Duality by Rowan Erlking (classic books for 13 year olds txt) 📕

He did not hit the ground. He would have thought it was a spell Malkia had figured out—yet all she did was scream his name with every strain of horror in her. His arms jerked up, lurching in their sockets as a tight squeeze latched around his elbows then reaffixed more securely under his armpits. Bernum looked up. The air around him fluffed in repeated gusts.

Black-and-white feathers, a tan face, and a grin of strange familiarity gazed down on him. The white-and-black head looked up again, even as Bernum was heaved right back into the hole he had fallen from.

“I come to help,” the winged man announced with a grin. He looked to Malkia with a nod for her. Tears were in Malkia’s eyes.

Bernum rubbed under his arms, glad his arms had not pulled out altogether. He was even gladder nothing had to break.

“No!” Omoni’s voice seemed distant in Bernum’s ears, shouting curses at them in the hollow ringing that smothered everything else. Malkia hugged Bernum’s chest tight, crying with thanks to the birdman.

“You belong to me! Magician, jump!”

Omoni’s words pierced in again. Then the necklace started to tighten.

Casting the birdman a weary, sorry look, Bernum looked down through the hole once more with a dizzy lurch. He lifted one foot for the leap.

“You crazy?” The birdman pulled Bernum back from the precipice.

“No choice.” Tapping the necklace that now had a light sheen of crimson on it, Bernum hopped onto the broken edge. He then stepped off.

The birdman dived after him.

This time, the jolt under Bernum’s arms was more sudden…but all the more welcome. The feather wings fluffed out. Both men landed soft as if they had just hopped a short distance. “You crazy! Is magic so powerful?”

Bernum tapped the necklace again with a glance up at the opening. “I can’t take it off. The spell is freakishly powerful.”

Malkia was peering down at the both of them, her hand to her chest.

Nodding, the birdman looked up. He patted Bernum on the head once then sprang back into the air with another gusty flap. “I go get wizard. He be here. Promised!”

Yes, Bernum thought dizzily as he heard Omoni shout from above for him to stay put and then order the guards to fetch Bernum to put him in chains—the wizard had promised. Did that proud cock renege already? He never did seem trustworthy. It was doubtful now that he could be expected to keep his part of a bargain, which meant the man would not help Dennik either. He and Malkia would have to find another wizard.

 Bernum swayed where he stood, touching his damp neck, hoping all that light-headedness wasn’t because the chain had cut too deeply. Mostly, though, he wondered where Jonis was. Had he gone up the steps after them? Or had the guards defeated the pale demon? Staggering, Bernum looked for a place to sit. But when he tried to go, the necklace started to cut again so he stopped.

“Bernum!” Malkia called down, her voice starting to come back into focus. “Are you all right?”

He looked up. “Nothing broken.”

“Stay where you are!” She sounded anxious. Her face certainly contorted with worry as if she would leap if she could.

Guards charged into the courtyard from a doorway opposite than he had expected. Blinking, Bernum wondered if there was another stairway he was not aware of. A fancy place like that probably had six. The thugs rushed over to him, pulling out a pair of shackles obviously meant for his wrists. But they hardly got to put them on him when a huge boom echoed somewhere at the front of the manor house.

“What was that?” The guards turned, gaping that way. They all hunched over with terror.

Indeed, what? Bernum peered toward the source of the noise.

It boomed again—this time with a crashing sound.

The men lifted their pistols, each one standing with their guard up to wait for an invasion of demons if necessary.

And they were right to.

Charging into the courtyard, all darkly colored with hoods over their foreign hair and faces, the circus performers ran at the men. The wizard was the only one who strolled in. He had his hands in his pockets.

“So this is the merchant’s digs. Not all that impressive to Hann standards.” The wizard lifted his eyebrows as he peered around.

The guards opened fire.

Though several performers ducked, Bernum watched the Perri knife-wielders spring acrobatically over the laid stone then take out three of the men with a fling and a crack. The red haired warriess sliced open the fourth while the fifth staggered away from the Blue Lord, giving the demon all the lead he had in his handheld weapon. Not one bullet struck their target, ricocheting off an invisible shield.

“Congratulations,” the wizard said to Bernum, striding up to him as if he didn’t have a care. “The belts work.”

There were others with them also, people Bernum did not recognize though they seemed to be more of the same kind of dangerous as the assassins from Perri were—only they looked distinctly southern and somewhat gaunt as if they had eaten only bread and water for the past three months.

The last guard crashed into a pillar where the Blue Lord set a hand to the man’s face. Immediately the guard started to shrivel.

“Hey!” Bernum lurched from his spot then teetered back as the necklace dug once more into his skin. “Don’t make more casualties than necessary! Let’s just get Malkia out and go!”

But the guard shriveled up into dust. The Blue Lord wiped off his palms with a dark turn towards Bernum. “That one was necessary.”

