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“Not as much as I’d like to, but I’m starting to come around to the idea that there are worse creatures than him walking the Earth, and if what we’ve discussed today is true, we’re going to need all the help we can get.”
Nodding, I vaulted over the walls and followed the Tyrant into the air. They were his angels, alright, and at their head… Kalmiya. I couldn’t help but feel that familiar twinge of jealousyrise up inside of me when I saw him race toward her. I tried to tell myself to ignore it, that he and I had gone through this already, but there was little I could do to stop the bile from bubbling up in the pit of my stomach.
Between the two of us, we guided the Ebon Legion’s angels over Helena’s walls and onto the courtyard. Fewer than a dozen angels had made the trip from the Tyrant’s Bastion. Each and every one of them covered in grime, and dirt, and dust—many of them with dried blood caked into their hair, their hands. They looked terrible, as if they’d just been through a war.
Most of them collapsed onto the ground as soon as they landed, exhausted.
As I had been when I arrived.
I came up beside the Tyrant and Kalmiya, who he was gently setting onto the ground. This time, he didn’t have to ask me to heal her. I knelt beside her and, bottling away anyfeelingsI may have had, I gently placed my hand on her cheek. Kalmiya looked parched, like she hadn’t had a sip of water in days, and she had a gash on the side of her head that had dried and clotted but had clearly bled profusely when it was inflicted.
She looked like she was at death’s door.
“W-water…” she begged.
The Tyrant barked for water as I let some of my Light trickle through my hand and filter into her body. She shut her eyes and took a deep, ragged breath as my power worked through her. “Hold still,” I whispered, “You’re safe.”
“No… one…” she croaked. “Is safe… from him.”
A different emotion hit me, suddenly.Fear. Not only was I brutally aware of my own fear of Medrion, but I was also intimately aware of hers. In that, at least, we were like sisters. It was that common ground that allowed me to swallow my feelings and finally keep them down.
“Don’t worry about him,” I said. “Save your strength.”
One of Helena’s angels arrived with a canteen full of water just as I finished pouring my Light into her body. Already I could see some of the color return to her face, and once she’d had something to drink, she seemed to regain her voice.
“What happened?” asked the Tyrant.
“It… was him,” she croaked. “Medrion… came the night you left… with an army. He slaughtered who he could… and tore the Bastion down. Nothing is left. I’m… sorry.”
A single tear fell from the corner of her eye and went streaking down her face, cutting a clean line along her otherwise dirty cheek.
The Tyrant’s scowl deepened. “I should have stayed,” he snarled. “I should have protected all of you.”
“He would have killed you if you had stayed.” Kalmiya said, after taking another long glug of water.
“I’m going to kill him.”
“No. That’s what he wants.”
“What?”
“He’s coming… we have to leave, flee.” She turned her pained eyes toward me. “He’scominghere now.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
SARAKIEL
The Tyrant had revenge in his heart. I could see it. I could feel it, radiating from him in waves of crimson and fire. He wanted to attack. To ride out in full force, meet Medrion’s forces in the air, and tear them apart piece by piece. But that was exactly what Medrion wanted; to draw the Tyrant out, away from Helena and the safety of her refuge.
Maybe this Bastion was tougher than we gave it credit. Maybe Medrion didn’t want to risk an open confrontation with Helena. After all, he knew Helena and the Tyrant weren’t exactly friends. Why would she respond to an attack on his Bastion? All of these were things the Tyrant would have been able to consider… were he not an absolute, raging mess.
“Please, calm down,” I said, as he paced, anxiously, along Helena’s green, grand hall.
“How can I calm down?” the Tyrant hissed. “He stands there, gloating, proud of himself for murdering my people and destroying my Bastion. I will not sit quietly and cower behind these walls! I will not give him the satisfaction!”
“I’m not asking you to do that, but this is a trap, and you know it.”
“And so what if it is? If I went back there with enough numbers, his trap would mean nothing.”
