Page 35 of Hexes & Heartstrings (Shifters of Bastion Keep #2)
Bruin, his wonderful little witch, was looking fatigued himself, and the area positively swam with the scent of evergreens.
His boyfriend's green skin was flushed, and around his neck he wore thongs of different lengths, each one with one or more dangling crystals.
He had similar bracelets around his wrists, their crystals chiming.
He looked like a proper orc shaman from the movies, except that his amazing boyfriend was a witch, instead.
Bruin's hands were soothing as they ran through his fur and stroked his muzzle. Every touch left behind a gentle coolness, erasing much of Russell's fatigue.
"Hey, Mac!" one of the dozens of observers shouted, seated at one of the tables of the Great Hall. "Can't find my water. Can you bring me your pitcher?"
"Course I can," the old gardener said agreeably from the other side of the room. The leathery-skinned castle resident grabbed a pitcher of water off of the table, making swift strides to carry it directly across the room, passing right beside Bruin and Russell.
"Ach, never mind, found it!" the observer said. She held her mug up, shaking it. "Sorry to bother you."
"Eh, fuck you, then!" Mac laughed. Then with an obvious shrug he set the water pitcher down next to Russell, muttering loudly about not wanting to carry it all the way back.
Another ridiculous but heartwarming gesture. Grateful, Russell shifted into his human form, downing long gulps.
"Four minutes left," Bruin said.
Russell looked over at the wall of the Great Hall, and at the massive digital clock that was normally used for incursions, counting down the time.
Just beneath the clock, his da's war game candles signaled the fight's ebb and flow. Four red candles were still lit, for Lady Yi and her party. But only two blues and one white one remained, for Bruin, Markos, and himself.
A red candle winked out, swiftly followed by a blue candle. Markos down.
Three minutes until victory, if they could just keep Russell away from her grasp.
Bruin grabbed Russell's hand and began leading him to the back of the room, towards the kitchen's serving entrance.
But then one of the kitchen staff emerged, carrying a tray of drinks. Even if Mr. Benoit hadn't shaken his head at him, Russell could smell his tenseness, and they reversed course just before Bonnie emerged from behind him, flashing her canine teeth as she threatened them with a dagger.
Bruin and Russell backed up against a side wall, following one of the few paths in the room that had been kept clear.
The witch had his hand held up cautiously as they went, several crystals on his wrist glimmering as the scent of dirt filled the air, but Bonnie didn't give chase, just growled and closed ranks next to a triumphant-smelling Lady Yi as she entered from the front of the Great Hall, Arthur beside her.
"Nowhere left," Lady Yi called out.
Bruin stared at her, then took a deep breath. Instead of lashing out at her like she might expect, he spun around and put his hands against the wall behind them. Glyphs that he'd drawn on it during his hour of prep time lit up, and he began chanting.
Join us, stone,
my friend.
A waiting binding—
Lady Yi sprang forward, launching herself ten feet across the room, Bonnie just beside.
Even if Bruin finished his charm and opened the wall immediately, there wouldn't be time for Russell to get through before they got him, and it looked like she knew it.
Her feline eyes were slitted, and her paws dug into the floor hard enough that her claws left gouges as she hurtled herself towards them.
And in doing so, she charged right through the middle of the Great Hall.
A middle that had been left purposefully clear by Markos, who had carefully arranged the long tables.
Tables which were occupied by castle staff and other guardians, ensuring that Lady Yi wouldn't choose vaulting over them as an alternate route in this final maneuver.
And in her haste to get to them, hoping to silence Bruin's spell like she'd threatened to do the night before, she and Bonnie stepped right into the middle of the room beneath a glyph drawn on the ceiling in stone-colored clay.
—ascends!
Russell flinched at the loud clack, like two bricks being banged together. The floor snapped up like a venus fly trap, closing around their pursuers in a latticework cage, their shock and fury visible as they banged uselessly against the stone.
Bruin leaned heavily against him, and Russell wrapped an arm around his wonderful, clever boyfriend, even though he felt weak in the knees himself from an hour of stress and scariness and angry scents.
"Two minutes," Bruin said, grabbing him by the hand and heading again towards the kitchens, leaving behind the fake glyph on the wall—one of four in the room, to ensure that no matter which way Lady Yi approached from, they'd always had a way to trick her.