Bernum set his teeth together. He glanced up at his sister who watched from the opening above. “We don’t want to give the police reason to chase us to the ends of the world.”

“Too late, my friend,” the wizard said, setting a hand on Bernum’s shoulder. He then stroked across the fresh cut on Bernum’s neck with his finger, taking off the trickle of blood. The cut sealed. “The police were already dispatched when we broke our friends out. We’ll all be running from here.”

Bernum blanched, blinking at him.

“Now, let’s get this thing off you,” the wizard Aldolvio said. He took the chain in his fingers as if plucking a piece of warm taffy from the puller. It came apart just as easily, melting in his fingers. The wizard held it out for Bernum to see then looked up to Malkia.

Rubbing his neck, Bernum gazed up also. “You promised.”

He heard the wizard chuckle. “Yes. I did.”

The black-and-white haired birdman swooped down as if on cue. With a heave, he grabbed the wizard first, flying him up to the hole where he set the wizard inside. Then he hopped off again, going back for Bernum who watched anxiously from below. The next moment Bernum was up on the ledge, staggering into the room. He witnessed the same taffy-pull for his sister. The wizard smugly discarding the chain as though it were merely a mere piece of trash he had plucked from her hair.

Malkia turned immediately to Burnum and threw her arms around him. He clasped her tight.

“Finally.”

Malkia sobbed. Bernum hardly fought the tears of relief as they drizzled down.

But the wizard stepped back. So did the birdman, sharing awkward looks with his fellow circus member. After a minute or so, the wizard cleared his throat. “Uh, I realize you are both relieved of an enormous emotional strain and all, but uh, we all really ought to be going.”

Brother and sister pulled apart. They nodded, both wiping their eyes, then they turned to the door. Malkia unlocked it with a spell.

“Uh.” the wizard pointed back to the hole in the wall. “I was thinking more about escaping that way.”

But Bernum shook his head, looking towards the hall himself. “We have to see how Jonis is doing. We can’t just leave him to fight on his own.”

“That’s right,” Malkia said. “I dragged him into this. We need to help him out.”

The wizard moaned. He took another decided step to the hole. “That Cordril is doing fine on his own down there. I’d warrant that he’s used to taking on hordes of demons at one time. Trust me, we ought to just go.”

“What about your documents?” Bernum asked, narrowing his eyes a little at the man.

Malkia already stepped out into the hall, checking to see if anyone was coming. The hall was empty.

“Our friend Taputa will stay behind to take care of that,” the wizard said. “He looks enough like one of you that no one will suspect him, as long as he keeps his eyes covered.”

“Taputa?” Bernum blinked then looked back at Malkia who was gesturing for him to follow her.

“The Blue Lord,” the wizard said.

“He wear dark glass over eyes,” the birdman added, tapping next to his amber colored eye.

Bernum wondered if that would actually work. Though the Blue Lord had dark skin, he still had foreign features. No Maldos would take him for anything else but an islander.

Parting ways, the birdman carried the wizard out the hole, while Bernum and Malkia rushed into the hallway. The chaos in the house had calmed only a little. Even as they reached the second floor, they could hear the screaming sobs of the merchant’s son who they saw as they got closer, hunched over, batting off his skin as if it were still covered with insects. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”

“They’re gone now,” a nursemaid murmured, patting him. “The curse is over. Finished”

The insects that weren’t crushed around him were scuttling away, almost in droves. Malkia blinked once with a look to Bernum, but he urged her on towards the bottom floor before she could say anything about it. A nurse saw them go though and screamed.

“Aaagh! Witches!” She pointed at them.

And every head turned.

The boy jumped up with a yowl, springing into the nearest room.

Malkia looked back, but Bernum pulled her along around the banister without even looking back, jogging fast to the first floor.

Brother and sister both halted on the bottom stair. Then Bernum took a cautious step into the hall. It was like nothing he had ever seen or imagined. Sprawled here, knocked with glass and broken pottery there, toppled stands and potted plants, torn curtains—the long hallway was strewn with casualties—unconscious as well as the dead—their guns laying about like scattered leaves. Brother and sister tiptoed through them, peering through the smoky and bitter gun-powdered air toward the far end where circus performers were scrambling out the bashed-open doorway. The fantastic wood was now splinters, the fine molding ruined along with the bent copper hinges. The performers were calling to each other in their foreign tongues as they rushed into the yard. Not a word was understandable. Jonis was not among them.

Making doubly sure the demon was not dead, Bernum rushed to the study door. Malkia was there a second after. Looking in, both halted then relaxed.

Whole and healthy, except for a few scrapes on his arms and a light burn where a bullet had grazed his shoulder, Jonis was at his cabinet pushing his back against it with, one foot on the wall to give added thrust. And though he was the