The Love of the Wielder (The Wielders Book Two)
Chapter Eighteen

They had discovered it entirely by accident. It was an incident that Donovan found immensely entertaining, but that made Maren blush fiercely.

It had been just a few days after the first time they had been together. Donovan had noticed a pattern. Anytime they were intimate, Maren participated with enthusiasm but always interrupted him as he felt the tension building in her body, not allowing him to bring her to release. After several times, he felt compelled to mention it.

Predictably, she had turned bright pink.

“I don’t think it’s wise for me to lose control,” she said, blushing furiously.

Donovan looked at her blankly, not understanding her meaning.

She wiggled her fingers in front of him, and then he understood.

“First of all,” she explained, “I would rather not set the bedsheets, or anything else for that matter, on fire. And second of all, I don’t totally trust that someone wouldn’t notice. I know it’s unlikely, but the notion does make it difficult to…ah…let go.”

“To be perfectly blunt, if you singe the bedsheets I shall be quite pleased with myself,” he replied. She smiled and shoved him playfully.

Donovan thought for a moment and then leapt out of bed. He walked around the bed, creating a curtain of Darkness to surround it. He even added something like a roof over it for good measure.

“There,” he said proudly. “Now, if anything goes astray, it’ll get caught by the…ah…‘curtains’ and no one would notice your magic over my magic.”

Maren was skeptical but agreed to proceed.

The bedsheets were indeed singed.

Afterward, as they lay entangled on the bed, Donovan asked if Maren had noticed a peculiar sensation—magically speaking—when she had let go of the Light. He felt the tug in his bones, but there was something…else there too. It was almost like a crackling feeling.

“I’m quite certain I didn’t even notice I had released the Light,” she answered.

Donovan chuckled. But suggested they try an experiment. He held up a strand of Darkness wrapped around his fingertip and asked her to touch the Light to it.

She summoned a small orb of Light at the tip of her finger and touched it to his finger wrapped in Darkness.

A bolt of lightning shot across the room, slamming into the opposite wall. It fortunately avoided any valuable items on the mantle above the fireplace, but everything seemed to rock with the force of it.

Donovan inspected the wall; it was cracked and scorched where the lightning had impacted it.

“How odd,” he observed.

“Why is it different from before?” she asked.

Months ago they had pressed their powers together and nothing happened. Both forces simply disappeared, as though they canceled each other out.

Donovan shook his head. “I have absolutely no idea.”

They had not attempted that particular experiment again, as they weren’t sure of the extent of any potential damage. And, in any case, it didn’t seem to have any practical applications, so they noted it as a minor oddity and moved on.

But it appeared there was a practical application.

Donovan wasn’t entirely sure what would happen when Maren forced her power to his in the atrium. Their prior experiment had used minuscule amounts of power compared to what they had unleashed this time.

The place where their powers touched instantly transformed into dozens of bolts of lighting that branched across the room. They continued to force their power toward the Trackers, creating more and more waves of lightning. Donovan’s hands and head filled with crackling as the lightning burst forward and he watched as the lightning branched out across every part of the room.

Lightning struck many of the Trackers almost instantaneously, knocking them down. Donovan didn’t know if they were alive or dead but they didn’t seem to be moving. Less than a dozen of the men were left standing when Donovan elbowed Maren and they both let go. Donovan breathed in relief. That had taken a tremendous amount of energy.

Even Kieran looked shocked. For several moments, he just stood there, surveying the carnage, before screaming at them.

“This isn’t over!”

“I’d be disappointed if it was!” Donovan shouted Kieran’s own words back at him.

“Well, I’ll admit that was a neat trick, you two. I never thought you’d be able to manage that, but it's beside the point. Now that I know you can do it, that won’t work ever again,” Kieran sneered.

“We don’t need it to,” Donovan growled.

“Maybe, maybe not.” Kieran said.

Then he snapped at the Trackers who were still standing, “What are you waiting for! Seize them!”

Reluctantly, the remaining men began to rush them. Donovan turned slightly to tell Maren what to do but found she had already acted. She took several running steps, a massive orb of light in her palm, and then suddenly flung both hands apart, firing the Light into the Trackers. A few of the men flew backwards several feet and lay still. Dimly, Donovan thought he understood why people were afraid of the Light and ran into the fray.

He found himself face to face with two of the Trackers. He supposed a fight would be rather cathartic. So, he slammed a wall of Darkness into both of them and they went flying. For good measure, he had the Darkness act as ropes that held them in place. It wouldn’t last very long, but it would help. More Trackers tried to approach him from the side, and he dealt with them fairly easily.

Then he heard Maren scream. He whirled to see her collapse to her hands and knees. He saw that Kieran had struck her with the same sort of “spear” he had used to murder their father.

