Zak Turner - A Twist In Time Read Free Page A

towards the porting booths, determined to get out of the concourse as soon as possible.  He was a good fighter, but this kind of combat was best left to the shadow-wizards who would surely be entering the concourse any minute.
    As he got closer to the porting booths though, he saw that a steady stream of people were becoming visible as they got close, and he realised that he was walking into a trap.  If he got to the booths, he would be revealed, and then he’d be an easy target.  He had to escape into the building to survive.  He turned and made his way back across the concourse, which was littered with frozen and stunned workers, heading for the council chamber.
    * * *
    The battle at the Abbey was going badly for the students, with only two seventh years still standing.  Tella Morton guided her five first years safely to the hidden cellar, and sent them through the portal into the school.  Sartrina went through last after Tella asked her to try and find some teachers to come back and help them.
    The seventh year then left the cellar and ran back to the cloister, where she Robert still cowering on the grass between Zak and Tallion.  She started to crawl towards him on her hands and knees, amazed that the other two first years were still fighting and apparently keeping the attackers at bay!
    Ross Burns, the other seventh year, was helping Tallion keep the second attacker pinned down in the archway, and he moved away from the eleven-year-old so that they were no longer a single target.  Now their attacker had to keep firing spells in two directions, which reduced his effectiveness. 
    A series of blinding flashes and thunderous explosions left them all reeling with ringing ears, as a volley of Libra Mortis curses met Zak’s never ending stream of Reverturs.  Zak was beginning to tire though; he was using an enormous amount of energy with his spells.
    Tallion we have to move, we can’t stand here forever!
    I know.  I can feel my power ebbing too.  We can’t leave Robert though!
    We won’t have to.  This seventh year will take him out of the way.
    Tella had reached Robert, and started to drag him towards the Warming Room, trying to make him move under his own steam.  Zak and Tallion slowly moved with them, back to back, endlessly firing Reverturs at their attackers, but the explosions were not so huge now, and the deflections were getting less and less pronounced.  The archway was close, and when Tella dragged Robert through it, Ross fired a volley of Firmus spells at both attackers to try and give them all chance to run for the portal.
    It worked after a fashion, and in the brief lull caused by the attackers rebounding the Firmus spells, the two eleven-year-olds and the seventeen-year-old dashed for the archway into the Warming Room, and raced for the entrance to the hidden cellar.
    Tella had Robert on his feet by the time Zak and Tallion burst into the room, and she was pushing the terrified first generation wizard through the portal into the school.
    Ross hurried Zak and Tallion through the blocked up archway first, and then paused to glance back towards the cloister before he went through it - and found himself face to face with a Libra Mortis!  This time he didn’t have Zak or Tallion standing next to him to deflect it either. 
    His world slowed to a crawl as he willed his legs to propel him through the blocked up archway into the hidden cellar, but he’d barely moved before the curse struck him and his world went dark.  His body fell to the ground, disturbingly half-in and half-out of the blocked up archway.
    The attacking wizard reached the archway himself a couple of seconds later and strode over the body as he went inside.  His instructions were to do everything he could to kill Tallion Middleham short of going into the school.
    As his eyes adjusted to the dark room, he saw the back of a boy stepping through the portal, and fired his last Libra Mortis at almost point blank range right at him.