But looking into that radiant adoring face smiling up at me, I couldn’t help but think no matter how many hoops I might have to jump through, she was well worth it in the end.
Epilogue
Of course, that wasn’t the end of it. When we did find the camp, everyone was keeping an eye out for us. Chatta apparently realized this too. She snuggled her way under my arm and beamed at everyone. “It’s settled!” she announced, with a fist raised in victory.
The whole team actually broke out in applause. I haven’t been that dense, have I…? I’m not going to ask that question out loud. I’m sure the answer will just be depressing.
“
Garth
,” Night had a wicked gleam of amusement in his eyes. “
Remember a certain conversation we had on the road a few months ago? Chatta asked if you were keeping any secrets from her, and I said you were.
”
I vaguely remembered that. I said I wasn’t keeping any secrets but Night maintained I was. And then he said he’d tease me forever when I realized what the secret was. Oh…busted
buckets
…
“
Ah, the light dawns
,” he whickered in amusement.
I groaned and buried my head in my hand. “I’m never going to live this down, am I?”
“
Never,
” he assured me gleefully. “
I’ll tease you about this until you’re old and grey.
”
Oh, and isn’t
that
something to look forward to?
“Just remember, Night, that what goes around comes around,” Chatta warned him archly. “When you fall in love with some pretty little mare, we’ll return every bit of teasing that you subject us to.”
That gave Night pause. “
Since when do you side with Garth in getting revenge?”
“I’m always on his side now, remember?” she reminded him smugly.
I looked down at her with a growing smile. That’s right, she will be forever on my side from now on, won’t she? Well, that just brightened my day considerably.
“Alright, people, tease the new couple later,” Xiaolang ordered in amusement. “I need a debriefing of what the Gardener told Garth first. Garth, I caught parts of it, but I’d like to hear exactly what he said.”
I was relieved to go back to business and went instantly to Xiaolang. We sat on a fallen tree trunk and went over everything that the Gardener said in some detail.
“That is a relief,” Xiaolang noted after thinking everything through. “I don’t know how they keep track of the whole land like they are, but at least if we cross swords with another Priest-Mage, we don’t have to worry about patching up the land afterwards.”
“Very true,” I agreed.
Lowering his voice, Xiaolang looked around suspiciously. “Garth, I have to ask. This oath that you took, doesn’t that prevent you from touching Chatta at all?”
“It prevents me from touching her in any way that speaks of intimacy,” I corrected with a grimace. “I can still hug her, like I did when we were still only friends, but anything more than that…”
Xiaolang frowned, eyes going to Chatta. “That’s going to be tough to live with for any amount of time. Especially considering how physically affectionate she is.”
I fully anticipated Chatta to be very grumpy until I managed to get her father to release me from that oath. Actually, just envisioning her future response was giving me a headache already.
“I can’t release you right now to go talk to Delheart,” Xiaolang continued with a sidelong glance at me. “But I promise that the next time we find a magician, I’ll try to work it so that you can go back with them.”
The words were barely out of his mouth before I was shaking my head in refusal. “No, Xiaolang. I refuse to leave the team here. I can’t and won’t risk a repeat of a Priest’s attack. Especially now, with them on the rampage.”
He opened his mouth to protest and thought better of it. “I see your point. Very well. In that case, I hope that we’ll soon have an opportunity to go back into Hain, so you can straighten all of this out.”
I was praying that happened soon.
Don’t miss the fourth and final book of the Advent Mage Cycle!
Balancer
Due Fall 2012
Also due late Summer 2012 is the
Advent Mage Compendium
full of side-stories featuring Garth and the Red Hand.
Turn the page for an excerpt from
Balancer.
From
Chapter One
We went back out to the road, and I went back to searching the area around us for magicians. One moment everything was normal, even peaceful, for such an early spring day. The next I felt an insane explosion of power. I could literally feel a ley line becoming exposed and power rapidly filled the air, becoming so thick that I could almost taste it.
Chatta and I whirled at the same time, facing the direction it was coming from.
“Garth, what—” she exclaimed in growing horror.
“It’s a ley line,” I answered, cutting her off. “Some idiot has tapped into a ley line!” Standing up in my stirrups I yelled toward the front of the group, “XIAOLANG!”
The Q’atalian whirled around in his saddle, hand reflexively going toward his sword hilt. “What?”
“We’ve got another lunatic tapping into a ley line!”
For a second he just froze, eyes wide with horrified realization. Then he snapped out of it. “Garth, you lead. Everyone else, get ready to engage!”
I didn’t wait for anyone to ask another question, just tapped my heels to Night’s flanks and started guiding him off the road. Night plunged into the high grass at a gallop, following my every direction instantly. Within minutes we had closed the distance.
Seeing the aftermath of what a Priest-Mage could do once they’d tapped into a ley line had sickened me. Seeing it in action…it was so much worse. I felt nauseated at the scene before my eyes. There were about six of them in the group, a typical size, although none of them were in the silver robes of their Order. I didn’t even need a magical sense to know which one was messing with that ley line. He was kneeling, a complex engraving drawn into the ground, his hand in the center of it. It was a drawn incantation, then? It certainly looked that way.
I wasn’t going to give him time to complete whatever he was attempting. Yanking my bon’a’lon from my belt, I snapped it open and charged.