Page 184 of A Bond so Fierce and Fragile

The pain in Loche’s eyes was for himself. For the person he’d become once he killed his mother.

For the person he’d leave behind.

After today… Lessia understood it completely.

She’d counted her kills. Sixteen rebels, many her own age, had fallen at her blades. Sixteen souls she’d have to remember the rest of her life, and perhaps even in the next one.

“Do it. Don’t be a fucking coward for once in your life, and do it,” his mom hissed, and Lessia’s gaze drifted farther out across the sea, toward where the wyverns still floated and then to where…

Where were the Reinsdor ships?

Lessia spun around as Loche said something to his mother, the words fading into the wind as her heart began beating harder.

“No,” she breathed as her eyes snapped to the southwest, where the tallest part of the rocky island behind them towered, a straight, dark wall driving its way deep into the sea, the waves crashing harshly against it.

Almost half their ships had been forced over there, forced between the curved edges that jutted out on either side.

Nearly as many rebel ships blocked their exit, the thick chains falling from them into the sea betraying how they’d anchored themselves there, making sure Loche’s ships could not escape while the fighting continued.

The struggle was still as loud and frantic as theirs had been in the beginning—the humans and rebels over there were more evenly skilled—but that wasn’t what made the last of Lessia’s verve leave her and crawl through the gaps in the wooden planks beneath her.

It was the hundred-foot wave chasing the Reinsdor ships toward that same inlet, how the wave curved around them, allowing them only to sail forward.

It was the armada of Fae ships behind it, a gilded one in the middle—the one that she knew Rioner must be standing in, in the bow, directing the wave.

It was the ships docking on the other side of the island, somehow coming from the north, with flags she didn’t recognize and with Fae who were now mounting the isle, molding the rock before her eyes so it built stairways leading directly above the trap.

“Merrick!” There was no other word in her mind, and he must have heard the pure terror in her voice because he spun, his dark eyes taking in the scene quicker than she had.

“Fuck! Chain her or kill her, Loche! We need to go!” Merrick screamed so loudly that everyone on their ship and several on the ones beside them looked over, then moved to what was about to unfold around them.

Rebel and nonrebel froze as one before they ceased all fighting, weapons clanging to the floor as they were abandoned. People were running back to the ships, trying to get away from the Fae soldiers who would follow the wave, aiming to crush those who now had nowhere to go in the cove.

Loche looked exactly how Lessia felt, his face so ashen she worried he might pass out. “What do we do?”

She knew that had it been a different situation, Merrick might have teased the regent for turning fully to him, but Merrick didn’t even blink as he responded, “We run.”

“No—” Lessia started, but Merrick dragged her to him, his face so hard that it reminded her of how it had looked when they first got to know each other.

“If we leave now, wemightsurvive. I saymight, Lessia!” Merrick’s dark eyes whirled with such emotion that shewhimpered at the sight. “I know! I know how much it hurts! Trust me! But they are already dead! They’re not getting out of there—not with that wave and the fucking anchors of the rebel ships.”

Another hand folded around her arm as she shook her head.

Loche.

“He’s right, Lessia.” The regent jerked his head toward where Iviry had already begun strapping weapons onto her tall body, her eyes flying to the cove and the ships trapped within as she did it. “We need to go!”

“There is a boat back here! It’s small, but we’ll fit on it.”

Lessia’s blood ran cold at the new voice before she realized it belonged to Zaddock, and she knew warmth should have filled her at the sight of him, of Amalise in his arms, injured but alive, of her sister walking hand in hand with a bloodied Raine, of Pellie and Kerym trailing behind them, of Venko running right into Ardow’s arms.

They were alive.

But it was as if ice had permanently taken the place of her usually warm blood, and when Kerym searched the group, his blue eyes more muddled than she’d ever seen them, she actually shivered beneath the sheen of sweat covering her skin.

His eyes captured hers, and she shook her head at his silent question.

Kerym didn’t scream.