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Marc joins us, grasping on to Sharpe’s waist.
Then Darius steps out of Marc’s body and appears at my side, reaching through the souls to wrap around Flint’s wrist. “I did not let a child god cut out my heart only for you to die now.”
But even our combined weight isn’t enough, and our feet skid across the concrete, dragging us toward the rip in the veil.
Then Mayn grabs Darius’s waist to anchor him, followed by O’Hara and Johannsson latching on to Sharpe. More and more of our people join in until a long line of the living resists the pull of the dead.
Slowly, we drag Flint free of the spirits’ hold, his body turning solid once more, and he crashes into mine and Darius’s arms.
Sobbing with relief, I clutch him close to me as the spiritfarers slip through the veil, taking all of the freed souls with them.
Flint turns his face into my neck and lets out an unsteady breath. “Put the bird back to sleep, love. No ascending today.”
Nodding, I let the glow fade from my skin, the release of power leaving me shaky and exhausted.
Sharpe’s arms tighten around me in a hug, and he ruffles Flint’s hair before he releases me. “Okay, back to work, people! We’re not done yet!”
Groans rise from all around, but they return to clearing the road.
By the time the fire trucks pull up, there’s almost a clear path to New Clearhelm.
Sharpe meets with the fire captain and convinces the man to let the fires in the forest burn for a while longer, just to make sure the Bone Man stays dead.
As the firemen get to work with their axes and chainsaws, breaking up the trees that can’t be easily dragged, the Clearhelm Police arrive.
Captain Bailey storms out of the first cruiser, his face livid. “All of you are under arrest!”
Sharpe ignores him as he continues to give directions to clear the road.
Bailey blusters and shoves at his reluctant officers. “Handcuff all of them!”
But no one seems eager to do the job.
As his shouts rise in volume, Mayn pauses to take a sip of salt water and wipes the sweat from her brow. “I could kill him.”
She delivers the words with the same dispassion she would use while offering to take out the trash.
“As could I.” Hatred for the man curls through me. “If only he’d been standing with the mayor when the Bone Man took him. That would have dealt with two thorns in our sides.”
“Fortune is never so kind.” Mayn sips from her bottle. “It would not be hard.”
No, killing Bailey would be easy. The man is far too confident of his position keeping him safe to guard against assassination. “But it would put all of us under suspicion.”
She hums quietly, the sound sending an unintentional shiver down my spine.
“And Sharpe wouldn’t like it,” I add as an afterthought.
“We wouldn’t have to tell him.” Her gaze shifts to Flint, who sits in the back of an SUV with Anny, recovering from his near death. “Or he could simply die in his sleep of unknown causes.”
I shake my head. Flint kills when he has to, but it bothers him more than it does the rest of us.
Well, it bothers him more than it does me, Marc, or Darius. Since his most recent reincarnation, Sharpe’s more selective about who he kills.
I smile as I spot the news vans arriving. “Never thought I’d be happy to see them.”
Bailey won’t try to arrest us all with the news recording everything.
Reporters boil out onto the street, their cameras already rolling.
