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Because that was Gawayn’s warm wind, meeting the flames, creating a wall of hot air around himself as a shield. Their first shots had landed. Burn marks marred his chest, shoulder, and upper thigh.
I hit the ground hard, my knees screaming at the impact even as I used them to roll away, clear of the flames and the sword still gripped in Gawayn’s hand. I swung upward, daggers in hand.
“Get back,” I yelled over my shoulder, edging into that space where flames met wind.
“No,” they said simply, in unison.
My heart cracked.
“This is between us,” I said to Gawayn instead, edging closer. I could feel the heat of the sisters’ flames. The near-invisible hairs on my arms started to burn away.
“If they will not stand down, then so be it,” Gawayn said. He sent a pulse of magic, pushing their flames back farther.
I could see Charis beginning to flag. She was the weakest of them, her magic limited. Carly would last longer, then it would be Cyara alone. But she was still healing, still weakened from the attack on her wings.
Wings.
Cyara could not fly yet, but the other two could.
I lunged to the side, out of the way of the flames. “Charis, to me!” I commanded.
Gawayn sighed heavily but didn’t move, didn’t pull back his magic. “Enough games, Veyka. It is only a matter of time before I wear them down. If you truly wish to spare them, then give yourself up.”
Charis paused, but did as I said, peeling away from her sisters and edging to my side. I couldn’t whisper. It would be of no use. We were all too close, our hearing too sharp for secrets in this small space.
But as I made a show of sheathing one of my knives and drawing the curved blade from my back instead, I dragged my hand purposefully along the outside edge of Charis’ white feathers. Her eyes widened, and I knew she understood.
She looked to her sisters, and I knew she’d convey the message. They may not be twins or triplets, but I’d seen the unspoken language between them. Recognized it for the same connection Arthur and I had once shared. It felt like a final gift from my brother that the sacred tie between siblings would be what saved me once again.
I waited for Charis’ eyes to return to me. A half breath to steady myself, then I dipped my chin.
Charis and Carly shot into the air and I shot forward on silent footsteps, praying the distraction would give me an opening.
But Gawayn was faster, more powerful than I’d ever imagined.
He shoved me back, a gust of wind whipping my legs out from under me even as another held Cyara’s flames at bay.
It was the fact that she could not fly that saved Cyara.
That spared her, as Gawayn’s brutal wind snapped her sister’s wings and brought them crashing down in front of him. Two swipes of his massive sword, easy, unbothered swings that were almost casual.
And they were gone.
Their heads severed from their bodies.
Cyara’s flame disappeared as the cry ripped from her throat. The same gut-wrenching sound I’d heard from my own lips when Arthur died. I remembered that moment. It had been Gawayn who pulled me to safety, who protected me when I’d been helpless.
But I wasn’t helpless anymore. I’d never truly been, I realized as I flung myself through the air.
No strength, no magic in the world could have stopped me, then, as I sank my dagger into his chest. The surprise in his gray eyes was lost to the darkness as death stalked nearer. I hooked that curved blade around his throat, ready to rake it across. To steal his lifeblood, as he’d been ready to steal mine.
But I was thrown back, my body careening over the lifeless bodies of my two felled friends, the force of it and the cracking of bones disgusting and wrenching.
I tensed the muscles in my abdomen, springing back up to my feet in the fluid, powerful motion Gwen had taught me. Her dark laughter as she’d watched me struggle, while we practiced again and again, was the power that fueled me through that next moment.
I gnashed my teeth, ready to go again, attack again.
But there was nothing to attack.
