bars. Flesh and bone met steel, and it was steel that gave way.

The bars bent inward, the stone moorings cracking from the impact. Seeing that Bartoth was momentarily on the opposite side of the gate, he reached to the shadows in the alcove and cast a sliver of darkness, which he stabbed into Bartoth’s foot. The mighty rock troll began hopping like a child with a stubbed toe.

“I’ll cut you to shreds,” he growled.

“You should put some herbs on that,” Shadow said. “Before it gets infected.”

“Shadow,” Lorica called, dropping to his side. “Will you stop messing around.”

“Never,” Shadow said, but followed her into the control chamber.

Guards rushed to the courtyard, gathering weapons tipped with acid. Shadow and Lorica passed through the soldiers to reach the interior, where a pair of operators franticly sought to work the levers.

The hanging cages began to shift and move, spinning around the inside tracks, moving further from the guard station. The dark elf in command, a woman with silver hair and a scar on her arm, looked up at their entrance.

“We’re moving all the cells to the back wall, as far as we can from the conflict.”

Clang.

Bartoth struck the portcullis again, the metal bending and screeching, the stone crumbling. Lorica leaned back and looked through the door. She grimaced at what she saw and stabbed a finger to the entrance.

“That’s not going to last long.”

“Any way to make the cages move faster?” Shadow asked.

“Only in emergencies,” she said.

“I think this qualifies,” Shadow said.

The woman reached for a lever, and hesitated. She blinked in confusion, her hands trembling before she reached for a second lever and pulled it. The hanging cages came to a halt, where they rocked on the chains before reversing direction.

“What are you doing?” Lorica demanded.

“I have new orders,” she intoned.

“Zenif is manipulating her mind,” Shadow said.

The woman shook her head and grimaced, and then her features smoothed out before she pressed a second rune. The cages accelerated, gliding toward the roadway, closer to Zenif and Zoric.

“Sorry,” Shadow said, and struck her on the side of her head.

The woman collapsed to the floor and tried to rise, so Shadow struck her again. A shout came from outside and two of the guards sprinted toward the control chamber. Lorica blocked one swinging sword and deflected the other upward. The two weapons were both tipped with acid, and one tumbled from the dark elf’s grip. It fell into the levers and runes, the acid causing it to sink into the controls.

A dull whine came from within, and suddenly the tracks in the ceiling shifted, turning into concentric circles. The chains began to accelerate, spinning around the circles and dragging the cells. The prisoners howled as their cages spun above the acid lake.

“What did you do?” Shadow demanded.

“It’s not like I meant to,” she said, pulling the lever that would shut the portcullis. “We need to get Mimic.”

“There she goes,” Shadow said.

He pointed to her cage as the dark elf sped by. The woman looked exactly as she had the last time they had met in Mistkeep, her skin sallow and mottled, diseased. Her eyes were cold and unblinking, even as her cell whirled above the acid lake. The shackles were on her ankles, binding her to the cage.

“We need to get to her before Bartoth does,” Lorica said.

“You want to get on the spinning cages of deadly prisoners that hangs above a lake of acid?” Shadow asked.

“You don’t?”

Shadow laughed. “Of course I do. I just wanted to make sure you did.”

“At least my wings work down here,” she said, and her cloak unrolled. “If you fall, you’re going to land in acid, and I don’t think even you can survive that.”

“A lake of acid makes everything better,” Shadow said.

“Nobody would think that except you.”

He climbed up to the window’s edge and looked out at the spinning cages. They were arcing twenty feet away, at least on the outer ring, and once he was on a cage, he would have to jump from cage to cage to reach Mimic’s cell.

Lorica leapt out the window, her cloak unfurling into bright wings. She flapped once and Shadow jumped, catching her hand and swinging outward. A hundred feet above a sea of boiling acid, he soared, and then landed above a cage. He caught a chain and held on as they spun past the outer guard house.

Crunch.

The portcullis crashed inward, the stone mooring unable to withstand Bartoth’s blows. He charged into the gathered solders in the courtyard, leading with his sword. At impossible speed, he spun into a whirlwind of blades, deflecting weapons and striking guards. Elenyr, Sentara, and Rune joined the battle, but Bartoth still had time to rip a spear from a soldier and hurl it at Lorica.

“Look out!” Shadow called.

Are sens

Copyright 2023-2059 MsgBrains.Com