The Stone Wolf (The Chain Breaker Book 4) by D.K. Holmberg (digital book reader TXT) 📕

was sending out from him. He didn’t have unlimited stores of that, and eventually he would need to focus that magic, harness it, and find a way to continue pouring it out from him so that he could keep her from whatever she intended.

“That’s an interesting trick,” she said.

Gavin chuckled. She seemed actually impressed.

Where had Tristan found this one?

He twisted, swinging the blade around toward her, and he struck a barrier that had formed around her. It was the same barrier she had used before, and again there was nothing he could do to get past it.

She stood with her hands pressed out from her sides toward the ground, as if she needed some contact with the ground to form that barrier.

Gavin smiled to himself. “Where’s your friend? She has to be around here somewhere,” he said. “That would be the only way you could hold me.”

She regarded him strangely. She was powerful, but he had another sense from her. Curiosity. Had Tristan not told her everything about the job?

“What do you mean by that?”

“No single sorcerer has ever been able to hold me before on their own. So, why don’t you tell me where they are, and I’ll make this easy on you.” He flicked his gaze to the side, looking along the street. With the glowing light of his blue blade, he couldn’t see much, but there was no sign of anybody else. When he turned back to her, she was still watching him with an odd expression on her face. “You sent her away? You stayed to die?”

“Who said I was going to die?” she said.

Smoke swirled around her.

That’s new.

She twisted her fingers in a sorcery pattern, but not one Gavin recognized.

“I’m going to carve right through this barrier. And then we’ll see just how powerful your sorcery is.”

“If you think that all I have is sorcery, then you’re mistaken. And if you think I have to do this alone, you’re a fool.”

She moved her hands out, and the barrier slammed into Gavin, knocking him back. He went tumbling, crashing into a building on the far side of the street. He hurried to his feet, but the woman had already started forward. She twisted her hands, forming another pattern.

This time, light began to glow from between her fingers, stretching outward. Again, this was no kind of sorcery Gavin had ever seen before.

Smoke swirled around her.

No sorcerer that he’d seen before had that kind of magic.

He rose to his feet and readied the blade. He was already starting to call on power from his core reserves, preparing for the possibility he would need to attack. He had no idea what was going to happen, but he didn’t want to get caught off guard by what this woman would do or how she might harm him.

What if I’m wrong?

He’d assumed that she worked with Tristan, but there was another possibility.

Damn. Of course they’d coordinate it when he had targeted Wrenlow.

“Let me guess. You’re working with one of the Fates. They were pretty angry the last time they were here, especially as I managed to exile them from the city. They’ll want the t’ranth too.” He cocked his head, watching her. He was ready for any sort of sorcery she might throw at him. “They believed they were untouchable. But no one is.”

Which meant either way, she had to be after the dark egg, the way of controlling the semarrl. He’d been waiting for the Fates to send someone after it, but he would’ve expected more magic than he had been confronted with so far.

Which suggested that this was only the beginning.

“You don’t have any way of controlling it. You might think you do, but you don’t.” She strode toward him, and there was energy coming off of her.

Gavin held his hands up and braced himself for whatever she was going to do, but he couldn’t fight back. Not nearly as well as he needed to.

The source of magic slammed into him.

She was powerful. She had magic that seemed to rival that of the Fates.

“You still haven’t told me who you are,” he said, searching along the street to look for the other. If he could figure out where she had come from and where the other was, he could target her as well. For now, he needed to delay.

But it wasn’t just that. He needed something more. As much as he hated it, there was a reason he’d come here in the first place. It was time for him to use his enchantments.

He slipped his hand into his pocket, grabbing the new bracelet Olivia had made for him. It had a limited store of power within it, but it was one Gavin hadn’t tapped into before. With it, he thought he could overwhelm this sorcerer. He had questions, and she was going to provide the answers.

He darted forward. The enchantment gave him enhanced speed, and he surprised her by the movement. But she surprised him by how quickly she reacted. She stepped to the side and, twisting her hands, sent out a spiral of red flame that struck him in the chest.

Gavin flew backward but jumped to his feet. His chest hurt, but he would deal with that later. For now, he had to focus.

He tried using his core reserves to push power into the bracelet. As he did, the bracelet vibrated, giving him a sense of the power within it. Gavin was also aware that there was a limitation to how much power was there. He could already feel the energy within the bracelet starting to fade.

Gavin didn’t have much time remaining with it. He had to react quickly.

Gavin sped forward, and he slammed his shoulder into the woman, driving her back. She shook herself off and got to her feet, then turned back to him. Another spiraling pattern crashed toward him.

Gavin was ready for it this time, though, having seen it before. Pushing off with his core reserves, he jumped and flipped in the air, coming to