Donovan watched with horror as the spear of Darkness that still streamed for Kieran’s hand appeared to change directions and a beam of Light was drawn out of Maren.

She screamed again. He knew her pain was agonizing.

Donovan fired everything he could at Kieran, but it had no impact. He seemed invulnerable, at least while he had this hold on Maren. Donovan decided to charge and tackle him when Maren shouted.

“NO!”

It was not a scream of protest, but a shout of defiance. She had struggled to her feet, and the flow of Darkness and Light appeared to have stopped. Both forces hovered in the air, uncharacteristically still.

“You will not,” Maren hissed and the flow of powers began again, towards Maren.

Donovan was amazed. Somehow, she was taking back her power.

Kieran roared with rage and anguish.

Donovan watched, in awe, as all the Light that had left Maren returned to her. He wondered if she was going to take Kieran’s power. He wasn’t sure if that was a very good idea or a very bad one. But she soon broke the connection, and the remaining Darkness in the air returned to Kieran.

“You’ll pay for this. No one takes power from me,” Kieran snarled at Maren. He sounded more fearsome than he looked. He was very pale and disheveled.

Maren did not respond. Instead, she rushed Kieran, her fist surrounded by Light, and punched him in the stomach. He flew backwards and crashed into a stone pillar. He did not get up.

If she had been anyone else, particularly a man, Kieran likely would have expected something like that and blocked her attack. If she had waited even a few seconds longer, he would have blocked her. And perhaps most importantly, if she had not badly rattled him by resisting his attempt to steal her power, he would have blocked her too. The combination of her strength, quick thinking, and his arrogance might have saved them all.

He and Maren both ran towards Kieran. They had to kill him. Maren reached him first and had already thrust a ball of Light into his chest.

Donovan saw the burned flesh on his brother's chest and knew he had to be dead.

Except then the burned flesh healed before his eyes.

Maren snarled and hit him again with a ball of Light, but the same thing happened.

“I need a knife!” Donovan yelled.

He thought one of the soldiers would have one. He heard a soldier running towards him, but did not dare take his eyes off Kieran.

“Hit him again,” he told Maren.

She did, but by the time the soldier reached him with a knife, the wound had healed.

Before he could think too much about it, he bent, and slit Kieran’s throat with the knife. Blood spurted everywhere. It should have killed him.

But he watched that heal too.

He looked to Maren to see if she had any ideas.

“Together?” she asked.

He nodded, and they stood over Kieran and forced their powers together. A bolt of lighting blasted into his chest.

It left a horrible blackened wound in his chest. But his chest still rose and fell, and the wound closed before their eyes.

He had nothing left to try. It was time to run.

“Move out!” he yelled. He wasn’t sure when exactly, but the wall of Darkness locking them in had disappeared.

The soldiers followed his order and began running towards the entrance. They had parked a convoy of speeders in front of the building and drivers were waiting in each one.

Maren didn’t move, though. Donovan tried to take her arm and pull her away.

“No! He isn’t dead! He needs to die!” she yelled.

“We can’t kill him. Not right now. We need to get out of here!” he cried, trying to pull her along.

“No!” she screamed and fired another useless orb of Light into his chest.

Donovan hated to do it, but he had no choice. He picked Maren up and held her over his shoulder.

“No! No! Put me down! No!” she screamed as he carried her out of the atrium and into the cool night air.

Transitioning from the adrenaline rush of the atrium to the back of a speeder was awful for Maren. She seethed in a toxic stew of adrenaline, power, and rage.

Maren was furious at Donovan for dragging her from the building while Kieran was still alive. She wanted to scream at him, but did not want to do it in front of the soldiers in the front of the speeder.

Her hands were shaking. Everything was shaking. Donovan tried to take her hand, but she jerked it away. She was so angry.

But as they pulled away from the building, her rage and adrenaline diminished. She was starting to feel exhaustion and pain and shock and terror creeping in. By the time they left the city, she could feel nothing else.

She must’ve made some noise of anguish because Donovan was suddenly right beside her making shushing noises and wrapping his arms around her. She did not resist and collapsed into him.

The shaking got worse, and she realized she was crying. The soldier in the front seat passed something to Donovan. It was a flask. Donovan helped her drink from it, and she found it helped calm her.

For a long time, he just held her, and she breathed through her emotional upheaval.

“We’re together. We’re safe,” Donovan whispered to her.

She nodded against him, but he kept whispering it to her over and over again. It was a good reminder. Exhaustion crept in, and she soon fell asleep in his arms.

—

Maren awoke and was relieved to replace she was still in the speeder with Donovan. It seemed like it had been ages since she woke up in the same place she had been when she fell asleep. A military jacket was draped over her and Donovan’s arms were around her. She saw he was awake and just staring out the window into the blackness that surrounded them.

