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Suddenly, the chopper lurches. There’s a sound like metal groaning.
Cora screams over the chopper noise. Her scream falls away as I fly through the air and out the chopper door. As I collide with a huge, feathery body. As razor-sharp talons slice down my thighs. As I grab onto something that feels like a man but also a bird.
My Damascus sinks into a feathery chest, and I keep pushing until it’s buried to the hilt. Then I rip it downward, gutting whoever or whatever this is that my Gift commanded me to attack.
Blood spurts onto my face, my neck, my hands. An ear-piercing shriek cuts the air.
Then I’m falling.
There’s a whoosh of air, like enormous wings are battling to stay aloft.
More blood covers me. Keeping hold of my Damascus, I let go of the feathered body, and it falls away from me.
The sense of urgency that drove me out of the chopper is gone. I’ve done what needed doing. Cora will be better off without a damaged Judge moping around Eagle Peak. My brothers will be better off with Rev as their leader. I spread my arms wide and welcome the fall.
Doc
“No!” Before I can react,Jud cuts his way free from the stretcher and leaps for the open door. “Jud!”
After everything we went through to rescue him, he’s going to commit suicide? By jumping out of a chopper when we’re on our way to safety? With Cora right here watching?
But he doesn’t launch himself into a freefall. Just outside the chopper door, he runs smack into…what the hell is that? A giant bird…man…thing?
It’s dark up here. The only lighting comes from the dim overhead in the cabin and the flashing beacon on the tail. But it’s enough that I can make out a man-sized, bird-like body with a beaked face and a wingspan as long as the chopper.
Raptor. Jesus Christ! He can turn into an actual bird?
He snuck up on us, and somehow, Jud knew. He threw himself out the door just as Raptor swooped in to block the cargo doorway.
The chopper leans in Raptor’s direction. I’m tossed toward the other door, where Target is perched. Raptor must have latched onto the side with his talons.
With Jud clinging to him, Raptor’s wings beat against the air. Then, Raptor falls away, and Jud starts going down with him.
Without thinking, I scramble to my feet and push off for all I’m worth. I can’t lose my brother after just finding him. I won’t!
I sail out the chopper door and wrap everything I’ve got around Jud. Arms. Legs. Will.
If he were his normal, fit size, I wouldn’t have a prayer of holding onto him against the fight of gravity. But he’s been starved for the last week. He’s lost a good percentage of his body weight.
I lock him in my hold, hoping I remember correctly that Stealth strapped me into a tether. If I hadn’t had to put one leg through the harness, I might not have even noticed my new soldier friend was looking after my safety. I was too busy looking after Jud’s.
I brace myself for what I hope will be the tether’s jerk. And there it is. A tooth-rattling, bone-jarring yank at my back.
I grabbed Jud awkwardly, my arms around his waist. He’s top heavy in my hold, and I tilt down. At least a mile below me is the massive black surface of Lake Pontchartrain.
Jud dangles from my straining arms, and the harness digs into my thighs.
In small, jerky segments, we’re hoisted up, and up.
By the time I’m lying on my back, panting with relief, X-Ray has righted the chopper.
“I got them!” Stealth shouts.
“Jesus Christ!” That’s X-Ray. “The hell was that?”
“That—was—Raptor,” I pant. A single nylon rope and carabiner stopped me and Jud from plummeting to our deaths. I’m having trouble convincing my heart that I’m safe.
I’m still on my back when Cora leaps on me and throws her arms around my neck. She kisses all over my face, and then she’s giving Jud the same treatment.