"Come on, let's run just in case.Arthur is still free. "
But as Russell looked over at where Arthur had rushed to stand beside the cage, all of the Hedge witch's attention was on Lady Yi, not them.
"Do it," she said, and Russell saw him nod, then slash with his dagger.
With a sound like someone gouging glass, a rent in the air appeared, and Arthur stepped through, vanishing.
"Lad, no!"
It was his da's voice, and the alarm caused Russell to freeze, clutching at Bruin as they came to a halt.
A second rip sounded from inside the cage, and into that gap the two prisoners escaped.
Bruin was about to dash forward and out of the room again, but Russell's ears caught the first hint of a sound, and he pulled Bruin back just in time to avoid running headlong into Arthur's blade as he cut a third hole.
"What do you think you're doing?" Da roared, dashing forward in his big werewolf form. "That's forbidden!"
Russell staggered backwards, dragging Bruin with him as he stared at the cut.
The gash widened, red at the edges like an actual wound, and Russell realized he was staring into the Umbral realm.
It was unmistakable, the shadows, the dusty smell that brought back incapacitating memories from nearly twenty years ago.
Out from the monochrome, Lady Yi and Bonnie charged towards them.
Bruin stood before Russell, but didn't have time for any witchcraft, it seemed. He was leapt upon by Bonnie, struck repeatedly in the face and belly. Russell could smell his pain, could smell the shifter's agitation and fury.
Could smell something else, too, something worse, and he whined.
Lady Yi was in front of him, and she didn't waste time with words, merely raised her rapier.
Russell moved, shifting into his werewolf form as he did so.
Yi's surprised snarl said that she hadn't expected him to charge forward. Her arm was jarred as her blade struck him in the chest, being deflected by his da's magic. Red filled Russell's vision, indicating that he'd taken a lethal strike; not important right now.
"And with that, I win."
Arms spread wide, Russell tackled her to the ground, rolling her to the side.
"You runty pup—!"
She didn't finish what she'd been trying to say, stopping as a large tentacle smashed the ground where she'd been standing. Russell howled his fear, scampering to the side.
He turned around, looking back just in time to see Bruin's stone cage explode in a hail of debris as a second and third tentacle emerged from the Umbral, tearing their way through Arthur's three open rents.
Three holes in reality, carved out by Lady Yi's Hedge witch and rapidly widening, and out of them large pink tentacles were finding footholds, flailing about to speed up the process.
"Close the damn rifts!" his da roared, lighting a candle. Around the room, guardians were shifting into their werebeast forms, calling out for weapons and forming into small squads.
"I can't," Arthur said, sounding panicky. "Not while it's blocking the gates!"
Angry shouts. Screams from those being injured. Horrible, dry, empty smells. Russell crouched down beside a table, putting his hands on his head.
"Russell," he heard his boyfriend say.
Russell felt a pang of fear, and self-loathing. He whined.
"Russell, I need you."
Despite his tears, Russell rocked forward. He managed to untighten himself from his ball and get to his hands and knees. Yes. His boyfriend needed him. He could carry Bruin to safety, yes!
"Yes," he said.
But Bruin wasn't smelling afraid, only concerned, only pained—pained for him? And as Russell reached out to grab him and pick him up, Bruin shook his head, pointing across the room, beyond the multiple tentacles.
Two youths. A little girl and a young raccoon shifter, hunkering beneath a table. There were a pair of guardians nearby, but both were busy fending off ever-increasing numbers of tentacles to be able to get to them.
"Get them out of the room, that's all you have to do. You're a big and brave wolf, and I know you can do it."
And after a pat on his snout, Bruin spun around to jog towards his da and Rosemary, chanting invocations as he joined them.
Before his fear could overwhelm him and freeze him in place again, Russell ran headlong in the childrens' direction, howling as he went. He made a straight line, leaping over tables and guardians and tentacles all, pretending that the spirit wasn't there.
He didn't stop when he arrived, either, just scooped the two little ones up into his arms as he continued to run and howl. He didn't stop until he was out in the hall, far away from the horrible monster.
The children saw someone that they knew, and they pushed themselves out of his grasp to rush into her arms.
Russell turned around, looking back and seeing guardians with armloads of weapons charge through the wide doors of the Great Hall.
His brain felt funny. He wanted to hide, but that felt wrong, somehow. He didn't know what to do. What should he do?
Bruin. His little witch was still in there!