AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Worn to bones, worn to blood,” she chortled, walking up to them. “A Spindle torn for flame, a Spindle torn for flood.”
He recognized the rhyme. She said it before, so many months ago, in a tavern at a crossroads. The Spindle for flood was gone. But the Spindle for flame remained, burning now, close enough to smell.
Ridha eyed them all, her brow furrowed in confusion. “We found the old witch floating out to sea, clinging to some driftwood. The Jydi said she is one of their own, and she led us through the clouds. Right to you,” she said. “Do you know her?”
Valtik’s laughter cracked like split bone.
“The Spindle looms,” she sang, puttering along. “The dead tree blooms!”
Corayne took her arm, as if the Jydi woman needed any kind of help. “She’s right—there’s no time to explain.”
Ridha threw her hands up in disbelief. “Baleir’s wings!” shecursed. “You understand the old witch?”
“Don’t fret over it,” Dom muttered. “We have worse to face.”
Beyond the beach, the city still burned, its gates still shut fast. Dom’s fear rose to life again. He tried to breathe evenly and slow his quickening heart.
The others looked out, watching the flames.
“Into the jaws of death we go,” Ridha murmured.
Sorasa was the first to climb back into the saddle, snapping her reins.
“You get used to it,” she said over her shoulder.
They wasted little time forming up, the war band on their horses, the Jydi and the Vedera on foot. The raider chiefs stood out in their war paint, white and blue and green swiped across their eyes, the colors denoting their clans. Only Valtik wore black. She returned to the Companions astride a horse none of them had ever seen before. Dom thought little of her mysteries now, long used to her strangeness. And grateful for it too. His mind was ahead, on the gates of Gidastern. They were only oak banded in iron, but cracks ran through the wood. Flames licked up inside the walls, burning against the other side of the gates.
The gates will fall easily,Dom thought, though they had no siege engines and no battering rams. From a few hundred yards off, he could already see them crumbling. A few Vedera would not struggle to bring them down.
Oscovko raised his sword, roaring out a cry to rally his war band. They answered in Treckish, a rousing shout, their swords ringing against shields. The Jydi joined the fray, haunting in theirchant. Their voices thumped like a drum, like a heartbeat, in a language beyond reckoning. Dom felt it pounding with his blood, and his horse pawed the frozen ground beneath them, eager to run. He was eager too, his sword in hand. The steel edge gleamed with the fiery light. Beneath the clouds and falling snow, he no longer knew what time it was, day or night. All the realm seemed to narrow, until there was only the burning city and their force. Even with Ridha’s ships, they numbered less than a thousand.
Will it be enough?
This would not be like the temple. Corayne could not hang back and wait, not with Taristan nearby. And not with the Spindle burning in the city. She would have to ride with them, safe within their company, the Spindleblade at the ready.
She waited now between Andry and Dom, her face indifferent and still. But her horse betrayed her emotions. The mare whickered nervously, feeling Corayne’s fear.
Dom wished he could take it from her, but there was nothing he could do but fight. It was his best use now: a weapon and a shield, not a friend.
Ridha stood with Lady Eyda and the Vedera of Kovalinn, the sight of them Dom’s only comfort. A single Veder was worth many good soldiers, and at least a hundred stood at Eyda’s back, armed and flint-eyed. But he feared for them too, Ridha above all. He could not even fathom the loss of her, not now when she was real and breathing before him.
Something clattered behind the gate, and every immortal turned, hearing what the others could not. Dom narrowed his eyes, trying to see through the wood itself, to whatever waited onthe other side. Something wasscratching, its claws breaking against the charred wooden gates.
Many somethings,Dom realized with a jolt.
Their roar was sharp and short, like a dog’s bark but deeper. Bloodthirsty. It rose from the city, echoing out over the coast, louder even than the crashing waves. The cry settled deep in the pit of Dom’s belly. His jaw tightened as the creatures roared again, his teeth gritted so hard they threatened to shatter. Many of the riders flinched, ducking down in the saddle or looking to the sky in fear. Others glared at the Companions or the immortals, searching for some explanation.
But there was none to be had.
The Jydi alone did not quail, raising their axes and swords and spears. Their chant deepened, louder now, rising to match the barking roar of the Spindle monsters beyond the gate. Oscovko followed suit, howling out his wolf call, and his war band reacted in kind, ringing their shields again.
Sigil added her voice to the cacophony, raising the cry of the Temur.
Then Charlie kissed his palms in prayer, looking to the sky. His lips moved without sound and Dom hoped some god heard him. After a long moment, Charlie looked down their line, his eyes finding each of them. He lingered on Corayne, offering her a grim smile.
“Don’t die,” Charlie said, dipping his head to her. “I won’t allow it.”
Her lips tightened, her smile tight but sure.
