Sons of Ironstorm - Book 4: Griffon's Stand

Chapter 26: A Change in Destination

"Their movements are without reason, as if deliberately chaotic.

Our greatest generals, sons of the High King, cannot divine their method.

Just when we expect them to appear and save their minions from death,

They allow the lot to perish in fire and blood.

And just when it appears they have forgotten the battle and victory nears,

The dark clouds heralding their appearance gather."

- from the Kata Na'Sylvinor

Shawn frowned as a powerful sensation washed over him, the second such sensation in less than a tenday. Yet, this one wasn't the surge of energy and power that announced the discovery of a Weapon of Power. 

No, this one was part pain and part bone-chilling cold, a malevolent feeling that quite literally felt like it was gnawing on his vitals while it was in his body. If he were to describe it with words, he would've said that it was almost as if something dark and evil had momentarily looked at them with a penetrating gaze that cut to the very bone before that gaze swept away, its attention captured by something in the far distance. Something to the north.

"Did you feel that?" Patrik hoarsely whispered in an eerie echo of the question he asked after the Tree Staff was found by their older brother, the youngest Wielder looking over at Shawn with eyes wide with apprehension.

Taking his eyes off the latest group of elves Ciradaan, Fenoran and Najthin were testing with the Kata spells and looking over at his brother, Shawn jerked a curt nod.

"Aye."

"What in the name of the Great Sea was it?" Patrik kept his voice low, intent on not letting anybody else know something might be amiss, especially Jaeda, who was standing a pace or two away, her attention focused on the testing. Since learning of the reaver blade and Dezi's near death, she hadn't been far from the younger Wielder's side since.

Shawn grimaced.

"If I were to venture a guess," he began in a low voice of his own, not wanting to alarm anyone either as he glanced over at Dezi, who was also watching the testing intently, "I would say something that was watching us, has moved its attention elsewhere."

A muscle rippled with tension in Patrik's jaw as he mulled that one over.

"It has to be our former jailers, then." And almost against his will, the Wielder of the Earth looked southward, to the dark storm that had been hovering there. "That biting cold, and the pain ... But, burn me, the only thing I could think of that would garner an abysslord's attention would be another Wielder. And the only Wielder to the north of us is Lawrence. But I would think two Wielders would be of more interest to the abysslords than one."

"Agreed," Shawn grimly replied, "unless Lawrence has gone and done something to gain their undivided attention."

It was Patrik's turn to grimace.

"If that's the case, then that changes everything."

"Indeed. We need to let Ciradaan know." Meaning to march over to where Ciradaan sat, the copy of the Kata sitting in his lap as he directed the elf in front of him through a series of ancient forms called the Forms of Light and Sound, Shawn stirred from where he had been standing on the far side of the practice yard.

Before the young Wielder could do more than merely prepare to move towards Ciradaan, several more figures appeared at the edge of the practice yard. Unlike the earlier crowd, which had given the Wielders and the elvish kings a respectful space, these newcomers weren't satisfied with waiting. Instead, they pushed their way through the elves waiting for the testing, heading straight towards Shawn and Patrik, eyes intent.