Free The Quest (The Hidden Realm Book 5) by A. Giannetti Page A

thing or get any purchase on it,” complained Valgus in a frustrated voice to his Dark King.
    “Force your dagger under it then,” said Torquatus impatiently. Drawing the weapon from his belt, Valgus attempted to slip its point under the silver chain, but no matter how strongly he thrust it down against Anthea’s neck, the point slipped away as if her skin was covered with a layer of clear crystal.
    “I cannot penetrate whatever charm protects her, my lord,” said Valgus at last, his voice full of frustration.
    “Strike off her head then,” commanded Torquatus impatiently. “You wear a charmed blade able to cut steel as easily as butter.” Valgus immediately drew out his sword, intricate, crimson lines of gleaming argentum twisting down the length of its curved black blade. Confidently, he raised it high in his right hand. Then, with all his considerable strength, he suddenly swung the razor sharp edge down at Anthea’s exposed white throat, intending to strike just to the right of the chain around her neck. At the moment of contact with Anthea’s still form, Valgus felt a numbing jolt to his hand and arm, and a flash of intense, scarlet light filled the chamber, momentarily blinding him and his master. As he was thrown onto his back by some powerful, unseen force, the ring of shattered steel falling to the stone floor of the chamber reached Valgus’s pointed ears. When Torquatus’s vision cleared, he saw his captain lying on his back, stunned and immobile, the hilt of his shattered sword still clutched in his right hand. Shifting his gaze to Anthea, he saw that both her throat and the chain draped around it were unharmed. His dark eyes flamed red at the unwelcome sight.
    “Even in death, my enemy thwarts my desires,” he thought furiously to himself, for there was no doubt in his mind that the amulet followed some directive that Dymiter had embedded into it at its making. Lifting his right arm, Torquatus directed a crimson ray, visible only to his third eye, at the slumbering form of the princess, attempting to draw her life force into his silver ring, but the deadly beam flared harmlessly against the silvery cloak that enveloped her quiescent body. Eyes burning like coals, he swore a fearful oath at the top of his voice, for his ring had never failed him before. Calming himself with an effort, he ended the spell which had claimed so many lives in the past. As the shaft of crimson faded away, he instead called up a veritable bonfire of magical flames around Anthea. Vindictively, hoping that even in her unconscious state she would feel the sear of the fire, Torquatus watched as Orianus’s daughter disappeared, enveloped in a scarlet inferno. Valgus hastily stepped back when the floor beneath the flames melted and flowed like water as the heat from the magical fire sank into the stone.
    “Nothing can survive the inferno I have created,” Torquatus thought confidently to himself. When he finally reduced the intensity of the flames, however, he ground his teeth in rage when he saw the untouched form of the Anthea, still wrapped in a cloak of white light, floating in a pool of orange, molten rock. Taking a deep breath, Torquatus calmed himself a second time.
    “The woman cannot be harmed as long as the shield cast by the talisman covers her,” he admitted to himself. “I could, perhaps, break the charm with the expenditure of enough power, for the amulet draws from the life force of the woman to maintain its shield, but the outcome is not certain, for the device seems to magnify the power of the wearer. There is risk, too, that such a contest might rouse the woman from the charmed sleep that keeps her helpless. Awake and with the talisman at her command, she poses an unknown danger. A more subtle approach is called for here, one that will accomplish my purposes with no loss of power or hazard to myself.”
    “You will speak to no one of what has happened here,” said Torquatus in a deadly soft voice to