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as she
moved. Pain lanced through her as she looked down at the thick
black tentacle that circled her arm. Another wrapped around her
ankle and she felt herself torn from the saddle. Valorous let out a
furious scream as the tentacles pulled her up into the air.
    Not tentacles, roots , she corrected
herself. Her gaze flicked to the gnarled trees for half a breath as
she tried to assess her situation. The ground where they had been
fighting moments before was a rubble strewn waste. Dozens of black
roots waved in the air below her seeking anything they could grasp.
Valor had shifted his fighting away from the cliff to avoid the
roots and his back was now exposed to the smaller demons that
crouched with bloodlust clear in their eyes.
    The pain on her wrist grew more intense and
she had to fight back a scream. That wouldn’t help Valor at all
now. He needed to focus on the shifter and she needed to solve her
own dilemma without distracting him. Her eyes watered as she
examined the root on her arm as best she could. They had lifted her
unevenly and she was balanced with her head tilted toward the
unforgiving black rocks below with most of her weight supported by
the root entrapping her ankle. From what she could tell, the roots
were coated in a sort of slime, that judging by the burning on her
wrist, was acidic.
    She swallowed heavily. “Well, at least when
the acid burns through and they drop me, I won’t have to worry
about being crippled,” she whispered, her imagination providing her
with a splendid image of her body lying broken on the rocks below.
“Use every advantage,” she whispered, repeating a lesson Neph had
pounded into her skull over and over. The only advantage she had as
far as she could see was height now. Her view of the battle was
perfect. “Help Valor kill it and this spell will end,” she
whispered as the roots pulled at her, stretching her body to a
painful angle. “Then die horribly on the rocks below as the roots
vanish,” she added in a pained growl. Options were limited, though,
and helping Valor seemed the best course available.
    The leather on her boot was giving away and
she could feel the acid reaching her skin there. Jala inhaled
deeply and tried to summon her power but concentration had never
been her strongest virtue and it was nearly lost in the pain now.
The pressure on her body increased again and she felt her ankle
give with a sickening pop. A gasp of pain exploded from her lips
and she had to fight back tears. Training with Neph had been
painful, or so she had thought. In reality she hadn’t really known
what pain was until now, she realized.
    The roots shifted their hold on her once
again and she found herself staring straight down at the ground.
The pressure on her wrist fell away and her heart rose to her
throat as she swung free, dangling from her broken ankle. Spots
danced before her eyes as the pain ripped through her. “Don’t
faint, fight. Don’t pull a Rivana. Don’t fail Valor as you did
Finn,” Jala hissed through clenched teeth. She summoned her power
once more, her eyes locked on the Shifter below. Another of Neph’s
lessons sprang to mind and she was praying it would work. Though
who she was praying to, she couldn’t really say at this point. She
supposed it was anyone that would listen. Valor had noticed her
predicament and she willed him to ignore her and keep fighting. His
right hand flicked toward the roots that held her as the Shifter
surged in again.
    Jala released her spell just as the
creature’s jaws opened to bite. Everything blurred together as the
Shifter’s huge clawed hand hit Valor full in the chest. Despite her
wish for him to ignore her, he had been distracted. His boots dug
trenches in the ground as he was forced back, but he managed to
keep his feet as their combined magics took effect. The shifter
staggered back clutching its skull as her spell unleashed and the
roots holding her hostage crumbled beneath her. She began to
plummet, the black