As the magical bone blade met the steel of Fel’s mace, clangs ringing out in the chamber, Syla ran around the back of the shielder. She looked for a makeshift weapon or any way to help, irritated toagainbe a liability instead of an asset to her bodyguard.
If the fierce warrior, who had to be half Fel’s age, bested him, he would come after her. Judging by the glances the man sent her way,shewas his target. With flowing black hair, sun-tanned skin, and deep brown eyes, he would have been strikingly handsome if he hadn’t come to assassinate her.
And had he been the one to kill Venia?
When Syla glanced that way, she cursed in surprise. A second warrior was crawling out of the sarcophagus.
For an instant, indignation filled her—it was blasphemy to open a tomb, much less climbintoit and onto the remains of the dead—but when the man leaped to the ground, fear over her own predicament replaced the feeling.
With tattooed cheeks and a gargoyle-bone dagger—one identical to the blade in Venia’s chest—the man rushed toward her.
Syla ran around the shielder again, darting past Fel’s engagement with the first warrior, and sprinted for the exit, but an alarming thought made her lurch to a stop. The stormer would easily run her down in the tunnels, and if she left Fel, she would be on her own. Defenseless.
As the man sprinted after her, Syla spotted her pack on the ground and lunged for it. Her first thought was that she woulduse her book as a weapon, but there wasn’t time to remove it. With the man almost upon her and thrusting with the dagger, she spun and hurled the bag at him.
Even though his brows rose in surprise, he was fast enough to dodge it and lifted an arm to knock it to the ground. The pack skidded into the doorway, stopping at the feet of someone new entering the chamber.
Forsaken by the gods, howmanyenemies were lurking in here? And why were these men trying tokillSyla instead of capture her, damn it?
She skittered back but bumped into one of the sarcophagi. There was nowhere to run.
But her opponent hadn’t continued to advance on her. He’d spun toward the entrance, his eyebrows rising in surprise again as a black-clad rider strode in, muscled and powerful with a gargoyle-bone sword in his gloved hand. Captain Vorik.
“Sir!” the second warrior blurted as Fel’s fight with the firstraged on near the wall, the opponents fully occupied with trying to kill each other. The speaker pointed at Syla, but Vorik sprang at him instead of answering, or even responding to the exclamation.
Though startled, the man got his dagger up to defend himself.
The bone weapons clunked together, the noise different from metal striking metal but sharp and rapid as Vorik swept in with slash after slash. The clear aggressor, he pressed the younger man, who barely managed to step onto the fallen sarcophagus lid instead of tripping over it. Unrelenting, the captain kept attacking, the series of blows so fast that Syla didn’t know how anyone could have defended against them. Throughout, his face remained masked, his jaw set. He wasn’t even breathing through his mouth.
His opponent was, the man’s eyes wide and confused as he panted, struggling to keep his fellow stormer from killing him.WhyVorik was trying to kill the man, Syla had no idea, but she glanced to the tunnel, wondering if she could slip past all the fighting and escape. But she couldn’t leave Fel. He was?—
A cry of pain came from his fight, and she turned, afraid he’d made the noise. But it was the younger man who’d dropped to one knee, struggling to keep his blade up as Fel swept the mace toward his head. Blood streamed through the man’s fingers as he gripped his side with his free hand. Powering past a weak defense, the mace smashed into the man’s skull.
Movement pulled Syla’s attention back to the other battle.
The younger man had also crumpled to the ground, his back to the sarcophagus, his dagger clattering onto the lid. Vorik bent, grabbed his shoulder, and thrust his sword into the man’s heart. His opponent didn’t scream, only gasping and stiffening with his back arching before he collapsed onto his side. Without a change in expression, Vorik pulled out his sword.
“Come.” Not hesitating or sheathing his weapon, Vorik looked at Syla, though he also glanced at Fel. “More stormers may bedown here, looking for the moon-marked. I’ll help you escape the city.”
“We’re not going anywhere with you, rider.” Though blood streamed from a gash at his temple, and his face was bruised from his previous battles, Fel stood straight and snarled, mace at the ready in case he had to fight again.
“It is I who will go withyou.” Vorik kept Fel in his peripheral vision, but he focused on Syla. “As I was attempting to say before you flung yourself off my dragon’s back, I’m here to protect you.”
“Yourdragondropped the roof on us and almost killed us,” Fel said.
Syla nodded and walked gingerly around the fallen men to stand not at Vorik’s side but at Fel’s. She needed to stick with her bodyguard and find a safe place where she could use her healing magic on him again. Only grit was keeping Fel upright; she was certain.
“That is true, but it was an accident,” Vorik said. “Agrevlari was unaware of the orders that I received. He knew only of the attack orders from the general.”
“The general who is your superior officer?” Fel asked.
“That he is. He’s quite the grouch though. I can’t recommend serving under him if it’s not a familial duty.”
“We don’t need stormer help.” Fel pointed at the doorway. “Go away.”
“Do pardon my bluntness, but I believe you may have both perished if I hadn’t arrived when I did.” Vorik spoke in a calm tone and didn’t appear harried—he wasn’t even sweatyfrom his battle—but he did glance toward the tunnel now and then.
Werethere more stormers roaming about under the castle? These had been lying in wait for Syla. Or for someone, anyway. They might not have known that she specifically would come but must have expected someone in the royal family to do exactlywhat she’d been attempting, fixing the shielder. Or at least trying to determine if itcouldbe fixed.
