He dips his head.
I frown, decide he’s being facetious, and return the gesture with extra flourish.
He clears his throat, then jerks his chin at the slight male bunched on the stairs, his discarded shackles on the step beneath. “My brother, Roan.” He digs into the breast pocket of his robe, pulls out a flask, and gives it a shake. “Hard to believe, given the current state of things, but he got all the brains. And this is fucking empty,” he sighs, nipping a glance at the sky above while tucking the flask away.
Roan gives an awkward wave, watching me as though he’s looking at a ghost—spectacles askew, cheek pressed against the wall beside a crimson spray. The sort of blood spillage that happens when an artery is abruptly severed.Toomuch blood to have come from him, despite the wounds on his wrists and ankles and the many abrasions on his face.
“I see things got messy up here. How many folk got tossed down the hole?”
“Eight or so.” Pyrok shrugs. “None were on high alert, though I’m guessing that’ll change once the Tri-Council realizes they’re missing Wardens.”
He’s not wrong.
A shrill screech pierces down from above.
I look up past falling sleet, through the distant grate as a pink-and-blue-feathered Moltenmaw cuts across the sky, just above the arches. Another follows, banking sideways, garnering us a perfect view of the armored soldier clinging to its saddle.
It wouldn’t be so alarming, were it not for the momentary glimpse offiveother Moltenmaws pounding through the clouds much farther above, in the shape of a perfect V.
Battle formation.
“I assume that’s the rapidly evolving problem?” Kaan murmurs from right behind me, his voice a tumble of warm boulders. So close my skin pebbles, every one of my muscles aching to lean into his atmosphere. To touch him. Hold him. Reassure myself that he’s okay.
But he’s not. None of us are.
We’re holed up in the fucking Citadel.
“I mean, it sure fuckin’ looks like one to me.” Pyrok pulls out a second flask he’s quick to unstopper, tossing back a glug. “The Tri-Council’s entire battalion is up there, swarming like they’re about to fight off an army.”
“Not an army. The city’s folk.” My words are chased by an eerie silence only battered by the distant sound of beating wings. “News of the impending moonfalls has descended on Bothaim, and it seems everyone believes the arches are runed to protect against them.”
Roan winces while Pyrok straightens, slamming the heel of his hand against the cork and jamming it back in place. “How’d you know that?”
Plucked a parchment lark from the sky and battled it until it bared its scrawled secrets.
“Not important.”
Roan straightens his glasses, squinting at me through the cracks. “She probably read someone else’s lark …”
I frown, cheeks burning. Unsure if I should be annoyed or impressed. “Uncomfortably accurate.”
“You’ll get used to him,” Pyrok mutters, looking up at the circling dragons. A Moltenmaw roars so loud I swear the stone shudders. “Plan, anyone?”
Kaan dumps a pile of scavenged white robes on the ground at our feet, probably wrestled off the folk they tossed down the hole prior to said tossing. “We get to the surface, then work it out from there.”
We reach a pair of large ornate doors bracketed by twin urns I suspect are stuffed with dead guards, based on the waft of excrement and the small blood smear on the ground.
“Guess a path’s already been paved,” I say, scowling over the rim of one as my suspicions are confirmed.
Could’ve left some for me.
Kaan presses his ear to the door. “On our way through, yes.”
“You’ll struggle to find an empty urn,” Pyrok tacks on.
I stuff my blade away with a little extra gusto, sharpening my scowl on him. “No need to rub it in.”
He frowns. “That’s not what I—”
