1st Draft Fridays - A Fistful of Deception: Book #4, Chronicles of Marsdenfel

Year 253 of the Bynding - somewhere in the Pardys Isles - winter, part IV

A/N: Okay, Wattpad ate my first attempt to post. Trying again…

I'm on-track to finish this book before NaNoWriMo. I've not yet decided what I'll be doing for NaNoWriMo, but I'll have a "NaNoWriMo 2014" cover and will post it on Wattpad. It may end up being Destiny Walker #3, but it could also end up the book after this, a collection of shorts, or something else. You'll find out as I do, on November 1st. *grin*

Hope you enjoy today's post! ^_^

— • — • — • — • — • —

Screaming catches my ear, and I force myself to my feet as another zombie lurches in—and stops abruptly, snarling quietly as if its controller is keeping it leashed.

“Tully?” Zeke’s voice calls.

I stare a moment towards the corner he stays behind, then look again at the well-controlled zombie. “This yours?”

“For the moment.”

Mostly-blind Zeke isn’t nearly as easy of a mark as he appears…particularly for someone attacking him with a reanimated corpse. “Took it from Sylvair?”

“Of course.”

The zombie fights enough that an amateur would assume it were poorly bound. I know better than that, but do I trust Zeke enough to let myself be vulnerable in front of a zombie he’s controlling? “Where’s Owen?”

At that moment, the ornate doors open ever-so-smoothly-and-quietly, and my brother slips through. He doesn’t wear more weapons than I usually do, when I bother to equip myself, but he does wear his more openly than I ever do mine.

Regardless, nobody who sees the two of us standing side by side will doubt that we’re related. Or suspect that we’re half elfin, for that matter.

My thoughts feel…fuzzy, and the world lists a little.

“Tully?” Owen says quietly, quickly approaching at an angle and examining the scene. He checks Sylvair’s body for a pulse. “Your hands?”

Him drawing his attention to them makes them throb sharply. But I “Can’t” heal them, right now. I’m about to fall on my face, but I can’t afford to. “The others—she must’ve sent more zombies after—”

“Taken care of. ’Most everyone was in the armory, and the ones who weren’t were in groups larger than our two pairs.” Owen stares at Sylvair’s body for a moment and gives a slight smile. “Hard to believe she’s dead.”

“Finally.” But I agree entirely with his sentiment.

My brother clicks his tongue as he goes from Sylvair to me. He grips my hands. I cringe. He draws up his magic to heal them, or at least stop the bleeding. Cold sweat breaks out along my skin, my stomach turns rancid, and I black out for a moment.

I return to my senses bent over a pile of vomit, Owen helpfully holding me out of it. Zeke is working at rousing Aldrik.

“What did you do?” Owen asks nonchalantly—which is itself a signal that he cares, very much, for the answer.

I gesture toward Aldrik and Sylvair with one still-hurting-but-no-longer-bleeding hand. “Waited for her to be all focused on him and stripped both their magic together.”

Zeke whips around to face me, eyes wide. “You—you stripped the magic of the father of your unborn child?”

“Yes.” I push myself back, away from the vomit. “Seemed like the best option in the time.”

Owen and Zeke exchange a look.

Zeke sighs and adjusts his lenses on his nose. “You know magic rushes pre-birth are what produce magical weirdos like me, right? It’s the only way to produce a ‘new’ kind of magic in a single generation since the Crystals came. Not that there’s anything truly new, at this point, but between his water magic, your telven magic, your elven magic, and then whatever magic the cousin had who you stripped some months ago… Your kid’s affinity is going to be for something strange. Blood, I’d guess. Hopefully not skin.”