Gathering Storm (The Salvation of Tempestria Book 2) - Gary Stringer (read e book TXT) 📗

even worried that your dark clone might be behind it. Shortly before the clouds started to form out there, a dark streak flashed across the sky and…”

Before he could finish, Daelen was gone, leaving Cat alone with the captain, who was suddenly embarrassed at being in a lady’s bedchamber.

Catriona flashed the captain a sweet smile, to try and reassure him that she understood he never would have barged into her room like that, except in an emergency.

Attempting to lighten the mood, she wondered, “Do you suppose it’s a Law of Balance, that as one’s power increases, one’s good manners must decrease as a result? A simple ‘excuse me, Catriona’ – that’s not too much to ask, is it? Maybe even a ‘thank you, Captain.’ I mean, how long does that take?”

The captain returned the smile but chose not to comment.

Trying another tack, she commented, “Maybe one of these days, he might actually remember that he’s not the only one who can control the weather. My druid magic is less draining than what he does because it’s more subtle and uses nature rather than coming from within. If he’d just stopped to ask, I could have told him, ‘Don’t fret, Daelen. I can sense that the storm is perfectly natural. No need to panic, just leave it to me.’”

As she was speaking, the storm ended and Cat rolled her eyes.

“He didn’t need to put the storm out,” she sighed, shaking her head, “just move it. We could have caught the trailing winds in our sails and used the storm to our advantage. Tell me, is he always so impulsive? Is it always act first, think later with him?” Once again, the captain kept his own counsel.

Seeing she was going to get no conversation, Cat asked the captain to please excuse her, as she was going to take a shower. The captain bowed and immediately left her cabin.

Moments later Daelen landed on the deck of the ship breathing just a little harder than before, and even as she showered, Cat could sense that true to her prediction, Daelen had wasted a significant amount of power to stop the storm, unnecessarily.

“Oh well,” she muttered to herself as she enjoyed the feeling of the water on her body, “I suppose I’ve got a few weeks to try and train the shadow warrior to pay attention to me and think before he acts.”

She heard Daelen say, “Well, Captain, you should have smooth sailing from here on out, but if not, you’ll have to handle it yourselves. I need to gather my strength for what is to come. Once I’ve checked on Catriona, I intend to go back to sleep to try and recharge as much as possible. Do not wake me except in an absolute emergency.”

“As you say, sir,” the captain acknowledged.

Daelen walked into Catriona’s cabin just as she turned off the water and stepped out of the shower. Seeing her standing there, naked, dripping with water, he seemed to freeze, staring right at her.

“Ahem!” Cat coughed. “In case you’re unfamiliar with our mortal customs, this is the part where you turn around, apologise for accidentally walking in on me like this and immediately go back to your own cabin.”

He did not move.

“OK, let me put it more simply: Get out!” she demanded.

Still, he did not move.

Her anger rising, she yelled, “Daelen, if you don’t get out right now, I’ll…”

She trailed off as she received something from Pyrah via her sympathic sense: ‘Pain’ and ‘Apologies.’ Then, just as she was trying to piece things together, Daelen began to keel over, and Cat had to rush to catch him before he hit the deck.

A pair of puncture marks on his left leg caught her eye and all at once, Cat realised what had happened.

When she got up, she had simply thrown the bedsheets on the floor, not realising Pyrah was entangled inside. Daelen, still not fully recovered from the incident with her staff and drained from stopping the storm, had entered her cabin just to check on her, not realising she’d got up. He had stepped on what he thought was just a pile of bedsheets and accidentally trodden on Pyrah, who simply lashed out on reflex.

If Catriona didn’t act fast, Daelen StormTiger was going to die.

Chapter 14

Ignoring her protests, Cat immediately shoved Pyrah into her pocket dimension where she could do no more harm. She rushed over to Daelen and managed to lay him on her bed while she forced herself to think her way through the panic. Poisons were something of a druid speciality. Most toxins, she could simply take into her own body, bit by bit, and then filter it out before absorbing a bit more and cleansing that, and so on until the poison was all gone. But Pyrah’s venom was no ordinary poison. If it could paralyse and kill an albeit split and weakened shadow warrior, what would it do to a mortal girl like her?

She searched her brain for anything she had learned that would help her. What use was all of her studying if it couldn’t help her when she needed it? For a moment, she couldn’t see past the irony that both Mandalee and Dreya had wanted to kill Daelen and she had stayed their hands. Yet she had almost done it once already and by the looks of it, the second time might be the charm.

“Wait!” she gasped out loud. “That’s it! That’s the answer!”

She quickly put the pieces together, threw her robes around herself and ran up on deck, yelling frantically for the captain with her voice at the same time as calling desperately for Mandalee with her mind.

The captain came running. “Lady Catriona! Master Daelen said, according to the plan, you can’t be on deck.”

“I know, it was my plan, but to hell with that now. There’s been an accident, and we need to rendezvous with the Dolphin as fast as possible. Faster, even.”

“But we don’t know where they are!” the captain protested. “It