ANGEL OF JUSTICE (2014 revised)

Chapter Seventy Six - Capturing A Demon

Capturing A Demon

Jazmin looked at the brief smile she saw on Jarron's face before his body suddenly vanished from Keltin's study. She stared with both fear and trepidation before forcing her gaze away. She turned and looked at Keltin and saw his reaction was one of equal surprise.

"What do you think happened, father?"

Keltin shook his head without taking his eyes off the now vacant space in the corner of his study where Jarron had been sitting in meditation.

"Dare we at least believe he found what he was looking for?"

Keltin rubbed his beard in his usual thinking mode then took to pacing the study, stopping occasionally to look upon the unconscious form of the sorcerer Charaz in the opposite corner of the room.

"It is not what I expected to happen, especially after his concerns of what might happen if he entered the citadel ward. He mentioned he was only going to try and communicate through the ward to the Star Chamber not disappear altogether. If this has not been the case, then we will have no idea where he went until his return, which I told him not to do."

"Then we have cause to worry."

"How can we not be, Jazmin after all that has happened? Charaz almost destroyed the ward recently and now that I have him trapped here, I have no way of knowing for certain whether my brother is free or not, but we must take it all as a ploy of that wicked sorcerer's to catch me unaware. If that is the case, Prince Darric and the whole of Aria are in grave danger and there is naught I can do about it from here. For all we know, right at this moment, Jarron could have become a prisoner of my brother's."

"But we were able to repair the hole in the ward after Charaz blundered through it. With the Book of Spells now in our possession, does that not give us greater safety against the Destroyer?"

"It does and it was the timeliest of interventions, I must admit. I could not have asked for a greater surprise than for Charaz to deliver the book to us when in turn he was actually in the process of trying to eliminate us. But my concern is that for every magical action, there is an equal and opposite force that takes effect. The blast of backlash magic that must have occurred when Charaz came through my ward even only in spirit form, could have done untold damage anywhere in the world. And with Jarron disappearing so soon afterwards..."

"It could have just been a coincidence? Has Charaz offered any explanation on what went wrong? It is obvious that he never planned to end up here in the manner he did."

Keltin shook his head. "Charaz won't part with what he was doing, but I do not care. I know he was trying to undo my time ward when something unexpected happened to him. My guess is that because he is not a destined keeper, he had not the power he thought to control the book directly against one of the god's own and his spell back fired, separating his soul and his physical body. Ultimately, in this state he could not live long and we both know Charaz would happily die than tell us whether Arbinn is free or not."

"Surely you would feel it if Arbinn was free or heaven forbid, dead? Would you not also be freed since the structure of the ward was of your making, father?"

Keltin nodded. "It was. If one of us was freed so would be the other. If one of us was dead the other would know, certainly. But Charaz's interference with the Book of Spells has changed all that now. And the reaction to his recent actions is yet to unfold fully to us so we can no longer make assumptions on what we think might happen. It is still possible that I am the only one that is trapped and Arbinn could have demolished Cardinia already and we would not be any the wiser until he arrives here personally to kill me."