The Huntsman of Adamos (Quartet)- draft
THIRTEEN MINUTES

CH THIRTEEN MINUTES

The Relic of Time shuddered much more violently than it had the last time it passed through the event horizon of the cataclysm. Karstien doubled his focus on the bubble of protective magic around them.

“It’s okay, children. We’re almost there.” He tried to reassure them, but something felt strangely wrong and the further from the past they got, the more wrong it felt. He looked over to where Cinna held his Aunt Kalyssa in one arm and another infant in the other and prayed they would make it back to the future. The moments the trip took seemed to be an eternity.

There was a flash and they were standing outside the walls of the Southern Castle, but it was greatly changed from when Karstien had left. Stone walls marked off a staging area surrounded by escape portals. A hugely pregnant Asha hurried after Shadz as he rushed toward Karstien, he looked much better than the last time Karstien had seen him.

“My King,” Shadz bowed, holding out a bundle.

“There’s no time for that. Put on your new armor, Kars, things have changed since you left,” Asha snapped.

“Wait? What?” Karstien’s demand was muffled as Asha forced mirco-mail armor over his head then Shadz began fastening plates of the specialized queen dragon’s scale armor over the micro-mail.

Allura rushed up then, ordering others to get Oren, Cinna, and the children clear. She hugged Karstien. “I was so afraid you wouldn’t make it.”

“What is going on?” Karstien demanded.

“We aren’t sure except that the Devourer escaped the moment you left. The Against Hope misfired. Meara and Vole came from Jura to verify Lessa and Lara’s numbers, they proved that what Daisy told us is true,” Shadz explained coldly.

Karstien’s jaw dropped. “How?... What happened?”

Allura shook her head. “Somehow Daisy was able to reach a few and tell them what she needed after you left to come forward.” Someone shouted there was only five minutes left.

Yuri strode forward wearing the same specialized armor as Karstien, “Uncle Yuri, you can’t go.”

Yuri held up his wrists, there was a time suppression cuff on each one, “No choice. We can’t count on the other me being there to lead you through the Temple City. We will only have thirteen minutes to get to Xelusia, bait the Devourer, set the Last Hope Device and make it back to the temporal jump chamber.”

“Last Hope Device? Temporal jump chamber?” Karstien demanded as Allura fastened his gloves on and gave him a curved sword identical to the one he lost in the last battle against the Devourer. Suddenly his question about the chamber was forgotten as he gaped at the ancient styled weapon, “My lightning sword?”

She gave him a worried smile as he stared at it. “Abe made it, Meara found more ore.” Then she kissed him. “I love you.”

“One minute!” Someone who sounded like Abrieth shouted. Crates with the names of the ships in the space fleet had been piled next to the Relic and one marked with the Aetherian symbols for Last Hope.

Karstien looked around, to see Shadz kissing Asha. She took his face in her hands, entreating, “Come back to me, Mine.”

“Nothing can keep me from returning to you, my golden one, not even time,” Shadz vowed, then Asha and Allura hurried to get clear.

“Wait, we don’t have a healer,” Karstien blurted out.

“We don’t need one.” Shadz opened a vial and swallowed something red and thick, then he began to glow golden like a healer.

“What was that?” Karstien demanded as Yuri also swallowed from a vial and grimaced.

“Your sister’s blood.” Rheema answered. Karstien stared at her in shock. Rheema set her face guard, “Yeah, Shadz is using blood magic, just like the Huntsman is using Lady Daisy’s donated blood to tap into her oracle power, it’s technically illegal but we have no choice. We will have to hope the healer magic will keep us from dying from the time shift and the oracle light will shield us because the shadows are probably waiting for us.”

“Like in the last war, failure is not an option, nephew.” Yuri took a deep breath and began to glow white like an oracle, just as his mother had taught him. He had never purposely drawn on the magic of the part of Daisy’s soul he carried until now. It disgusted him that he had to drink her blood to do it. “Karstien, you need to set the shield of the Flame before we launch.”

Instinctively, the young king held out his hands and the Flame of Aetheria spread around them. There was a flash and they were falling back into the past. “What is going on? It’s only been a few minutes.”

“Shadz and I both began having dreams only days after you left, then Lara and Rheema started having them. It was a distress call. We used a type of blood magic to bind our dreams, so we could reach Daisy,” Yuri explained.

“That was two months ago.” Shadz added. “We had to build another Temporal Implosion Device twice as strong as the last because Demona opened the Gate at the moment you left, and the rebound of the time energy had an unexpected side effect.”

“What side effect?” Karstien demanded.

“Time is moving faster Then, every minute we notice is a day for them. The thirteen minutes you were in our time has seemed like thirteen days to Fleur. But Meara said that when we land, time will shift for us to the speed of the place we arrive at, our thirteen minutes will seem like thirteen minutes to us but in the future it will pass much faster, 1440 times faster,” Rheema explained.

