Tal wasn't listening. He ran in after Adras, boots clinking on the broken metal leaves.
The room was not very big. There was no bed, no furniture at all. A single medium-sized Sunstone shone in the ceiling.
But Gref was there. The small boy hung suspended in a strange cocoon of shadow in the corner of the room. Tal could see his face, which was relaxed as if in sleep. But the rest of him was surrounded by a shape of darkness.
As Tal stepped forward to look, the shadow moved. Gref slid down until he was sprawled on the floor. The shadow shook itself, and formed into a shape both Tal and Milla recognized.
It was a Hugthing. A Spiritshadow Hugthing. A free shadow, for there was no sign of its master.
Tal backed away, his Sunstone ring raised. He had to blast it before it wrapped itself around him, he knew. But Gref was right behind it.
Adras was not so careful. He roared and stepped forward, gripping the Hugthing by one shadowy corner. Instantly it wrapped around his powerful arm and started to squeeze.
"Odris!" yelped Adras.
Tal and Milla ducked to the sides as Odris charged into the room. The female Storm Shepherd grabbed another corner of the Hugthing.
Then they both pulled.
Tal dived under the tug-of-war and crawled over to Gref. His brother still hadn't woken up. Tal touched his face. It felt cold, far too cold to be normal.
He took Gref's hand. It hung limp and lifeless.
Then he put his ear to the younger boy's mouth, hoping for the faint touch of breath.
There was none.
Tal slowly stood back up. He felt a million years old and tired, so tired that he wanted to go to sleep right there and then and not wake up until everything was right again.
But nothing ever could be right again. Gref was dead.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The noise of the fighting Spiritshadows and the still-sounding wakener faded. The light dimmed. Tal stared down at the still form of his little brother from far away, his eyes fixed, unable to blink.
Behind him, the two Storm Shepherds roared as the Hugthing split in half with a horrible squeal. Then Adras and Odris stood on the halves and ripped them into quarters and then into smaller and smaller fragments of shadow. All these pieces flopped and rolled about the floor, unable to get a grip or do anything. A few tried to join together, only to be ripped even smaller by the furious Storm Shepherds and the tiny bits stuffed into cracks in the walls.
The wakener kept on blasting its single note every few seconds. In the silence between the blasts, shouts could be heard, close by. Orders being shouted. Not the surprised response of ordinary Chosen.
Milla knelt by Gref. "He's dead, Milla," Tal said slowly. "He's dead."
Milla quickly touched Gref's throat, two fingers feeling under his jaw. She kept them there while she spoke urgently to Tal.
"There are Guards coming up the south and east corridors."
Tal didn't answer. He had totally and utterly failed. Gref's life was the price of his failure.
"We'll have to try the west corridor and fight our way out if we must," Milla declared. "Now, before they gather their full strength."
"I can't… I can't leave Gref here," said Tal dully. He couldn't think what he had to do, but he couldn't just run away. "You"
Milla suddenly bent closer to Gref and pushed her fingers in harder.
"He's not dead!" Tal couldn't believe what he was hearing.
"He's not dead," Milla repeated. "He's sick… or poisoned. Come on!"
Tal bent down and tried to pick Gref up, but his leg gave way. Milla had already turned to leave, but she looked back and shouted, "Get Adras to carry him, you idiot! Ready your Sunstone to fight!"
"Be careful with him," Tal instructed Adras. "Very careful."
Adras cradled the boy gently and ducked down to go through the door. As he bent down, light suddenly flared all around the doorway and on Gref's wrist. The Storm Shepherd staggered back and looked at Tal.
"I can't go through," the Storm Shepherd said. "Something is stopping me."
Tal saw what it was. There was a bracelet on Gref's wrist. A bracelet set with Sunstones. He looked at it carefully. The Sunstones were all quite small and they had been especially put together to create a particular effect.
Gref was obviously in a more secure prison than Tal had imagined. Unless he could get the bracelet off and it was a single piece or deactivate the spell, Gref was trapped there.
Milla looked back in to see what was holding them up.
"Come on!" she said. "There are Guards in the west corridor now! We have to attack and punch through!"
"I can't get Gref out," shouted Tal.
"Then leave him!"
Tal looked at the Sunstones set into the doorway. There were six of them, all welded deep into the stone. He'd have to pry all six out to annul the spell. It would take too long.
"Put him down," Tal said, though he choked saying it. He pointed. "Carefully."
Adras put Gref back down in the corner. "Go!" said Tal.
But Tal lingered a moment. He raised his Sunstone ring and a hot blue ray sprang out. It cut into the stone and with a few decisive movements, Tal carved his name on the wall in letters a stretch high.
It was a message for Gref, in case he woke up. Tal was leaving him now.
But he would be back.
Out in the hall, Milla was already running for the western corridor entrance, with Odris close behind her.
Adras roared out a challenge to the Spiritshadows that were spilling out from the eastern and southern corridors, their Chosen masters close behind them.
"Die, little shadows!" roared Adras. Shadow-lightning flickered from his hands, and he stretched himself to be more than fourteen stretches high. For a moment, even Tal was scared, and he understood why the Guards were approaching slowly. None of them - or their Spiritshadows - wanted to be the first to tangle with whatever Adras was.
To make them even less eager, Tal raised his Sunstone and concentrated on it. Red light flared in its depths and Tal coaxed it to the surface. Then he screamed a war cry and thrust out his hand.
Triple Red Rays of Destruction shot out from the stone, slicing across
the darkness of the Hall, weaving together and then apart, striking stone, shadow and flesh. Sparks shot from stone, scraps of shadow flew, and Guards shouted in sudden pain.
Tal ran as answering rays shot out. He was already looking away when a shockingly brilliant white light flashed and he felt its heat on his face.
"Strong!" boomed Adras, who was running at his side. "Again! Give me light!"
Ahead, Milla's sword left a trail of luminescent afterimages as she cut at the two Guards who blocked her way. Odris grappled with their thin-waisted Spiritshadows, holding one off with a raised foot as she gripped the other and twisted and twisted, as if she were winding up a top.
Then all four of them were in the western corridor and there was no one ahead. Shouts and cries and the call of the wakener dimmed behind them as they ran and ran.
"Which way?" Milla shouted as they came to the first intersection. A Guard stepped out and was instantly bowled over by Adras, and her Spiritshadow flattened by a two-fisted punch from Odris.
"Not that way!" yelled Tal, as he saw more Guards coming up from the left. He turned and saw yet another squad coming from the right.
There was only straight ahead, and they were running again as Tal desperately tried to remember the Codex's map. He didn't know the White Rooms, and he was already a bit lost.
Besides, where could they run to?
"Guards ahead!" shouted Milla as they came to another intersection, a three-way fork in the corridor.
Tal stopped and stared. There were Guards ahead… but that was not the worst of it. Safely behind the first rank was the ponderous body of Shadowmaster Sushin, wrapped in the robes of the Deputy Lumenor of the Orange Order. He had his hideous, fanged monster of a new Spiritshadow at his side.
Sushin saw Tal at the same time. Despite his fleshy arms, his reflexes were quicker than the boy's. His hand flashed up and a ball of orange light flashed out, screeching across the forty stretches between them.
Adras tried to bat it away but the ball went straight through his palm, without seeming to touch the shadow-flesh.
It struck Tal as he was raising his own Sunstone, desperately summoning a blue shield from its sparkling depths.