Book 3 Chapter 51: A Damned Shame
Dantes and Jacopo, weakened, flew toward the closest of their allies to help prepare for the Viscent forces that were approaching. The nearest of them was Wane, who was waiting at the end of an alley with his inscribed stave and muttering under his breath. Dantes could feel the tips of his wings tingle as he landed behind him. He shifted into himself, and felt his fingers tingle in the same way, but stayed still so as not to interrupt whatever spellwork Wane was working on. Instead he and Jacopo kept working on cutting off and repairing the weaves of life that they were connected to. He still wasn’t able to cast his focus across the city, his range had taken a serious hit. He couldn’t check on Jacque, Vera, and Alessa across the city, nor could check on Argenta in Uptown. He was confident that Zak could keep everyone safe, though he found himself wishing he had his help on the front too. That was the problem with good people, they could only be one place at a time.
“Surprised to see you here, you okay?” said Wane, before moving back into his muttering.
“Godfrey hit my gardens. It’s very painful, but I’m working on fixing what I can now.”
Wane nodded and closed his eyes again to return to his spellcraft.
Dantes was in the middle of weaving more of the frayed threads back together when he sensed a column of Viscent soldiers approaching.
“Thirty,” he said, closing his eyes and struggling to see them through the eyes of a hiding rat. “One of them is a mage.”
Wane nodded, finally opening his eyes as he finished his spell.
“Can you take out the mage?” he asked, raising his club high. “They may be able to interrupt what I’ve set up if they’re good enough.”
“Could they really compete with an Academy mage?”