A Rip of Realms (A Shade of Vampire #39)(3)

“What the HELL are you doing?”

Tejus bellowed after me, but I was soon swallowed up by the mass of ministers and I didn’t bother to turn around. I would return to him when I found them but I had to know that they were safe. Tejus still didn’t fully understand that when it came to Benedict and my friends, if they weren’t okay, I wouldn’t be okay. Much to his annoyance, my own safety would always come second place. I pushed and elbowed my way through to the portcullis. Most of the crowd didn’t even notice me. I was too small compared to them to attract much attention: the only danger would be losing my footing and being trampled to death by the mob.

With one final shove, I broke free of the bottleneck of sentries that had formed at the gate and started to run toward the main entrance.

My strides seemed more powerful than normal, like I was running at twice my speed…and more than that, I could feel strength coursing through me, as if I could easily obliterate anything that stood in my path. I didn’t know if it was the adrenaline, or my newfound sentry powers, but it felt good not to feel so powerless, even for just a moment.

I reached the entrance in a matter of moments; when I got there, I skidded to a halt.

No!

There was a loud boom, like dynamite exploding, and I stared open-mouthed as the entrance arch split in two and collapsed, almost gracefully, in on itself. I heard the screams of the sentries who had been standing beneath it—and the ones behind who hadn’t made it out yet. Then a brief silence, as all cries stopped.

“BENEDICT!” I yelled out, shattering the silence. A commotion broke out behind me as the ministers and guards realized what had happened, and within a few short moments it was total chaos.

Ignoring the sentries, I started to run around to the side entrance of the castle. My stomach was twisted in a tight knot, a sick lurching feeling accompanying every step I took.

Please be safe.

Racing ahead, I had to make a wide berth around the grounds of the castle. The rock and stone from the towers and buttresses rained down with heavy thuds and splintered off into lethal shards. I paused for a second as I caught sight of the small door to the side entrance—I could see the familiar figures of humans gathered outside it, along with bright red flames pouring through, black smoke snaking into the sky.

“Ruby!” I called out, recognizing the blonde halo of my friend. The group of kids surrounding her moved out of the way to let me pass, and I raced up to Ruby. She and Julian were hunched over the body of my brother.

“He’s okay,” she asserted before I could say a word, still stomping out fire embers on Benedict’s robe.

“I’m fine,” Benedict agreed sleepily. His face was soot-stained and perspiring from the heat, but he was alive.

“We need to move him back,” I replied. The flames erupting from the doorway were growing more intense by the second. Ruby and I started to drag him away from the door—I held onto a corner of his robe, trying to make sure that I touched him as little as possible. I noticed Yelena being carried off by Jenney and Julian, and the rest of the kids doing the same to a small dark-haired kid I’d almost syphoned from a few days ago. I hoped he was okay.

“Does it hurt anywhere?” I asked, turning my attention back to Benedict. Now that he was away from the fire, I placed my hands behind my back, careful not to come into physical contact with any part of him as the hunger started to rear up inside the pit of my stomach.

“No,” my brother murmured deliriously, “it was just really warm in there… It must be the entity doing this, right?”

“I think so,” I replied. “Nevertide is split up the middle, like a huge landslide or something…and the sky, well, that’s just weird.”

Benedict looked at me in confusion, but before he could ask what I meant, one of the kids cried out.

“The tower! The tower’s going to fall!”

I looked up. The north tower directly above us had started to sway, lurching like a drunk back and forth as more splits and tears and crashes emanated from within the castle.

“Everyone back!” I cried out, knowing already that we were too late…The first rock fell just a foot away from where Benedict’s head lay. The kids screamed out. In the next moment, a familiar hand slammed into mine.

“Throw your energy out—now!” Tejus yelled down at me. He must have followed me as soon as I’d left his arms, and I was immensely grateful in that moment that Tejus refused to abandon me under any circumstances, no matter if it threatened his own life.

“What do I do?” I cried back.

“A barrier!”

“I don’t know how to do that!”

“Let your instinct take over, Hazel. Just trust me.”

He clasped my hand tightly, and, trying to see into his head without syphoning his energy, I followed his lead, attempting to throw my energy outward so that it encircled all of us from the falling rocks. Tejus was still weak, I could tell, but somehow he still managed to start building the shimmering, bluish barrier.

“Don’t hold back.” Tejus yanked at my hand. “I’m syphoning off your friends—I’ll be fine.”

The entire process took only a few seconds; I poured the rage and fury, the power and the desperation I felt into a single channel outward. In my mind, it created the same thick rope of ‘energy’ that I used to bond with Tejus, but this time it was directed onto the ground—and where the energy came into contact with the ground, it spilled out, covering the ground and then rising up into a large bubble, merging with the wisps that Tejus had already started to create.