“Why are you with us, Rheema?” Karstien noticed she was holding two swords that glowed with the Flame of Aetheria , but she carried a curved lightning sword on her back.

“I’m here to defend you all if the Shadows attack us and meet my sealed one,” she grinned. “The First Protector Lord Abrieth and his swordsmiths have been working overtime, the whole kingdom has.”

“And all the crates from the space fleet?” Karstien asked.

“Daisy made a chamber to bring nearly a thousand refugees forward. Those crates are filled with every Chronos Energy Storage Crystal not on a ship,” Shadz coldly answered.

“By the light.” Karstien breathed out in shock. Over his shoulder was a time bomb literally made out of time energy and surrounded by enough stored time energy to rip a hole in the universe. “I hope she doesn’t kill us all this time.”

"You say that every time." Shadz started laughing as they appeared in the middle of a ruined city. The once great City of the Kings had been reduced to unrecognizable rubble. Aetheria was a wasteland. Nothing living remained. Several people ran out of the blowing dirt surrounding them.

“Thirteen minutes! Move it!” Fleur shouted at them, over the wind. “We have to reset at the new location and get the T.I.D. planted.”

The people were grabbing the crates and running back into the blowing dust. Yuri saw movement to one side and someone shouted, “Undeads.”

Rheema ran to the oracle and shoved the curved sword into her hand, “Meara sent you a present.”

Fleur’s strange black eyes smiled for a moment and she hugged the woman who had been her daughter’s best friend for centuries. “Thank you, Rhee.” Then she was the War Oracle again.

“Rheema, Karstien, go with Regulus.” Fleur grabbed Shadz’s arm, shouting over the maelstrom, “We have to get the T.I.D. to Xelusia, the portal is this way.”

Shadz held his black sword in one hand and grabbed one end of the crate. Yuri lifted the other end, his bow traded for a curved sword. Two masked men grabbed the biomass simulator and followed as Rheema spun into action defending the retreating group. Her fighting style exactly like Fleur’s dual sword wielding.

As they scrambled over debris, blast of lightning and dark lightning cleared a path for them. Yuri glanced around; it was worse than his nightmares had shown him. Suddenly Fleur skidded to a stop in front of a stone room like the ones they used to protect the portals in the infernal realm. She quickly worked to lock, and they rushed in. As the door slammed behind them, the necromanced creatures began beating on it.

Panting, Fleur looked at Yuri with dead eyes, “You shouldn’t have come, Huntsman.”

“How could I not? None of this is what I remember.” He argued as they followed her through the portal to Xelusia.

“That’s because it isn’t what you remember.” She said as they walked through the dusty, empty halls of the Palace toward the Temple. “The Devourer is a desperate animal trying to escape its fate. It harvested both worlds to escape, but the temporal energy has it trapped for now. However, as the worlds move apart, the wall of this cage are growing thin. Time will slowly return to normal in a few thousand years but right now, the rotational cycles of the twin stars and planets will have them far enough apart that it will be able escape within three years. It’s going to go after the Tear, and we have no way to warn Adamos.” She spat out his father’s name like she hated him.

“Where is Lord Yurieth here?” Shadz demanded. “They cannot encounter each other or we lose both.”

“Why?” Yuri demanded.

“Because you’ll both go into temporal shock, have seizures, and die.” Shadz said flatly, “The Guardian barely revived after attempting to speak to his younger self despite those suppression cuffs you wear. He was far stronger than you, and if he died, you won’t revive.”

“Enough, Shadz. That won’t be an issue, as expected, everyone at the temple complex was sucked through the Gate and reduced to their dust ghost. I checked on them, they are all still alive.” Fleur said.

“If it can be called alive,” Sangriel’s voice came from one of the masked warriors carrying the other crate.

“Tenepha is with them,” Fleur retorted, “Would you rather she suffered the alternative and had her soul consumed?”

“Forgive my brother, Dark Oracle, he is grieving my sister, his sealed one.” The other Xelusian said, “I do not believe we have met, Huntsman, Lord Mage. I am the Assassin Tangriel of the Blood Brotherhood.”

“What is your house?” Shadz asked suspiciously.

“I have no house or clan, I am of the Brotherhood, they are my family.” Tangriel answered. “My soul and my blood serve the Dark Oracle.”

Stopping in front of the Gate, Fleur began unpacking the Last Hope. “Tangriel, Sangriel, take Yuri to the top of the Temple, he knows how to set the biomass beacon. Shadz, time?”

“Eleven minutes, 14 seconds.”

The two assassins and huntsman easily scaled the obelisk at the peak of the temple. Tangriel held it in place as Yuri secured the folding arms and Sangriel sealed them to the stone. They ignited the beacon that would give off the energy vibration of a rich source of life and jumped down as dark cloud billowed toward them from the south.

Yuri eyed Tangriel suspiciously, as they ran. “Why would you serve an Aetherian? Do you owe her a blood debt?”

