Sentinel

Chapter 6 - Retrieval

Dedicated to Hope-Adon because inspiration.

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Chapter 6 - Retrieval

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"This would be much easier if you were to comply," said the Commander. 

Skye didn't answer. 

She couldn't. 

Her vision was glassy. Her head was lost in a buzzing that replaced silence itself. She was vaguely aware of how much of her blood stained the table top. The only way she could endure this torture as the blade rose and fell over her skin was to fall back into the very place the blade assaulted--her soul. 

There was a light in there. It warmed her thoughts, pushed her on, kept her mouth shut and her stubborn determination high if she embraced it, which she did. She didn't have another choice. Outside of the small bubble of security was a cold, war-torn surface full of exquisite misery. 

"Do you know--" began the Commander, his sentence interrupted by the sound of a door swinging open on creaking hinges. 

"Commander, sir! Silverborn have been sighted outside Darni. They appear to be preparing for an attack."

The Commander's low growl made the hairs rise on Skye's neck. "I doubt it. The Silverborn would have run back to Alguarde with their tails between their legs by now. To be out still is suicide for them."

"Just reporting what the scouts have seen, sir."

A few more words were exchanged between them that Skye tuned out, once more slipping below the surface as unconsciousness tried to take her. She felt the Commander's eyes study her for a long, heavy moment before he placed the blade on the table directly between her shackled hands and left the room, leaving her alone in the half-lit room with the blade that glowed the colour of twilight. 

The light that'd nursed her changed with the slam of the door. It became urging, telling her to take this chance before it slipped away. 

Shackles only open with magic. Skye's bleary thought drew her eyes to the soul blade resting on the table, glinting at her. It has to be magic. Has to be.

Her fingers scraped the hilt of the table for the discarded blade. The metallic handle was warm against her skin. She brought the tip of the blade around and dug the point into the thin line until the shackles split. Her eyes were closed as the shackle around her left wrist snapped open, revealing the bloody skin it'd held. 

Skye took the blade in her now-free hand. Her fingers refused to move correctly, but the second wrist should be easier to free, shouldn't it? Lines of fire traced up the arm she didn't want to look at. She refused to acknowledge the damage the Commander had done to it and remember the Master's mark. 

Just have to open the cuff. Just have to open... She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to keep herself together, ...open the cuff. 

A wave of dizziness swept her thoughts away, leaving her face feeling strangely numb. 

Specks of light danced across her vision, and Skye succumbed to darkness. 

*+*+*+*

With movement inside the head-height walls that encased Darni's urban centre, Tayne knew they didn't have any time left to prepare. 

He checked Wing's girth and threw himself into the saddle, standing up in the stirrups to face the seventy-odd Silverborn gathered behind him. 

"Silverborn!" called Tayne. "You have your assignments! You know what is at stake--something the corruption thinks to have claimed for itself! Once inside the gate, the serpents follow Andro, the eagles with Nissa, and the foxes with Luke! I shall have the honour of fighting beside the rest of you!"