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Amelia…where was Amelia? He hoped Ragnar had dragged her away. That they weren’t a part of the fight.
The air crackled and shifted like sea froth around jagged rocks, the magic a hum he felt in his bones. Sels kept coming, soldiers and drakes both, and each time Alpha tore one to shreds, two more emerged to harry him further.
A wolf hamstrung a soldier, and Leif tore out his throat when he hit his knees.
They had to close that portal. Nothing could end until they did so.
But Leif hadn’t the faintest idea how.
~*~
Magic was more about feeling than thinking, Amelia had learned. She was not a patient person, not one prone to meditation and letting feelings flow through her. She didn’t call on Alpha’s mind for help, either, not wanting to distract him, and so when she closed her eyes, and sought that other plane, the Between, she feared she wouldn’t be able to reach it, much less reach anyone else there.
But desperation, the sheer force of her need, must have propelled her, and, as Tessa had instructed her, she dropped down, and then up, found the light, and hurtled toward it, dizzy and sick when she landed in a heap on the crushed, dead grass of her desired location.
A moment later, Tessa popped into being across from her, looking around in bewilderment.
“Tessa,” Amelia said, breathless, from the ground, and heaved herself to her feet, shaking like a new, wet foal.
Tessa gasped. “Lia! Are you all right? I was riding, I’m still in the air, and–”
“I don’t have time,” Amelia gasped. Her heart was racing, panic blurring her vision at the edges. “Get Náli.”
~*~
Reggie had been plagued by nightmares of his captivity for nearly a year. They woke him almost every night – though Connor’s affections had dulled them as of late – and haunted him at spontaneous waking moments as well: a scent, a snatch of a cruel laugh, a too-tight collar that reminded him of the noose.
This was worse. And it wasn’t even a nightmare at all, but current events that he couldn’t wrap his mind around.
In his brief stint as the Selesee army’s pass-around whore, he’d never seen anything like the slender winged beasts that poured out of the crack in the world.
For a moment, when he’d been knocked back by the force of the rending of the air, he’d lain there, dazed and stupid, as he watched men and monsters emerge from what looked like nothing more than a bottomless black well hanging suspended above the road. He was a lord and heir who’d been trained as a knight; he’d won countless tourneys on horseback, his lance shattering against his opponent’s shield. He’d never been meant forthis. For grappling with horrors beyond his wildest imaginings.
Then Connor appeared above him, held out a hand, and said, “You all right?”
Reggie clasped his hand and let himself be hauled to his feet. “Yeah.” He was breathless, and his heart was lodged in his throat, but there was nothing for it. “We’ve got to contain them.” He nodded toward the void, toward the Sels engaged by snarling wolves, and the reinforcements that leaped down, more and more, bright gold against the dusty backdrop of the road. “If any of them get loose in the countryside…”
“Yeah,” Connor said, grimly, though his gaze glittered with readiness. He drew his sword. “You take the left, I’ll take the right.”
Reggie drew his own blade, took a deep breath, and nodded.
“With me!” he called to his men, and lead the charge, a wide arc out to the side of the road. Across it, he saw Connor doing the same, drawing a circle around the enemies pouring forth.
A volley of arrows entered the fray, finding gaps in armor, the narrow slits of visors: Connor’s best Stranger archers, hitting neat targets. Men fell, and were replaced. The Sel numbers were such, now, that the wolves couldn’t keep them at bay. Three broke off to the left, and charged straight for Reggie’s position.
“Hold!” he called to his men. “Hold them here, now!”
He knew a pang of want for his helm, and his shield, fixed uselessly on his saddle, but then the first of the soldiers was upon him, and there was no more time for thought.
He brought up his sword, and steel chimed against steel, like the clanging of bells.
~*~
Wars amongst the clans of the Waste were nothing like the wars in which Erik’s grandfather and father had fought; wars like Erik himself had waged, as revenge for his father’s death. No soaring campaign tents, and tables spread with maps; advisors, and cups of wine and Serious Discussions about formations, and routes, and whether the summer bogs were sturdy enough underfoot to support the weight of loaded wagons and armored men on heavy horses.
No, the wars of Ragnar’s youth had been opportunistic murders in the dark of night; creeping outside sleeping tents with knives in hand; cudgeling one another with blunted clubs while the rest of both clans stood in a circle, screaming and egging them on. It was duels, and horse races, and stabbings. Cheating – so much cheating. Because there was no such thing as honor in the Wastes, only survival, and Ragnar had survived most. He was cleverer than his father had been, and more ruthless. It was something Erik and his little princelings could never hope to understand: honor and ceremony and honesty didn’t mean shit if you were lying dead in your bedroll, an enemy’s knife stuck in your chest. Power was all that mattered. Fear. And the man with the most teeth around his neck was the most powerful, and the most feared.
In that way, Ragnarwashonest. More honest than any of them.
