Before he hits the ground, three other Fade soldiers endure the same fate, falling in swift succession. Victims of my half-emptied sheath.
Clode squeals in subtle warning—a good sign shedoesn’thate me. I spin in time to avoid getting beheaded by a white sword whipping toward me.
Bothaimian ore.
I charge the beaded guard blocking the entrance I came through. Dodge the three daggers he tosses, one skimming so close it slits my shroud.
He cracks out an order that shakes the ground, sending a hairline fissure darting toward me like a lightning bolt. The first whisper of a chasm preparing to pry open and gobble me up.
But I’ve already flung a blade.
It sinks into his eye the moment he finishes his busty order. At the same time, Ileap—blasting a dense crush of words.
“JU AATH GRUH!”
The ground—now yawning beneath me like a grumbling maw—snaps shut as the final word leaves my lips.
Gravity grips me.
I roll across the still-shuddering stone. Come to a halt before the guard even hits the ground, his body jerking through its final motions.
I get behind him and take his dead, crumbling weight, using his body for a shield as a hissing, flaming command tries to shake my nerves, spat from someone across the way.
But I’m too far gone, dunked in the icy mindset I lived in forphases. When my existence revolved around a tiny cell, Fallon, and a battle pit where I fought for her food.
Her water.
Bloodstone to keep her from withering from sun starve.
Flames gush at me like a blow of dragonflame, plugging the air with the reek of fried flesh and hair. I choke it back, fill my lungs, then blast a barrage of suffocating words.
A strange, seething voice cries out against my eardrums. Something that sounds a lot like brokenheartedyearningbefore the flames wither. I imagine I hear that same voice scream in pain before they evaporate in a puff of smoke.
Then …nothing.
Lacking the time and patience to mull over the oddity, I shove the heavy body off, refusing to look at the guard’s blistered face as I stand, breath held. Savoring the air in my lungs, I stalk through the bloody carnage, stepping over bits of stone and crooked limbs poking out from beneath the mess.
My mental sound snare is still so wide open that when I come to a lone survivor—a Bothaimian guard twisted on the ground, eyes bulging as he gasps for breath—I don’t hear a thing beyond Bulder’s and Clode’s riotous clamor.
But those bright-blue eyes, theypleadwith me. Like gnarled hands clawing at me, nails scratching.
I crouch, retrieve a white sword from the rubble that I set against his throat, puffing a single word.
Clode blows breath within the room, into the guard’s lungs.
He gasps, some of the redness easing from his otherwise pale, freckled face. The reek of piss fills my nose, a golden puddle growing beneath him.
I put a little less pressure through the blade, tighten my sound snare, and block the Creators’ songs. “Who were you waiting for?”
“N-not you.” The words are jagged and abrupt. Pitchy, like his voice has not long cracked. “We’ve been here on T-T-Tri-Council business.”
“And the Fade soldiers?”
“Their captain got a lark just after feasting,” he rushes out, speaking so fast he stumbles over the words. “Orders from Bothaim to c-catch and imprison the king. That he’d be here.”
I push more weight down the blade, dimpling his flesh. “Whichking?”
Any remaining color drops from his cheeks. “Th-the Burn King. Kaan Vaegor, ruler of the north, traitor to his family name.”
