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.Of thesekasha , there was no sign.He was all alone."Is Pony alive?" His voice was quiet but loud, like a whisper over amicrophone.Pony was breathing, so Tinker said, "He's unconscious.""Get him up," Windwolf commanded."Get him to the other end of the bridge.The others are coming."Tinker glanced down at the still unmoving Pony, a foot taller and easilyfifty pounds heavier than her.How the hell did she move him? And where wasTomtom? What could the oni lord do especially if he could throw illusions intoWindwolf's mind?Pony had dropped his sword, but he had other weapons on him.The guns wereuseless; the bullets would only feed energy into Tomtom's shield assuming thatwasn't an illusion.The knives placed her too near the much larger andbetter-trained oni.That left Sparrow's light bow and spell arrows.The arrowswere all fletched white, which meant the same spell was marked onto the shaftand activated by the sound of the arrows' flight.As Tomtom surely planned, Windwolf moved to the end of the bridge to coverher and Pony.He spoke a word, shifting his right hand with fingers cocked instiff positions, and his shield extended out to cover the full end of thebridge."Go! Leave Pony if you have to." Windwolf commanded as the oni opened firefrom the cover of the trees.The bullets deflected off his shield, but Tomtomcould walk through it.She didn't spend the last three weeks protecting Pony to leave him now, noteven to save Windwolf.Tinker nocked an arrow and looked for the factors of73931.She could keep Chiyo from reading her mind by doing math, but thathadn't kept Chiyo from deluding her.She'd foiled Chiyo by noticing somethingthat the kitsune had forgotten to disguise.Surely if Tomtom had two people toaffect, there would be something he'd overlook, but what? The darkness itselfwould erase most of his errors.She lifted the bow, drew back the arrow, andtried to find a target."Tinker, what are you doing?" Windwolf growled."Trust me."I can outthink him.I know I can.Tomtom could fool her eyes.The gunfire covered his footsteps.What would hemiss? His shadow? His smell?Then it came to her Tomtom would never think of hiding magic from adomana ,since he couldn't feel magic himself and she focused on the active magic inthe area.There, passing through Windwolf's shields and nearly on him, wasPage 251 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlTomtom's own shield spell.She guessed the location of Tomtom's heart and loosed the arrow.As the arrowleapt from her bow, its whistling passage through the wind activated the spellwritten down its shaft; the kinetic energy of its physical form was transmutedinto coherent light a bolt of pure energy.There was a faint ripple as itpassed through Tomtom's shield spell apparently designed only for solidprojectiles.Then it lanced its way through the oni lord, and he appeared witha gurgling scream.He was only six feet from Windwolf, sword upraised andready to strike with a neat hole burned through the right side of his chest.Windwolf shouted, lifted his arm straight out, fingers splayed.The windslammed Tomtom backwards thirty feet.Windwolf growled a spell to summonanother bolt of lightning, moving his hands in interweaving circles, hisfingers flicking through complex patterns.The brilliance struck Tomtom as theoni lord started to rise.He didn't get up again.There was a sweep of headlights on the far side of the bridge, and thesekashaspilled out of two of the Rolls and charged across the bridge.Windwolf flinging lightning bolts, the arrival of thesekasha, and their ownlord dead made the oni flee into the forest.Thesekasha met no resistance asthey passed beyond Windwolf's protection.Only when thesekasha had set up aline of defense did Windwolf loose his hold on the magic, letting it drainaway.He triggered a light orb as he walked to her, bathing them in light.Peoplesurrounded them, but he seemed to be the only one in focus."You're alive! My most wonderful, clever, little savage!" He lightly tracedher face.She'd never seen him smile so widely
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