“I’m not trying to hurt you.”
He looked past her and started toward Agnew. Jayna attempted to use power through the Toral ring, but a burst of energy struck her and she was thrown back.
Asaran glanced in her direction, his gaze lingering on her briefly, before he turned again toward Agnew.
He was going to harm the sorcerer.
Jayna didn’t know Agnew very well, only what Char had told her. She’d had just a few interactions with him in the time she’d been in Nelar, but it was enough for her to know he had helped. Without him, the fires in the homes of the seven dular would have caused total destruction and burned the houses to the ground.
She needed to help him now. Whether or not he would react poorly because she was no longer a sorcerer, she didn’t know, but she knew she had to call upon more energy. The dragon stone could help.
Jayna tried calling on that power, but it came slowly.
She looked down at her ring. The smoke she’d been calling into the bloodstone had filled it, giving it a murky appearance again, but the most recent attempt at drawing off the smoke had changed something. Jayna could feel that smoke had flowed into the bloodstone.
She grabbed her pouch and found the one that the girl from the market had given her. She focused on it, triggering it, then tossed it toward Asaran.
When the enchantment struck, it blasted, striking him and tossing him back toward the fire, but it also struck Agnew. The shock of the waves of energy slammed into both of them.
Agnew had erected some sort of barrier around himself, though Jayna suspected it wouldn’t be enough to withstand Asaran coming toward him. Still, it wasn’t even that which troubled her. Power radiated toward the fire, toward the heat that fueled him.
As he landed in a crumpled heap near the fire, Jayna reached into her pouch to grab another enchantment. If she could focus on Asaran, if she could use that blast and get him away from the fire . . .
She triggered the enchantment, then tossed it, sending it near Asaran’s feet.
She waited, but this time, the blast didn’t strike the way she had expected.
That was odd.
Jayna took a step forward, heading toward Asaran to see if he was going to get up, then the blast struck, tossing her back and slamming her into a wall.
She got up slowly. Her head was ringing. She shook herself off.
When she looked over to the fire, Asaran was gone.
The blast should have tossed him away from the flames and the hearth, but she found nothing as she swept her gaze around the inside of the room, looking for him.
She did notice a little bit of smoke, a tracing of energy to suggest he might have disappeared, but nothing else.
Sorcery built, and Jayna turned to see Agnew standing, hands twisting in a complicated pattern.
“You don’t need to do that,” she said. “I was just trying to—”
The blast of wind started to strike.
Jayna reached for power, calling it through the dragon stone. The energy flowed out and around her, creating a buffer against the wind. It was barely enough for her to withstand the force of Agnew’s blow.
“You dular would dare come in here and attack me?” Agnew had a thin, creaky voice.
She knew he was old. Even in the Academy, there were stories about Agnew and his age, mostly said in jest, but not always. He had been situated in Nelar for decades, his post one where he had felt he could offer the most help to the people and serve the Society. It was part of the reason Char had been so eager to work with Agnew, wanting the opportunity to spend that time with somebody who had such experience and knowledge. And now this ancient sorcerer was angry with Jayna.
“I’m not a dular,” she said.
She had to focus on the power within her, holding on to the barrier. Through the dragon stone augmented by the bloodstone, she thought she could hold out, that she could withstand any attack he might make, but using the bloodstone to draw the smoke off had weakened the ring enough that she wasn’t sure if she could. She felt a strange resistance through the ring that limited her ability to call upon its power.
“Dular,” he sneered. “I saw what you were both trying to use on me.”
“Both?”
She frowned, cocking her head to the side, and regarded Agnew for a long moment. Did he really think she had been using enchantments, and that Asaran had been using an enchantment? Could he really not have known that he was an Ashara?
He might not. Knowing what she did of the sorcerers, along with his fear of the dular . . .
A blast of power struck her.
This was a lance of light, pale white and streaking toward her. Jayna reacted as quickly as she could, creating a spiral of power around her and pushing downward with as much energy as she could through the dragon stone, but she couldn’t draw as much as she needed, forcing her to use a hint of sorcery. The combination created a bit more of a barrier and had thankfully secured it around her, holding steady.
When his lance of light struck, it sizzled, then began to creep around the barrier, reminding her so much of the way Asaran had constricted around her barrier earlier.
She pulled on power, borrowing from the dragon stone and the bloodstone. She needed that additional strength. She continued to constrict that power, sending it through the ring, forcing as much out of her as she could. The light that Agnew had forced upon her started to squeeze, twisting up and around her barrier, snaking around it no differently than Asaran had snaked around it. The energy he used was forceful and violent, and she had to find some place deep within her in order to withstand it.
She had to fight, but she didn’t know if she had enough power. She knew she could still push though, and she had to tamp down the smoke within the bloodstone to draw more energy through the dragon stone. That would hopefully be enough to give her access to greater power once again.
It was difficult to do so while holding on to the protection around her, but Jayna forced her attention to split, and she focused on the smoke within the bloodstone, compressing it. As she felt it starting to shift, she jammed power all the way through it.
The combination of power finally freed her.
Power filled her, flowing more intensely through the dragon stone once again, and barely in time.
Agnew strode toward her, and another one of his lances of light that snaked out and around her barrier had erupted, starting at her feet, and now the two beams of light were working around her, twisting and trying to squeeze against the power she held. Agnew then sent a beam of yellow light streaking across the floor, once again starting to twist around her barrier.
“The dular have gotten away with far too much in this city for far too long,” he said.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. The dular haven’t—”
Agnew didn’t give Jayna a chance to finish. Yet another beam streaked out from him.
He was powerful, and he used blasts that were designed to overwhelm, limiting her ability to react. Jayna tried to thrash at him, struggling to fight against the energy he poured at her, but she couldn’t.
The only thing she could do was attempt to hold out and try to increase her resistance, but even that became more of a struggle.
He continued to force power upon her.
She reached into her pouch. She didn’t want to fight Agnew, but at the same time, she wasn’t about to let him hurt her. She slipped out one of the concussive enchantments, activating it while she did, and it exploded.