AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Once we picked our way to the outer edge of the tents, I turned my gelding loose. His hoofbeats rang hollowly across the emptiness of the flatlands, the cold wind whipping back the cape, my leather jacket keeping out most of the night’s chill.
It took forever, but when the Caverns came into view, I slowed to a walk. The ridiculous helmet had rubbed my nose raw, but as long as my face stayed covered and my hair hidden, no one from the opposing army would recognize me.
Just a lowly enemy scout sent to gather intel.
In the silent no man’s land between the two slumbering armies, I slung the cloak over my shoulder and worked the bands off my arms. Then I took the stolen chain, meant to connect two weapons together, stringing the bands onto it and fastening them around my neck.
Magic illuminated the air with a shimmer of white. Fine, then. If they were looking, the mages would see me coming, but that could work to my advantage.
No hate in my heart, no hate in my heart, no hate in my heart.
I chanted Torin’s warning over and over as I urged the gelding forward, theclomp,clomp,clompof hooves echoing loudly across the arid plain. They’d lit a few small fires in front of the gaping maw of the Caverns, Caladrian soldiers in their blue and silver uniforms, and mages in their nondescript dark robes gathered around them, faces lit by the flickering flames.
I stopped at the copse of dead trees sticking like spikes out of the cracked ground, tied the reins around the sturdiest branch, and walked away from the gelding, ignoring his soft, nervous snort at being left alone in the darkness. “Don’t worry, I’ll be back for you.” The crackled ground looked like dragon’s skin, a million scales of curled up dirt crunching beneath my boots.
The night smothered my quick, nervous breaths and the snapping of the fires—even the low hum of conversation seemed dulled down out here in the open.
I walked steadily toward our enemies, making no effort to be quiet. My hand slipped into my pocket, and I ran my thumb over the smooth white stone one last time, a sense of calm stealing over me. Fifty, a hundred…two hundred enemies, I counted, with those awful hounds laying off to the side, restrained by leashes of black, ghostly magic. Some of them raised their heads then climbed to their feet, their hackles bristling.
I drew a shaky breath when the voices stopped and I made out faces outlined by the firelight, the gleaming greed in the mages’ eyes, the sharp, hungry teeth of the soldiers, the raw hunger of the hounds.
I raised my hands when the mages snapped the leashes off the beasts, sending ten powerful, monstrous creatures streaking toward me, mouths gaping, teeth so sharp they glinted.
Food for their beasts, I’m sure they thought.
A spy to be dealt with.
Behind them, the soldiers’ faces twisted with eagerness. These were the males who’d put three arrows through my lover. The ones who would die first.
Tomorrow, Zorander and his men could defeat the rest of the Fae King’s army through blade and brawn as he had for hundreds of years.
But these men…These were mine.
Coarse laughter rang out, the soldiers anticipating the spectacle of the hounds ripping me apart. One of the mages cupped his hands around his mouth and howled into the sky, a mockery of the hounds, and yet the beasts joined in until the air shivered with their voices.
I was supposed to shed blood today so the Oracle’s plan could come to fruition.
I would do no such thing.
I was going to save the ones I loved.
I was doing this for Raz and Adele and Zor. For Tavion and Tristan. For the innocents in Tempeste who would suffer once war overflowed the walls of the city.
I squeezed my eyes closed and culled every shred of my hatred away, leaving only my purest intentions behind.
Love. Protection. Friendship.
No hate in my heart, no hate in my heart, no hate in my heart.
I lifted my hands over my head and drew a deep breath of crisp air tainted with bloodlust and the beast’s foul breath, who were snarling like a pack of ravening wolves as they bore down on me.
I willed my blood to ice, my temper into calm.
I was without sympathy or remorse, a creation of both the Oracle and the Fae King, and I would protect my family and my friends.
“I do this out of love,” I murmured before I ripped the magic up out of me and cast a roaring wave of power straight into the hounds.
The starlight power tore through their tough hides, shredding them apart, growls turning to yelps of pain, snarls to whimpers as starlight morphed into white-hot flame. I stalked straight into them, through them, toward the mages and soldiers fumbling for arrows and swords and magic of their own, fumbling for whatever they thought might protect them…but it was too late.
