Soulwoven

Chapter Forty-Five

~45~

Litnig Jin took deep breaths.

Darkness surrounded him. His ears rang as loudly as if a bell had been struck inside his skull. Dust clogged his nose and stuck to his face, his lips, and his teeth.

His house had collapsed. He’d seen it lose a wall.

But it hadn’t fallen on him.

He reached above his head and felt splintered wood and plaster wavering a few inches over him. Next to him, someone thin and warm was clutching his arm with shaking hands.

My mother, he realized.

Four pools of white light blazed in the dusty air.

Ryse and Leramis. The two of them stood next to one another, arms locked, soulweaving.

Together.

A wave of jealousy washed over Litnig.

The ringing in his ears subsided.

“Is everybody ok?” Cole shouted. He was twisting a finger in his ear, like he was trying to work out a piece of debris or dust or maybe just the ringing. Dil and Len flanked him. Dust coated their faces.

Litnig heard murmured assents. His mother whimpered. Ryse and Leramis said nothing, but their grips on one another’s arms tightened.

Litnig’s stomach twisted.

“Ryse, can you get us out of here?” Cole asked.

She and Leramis responded simultaneously.

“No, but he can.”

“No, but I can.”

The synchronicity of their voices was eerie, and it confirmed Litnig’s thought that they were linked somehow. Something angry stirred in his chest. A harshness that had been growing in his soul since Du Fenlan woke up along with it.

“Then why don’t you do it?” he spat.

Ryse and Leramis glared at him as one, and the debris above him moved. The pile shifted up ever so slightly, slid sideways, and crashed to the ground.

Stars appeared above Litnig’s head. The wind kissed his face.

He straightened to his full height.

He stood in the center of a pile of rubble eight or ten feet high. None of the walls that had once framed his house were still standing. The dust around him had begun to dissipate, but it still filled the air.

Despite all the noise, the streets were dark. No lights shone in the windows of Litnig’s neighbors’ homes. No shouts of alarm disturbed the silence.

The hair on the back of Litnig’s neck stood up.

Ryse and Leramis gave a simultaneous, shuddering gasp. Their breathing lost its synchronization, but it remained heavy.

Litnig didn’t like the sound of it.

“Can we get some light?” he asked.

Ryse pursed her lips, and an incandescent sphere kindled in the air above the wreckage.

Litnig sucked in a deep breath.

Several score of skeletons filled the street in both directions. The empty sockets of their old, yellow skulls gleamed in Ryse’s light. A few of their heads tilted sideways, as if the skeletons were uncertain how Litnig and his friends had moved the wreckage of an entire house off of themselves.