Free Claimed By Shadow by Karen Chance Page A

Pritkin’s shields glimmered around us, faintly blue and wavelike in the flickering light from a nearby torch. “Do it!”
    “Give us the rogue, Pritkin,” one of the mages demanded. He was tall, with a prominent Adam’s apple, pallid skin and a booming voice that didn’t match his skinny frame. “She isn’t worth this.”
    “She’ll get a fair hearing,” the bulkier, African American mage at his side added, although the look he sent me wasn’t friendly. “Come peacefully while you can.”
    “What’s going on?” I asked. The only answer I got was something large whizzing past my face, all of a millimeter from my nose. I jumped back with a shout, just as a heavy mace collided with a nearby suit of armor. That was a lucky break, since the heap of old metal had been about to bring a sword down on my head. The mace caught the thing in the chest, leaving a big dent and sending it staggering back into a tapestry.
    I looked around wildly, not understanding what was happening. The mace had sliced through Pritkin’s shields as if they weren’t there. Even more worrying was the fact that the mages hadn’t thrown the thing—it had come from somewhere behind us—but there was nobody back there. One of the knights was missing its weapon, but there was no one around to have thrown it.
    A clanging sound caused me to whip my head back around and, for a second, I thought the mages were attacking. But although they were looking even more grim, I was no longer the focus of their interest. Their eyes and weapons were leveled on the damaged suit of armor. Instead of simply falling over, it appeared to be fighting its way out of the tapestry. Once it threw off the heavy material, it started feeling around for its sword, which the impact of the mace had knocked away. But Pritkin grabbed the weapon first and, despite it being almost as tall as he was, leveled it menacingly on the creature.
    The knight appeared unfazed. It righted itself, then wrenched a shield off the wall and sent it sailing at us like a hundred-pound Frisbee. Pritkin threw himself at me, smashing us into the wall just as the heavy iron sphere sliced through the air where we’d been standing. It crashed into a stained glass window at the end of the hall, causing a cloud of multicolored shards to rain down around the back staircase.
    I didn’t even have time to catch my breath before Pritkin hit the floor and jerked me down beside him, pushing my head so low that my nose found out by experience just how hard fake stone can be. I didn’t complain, though, because the next instant my hair was ruffled as another shield blew through the air right above us. It took a bite out of the wall across the hall, embedding itself halfway into the plaster and sheet rock.
    The two war mages must have done something that drew the armor’s attention, because the old relic suddenly started moving towards them, flakes of rust drifting to the ground behind it. I clutched Pritkin’s arm, stunned and disbelieving. “How did that thing get past my ward?” The first shield had come within about a foot of us, and the second had missed me by maybe half an inch. How close did a threat have to get before my star decided to pay attention?
    Pritkin ignored me. He jumped to his feet, grabbing the sword he’d dropped when we had to get up close and personal with the wall. It turned out to be a bad move. The knight’s visor-covered face immediately swiveled back in our direction. I guess it didn’t like anyone else touching its weapon. It couldn’t fight all three mages at the same time, but somehow that didn’t make me feel better.
    That was especially true a second later when the corridor echoed with the sound of a couple dozen metal figures simultaneously stepping off their plinths. It seemed that the internal defenses Casanova had talked about had decided to up the ante. The approaching metal army looked like the medieval version of a chorus line, all moving in perfect