Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 142916 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 715(@200wpm)___ 572(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142916 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 715(@200wpm)___ 572(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Something is wrong, she whispered into Tora’s mind. Demons don’t race toward the energy of the sword. They run from it. Or try to hide. This demon is doing neither. It’s as though the sword is feeding the creature more energy.
Anything out of the usual and Silke knew she needed to be concerned. She shifted the pulsing lights to the ceiling and took a moment to be a calming influence in the mind of the sea serpent. It was nearly impossible to see beyond the creature’s need to kill. It felt to Silke as if the sea monster were in a frenzied thrall, hypnotized, under a spell to self-destruct if the end goal of killing her was met.
How had Lilith pulled it off that one of her demons would become stronger when faced with the crystal sword? Raik was far more aggressive, feeding off the frenzy of the demon directing him to try to kill Silke. He could no longer see her as a friend. She was the enemy that had to be destroyed for Raik to live.
Silke concentrated on delving deeper into the sea serpent’s memories. There had to be a clue. It was becoming more difficult to escape Raik’s wildly swinging punches with his hamlike fists as he growled and snarled at her. Each time she had to make an evasive maneuver, the chances of the serpent realizing she was examining its memories doubled.
She persisted, moving farther and farther back, sifting as quickly as possible through the sea serpent’s memories until she found the moment when Lilith and two mages brought the newly formed demon out of the trough where it had been conceived. There it was. The answer—and not a good one.
They conceived these serpents in vats surrounded by crystal lights. Somehow, they were able to construct a crystal sword, and they used the energy from the sword and the colors to enhance the power of the demon.
That was bad. Very, very bad. If they could mutate one demon, making him immune to the slayer’s weapons, they could mutate many others. She watched the infant serpent as it was exposed to the pulsing crystal colors that were directed at the creature night and day. Many of the serpent babies died. Many went mad and were destroyed. Only the strongest survived. The hatred of those pulsing colors and anyone who wielded them was embedded deep into their brains.
Silke took a deep breath, avoiding another attack by Raik as she meticulously examined the way the lights played over the vat. Were the serpents completely immune? She didn’t think so. The lights caused extreme distress. There was a pattern to the way the wielder of the crystal sword used the colors.
Mage, she identified. Lilith enlisted the help of mages to create these creatures. They’re falling back on the same spells, the ones they know have worked for centuries.
She didn’t use any of those same weaves because it had been Tora who aided her in constructing her weapons. Tora had never gone to a mage school. She had developed her own weaves of protection through trial and error. She didn’t even have parents to help her. Over the centuries, she had perfected each intertwining strand. In the end, she was able to protect the forest where she had aided the people in defeating the Romans centuries earlier. Not just the forest; she also was able to secure some of the buildings in the village. The sea was too vast, so Silke and Tora had made their priority the forest and village.
Watch yourself, Raik is becoming more agitated, Tora warned.
That horrid demon is chewing through his skin, Silke said. I was afraid it would do something like that.
Once again, she pointed the crystal sword directly toward the arm where the demon thrashed and bit beneath Raik’s skin. This time she darkened the colors from pastel to deep-hued watercolors. The moment the rays of color hit Raik’s arm he bellowed, growling like an animal and lunging at her over and over.
She continued to circle him, keeping the vivid lights pulsing directly over the sea serpent’s head, where it was raised, battering and biting at Raik’s bone, muscle and skin. The moment the new colors struck, the demon went berserk, adding a high-pitched scream to Raik’s maddening vocalizations.
Silke chanted softly, keeping her tone pure and melodic. She was careful never to raise her voice or her level of energy. She didn’t want to tip off Lilith to who she was, should the serpent’s agitation draw her out. Energy and power had a footprint. Once she was able to read that print, Silke could identify the creature anytime she ran across it.
“Demon from the sea.” She knew the mages called him Snaggle from her foray into his memories. “Sent by Lilith, named Snaggle, to create chaos and hatred. I command your attention.”