“Where are we going?” she whispered. Her voice was hoarse from sleep and a great deal of screaming.

Donovan looked down at her with a small smile.

“Blackstone. We should be there in about an hour.”

Maren nodded. She was still exhausted.

“Are you alright? Are you injured?” he asked.

She mentally surveyed her body. Her neck hurt. Everything on her backside between her shoulder blades and her knees hurt. Her arm hurt in a way that suggested Joan had not completely finished the job of healing it. Her other arm still hurt from the Trackers carelessly drugging her. Her head hurt. Her ribs hurt. Her knees hurt. And her chest where Kieran had branded her hurt a great deal.

She didn’t know about the baby. She wasn’t ready to look.

But nothing was getting worse. Nothing was dire. That was something.

“I’m injured in several ways, but nothing perilous. Just painful,” she said.

“Tell me,” he said.

Maren sighed. She wanted to avoid listing her injuries to Donovan. She’d have to talk about how she’d gotten them, and she did not feel like she could do that. Not only that, but she knew it would make him furious, and she wasn’t really prepared to do that either.

“It’s all right. Everything will heal,” she said.

She knew he didn’t like that very much.

“At least tell me where I can use the Darkness to help you,” he said. “Something like ice will help.”

She had to admit, that as much as she did not want to discuss her injuries, that likely would help the burn on her chest in particular.

“Just under my collarbone on the left side,” she said and shifted, so he could access that area.

“Ah, maybe you can give me some light—illumination, I mean? I can barely see anything.”

She smiled slightly and drew a small orb of Light to her hand and held it over her chest.

She was too tired to worry about the soldiers in the front of the speeder. They had already seen her do quite a bit of magic in the atrium of the Tracker headquarters and hadn’t tried to hang her yet, so she reasoned it was alright.

Donovan looked at her chest. She saw him clench his jaw. She couldn’t see the burned patch of skin, but thought it likely looked awful. But he said nothing. He only nodded and used his powers to soothe her.

She let go of the Light and the speeder got very dark again. She sighed and leaned in to Donovan. His power helped more than she expected. She felt her own power rising in response, but it felt like a friendly surge, as though it just wanted to say hello to Donovan’s power. She pushed it aside, though. They did not need an explosion of lightning in the speeder.

“Thank you, that helps,” she whispered to him.

He just nodded and kissed her forehead.

Maren relaxed and tried to quiet her mind. Then she very suddenly remembered something strange.

“Donovan, at the roadblock and at the headquarters, were the soldiers calling us ‘Your Majesty?’ I seem to remember it, but I’m not sure if that really happened, or I imagined it.”

She felt him sigh. “That really happened.”

She gasped, “Your father?”

All he said was, “Kieran.”

“I’m so sorry,” she breathed.

She had thought perhaps Kieran was lying when he wanted her to address him as the king. She knew Donovan was still alive, so thought perhaps his father would still be alive. Not so.

“I’m afraid our reign will be rather short-lived. Kieran is claiming the throne for himself and has announced I’m dead. You are allegedly to blame,” he said. He sounded only vaguely interested in the notion, but Maren knew he was trying to cover strong feelings.

“The Duke has offered to back my claim, but…”

Maren nodded. Even in her exhausted state, she could think of dozens of reasons why that would not be a good idea.

“I expect Kieran has outed me?” she asked. She found she didn’t care one way or the other. It didn’t matter. It wasn’t as though she could live in public anymore.

“He has,” Donovan said. He sounded like he wasn’t sure how she would react. She hadn’t been sure, either.

“I’m surprised you found so many men willing to come get me,” she said. She hadn’t counted the men but knew it was well over a dozen at least.

She heard the smile in his voice when he said, “Twenty-four men volunteered to go and save The Wielder Queen.”

“No!” she breathed. She had a very difficult time believing so many would openly support her.

“Mmhmm, in fact —“ he raised his voice, so the men in the front could hear him “— Captain Beven here assembled nearly half the men. The rest came from the men at Worthingham.”

Maren did not know what to say.

“Ah…you have my gratitude, Captain,” she said loudly to him.

The Captain was apparently the passenger in the front seat, and he turned to them, “It was my honor, Your Majesty. All the men have lost someone to the Trackers and wish to swear oaths of fealty to you.”

Maren found that shocking. “All of you? To me?” she cried.

“Yes, Your Majesty,” he confirmed.

“They wanted to do it before we left to get you, but I told them it wasn’t necessary. Besides, we really didn’t have the time and I thought it best that you accept the oaths instead of me doing it on your behalf,” Donovan explained quietly.

“Gods above,” was all she could say.

—

It was still dark when they arrived at the fort at Blackstone. Donovan had never been to that fort before, but he knew it was more or less the same as any other, with grey stone walls, a large gate, and a courtyard.

