The pillars of creation

"Don't worry," he said, cheerfully. "You'll be fine. The Sisters helped you with their magic while they were healing me, and now Sister Perdita will be there with you. I'll be there, too. You'll at last avenge your mother.»

He didn't know what price the Sisters had placed on their help, and on vengeance. Jennsen couldn't bear to tell him, but she had to find a way to say something.

"Sebastian, if anything happens to me-"

"Jenn," he said, taking hold of her arms, looking into her eyes, "don't talk like that." He turned suddenly morose. "Jenn, don't say such a thing. I couldn't stand the thought of life without you. I love you. Only you. You don't know what you mean to me, how you've made my life different than I ever thought it would be-so much better than I ever thought life could be. I couldn't go on without you. I couldn't ever again endure life without you. You make the world right for me as long as I have you. I'm hopelessly, helplessly in love with you. Please don't torture me with the thought of ever being without you."

Jennsen stared into his blue eyes, blue like her murdering father's eyes were said to have been, and she was unable to bring forth any words to explain, to say how she felt, to tell him that she was going to be taken from him and he would have to face life alone. She knew how awful it was to feel alone. She simply nodded as she turned back to the trail and veiled the black scarf back across her face.

"Hurry," she said, "Sister Perdita is waiting."

The woman scowled at Jennsen through her own dark mask as she stood waiting in the wind atop a broad flat rock. Jennsen could see that the trail beyond the Sister descended steeply among the shadows, down into the very Pillars of Creation. As they approached, Jennsen realized that Sister Perdita wasn't frowning at her, but looking past her, staring back the way they had come.

Before they reached her, up on the flat rock where her black robes lifted in the sweltering gusts, they, too, turned to see what she was watching so intently. Jennsen could see, from their high vantage point, that in their efforts they had reached the top of a divide in the trail from where it dropped rapidly down, following the side of the ridge, to take them to the bottom. But looking back across the wide gorges and rocky ridges they had already crossed, she saw that they were almost as high again as the valley rim. There, she could see the small cluster of squat buildings, looking tiny in the distance.

The rider was almost there, charging in on his horse, following an arrow-straight route toward the trail. The company of a thousand men had gathered in a thick line not far from the trailhead, waiting for him. Dust rose in a long plume behind the galloping horse.

As the lathered animal raced in at full speed, before it reached the men, Jennsen detected a falter in its gait. The horse's front legs abruptly crumpled. The poor beast went down, crashing to the rocky ground, dead from exhaustion.

The man atop the horse smoothly stepped off the animal as it collapsed to the ground. Without seeming to lose momentum or stride, he continued to advance toward the trail. He was dressed in dark clothes, although not like those of the nomadic traders. A golden-colored cape billowed behind him. And, he appeared to be a lot bigger than the traders.

As he made straight for the trail, the commander of the cavalry cried out for the man to halt. He didn't challenge them, or seem to even say a word. He simply ignored them as he marched resolutely past the buildings on his way to the trailhead. The thousand men raised a shrill battle cry and charged.

The poor man brandished no weapon, made no threating move toward the soldiers. As the Order cavalry raced down on him, he lifted an arm toward them, as if warning them to halt. Jennsen knew, from both Sebastian's orders and from the way they charged toward the lone man, that they had no intention of stopping for anything short of his head.

Jennsen watched with dread as a man was about to be killed, watched, spellbound, as the thousand men crashed in toward him.

The valley rim abruptly lit with a thunderous explosion. Despite the dark head wrap, Jennsen shielded her eyes as she gasped in surprise. The violent rope of lightning and its terrible counterpart had twined together-a blazing white-hot bolt of lightning twisted together with a crackling black line that looked to be a void in the world itself, terrible power joined and discharged in an explosive instant.

In the space of a heartbeat, it seemed as if all the glaring brightness of the barren plain, the fierce heat of the Pillars of Creation, had been gathered at a single point and unleashed. In an instant, the ignition of that explosive lightning annihilated the force of a thousand in a brilliantly lit red cloud. When the blinding light, the thunderous roar, the violent concussion were suddenly gone, so were the thousand men-all of them leveled.