Sons of Ironstorm - Book 4: Griffon's Stand

Bridge

Patrik frowned as he watched the soft red light dancing inside the cage formed by his curled fingers. The light marked the passage of one of the new runes that had come into the Wielder of the Earth's mind with Shawn's counterattack against the demons.

- The bridge has opened more doors than I would've, or could've imagined, - the Earth's avatar breathed in astonishment deep inside Patrik's mind. - So many new runes, so many new combinations ... I can barely keep track of them all! -

'Bridge?' Patrik frowned as he abruptly closed his hand on the spark of light, snuffing it out as he reabsorbed the rune into his body. Is that what they called what happened to Shawn when he pulled in all that extra power and made a connection of some kind to his brothers and fellow Wielders?

Then a shifting in the bed nearby caught his attention and interrupted his thoughts.

<<Frost me,>> Shawn hoarsely rasped as he slowly and carefully sat up, hand to the side of his head as he winced in pain. <<How long have I been out?>>

"Three days," Patrik answered in Taren, the sound of his voice bringing Shawn's attention to his younger brother where he sat in a chair at the foot of the simple cot the older Ironstorm had been lying in.

"Three days?" Shawn laid back with a groan. And, just as quickly, he sat back up, eyes wide.

"Dezi!" he cried in sudden anguish, ignoring the pain that threatened to consume his senses as it washed through him as he frantically looked around the room.

"Here, beloved." Dezi smoothly stepped in through the room's only door to quickly make her way to the bedside. And into Shawn's outstretched and anxious arms, instantly molding herself to her husband's muscular body.

<<You're safe,>> Shawn murmured with not a little relief as he held Dezi tightly.

<<Thanks to you, my silver flame,>> Dezi just as quietly replied with her lips against Shawn's neck, her words brimming with the intensity of her love. <<You saved my life, my very soul from the Abyss.>> If Shawn had any reply to Dezi's passionate and powerful words, they were lost as in the next heartbeat Dezi locked her lips to Shawn's, kissing her beloved deeply.

So intense was the embrace, Patrik felt himself growing uncomfortable with each moment it lasted.

"Ahem," he quickly said after clearing his throat when he couldn't stand watching his brother and Dezi any longer.

"Ah, sorry, Patrik," Shawn managed, breaking Dezi's kiss to send an apologetic look in his younger sibling's direction. "Almost forgot you were there."

"I noticed that," The Wielder of the Earth deadpanned, then stood. "Now that you've returned to the land of the living, mind telling me just what in the name of the Great Sea did you think you were doing? Maker burn me, you nearly got yourself killed!!"

"He does that far too frequently," Dezi quietly pointed out, looking away from Patrik to level a purple-eyed gaze at Shawn, who found himself the one that now looked and felt uncomfortable.

"To tell you the truth, I had no idea what I was doing," the older Ironstorm admitted after a brief pause to look first at Dezi, then over at Patrik. "I only know the rage and the pain I felt when I saw Dezi get hurt, the loss and the sorrow combined inside me." He looked back at Dezi.

"They fused into something ... Something that unlocked a power that had lain dormant deep inside." He looked down at the floor, uncertain. "Before I could react, I was filled with more magic than I had ever summoned before to where I felt I would burst," he continued in a hoarse whisper. "And yet, I didn't consider whether or not the magic would kill me. No, the only thing I could think of was an overwhelming need to kill as many demons as was physically possible."

A muscle jumped in his jaw.

"They needed to pay for hurting her. They needed to pay with their very lives!"

"And pay they did, my brother," Patrik carefully pointed out with a frown as he watched dark emotions once again roil over his brother's abruptly tense form even as Dezi pulled herself even more tightly to her husband's powerful body. Thankfully the dark elf woman's immediate presence was enough to calm the seething fires that threatened to burst once more into flames within the powerful Wielder of the Star.

Stifling a sigh of relief, the younger Ironstorm pressed on, voicing the thought that had nagged at him since his brother's collapse after the counterattack.

"We just need to figure out how to unlock that ability without the need to foster that level of emotion."

Shawn drew in a long, cleansing breath as a ripple of runic light washed over the older Ironstorm, signaling the end of this most recent surge of emotion.

"Already done," Shawn announced with an apologetic look at his beautiful dark elf mate before he smoothly let her go to swing around, put his bare feet on the floor and stand to languidly stretch. "The avatars are calling it a 'bridge', permanently linking the Wielders to the new runes."

Again Patrik summoned the rune he had been examining before Shawn was awake, letting it dance briefly across the callused skin of his palm. Unbidden a rune came into his mind's eye as he pondered the bridge the Earth's avatar had mentioned and to which Shawn was obviously referring to. 

Taking hold of it with his will, he nearly cried out loud as activating it sent runic magic surging through him like a mid-winter hurricane snarling off the Sea of Uepolua. Wielder armor formed and was reinforced in the same instant, and offensive magic like the spells Shawn had used to quash the Kaal Eran force attempting to enter Gorgon's Dagger rippled through his mind, the rune combinations long and complex.

"By the Great Sea!" he finally breathed in astonishment, looking down at his gauntleted hands, nearly lost in the glow emanating not from his armor, but from his very body.

"Just make sure you don't lose control," Shawn admonished as Dezi returned to his side, not content to sit alone on the bed. He curled an arm around her shoulders as she encircled his torso with hers, once again pulling close to him as the two of them squinted to make out Patrik's form nearly lost within the reddish light that now enveloped him.

"Like I did. Or it'll sweep you ahead of it like a tidal wave before it rolls over you, crushing you beneath the weight of the universe itself." Shawn paused in thoughtful remembrance.

"Like it did me."

"Duly noted," Patrik drily replied before letting go of the massive surge of power filling him, willing it back into its place of origin. His armor returned to its amulet and the spells faded from his mind as the runic power slipped from him.

"No getting crushed by the universe." The last rune, the small speck of light he had summoned to dance on his palm, disappeared, absorbed into his flesh. And Patrik let out a sigh as the room somehow felt darker with the runic power gone from within. Then he was resolutely straightening his shoulders.

"Now that you're up and about, we need to tell the war council so they can plan. While we've managed to keep the Kaal Eran out this time, I don't think it'll be long before they try again."

Nodding, Shawn turned to the door, Dezi still pressed into his side. Only to pull up short upon noticing just how little clothing he had on.

"Um," he began, looking over at Patrik then down at Dezi. "Perhaps a bath and a change of clothes are in order before we meet with the council. And some food. After all, it has been three days." His stomach grumbled in low counterpoint to his words, eliciting a chuckle from Patrik and a raised eyebrow from Dezi.

"Yes, definitely something to eat before we do all this!"

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