The convoy pulled into the courtyard and Donovan saw Alec, the Duke, and Maren’s parents waiting there. He knew they would be extremely anxious. He got out of the speeder as soon as it stopped and called, “She’s all right,” to them. That was the most pressing piece of information they wanted.

Donovan worried it wasn’t true, though. He thought it likely that she had downplayed the extent of her injuries. He wasn’t sure what had happened to her chest, but the burn looked horrible.

And she had said nothing about the baby. He didn’t want to ask in front of the soldiers, and it hadn’t seemed right to try to check while she was sleeping. He was worried, though. Donovan knew he would be terribly sad if that tiny buzz had disappeared, but he was sure that Maren would take it far worse than him, and he wasn’t sure he could pull her back from that.

Donovan went around to the other side of the speeder to help her out. She wanted to walk, but he wanted to carry her. She won. He thought she needed to walk more than he needed to carry her. He did wish he had thought to bring a pair of shoes for her, though.

She didn’t seem to mind and walked with her head held high. Even though she was an absolute mess, he thought she looked very regal. His Wielder Queen.

He breathed a sigh of relief for the thousandth time that he had gotten her away from Kieran.

Her parents hugged her, and she nodded to them that she was alright. Alec hugged her next, but then rapidly held her back apart from him and got a good look at her.

“Infirmary! Now!” he ordered.

Donovan expected that, but Maren apparently had not.

“I’m fine, did the other Wielders come with us? Just give me a minute with one of them, and I’ll be fine.”

Donovan wasn’t sure, but Captain Beven nodded.

“Yes, Your Majesty, we weren’t sure what else to do with them.”

“Well they can meet you in the infirmary because even if you only have the injuries I can see, which I very much doubt, you need to be in bed immediately,” Alec said sternly.

“I’m told I'm the Queen now, you can’t speak to me that way,” she said loftily.

He smirked but remained firm.

“Fine! I’ll go. Probably the other women need a physician too, in any case,” she said.

Donovan thought that was likely.

He made to go with her, but the Duke cleared his throat loudly and gave him a significant look.

Donovan nodded. He did need to speak with him immediately. He looked at Maren’s mother and she nodded. She would go with her.

He kissed a clean and unmarred spot on Maren’s temple and told her he’d be with her soon.

He followed the Duke into what appeared to be the commandant's office and sat down with a huge sigh.

The Duke looked at him expectantly but said nothing.

“He’s still alive. We tried very hard to kill him, but…we couldn’t. He just kept healing,” Donovan said. He was not pleased with the situation. He knew how important it was for Kieran to die, and he felt like he had failed in his duty.

“I don’t know what to say,” the Duke said.

Donovan shook his head. “I don’t know, I expect it’s something to do with the powers he’s been stealing, but the one thing I know is that you can’t use your own Light to heal yourself.”

“Hmmm…it’s not his Light, though. Maybe that’s it,” the Duke suggested.

Donovan shrugged. It was certainly possible. But the why didn’t matter.

“What do you want to do now?” the Duke asked.

Donovan had given this some thought while Maren had been sleeping. “We have to run. We’re a danger to anyone we’re with. I’m hoping that if you and Maren’s parents lie low for a while, he’ll leave you alone.”

The Duke answered the question Donovan hadn’t asked. “I’ll look after them. We should all be fine at Worthingham. We’ll be quiet and say the right things if asked.”

“I thank you,” he said.

“Are you going where I think you’re going?” the Duke asked.

Donovan nodded, “It’s the only thing I can think of.”

“I’ll send the men—her men—to escort you to Clifton. I’ll have the fort there give you horses and supplies, and it’s not far to the first peak. I believe we have a map or two that might help as well, I’ll see what I can replace.”

“Kieran will expect us to go north, I think,” Donovan said. It was his one misgiving about the notion.

“We’ll have a few convoys, including mine, depart around the same time. Hopefully, it will confuse the search.”

They fell silent.

“I’m sorry. I know this isn’t what you wanted,” Donovan said. He felt terrible.

“Gods, man! You did everything you could! It’s just the wrong time. But I believe what you told the men in the courtyard, even if you didn’t. Change has already started. And I believe you’ll be back.”

Donovan could only nod. He was very moved by the Duke’s words.

“We’re deeply grateful to you,” he said instead. “I don’t know that we can ever repay you for everything you’ve done.”

The Duke smiled. “Actually, you can… I’ll write you a letter before you go, give it to Margot if you replace her.”

Donovan could only nod in response.

The Duke rose from his chair. “Come, let’s go check on your wife.”

Donovan nodded and followed the Duke out, marveling at how fortunate he was that his father had once insisted that Maren marry a duke.