Tangriel laughed, but there was no mirth in it. “She is no more Aetherian than I am. The Dark Oracle sees worth in all souls regardless of their magic, she told me she sees the potential of their hearts. She saved me, my children, and my brother assassin when the Devourer was released. My sister was at the Temple and taken to the other side of the Veil of Darkness. The Dark Oracle made the Huntsman Regis search the city for survivors. We were only saved because she had told Sangriel about the double-walled obsidian saferooms as a last resort to survive the Cataclysm.”

Yuri nodded, “It is something she would do.”

Tangriel stopped and caught his arm, “How could you reject her? Lie to her for a century about your feelings? Did your time in the dust make you insane or were you mad before you were trapped?”

Yuri yanked his arm away. “I love her.”

Tangriel snorted then insulted, “Then you love like a Xelusian, Huntsman. I can smell her blood on your breath.” Tangriel jumped down to where Fleur stood. “Dark Oracle, the device is set, the Devourer approaches from the south.”

“We have less than five minutes, Dark Oracle.” Sangriel warned, he was staring at the Gate, something floated on the other side. “I... I cannot go with you.”

“You won’t survive on that side for very long,” Fleur warned, putting her hand gently on his arm.

“But I will be with her, our children will be safe on the Tear and my nephews with you. Thank you, my lady.” He glanced at Yuri and Tangriel, then walked into the Veil of Darkness.

Fleur turned and ran back toward the portal in the late Lady Naphtala’s chambers. Stepping out into the saferoom on Aetheria, she pulled the control crystal and it closed as soon as Yuri was through. A small sob breathed out of her lips.

“Dark Oracle?” Tangriel murmured. Yuri was shocked when she hugged the Assassin and he held her back. “You showed him kindness.”

“He will only have day with her before the device seals the Devourer away.” She said sadly, her chin trembled as dark tears streamed down her cheeks.

Tangriel squeezed her tighter, but looked over her head at Yuri, “Honest love for a day is better than centuries of living lies.”

Yuri stared at him in confusion but Shadz raised an eyebrow.

Fleur straightened and stepped away, pulling out her sword and Karstien’s. “Yuri. Shadz. Run straight for the beacon, the portal to the fortress is there. It isn't far. Don’t try to kill anything, just run. If one of us falls behind, leave them. We will try to get you there in time to go back to the future.”

Before either could respond, the door opened, and a blast of lightning and dark magic flattened the creatures waiting to kill them. The four were all fighting and running. Then Shadz and Fleur vanished from sight. For a moment, they were cornered, and Tangriel whispered to Yuri as they stood back to back. “She is a goddess, how could you not love her back?”

Yuri’s curved sword flashed as he snarled, “I do love her. I have always loved her.” A moment later they were face to face.

Tangriel’s eyes were hard and hate-filled. “Liar. You loved your duty, but now it is finished. She is free to be truly loved.”

“And who would love her more than I, Assassin? You who killed your wife?” Yuri demanded as he killed two more creatures.

“So Sangriel told you. Did my brother also tell you she would have bled our children on the Blood Altars. Fleur understands why I killed her, and she would have done the same. She loves me for who I am, not what I am. That is why you can’t go back, Huntsman. You would treat her as you did your first wife and never love her.”

Yuri dodged under the Assassin’s blade. He rolled to his feet, he could see the determined madness in Tangriel’s eyes. “Don’t do this, Assassin, think about your children.”

“Oh, I am. I have seen Fleur with the surviving children. Listened to her sing to them so they could sleep without nightmares. She will be an excellent mother to my sons.” Tangriel threw a blade and Yuri barely managed to catch it and fling it back. The assassin dodged to the side as the flying dagger impaled in the head of one of the necromanced corpses, driving it from its feet with the force of the throw. Tangriel sneered, “Why Huntsman, I think you might be trying to kill me.”

“I’m not trying, I will. Fleur is mine for all time,” Yuri snarled.

Suddenly there was a brilliant flash of oracle light and Tangriel staggered mid-throw, blinded. Before Yuri could kill him, Fleur appeared out of the blowing dirt and dust.

Killing a creature, she shouted at Yuri, “We have to move, there’s no ti...” Her words cut off as she fell forward into his arm. One of Tangriel’s throwing blades was sticking out of her back, between the plates of her armor.

“NO!” Tangriel shouted, rushing forward. He pulled his blade out, pleading, “My love?”

Yuri’s fist collided with Tangriel’s jaw and flattened the assassin, he did not move to get up as the dead swarmed him. The Huntsman scooped up Fleur and ran as hard as he could for the beacon. Karstien’s voice shouted in his mind, “Hurry, Yuri! Twenty seconds.”

He went through the portal and stumbled into the tunnels below the fortress of Odini. His footsteps pounded through the corridors. Shouting encouraged him to run faster, he leapt through the door into the chamber as the Relic fired. Immediately, they were attacked. The Shadows blanketed the edges of the chamber, resisting their attempt to flee, and holding the Relic of Time in place.

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