The moment the metal touched the enchanted wooden door, a golden flash of power lashed out, causing the pole to violently reverberate while throwing my body across the room.
“Mother’s tits of the stupid gods,” I huffed as I worked to catch my breath and threw the rack down to the ground.
Ugh. What the hell was I going to do?
I shoved the dresser from the wall and ripped the old tapestry down that Nyra and I had used to escape when we led the rebellion from the city.
My jaw dropped at the sight I beheld—cemented bricks had replaced the ancient wooden door that led to the tunnels within the castle walls. I placed my hand on the cold stone that blocked my only way out of my new prison, and my lip instantly trembled.
My body turned, back resting against the wall as I slid to the floor against it and wept.
The sounds of war echoed from my tower’s window as the battle raged on beyond the city gates, and there was nothing I could do to get out of here or help my family who could already be injured, or…I wasn’t even able to bring my thoughts to the other option.
A deafening, shriek-like roar boomed from beyond my window, making me jump up from the floor. I used the sleeve of my filthy gown to wipe away the tears that slipped down my cheeks—which I had been wearing since the queen forced me to stand before the masses and placed the label of tyrant on my sister's name.
I hated everything the gown represented—what I had been and believed before Lia opened my eyes to the truthof our war and family. My body no longer felt comfortable in the soft, flowing fabric. It craved the fighting leathers andpantsthat I had come to love, because it meant I was a warrior. Like my sister and Zaela.
I ran to the window and instantly ducked down to the floor as two wyverns and their riders whizzed past me, their teeth and tails lashing out at each other continuously. Pulling myself up on the windowsill just enough to peer out of it, I watched as both Lia and Kellan attacked one another atop the flying beasts.
“Oh gods,” I whispered, my eyes darting back and forth between each rider as their mounts aimed to kill the other.
The sight of the wyverns vanished, replaced by the sound of a thunderous blast that rumbled the floor beneath me and shook the walls of my chambers.
“Shit!” I gasped as I tried to lean out the window and peer around the side of the castle, but it was no use. All my eyes took in was thick, black smoke from their blast of flames and a mingling gray dust that had erupted from the boom.
My lips parted as terror consumed me. “Lia!” I screamed.
My neck twisted back and forth, searching the sky for any sign of her. My gaze drifted down the side of my bedroom’s tower to where a thin lip of stone wrapped itself around the structure—the same lip I deemed impossible to use for escaping all that time ago in my original escape of this room.
“I must be out of my gods-damn mind.” I sighed.
Taking in a shuddering breath, I lifted myself onto the windowsill, carefully swinging my feet over the opposite end of its ledge. My stare shot down to the ground thatwas hundreds of feet below, and my stomach dropped. Slamming my eyes shut, I worked to talk my nerves down, but it was no use—my heart wouldn’t stop racing in my chest.
I had to do this. Lia may be depending on me right now, and being a coward, locked in the same tower I had been my entire life, wouldn’t help her or anyone else for that matter.
My eyes narrowed in on the tiny ledge, and my fingers tightly gripped the edge of the windowsill as I wiggled myself down onto the lip. The moment my feet touched the stone, I bit the inside of my cheek as I worked to concentrate on not slipping to what surely would be my death.
My red locks of hair fluttered around my face, dancing like fire in the smoke with the wind. I pressed my back flush against the cool stone of the castle’s tower and carefully slid my foot along the ledge—and then again, and once more, until I was scaling around the side of it.
My lungs forced me to breathe as I slowly made my way, my heart sinking every time it acknowledged the height of the tower.
Finally, a bridge appeared to the next spire over on the east side—where the castle’s library was. The smoke leisurely cleared the air, carrying away toward the sea on the wind, and my eyes glimpsed Nox in the far distance, headed straight for the battlefield—Kellan’s wyvern nowhere in sight.
“Thank the gods,” I breathed.
Once I stood before the bridge, body still pressed against the tower, I whimpered, slamming my eyes shut andturning my face away from the situation I had trapped myself in.
“Well, Avery,” I said to myself. “You’ve already come this far.”
Without lifting my foot completely from the ledge, I carefully slid it forward until I felt comfortable enough to put my weight on it. My back lifted from the wall’s barrier as I carefully took my first step along the unrailed bridge, clearly never designed for walking upon. My eyes drifted along the path over to the next tower, where a window was placed only feet from where the bridge met the structure.
“You can do this. You can do this,” I worked to convince myself.
My feet moved, taking step after step, gaining confidence in each one as my arm shot out at my sides for balance. The dress I wore fluttered in the wind, threatening to rip me from where I stood. The connecting bridge was barely a foot in width, leaving no room for error in where I placed my steps.
My left foot slipped off the side, and my body dropped down into a crouch, my fingers’ grip on the bridge sending broken pieces of stone down to the ground below. Pure fear took over me, racing up my spine like a lick of ice as my gaze narrowed in on the remaining distance that stood between me and the next window—the distance between life and death.
I blew out a breath and slowly rose to stand, balancing my arms out at my sides once more. With furrowed brows, I quickened my pace across the aerial walkway until I finally reached the opposite side.
