Page 360 of Commanding Scythe and Sky

Too small.

Horror curdled my stomach. The figure lifted his tear-streaked face, and the world fell away.

Not man.

Boy.

Fletcher was strung to the whipping post.

“Goddamnit,” Barry muttered, releasing my elbow and shifting into shadow in the next breath. But he didn’t appear beside Fletcher. Didn’t reappear at all, for that matter. He was just gone. Panic rooted me to the spot, a scream bubbling up my throat as that wretched man raised his hand again.

I slammed magic through my arms, and Smith’s hold on me popped off like I’d electrocuted him.

“Briar!” he barked, his voice twisted between panic and anger.

But I was already running.

Running with his livid shouts at my back. “Stop! You don’t know what you’re fucking doing! Briar!” Throwing my arms out, I yanked everything down behind me—paintings, shelves, suits of metal armor—a calamitous clatter echoing off the walls and nearly swallowing his pleas for me to stop.

The guards at the end of the hallway turned, brows lifting a beat before I wrapped my magic around their hearts and squeezed, bringing them both to their knees as I sprinted through the double doors.

“Goddamnit, Briar,” Smith snarled.

I released the guards, bolting down the steps as they both gasped for breath.

“Stop!” I cried as that sick son of a bitch raised his arm again. “Stop!”

Not a single soul stopped me as I threw myself through the gathered crowd. It wasn’t until I lunged between the guard and Fletcher that anyone reacted with more than shocked gasps.

The guard redirected his blow, and I threw up my arm, turning my face aside just in time to avoid the brunt of it. Leather cracked across my forearm and licked my cheek, the sharp sting drowned beneath the anger threatening to eat me alive.

With a cry, I staggered back, but the man yanked me forward. Or at least he tried. I wrapped a tendril of power around his heart, squeezing as that anger rose and rose and rose within the walls of my outrage.

I wanted to crush it.

Wanted to kill him for the cruelty he so eagerly inflicted on someone who hadn’t even ascended yet.

A boy.

Wanted to watch his lifeless body slump to the ground.

But the thought left me frozen in a moment I should absolutely not be.

The memory of Cora’s father on his knees slammed into me. Then the man who’d crumpled as I dashed into the hospital wing. Horror cooled the rage just enough. Constrict? Yes. But I wasn’t a killer. I never should’ve known the feeling of snuffing out a life. It was incompatible with the power flowing through my veins.

“No,” Fletcher croaked, slumped against the whipping pole, the strength drained from his body. Keeping my hold on the guard’s vitals, I dropped beside him, knees striking the hard earth a beat before I threw my arms over him protectively.

“What is the meaning of this?” Moros drawled, but I didn’t miss the cruel pleasure in the subtle curl to his lips.

“I could ask you the same thing!” I snapped. For one vicious second, I decided maybe one more death was warranted, and my magic lashed for Moros, colliding with an impenetrable wall. “What is wrong with you people?”

The icy amusement in his eyes and lupine tilt to his head told me I’d just given Moros something he desperately wanted. Something I likely wouldn’t survive.

I couldn’t bring myself to care.

“He’s a traitor,” Moros said simply.

“He’s a child!” I shouted back.