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One of the Weir managed to sidestep her attack and its claws ripped into her hip, slashing through the leather pants she wore. She almost didn’t feel the pain when its teeth sank into her knee next, but she slammed her fists down on its head and channeled enough flame to destroy it. Pain and dizziness began to surface, threatening to break past her desperate struggle to survive. Pain and blood and smoke filled her lungs and she found herself screaming in challenge, delving deeper into the magic of the fireblood, drawing on its infinite power and infinite danger.
“No, Hettie!” Tyrus warned.
She heard his words but they were meaningless to her. Another Weir landed in front of her, and she grabbed it by the ruff of its neck and ripped it apart with her magic. Let them come! Let them meet their death! She was enraged, feeling her mind begin to totter over the brink. She no longer cared. If she were going to die in the Scourgelands, she would ruin it. It would be reborn in fire.
“No!” Tyrus shouted, striking her hard across the face, just as Annon had. While he was turned, two Weir knocked him down, ripping into his flesh. He groaned in pain, twisting quickly and shielding his face from their claws. Fire bloomed again, shattering them both, and he made it up just as another round advanced.
“Climb, Hettie!” he begged her, retreating to the promontory wall. “That way! Climb!”
He stood between her and the Weir, his expression full of hate and rage. He took the leather pouch around his neck and put it in his mouth, beginning to chew on the bag. It contained monkshood, the dose she did not know. He would chew on it, dissolving it with his saliva until it entered his system. It would kill him, but not until after he had released the full power.
Her heart spasmed with sadness, seeing the desperate look in his eyes. “Please!” he begged her, imploring her to abandon him to the madness. To save herself as he could not do.
Tears stung Hettie’s eyes. He had always been so hard, so implacable. But she saw at the end that he had been preparing himself for the moment. That he had truly come to the Scourgelands to die and save her and Annon if he could. He wanted to repay the debt owed to Merinda. Hettie rarely wept. She experienced a surge of forgiveness so powerful that she nearly started sobbing. Through the hard shell of his emotions, she saw him as he truly was and she pitied his loneliness, his solitary life, his determination to sacrifice all to save the world.
Abandoning him was the hardest thing she had experienced. She hurried onto the rocky edge, clambering swiftly to find handholds and footholds. One of the beasts snagged her boot, but she kicked free of it and clawed her way higher, leaving the Weir down below to surround Tyrus on all sides. He was hunched in pain, his arms crooked as they spread out, unleashing flames.
The rocks scratched her fingers as she pulled herself higher, fighting off exhaustion and despair. The smoke from the fires made a haze that was difficult to penetrate. Before long, she lost sight of Tyrus below and the darting shadows that converged on him. A few drops of rain pattered on her head. Thunder boomed right overhead, splitting the air with its deep coughs. She struggled to find footing, maneuvering up a cracked lip that made her muscles ache and wither. There was no Paedrin to catch her if she fell this time. No rope or harness to secure her to the knobs and crags. Painfully, span by span, she climbed toward the crest of the promontory, listening to the barks and snarls below.
A wave of heat and light rushed from below, blinding her. She pressed herself against the rocks, scraping her cheek against a spur of jagged stone. The fire was white-hot in intensity, exploding in a pillar of devastation that scorched the ground all around. The wall of flames was almost as high as she had climbed and it made her reel at the power he had delved into to unleash such an inferno. The light made her shadow against the cliff wall, and she hung her head, drenched with misery as she realized what he had done. He had sacrificed his own mind and his life to save her, a poor Romani girl who had never studied the Paracelsus tomes, had lived a life of thieving and deception since she had been stolen at birth. Of the two of them, she had deserved to die.
The flames roared and spread across the wasted land. But amidst the roar of the flames, she heard Tyrus’s mad laughter ringing out louder still.
Annon’s eyes felt as heavy as stones. He lay crumpled in the clotting mass of dried leaves and sharp twigs. His blood seeped from his body, spilling from the wounds and soaking the ground. His feet tingled with the loss of feeling. His fingertips experienced the same sensation. As a strange memory, he recalled the Rike Lukias speaking clinically of these sensations where Khiara had revived him back in Silvandom. What a curious memory to have in such a moment. He swallowed, experiencing the effort it took to complete. His vision began to swim, but he tried to focus his eyes. Was that music he heard? What strange memory had been unlocked in his mind? He lay prostrate, one arm flung out ahead of him. The burn of the arrow in his shoulder that had pierced him through was fading. The one in his stomach had wrenched when he had collapsed, ripping his skin wide open. He felt numbness now. Water—just a mouthful of water would have been worth a thousand ducats.
