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A forceful gust of wind hit my back, and I moved to turn, feeling the ground beneath my feet tremble. My head recoiled at the force of the impact. A swift blow to the back of my skull. I fell.
And fell.
The sound of beating wings was the last thing I heard before the dizzying darkness swallowed me whole.
Chapter Twenty-One
Alaric
Atremor of pain raced across the back of my head. I shuddered at the force of it.
“Where’s Liana?”
Two words. That was all it took to obliterate every other thought from my mind.
Where’s Liana?It was Tiernan who’d said it. I spun, leaving Valin to trail off mid-sentence.
The day courter stood there, chest heaving and eyes wide. His head whipping back and forth.
The edge. I was there in an instant, peering over to the clouds and darkness below.No.She couldn’t have fallen—wouldn’t have. My stomach dropped.
Kade dove from the plateau before I could open my mouth to give the order. His wings tucked tight against his sides, plummeting downward. A pained roar echoed after him, mirroring my own pain.
I shouted her name. But it was futile, she wouldn’t be able to hear me. I felt for her. She had a certain feel to her emotions, and I would know if she were nearby, but I felt nothing except the violent worry of Finn and Tiernan.
I whirled back around, searching the immediate area. She wouldn’t have gone off alone. She wouldn’t do that to us. But… no. I was faced with bare rock. She wasn’t there either.
Neither was Valin.
Valin.
Where had he gone?
Valin could’ve left without our notice as we peered over the edge of the cliff, but Liana couldn’t have gotten past us without notice. She either fell down or someone took her… up.
Draconians bobbed and weaved as they soared through the star strewn sky. Tens of them. But none of them carrying a passenger. How far could she have gotten? How long had it been? A minute? Three?
Finn shook at my side, ready for an order—anything, just anything. He needed to move. “Go,” I ordered him, jutting my chin up to the sky, “Find her!”
He left the ground with such force the mountain shuddered under my boots.
“Captain?” Tiernan said, waiting—eager for orders like his comrade was.
Could she have been right about Valin? The thought made me want to be ill. My heart thudded against my chest. Fast. Faster.
I would rip him apart with my bare hands. Put his head on a pike—and burn the rest of him to ash. I would—
Liana… I pictured her, taken. Alone. Afraid. It took everything I had to remain on my feet. Turn the crippling anguish at my failure into something I could use. To find her. To bring her home.
Iwillbring her home.
I looked to Tiernan. Saw the same anger in his eyes I felt. The same torment. He was thinking the same thing. His emotions rippled off him in rogue waves, crashing over me. Feeding into my growing storm of fury.
“Find Valin,” I growled through gritted teeth and raced into the crowd, sword out. The blade eager to taste the blood of a hero.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Liana
