Denser had no choice. He dropped to his hands and knees, braced himself against one wall and began to edge his way down to his wife and into the teeth of the gale in whose eye she lay helpless, her mind being ripped apart with every beat of her heart. Beyond her, chaos held sway. The Raven's warriors had been swept into the hub room to join the helpless mass at the mercy of the extraordinary wind. He could see them struggling to create distance between themselves and the enemy. Auum and his Tai still resisted and it might prove a crucial advantage.
Denser fought every inch against being thrown back up the corridor. He couldn't afford to fail. Not for The Raven and most particularly not for Erienne. The last few yards, he was flat on his front as the wind howled past him. Erienne was its epicentre and its focal point.
Reaching her body, everything stilled. He lay very close to her, feeling her ragged breathing, seeing the blood trickle from ears and nose, the drool from her mouth and her eyes twitching horribly beneath their lids. Her body quivered. Every muscle was taut to breaking and every nerve end fired. She was hot, too hot to five for too long, her face and hands sheened in sweat.
'Hold on, love,' he said, pushing aside his emotions for the moment. 'I'm here. Please hold on.'
He knew what he had to do. He could shield her from the Xeteskian mana, starve the One of its fuel. Of course, that was why the Circle Seven were present. In their typically arrogant way, they thought that by doing the same, they could keep her safe until they understood the power and brought her back to herself. It had led them to this ridiculous folly and risked her life.
Of course they had an advantage. They were six powerful mages and could keep up the casting indefinitely. He was one man and it was terribly draining. He looked up and caught Auum's eye. He mouthed 'be ready' and though not sure if the elf understood, bent to his task.
Partitioning his mind, he tuned to the mana spectrum and pulled in an oval construct, packed with pulsing mana energy. That was the simple part. Keeping the construct rotating and feeding on the mana about it, he sought the centre of the gale. What he saw all but made him lose his concentration. Into the darkened pit that was Erienne's mind, mana was being dragged like water thundering into a sinkhole.
And from the centre of that same hole, the power was being channelled out. Struck through with a deep brown, the Xeteskian-based energy was gouting from her, thrashing in every direction. But it shouldn't have been the Xeteskian colour. Every fibre of his training told him that mana dragged into a Dordovan mind would be coloured the vibrant orange of that college because her manipulation of it, the lore she applied instinctively, made it that way.
He drew breath and moved the oval construct forwards, feeling it buffeted by the tumult around it. Dragging on every ounce of the learning he had gleaned from his time with Dawnthief, he forced his shielding spell in. He couldn't see Erienne's mind but he knew its position. He stopped the rotation of the spell, opened it along one side, shot it down the sinkhole and snapped it shut.
The effect all around him was instantaneous. Without the energy to get to his feet immediately, he opened his eyes and looked straight ahead. Quickest to react, Auum, Duele and Evunn stormed into the hub room. Swords in hand, they attacked the soldiers on the left-hand side. Only just regaining their feet and sense of direction, half of them were dead or about to die before they'd even formed a defence. Blood flowed across the floor.
Auum tore the throat from one man, backhanded his blade into the chest of a second and straight-punched a third in the windpipe. He couldn't see Duele but he saw the body that tumbled into view, Evunn leaping it smartly before crashing his left foot into the stomach of his first target.
In the centre of the room, Sian'erei wrestled free of Dystran and struck him on the nose, skittering back towards the corridor at an order from Hirad. She began to cast. The Raven warriors and Rebraal regained their feet quickly. The Unknown's blade flew from his scabbard, tapped once on the ground.
In front of them, the Circle Seven mages, ever quick when self-preservation was needed, had scrabbled to stand and were diving for cover behind the statuesque Protectors or running headlong for stairs or other passages. Denser saw Dystran take a single pace and disappear, a look of thunder on his face as he went. Another of the Circle Seven did likewise before all of them had taken themselves from the immediate vicinity.
Hirad snarled and lashed out at a mage too slow to rise. The blade caught him on the top of the skull, splitting it apart and spreading gore across the stone flags. Darrick fenced briefly with a soldier before dragging his blade hard across the enemy's stomach and stepping back smartly as entrails disgorged through his wrecked armour.
It was carnage, all watched with total detachment by the men in the masks, the former elite fighting force of Balaia. And it was all over in moments.
'Back off, back off,' said The Unknown. 'Auum, leave the Protectors. Sian, keep the shield going. Rebraal, make sure they understand.'
A shout went up behind Denser, urgent. Rebraal answered and the TaiGethen backed away into and down the corridor. Protectors watched them go, weapons slack in their hands.
'How is she, Denser!" asked The Unknown into the sudden uneasy calm.
'What are we going to do, Unknown?' Denser felt his world collapsing around him. 'What the fuck are we going to do?'
Sha-Kaan bellowed and tore a hole in the roof big enough for his head. He plunged it inside and snatched up a Protector, crushing his bones and spitting him aside. Somewhere a woman was screaming. He looked around again. A mage was backing away. Nyam.
He swivelled and took in the room. One Al-Drechar was dead. The other, apparently unaware, was asleep. Other Protectors stood in the room but none made a move. There was something altered about them. None made any attempt to cover the mage but three still stood in front of Diera who had run in, sensing something at the last moment. She was too late, though at least was safe. But it was she who was screaming. The babe in her arms was too traumatised even to cry.
He turned back to Nyam, arrowed in his head and stopped inches from the mage's face.
'Speak,' he ordered, knocking the man back against the wall with his breath. 'Explain now. Your life hangs by the merest thread.'
'We can't stay here,' said The Unknown. 'Denser, can you get up?' Below him, Denser nodded and pulled himself up. 'Be careful with her. I'm shielding her but I won't be able to do it for long and it isn't protecting her, only us.'
'All right, Denser, all right. Let's get ourselves away from here,' said The Unknown, dragging the mage towards him. 'Keep your concentration. Thraun, carry Erienne. Be careful.'
Thraun nodded and padded over, smoothing Erienne's hair from her face before picking her up, resting her head in the crook of one arm, her knees across the other.
'She is fading,' he said.
'Just look after her,' said The Unknown. 'Ideas. Darrick?'
'Gods know how much time we've got, said the erstwhile general. 'Not long. The Circle Seven mages all got out and they'll be back in strength. All we can do is lose ourselves from here, I guess. The TaiGethen are at the access points right now but whatever we're going to do, we need to do it now. What about them, Unknown?' He pointed at the Protectors.
There were fifteen of them standing in the centre of the hub room amongst the blood and bodies covering the floor. Weapons had been stowed and they stood in a loose circle, saying nothing.
‘Ithink you're needed, Unknown,' said Denser, levering himself away, 'I'll be all right. Go on.'
'Right,' said The Unknown. 'Rebraal, Hirad, go with Denser into the research room. Take what he says we need. Everything else destroyed, all right? Oh, and make sure Kestys is dead. He knows far too much about all this.'