The rock beetle huffed. Raithe leaped onto his back and held out a hand, pulling me up in front of him. As I slid into the saddle, I looked back at the abomination. It was still raging at Halek and Kysa, lost to madness and lashing out at anything that was close. As Raithe’s arms slid around me and Ratuk’s wings opened, ready to take off, I drew in a quiet breath.
“No,” I whispered. “I can’t leave him. Not like this.”
“Sparrow.” Raithe’s voice was a warning. “You heard what he said. He will kill you if you go back. The man you knew is gone.”
“I know.” Tears threatened, regret and loss clawing at me from within, but I forced them down. The time for grief was past. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t save him.” I looked back at Raithe, meeting those pale eyes. “I know what I have to do—I just need to get close enough.”
He gazed at me, then sighed. “What do you need me to do?”
Relief bloomed. “Distract him,” I said. “I don’t need long, just a few seconds at most. But I have to be right up on him, close enough to touch.”
A muscle worked in Raithe’s jaw, but he nodded. “All right,” he agreed. “I don’t know what you’re going to do, Sparrow, but we’ll give you as much time as we can. Just...” His hand rose, pressing to the side of my face. “Be careful.”
“I will.”
“Wait.”
Raithe’s tunic wriggled, and a moment later Meeka’s head poked out, blinking. “Take Meeka,” he said, clawing himself out of Raithe’s shirt. “Meeka come. Meeka help.”
I winced. The jair’oa didn’t look great; his eyes were bleary and his movements sluggish. “Meeka, no,” I said. “You’re still hurt. Stay here with Raithe.”
“Not hurt.” The jair’oa crawled onto my leg. “Meeka still has small magic. Maybe. But Meeka come. Help Fateless.” He half leaped, half scrambled onto my shoulder. “Not afraid. Kill dead thing once and for all.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat, feeling his tiny body press close. “All right,” I said, turning forward. “Then let’s get this done. Ratuk, up!”
The rock beetle’s carapace split open, translucent green wings spreading outward. With a familiar drone that made my teeth vibrate, he rose into the air, soaring above the sand. I leaned my weight to the side, and Ratuk banked sharply, heading toward the abomination and the one-sided battle taking place in the center of the room.
As we flew forward, my eyes were locked on my target: that thin, shimmering knot within the hulk of rotting meat and flesh. It flickered in and out of existence, and as Ratuk swooped lower, my muscles tensed, and my heart beat faster.
“All right, Ratuk.” I patted the beetle’s shell. “Listen to Raithe until I’m back. Meeka, are you ready?”
“Meeka ready!”
I leaped off Ratuk. Hitting the sand, I rolled with the momentum, holding Meeka close to shield him from the impact. Coming up on my feet, I stared up into the massive bulk of the abomination. Beetles swarmed through its flesh, and the stench from being this close made my eyes water. I blinked away tears and let my eyes unfocus, and the world flickered into that strange, hazy state where everything was blurred and unreal.
Time seemed to slow. I saw the tangle of thread within the abomination, wrapped around its bones and woven through its flesh, the knot centered at its core. I reached out, but at that moment, the abomination swung its huge, terrible head around, and I saw myself reflected in its dead white eyes.
“Fateless. Now you will die.”
Its head snaked forward, jaws gaping. I lunged, reaching out desperately, and my fingers brushed something thin and almost insubstantial. Darkness fell as those jaws closed on me, and I shut my eyes.
“Meeka, now!”
Cool air hit my face. Gasping, I looked up to find myself kneeling several yards behind the abomination. Meeka lay limp and motionless beside me, his tail brushing my leg, and my heart clenched painfully in my chest. I placed one hand on his body, feeling the rise and fall of his breath through his fur, and breathed a sigh of relief.
“Meeka.” He didn’t stir, but his ear twitched at the sound of my voice, and I slumped in the sand. “Thank you.”
Something tickled my other palm, like a hair being drawn across my skin, and I looked down.
A gleaming thread was wrapped around my hand, shining with the faintest of light. It flowed away from me over the sand, and my gaze followed it... all the way to the heart of the abomination, which had turned and was now staring at me. It didn’t move, gazing at the thread in my hand as if it could sense it. For just a moment, the huge body of the abomination trembled, fear and hope pouring off its rotting form, making my throat close. I took a deep breath and stood, raising my arm to the creature before me.
“This ends now,” I whispered, and gave it a tug.
The knot within the abomination uncoiled. The tangles loosened, unraveled, and then the entire thread came free,spiraling up and away from the prison of dead flesh that had held it for so long. The enormous mound of rotting dragon shuddered once and collapsed, wings crashing to the sand, head hitting the dunes with a thump. The swarm of beetles and worms abandoned the corpse, scuttling out of its body and streaming away over the sand, and the monster’s flesh began to shrivel. Skin and muscle withered, peeling back from the bones and shrinking to nothing, until only the massive skeleton of a once great dragon remained half buried in the sand. As I watched, the bones, too, crumbled, dissolving to dust and ash and blowing away on the wind.
I breathed in the dusty air and let it out slowly. It was done. The abomination was gone, the magic holding it together faded with the unraveling of the soul. I prayed to the goddess that I would never have to face something like that again.
“Sparrow.”
