Eclipse: Time Thief (Romantasy)

24. Passageway

The power escaping from the cracks within me might not have compared to what I'd once been able to do, but it energized me now. As I ran, I easily listened for heartbeats. There were five guards already in Nash's path. I couldn't leave all of them for him. My eyes fluttered as I aimed my bow and drove my arrow with my mind. It whizzed between trees, around branches, and flew straight into the heart of a guard headed for Nash.

Despite not being able to use power for so many years what I could grasp came back to me naturally.

With my hearing attuned, I noticed the stomping of the guards as they all switched directions, running straight for me. They must have been watching their radars and I must have exuded enough energy for them to detect.

A group came into sight. They scattered between the trees, using them as cover as they wove through the woods.

I had to break through this seal on my power. These few hours on the Mountain of the Gods had helped me to regain far more than I had during years of training and struggle. Everything was different here. I could do this.

When Piercey and I had trained at the Sacred School, he had increased his powers by studying the science behind what we did and by actually understanding the code of our world. I'd always felt it, like water I could run my fingers through, or sand I could gather in my hand. It was the same as seeing the visible world versus reading a description of it. Without thought, I experienced it.

Together, we'd made a great team by combining those imperfect methods. I didn't understand exactly why this mountain changed my access to my power, but as I reached for it, I felt as if I could actually touch it for the first time since it was sealed. If only I had Piercey with me to help me get there faster by seeing the world through his eyes as well as my own.

I could not allow anything to hold me back, though. Lifting my palms, I scraped down to the depths of my soul with my will. Everyone was counting on me. If I couldn't do this, it wasn't just Leif, Wren, and Nash who would die here. All of our warriors and innocents would too. I had to let go of my past failures and my fear that I couldn't do this. I had to kill the curse.

A wave of energy exploded out from me.

The guards flew through the air from the power of the hit. They slammed against their backs and slid across the ground, knocking into each other, into thick trees.

Wow. The rush flooded my body with energy. It was by far the most power I'd managed since losing mine. Even so, it was a pathetic shadow of what I'd once managed to do. I should have been able to instantly kill all of them.

I lowered my head. The burn of my power ate across my skin. This sting was only a taste of how bad it could get. I needed to get used to it again.

To my heightened senses, the subtle twitch of a guard turning his hand for his knife jolted through my chest like he'd slammed his fist into me. My eyes snapped to him.

I bound his hand with my mind. Turned his own weapon on him so the quivering tip pushed for his throat.

He clasped it with both hands. The veins in his arms and neck and face strained like massive worms thrashing to break free of skin.

He shrieked. Maybe they all shrieked. The noise faded in the background for me. I only heard my own blood rushing through me. I felt alive again.

I drilled the knife into the man's neck as I lunged for another guard.

The rest happened fast. Incredibly fast. It'd been so long that I had forgotten how quick I could move, think, act when I accessed my power.

I snapped the wrist of a woman and drove my sword through her gut.