Guardian Last (Lords of Syon Saga Book 2) Read Online Free PDF Page A

perhaps not.  With no army, eventually, Cragen’s
men would surround the city and besiege it, and eventually, the lord mayor
would surrender.  Pyran simply could not stand against such a force, and once
it fell, Syon would be all but defenseless. 
    The Dhanani were all but gone, hunted nearly out of
existence at the end of the Gods’ Rebellion and restricted so completely by
B’radik’s decree that they would be well nigh useless against Cragen’s forces. 
Besides, they were too far west to be of much use.  The Brymandines, and the
ghost people…  They would as soon fight each other, and they would vie to see
who could sell the other side out to Cragen first in the hopes of surviving
long enough to gloat.  The Anatayans, formidable as they were, were far to the
northwest and could not possibly get to Pyran in time, even assuming they were
inclined to fight Cragen, which was not by any means to be assumed.  Besides,
they were as much a danger to mages as Cragen with their damnable
superstitions.
    With no one left to defend them, how long could the mages
hope to last, under those circumstances?  How long before all of Syon was
subjugated to Cragen’s will?
    The sentry followed the Guardian’s gaze across the marshes
to where the approaching army stood on the hilltop poised to attack and
nodded.  “The ghost people keep a shrine to Lim’gar in the temple, if you’re of
a superstitious bent.  Otherwise, I say we stay here and do what we must.”
    “Do what we must,” Galorin repeated thoughtfully.  He
watched the tiny figures in green and gold racing toward the city walls and the
menacing wall of men filling the hills behind them.  “And so we shall.”
     
     
    “They’re slowing at the hilltop!”
    Damerien nodded and took the brief luxury of looking behind
him as he rode.  Indeed, the army that had stayed right on their heels was
falling behind now, stopped, so it seemed, on the hilltop and not yet spilling
around it to fill the marshland.  No doubt they were bringing up their siege
machinery.  Regardless, whatever they were doing would take time.
    “We might survive this yet,” Damerien laughed darkly.  “Do
not slow your pace.  Achieve Pyran.  Everything hinges on that.”
     
     
    The Guardian felt a chill on his spine and looked out over
the hillside.  He raised a hand to throw more light across the valley but drew
himself up short.  In his view of the world, amidst the threads and strands of
probability and along the certainty trees that overlay everything in the
universe in which this world was but a speck, a grayness was spreading, a
moldering festering change in the strands of power that started on the hilltop
and extended across the valley toward Pyran. 
    “No,” he whispered.  The other mages’ eyes grew wide with
terror, and he knew that they also recognized the signature in the power racing
toward them through the strands, racing across the valley behind Damerien and
his men.
    Cragen had not only sent his entire army to invade Syon.  He
had sent the Wittister mages with their corrupt, stolen power––a power fed by
those they’d killed.  The sheer amount of force he saw on the strands…the king
must have sent them all.  Without the rest of the Guardians, he doubted even his
mighty protections could withstand the force of their attack.  Not after he’d
spent so much of his strength to get the others to safety.
    Do what you must.
    He watched the taint in the strands as it moved over the
marshes toward Damerien and felt sick.  At this rate, the corruption would
overtake the Great Liberator and steal his life and his power before he could
reach Pyran.
    The strange vision he’d had of Damerien filled his mind.  If
the Wittisters could seize upon power like that…  The Guardian gulped dry air
down his throat, terror filling his heart, not for himself, not for his mages,
but for all the people of Syon. 
    He could not wait.  He had one chance to end this and save