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Trouble.
I tug on Valdus’s arm until we’re back in the alley.
Just in time.
A squad of guards clad in deep black armor appears on the other side of the square. Clean-shaved and wearing a fresh coal-black shirt, Rev is among them, looking once again like the man I danced with in the palace and not a prisoner of the rebellion.
“It seems Our Sun and Light has cast his attention away from this forgotten town for too long. Even the dustwalkers have scrambled out from the holes where they’ve been living.”
A woman turns around in search of the person who made the comment. Long dreadlocks pulled down to her chin can’t fully disguise old burns that mar her skin. On the other side of her face, a tattoo of a broken chain curls around her ear under the hairline cut short.
Rev motions to his squad with an indifference etched on his sharp features. The soldiers move as one, reaching for their weapons and advancing on the group dressed in rags. None of the bandits shrink away from the challenge. The girl pulls a sword from the scabbard on her hip. The black metal swallows all the light, and even from across the street, I can sense binding on that blade.
“Hasn’t anyone told you not to bring a knife to a gunfight?” asks the guard at the helm, pulling a shining revolver from his belt.
He fires four bullets in rapid succession, but the girl deflects them with the blade of her sword. All but one. It skids across her cheek, leaving a bloody trace and flies past. A cry of pain follows. When we realize it’s not coming from the Dustwalker, even Rev’s piercing eyes search for the source of the agony echoing through the square.
Even with a woman clutching her stomach, doubled over in pain, it’s a merchant standing amidst the spilled cogs of an automaton whose cry drowns out everything else. Until I recognize that freckled face.
“No,” I gasp and jump onto the square.
Valdus catches my hand, pulling me behind him before I can take another step. He holds me in place, and I can do nothing besides watch in horror as blood flows through Lara’s hands. She catches herself on a stall with a retreating owner but her weakening limbs can no longer support her.
“No,” I cry again, but shouts of panic and despair swallow my voice.
I can see Numair, stopping in his tracks, his features frozen. He watches Lara slide down to the ground, leaving a bloody trace on the wall of the stall.
I try to break free, but Valdus’s hold on me is still iron-clad. “Neylan, look around you. Look where you are.”
“I don’t care,” I cry out. “I don’t care about any of it. I have to go. I can save her.”
“He will care.” Valdus’s gaze pierces mine, urgency written in his features. “Magnar’s daughter or not, a binder is an outlaw in this desert. He will gun you down. One spark of your energy will be all it takes.”
I swallow my tears down.
“How hard can it be to follow a simple order?” Rev’s voice is as dry as the desert and as low as the morning breeze, but it carries the anger of a thousand men. He no longer looks at Lara, nor at the Dustwalkers, who don’t wait for the confusion to settle down and dash down alleys and up the rooftops. “You had to shoot a civilian,” Rev says, wrenching the gun from the guard and putting its burning hot barrel to the man’s forehead. The man flinches, tries to pull away, but Rev only presses it harder. “We’ll have to bring Wraiths to control this town now, but I’m afraid you won’t be here to see the priests of the oblivion.”
The last gunshot echoes through silent buildings and deserted stalls. The guard’s body goes limp. Rev is out of the square before his body falls to the ground. The other soldiers don’t linger either.
Before the last one disappears, I dash across the square with Valdus right on my heels, but Numair has beaten us to it. With Lara’s limp body in his arms, he pulls her close to him, rocks her against him, and whispers words into her ear as her features contort with pain.
“Take us somewhere where I can heal her,” I beg Valdus.
Numair lifts Lara in his arms, never stopping the murmur of words. I’m not sure she can hear him any longer. Even if I couldn’t see the haze cloud her eyes, I still could feel her energy slip away with every passing second. I grab her hand and pour ethera into her as we follow Valdus to a house that he must have circled with a protective red circle on one of his maps.
“Stay here,” Valdus says, gripping Numair’s shoulders and pulling Lara from his arms.
He deposits her on a table in an abandoned kitchen and sends the first rebel coming through the door to fetch Inara, but as I put my hand on Lara’s chest, I know, no matter how fast he can run, it’ll be too late.
Lara’s heart has stopped.
“No,” I mutter, my voice cracking.
I send ethera in waves to force her heart to beat again.
“Neylan,” Valdus whispers.
Shutting my eyes, I will ethera to pump through her veins, but it only rebounds.
