A section of the dome collapsed, a violent tearing of rock and crushing weight that sent the world swaying, knocking the guards off their feet.
I pounced on the nearest one, bent his head back as far as I could, and tore out his throat. I drank messily and fast, my only goal to fill my stomach with as much blood as I could in ten seconds. The guard’s blood was powerful, filled with a strange magic that might just kill me in the end, but in the meantime…
I lifted my head and roared as power poured through me.
A second guard fell beneath my fangs, and I drank himdry, too. Stone and debris were still raining down when I rose to my feet, broken leg mending as unnatural strength flooded into my system, ripping the chains out of the dead guard’s hands.
The platform had tipped. I’d ended up on one side, the Overseer on the other, already on his feet, both of us squinting through the choking dust cloud, coughing.
Across the ring, Nico was disoriented—for the moment—Emberline crawling away from him on her hands and knees, leaving a trail in the sand as chunks of debris slammed into the pit all around them.
Gods, if Nico didn’t kill her, the falling rock would.
“This way, Nico,” she shouted, coughing. “Nico,come on. Follow me.”
He turned his head to follow her voice, but the draught still had ahold of him. His gaze didn’tfocuson her, didn’tlandlike it normally would have.
Ten feet away, the Overseer’s voice cut through the chaos like a bullwhip.
“Secure the prison, we’re under attack,” he bellowed. “Round up the prisoners, get them back into their cells.”
Guards snapped into motion, herding dust-covered convicts deeper into the prison, shouting orders as inmates surged like a tide, panic and the opportunity for escape giving them courage. A few broke ranks, racing for freedom, only to be headed off.
The Overseer found me in the chaos, pointing two of his biggest guards in my direction.
Gabriel launched himself over the edge of the ring, hand braced on the balustrade, before he glanced up one final time at the wide triangle of blue sky that looked like a wound.
And in that widening gap, I saw movement. Shadows sweeping across the opening, the whir of blades in the air.
On the other side of the ring, Emberline was still moving—dragging herself toward where Gabriel landed in the pit, miraculously unhurt.
With my heart slamming against my ribs, I grasped the chains and heaved. Pulled until the links gave way, and then I limped through the heavy sand toward my wife.
But she was trapped, and Nico lifted his sword again, a merciless executioner with death in his eyes. Too far away for me to ever reach in time.
And still, Emberline kept arguing, kept urging him to remember, breathless and bleeding and refusing to give up on him, then finally raised her hands, bringing that pitiful remnant of a sword up to shield her face as somewhere outside, another explosion rocked the desert.
The dome above us groaned like a dying god.
The Fossa was coming apart.
And if we stayed here, it would bury us all.
23
EMBERLINE
My spine pressed flat against broken stone, every dust-filled breath scraped down my throat like sandpaper.
All around us, chunks of rock—some as big as buildings—crashed down, the floor of the Fossa shuddering beneath every impact.
Nico didn’t even notice. He had me trapped—legs braced wide, his shadow swallowing me whole. That sword was raised over his head in a sure grip, his expression eerily blank as he brought that blade down, down?—
Toward my throat.
I whipped up my broken sword, angled it so the crossguard caught, wedging his weapon between the guard and the ricasso. My arms were shaking, and he had all the leverage, forcing that sharpened edge closer and closer to my carotid, until the razor-thin blade sliced through skin.
The draught had taken the Nico I loved and turned him into a mindless killer, but even that didn’t matter now because in two seconds, I was going to be dead.
