.:Chapter 24:.

The wolf growled, and all of Amy’s courage flooded out of her. She dodged The Wolf as she sprang at Amy, and threw herself on top of Bernard. There had to be something in his pockets she could use.

Her frantic search turned up one of the tiny gemstones he had offered her not so long ago. A ward stone. It would work.

“Wake up! What do I do with this?” she hollered at him.

He only moaned in response. She felt him down again, then gave up and hammered him with her fist. “Wake up!”

His eyes opened briefly, then started to close again.

“What do I do with this?” she repeated.

She saw his pulse flutter, and he opened his eyes again. “Invoke it.”

“How?”

He held out his hand and lightly touched the stone. What felt like surges of electricity shot up and down her spine until she was forced to let go of it. It landed on Bernard, who didn’t react except by following it with his fingers. The stone paled under his influence, changing until it was pure white. When it showed signs of cracking under the strain, Amy gingerly removed his fingers. Though it pained her to be near it, Bernard himself seemed rejuvenated.

He swung to his feet, stone in one hand, sword in the other. “Let’s get out of here.”

He seemed far more powerful than she ever remembered, his face gentle, yet at the same time fixed in stone. He began striding toward the indels, slowing only when the bear-indel reared into his other form and bellowed a roar.

“Come to me, indel,” he whispered.

The bear hesitated, looked back towards the wolf, and then charged. Bernard raised his sword, and swept it down as the bear approached. The stone gleamed in his hand, bathing them both in an eerie white light. The bear slowed as he came close to the stone, curling his lips back as if in immense pain, but never stopped his forward motion. He pushed the Invoker down, clubbing him with a massive black-tipped paw. Bernard fell heavily, but his sword came up once again as the bear straddled him, and cut the bear down the length of his jaw.

Blue shot from the sword, and the stone knocked loose from Bernard’s hand flashed.

The bear roared as the wound on his jaw hissed, and Amy heard herself crying out in horror as Bernard made a clawing motion in the air, pulling at something only he could see. The flesh began to peel away from the bear’s jaw, revealing what seemed like acres of clean white bone.

The bear’s roar stilled as it crunched to the ground, the horrible magic continuing until there was nothing left of the bear but a few scraggly bits of hair, and the skeleton itself.

Amy exchanged glances with Schreber and The Wolf, and for once, the three of them shared something that was almost agreement.

They were all, one and the same, terrified of Bernard.