The Rifts of Psyche by Kyle West (i love reading .txt) 📕

She clapped her hands, and the dream ended.

30

Lucian was shocked awake, and Serah stirred from beside him. She must have been roused by his heavy breathing and groans.

“What’s happened?” she asked. “You all right?”

He reached for his Focus to calm himself. The image of the shadowed queen in her audience chamber had burned itself into his memory.

The darkness was dispelled when Serah streamed a fireball over their heads, providing light.

“Lucian? What’s wrong?”

“It was her,” he said. “I didn’t set my ward.”

“What did she say?”

Lucian shuddered. It was the last thing he wanted to talk about. Instead, he stood up and brushed off his pants. “We should get moving. It would take too long to explain, and Fergus and Cleon are in trouble.”

“Right.” Serah stood with him. “Well, we should head toward the lights. That’s the only place they could be.”

They set off into the darkness. His head was still pounding, but with the exception of the dream, resting had done wonders. He wasn’t sure how long they had slept, but it felt like a long time. Long enough for Fergus and Cleon to be far away from here, or even dead.

Serah led the way with her fire. Lucian tried not to think about how visible it would make them.

Every few minutes, Serah would extinguish her light, giving their eyes time to adjust. But always, those fires they had seen from above were still hidden.

After an hour of walking, Serah came to a stop. “We should have seen some sign of them by now.”

“We need to keep looking. We’ve barely started.”

A quick fluttering of wings from behind caused them to turn. Over their heads flew a large creature, at least two meters wide. It screeched as it shot into the darkness.

“Rotting hell,” Serah said.

“What was that thing?”

“Gloombat. A whole colony of them could be on us in minutes.”

Rotting hell indeed.

“Stream a sphere as bright as you can stand and pray someone cares enough to save us.”

Lucian hurried to do as commanded. He reached for Radiance and streamed, though it tore at his mind to do so. A bright sphere of light shone above them.

“It doesn’t need to last long,” Serah said. “Just a burst to get people’s attention.”

Lucian streamed until the light above their heads was blinding, a single beacon shining bright enough to reach the cavern ceiling high above them.

“Let go,” Serah said. “Save your ether.”

The light of Serah’s floating fire was nothing compared to the former brilliance of Lucian’s sphere, but it would have to suffice. They ran over rough, rocky terrain, weaving in and out of rock formations. When they arrived at a cliff, Serah pushed Lucian on.

“Jump!”

He didn’t have time to doubt. He leapt as far as he could.

And he could see lights floating in the distance.

He sunk in slow motion and fell even slower as he became wrapped with a silvery aura. They were still falling, albeit slowly.

“Light!” Serah called.

Lucian streamed another sphere, revealing a pillar of rock in the distance. Immediately, he saw what he needed to do. As he reached for his Focus, he could hear the collective flutter of wings from behind. He couldn’t chance a look back. All he could do was keep his eye on that pillar. He opened another stream, this one Binding, forming a focal point on the column. Ether drew reluctantly from the Orb. He was all too conscious of what the Sorceress-Queen had told him, that the Orb didn’t find him worthy.

It had to find him worthy now, or both he and Serah were dead.

He formed two anchor points, one for him and Serah. Deepening his Focus, he streamed.

Nothing happened. They were still falling.

Help me, damn you. I’m about to die!

The magic tore from him in an angry torrent, rocketing he and Serah out of the chasm and toward the pillar. Looking over his shoulder, Lucian could see hundreds of red, beady eyes glimmering in the darkness.

Lucian cut off the stream, but the Orb’s power was bursting at the seams, demanding to be used. It was as if it were challenging Lucian to handle that power. As if it believed he couldn’t. With a roar, Lucian reset the anchor point from he and Serah and onto the rock spire, and the focal point on a pair of red eyes in the center of the swarming cloud of bats.

“Get down!” he shouted.

He and Serah barely had time to duck behind a boulder before the rock spire simply . . . disintegrated as it shot toward the bats, spreading a scatter of high-speed projectiles. Lucian, streaming by instinct, created a reverse Binding ward around he and Serah, which kept the rocks from tearing them to shreds. Hundreds of screeches echoed throughout the cavern, piercing Lucian’s ears. The Orb’s power ebbed. Hopefully, that use of magic would satisfy it.

“We’ve got to keep moving,” Serah said. “It won’t take the survivors long to regroup.”

They ran toward the fires burning in the distance. Several gloombats broke ahead of the cloud. Serah turned, her hands radiating gray magic. She cried out as she sunk the forerunners with a gravity amplification stream. Lucian’s stomach churned upon hearing those bodies crunch on the rocky ground beneath. Lucian tried to tether a few of them, but the Orb wasn’t responding. Well, rot the damn Orb, then. He reached for the Psionic Aspect instead, streaming a kinetic wave that pushed back against the cloud of bats.

But it was only a stalling move. And Lucian was low on ether. There were still hundreds on their tail. Lucian readied his shockspear, knowing it was probably the only real defense he had left.

“We’re not going to make it!” Serah said.

Sharp pain lanced Lucian’s right shoulder. A small gloombat had latched, its talons piercing his clothes. He let out a yowl, reached for Dynamism, and streamed electricity into the bat’s body. The bat screeched as it fell to the ground, the singe of its burnt hair almost making him gag. The pain was hot, but