AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He started at the sound of his name, the name he’d all but forgotten, and his eyes flew open. The chamber, the lava, the hammer before him—it all melted away, until there was only her. Hali, her silhouette framed in the doorway, her eyes glowing in the darkness.
“Osric,” she said again, and this time he felt a warm hand on his arm, the heat of it searing through the cold. He tried to speak, to form words, but his throat was dry, his tongue thick.
“What are you doing here?” he managed at last.
She offered him a sad smile, and suddenly, he felt the weight of everything bearing down on him. The guilt, the lies, the shadow of the Obsidian Circle and the promise of the Hammer of Earthblood. He longed to step forward, to take her in his arms, but he knew he had no right. Not after what he had done.
“I had to see for myself,” she said. “I had to know . . .”
Her voice trailed off, but he knew what she was asking. Was he the man she had thought he was? Was there any trace of Osric left, or had he been consumed by his quest, his duty, his need for vengeance?
He didn’t know the answer himself.
The world spun around him. Hali’s words, the fury and certainty in them, struck a chord deep within him, and suddenly he was torn. Torn between his duty to the Forge, and the growing realization that perhaps the Forge’s way was not always the right one. Torn between the path that had been laid out for him, and the path that he longed to walk, a path that led back to her.
“Seize the Hammer,” Agnith said, his voice a low rumble, but he was no longer looking at Osric. He was staring straight at Hali, his eyes burning with a cold, eldritch light.
“The Hammer of Earthblood will never belong to you,” Hali said, and there was a tremor in her voice now, a hint of something softer, sadder. “There are other ways, Osric. You do not have to follow in their footsteps.”
The ground beneath them shuddered, the chamber itself shuddering at the raw power that crackled between Hali and Agnith. Osric could feel the pressure building, the heat and the magic of it, threatening to tear him apart.
“Osric,” Hali said, and this time, it was a plea. A prayer. “Please.”
Osric’s heart shattered with the plea in her voice, but this was what he was forged, reshaped to do. He seized the Hammer of Earthblood and wrenched it free, the metal groaning and spitting lava as it came loose. He turned his back on Hali and headed toward his Forge of Vulkan fellows, each footstep heavier than lead.
Chapter
Fifteen
The obsidian flows of Jötuneld were no kinder to Hali and her companions than they had been to Osric and the Forge of Vulkan. The shards tore at the soles of her boots, the acrid smoke stung her eyes, and the heat of the molten rock threatened to sear the hair from her beard. But still she ran, her heart aching with the need to reach Osric, to make him understand.
“Please,” she called, her voice carried away on the hot wind. “Please, don’t do this.”
But he was already far ahead, his form a dark shadow against the roiling sky. With a cry of frustration, Hali redoubled her efforts, her feet moving as fast as her heart was pounding.
Sooty was at her side, his face set in a grimace of determination. “I still think we should have a plan,” he said. “But since that’s not an option, I suppose running will have to do.”
Hali gave a breathless laugh. “Running’s always been one of my strong suits, you know. That, and talking.”
“I’ve noticed,” Sooty said dryly.
Pippa Tumblebottom fluttered along just behind them, her delicate wings a blur of iridescent colors. “He’s right, you know. Perhaps a little less talking and a little more running would be in order.”
“Easy for you to say. Your feet aren’t melting to the ground,” Hali huffed, but she knew Pippa was right. She’d said all she could to Osric. Now all she could do was reach him, and pray that her words had found some purchase in his heart.
They crested a ridge of obsidian, and the valley spread out before them, a vast expanse of steaming rock. In the distance, they could just make out the glow of lava, and the dark shape of Osric and the other Emberforged, still running toward it.
“We’re almost there,” Hali said, though she wasn’t sure if she was trying to convince Sooty and Pippa, or herself.
She pushed herself onward, her muscles burning, her lungs aching for breath. She couldn’t let Osric go through with this. She had to make him see.
“Osric, please!” Hali’s voice was raw with emotion, her throat tight. She staggered to a stop, her hands braced on her knees as she tried to catch her breath. “Please, you have to listen to me.”
Osric stood a few paces away, the Hammer of Earthblood cradled in his arms. His face was a mask, his eyes dark and distant. “I’m sorry, Hali. I can’t.”
“Please,” she said again, and this time there were tears in her eyes, a lump in her throat. “I thought you—I thought there was something between us.”
“There was,” Osric said. “There is. But it cannot change what must be done.”
