Page 45

TYCHO

The sounds of fighting in the distance are clear. Men and women are shouting, screaming, dying. I don’t know how many scravers have attacked, because my attention is solely focused on the one pinning me to the ground.

I’ve tried calling magic to fight him, but everything I attempt is met with failure. Any fire I create is blown away by his wind. I’ve seen Grey repel enemies on the battlefield, but it’s not a practiced skill for me—or maybe scravers are just immune. My efforts leave me panting in the dirt.

I have no idea if Malin will find the king—or if I’ve just sent my friend to his death.

I have no idea what the scravers will do with Grey if they find him. Will his own magic be equally useless? Will they tear him apart like they’re doing to the soldiers on the battlefield?

Have they already?

I have to shove the thoughts away. They won’t help me now.

In between attempts at magic, I surge at Nakiis’s hold, but he barely budges.

“They’re not just after the king,” I snarl at him breathlessly. Desperately. “They’re killing everyone.”

“Those same soldiers conspire against your king, too.”

“Not all of them!”

Nakiis says nothing. Down by the training fields, the scraver screams have grown louder. Something has changed—but I have no idea what.

“Grey would help you,” I say. “He’s helped you before, and he would help you now—especially if he knew what you needed.”

“No. He would not.” Nakiis leans down close, until I can see the glint of his fangs. “He threatened you. He trapped you here.”

The words tug at my heart, leaving seeds of doubt. He’s said these things before, and I remember how they felt true then, too. I consider how much time I’ve spent doubting Grey’s friendship over the last few months. How much time I’ve spent regretting my loyalty.

Again, I remember the moment when I was fifteen years old and the king stood up for me to Captain Solt, how it felt to have Grey on my side.

I remember the moment I faced him on the fields a few weeks ago, when he told me I wouldn’t be allowed to return to Ironrose.

I’m keeping my people safe. That includes you.

Have I been misreading his actions? Maybe we both carry so much sorrow and suffering that we’re no longer seeing things the same way, but that doesn’t mean Grey is working against me.

Have I been fighting an enemy that doesn’t really exist? Is he ?

Is Nakiis?

I look up into the scraver’s coal-dark eyes and think of the way he said I’ve never really been afraid of him. I think of the way he finally trusted me enough to relax in my presence. I think of the weird truce we’ve formed—a truce that felt like it might be sliding dangerously close to friendship.

“If you trust me enough to help you ,” I say, “then you have to trust me enough to help him .”

He says nothing. His grip doesn’t loosen one bit.

“And if you trap me here,” I add, “with the intention of forcing me to work for you, then you are no better than the people you’re afraid of.”

That gets a reaction. I can feel the jolt in his body. But he still doesn’t loosen his grip.

“He let my father die,” he says.

“No,” I say. “He didn’t. I swear to you, he didn’t. He did everything he could to save him. And your father’s last words were begging Grey to find you . To help you . And that’s exactly what he did.” I take a breath, listening to the screams from the distant fields. Even if Grey isn’t out there, Malin is. Other soldiers are. “Nakiis, please . I owe the king my life. Let me help him.”

Nakiis stares down at me.

And then, without a word, he snaps his wings wide. He launches himself into the trees, leaving me alone on the path.

Mercy spooked and bolted a while ago, so I have to run. My boots are loud on the path, my breathing clouding as I draw closer to the training fields. Magic is in the air everywhere, so many different threads that I couldn’t even begin to count. The distant cries from falling soldiers and screeching scravers echo through the woods. It’s even louder than when Jax and I were attacked with the traveling party. There must be dozens of the creatures in the sky—if not more. As the trees begin to thin, their wings flicker against the sun in every direction, though they seem to be narrowing to a point.

When I near the training barracks at the base of the mountain, soldiers are running in the opposite direction, fleeing into the mountains.

“Stop!” I shout at them. “We have to help the king!”

They blow past me, one of them colliding with my shoulder sharply. Some of them have blood streaming from open wounds. But none of them stop.

A younger soldier stumbles as he runs past me, and I grab hold of his armor, recognizing the single mark on his shoulder that signifies him as a recruit.

“The king!” I snap as other soldiers stream past us. “We have to help—”

“They want a magesmith,” he gasps. “So we’re letting them have him.”

I stare at him, sure I couldn’t have heard that correctly. “What?”

He jerks at my hold. “General’s orders. We’re to run—”

Another soldier sees that I’m holding the recruit in place, and he knocks him free. “Come on!” he snaps.

They bolt away toward the trees. My blood goes ice cold.

They want a magesmith.

So we’re letting them have him.

General’s orders.

I dig my boots into the turf and run again. As I near the training fields, I begin to pass bodies, every one lying in a pool of blood, most bearing claw marks that sliced armor free to find the flesh below.

But there, just past the gardens, I see a man in black with a sword in one hand, and a dagger in the other. He’s driving scravers away, one at a time, though he must have magic, because they can’t all descend on him at once.

Grey.

A few Emberish soldiers must have tried to defend him, but they lie in crumpled heaps of gold and red all over the battlefield. My heart drops as I think of Malin—just as I notice a soldier tucked in a stone alcove of the garden, arrows firing wildly.

Before I can squint to see if it’s Malin, a screech overhead draws my focus. I barely have time to draw a blade and swing before the scraver swipes for my throat. I see blue feathers and a flash of fangs, and then it’s bleeding and falling to the ground.

I keep running, but another dives from above. Sparks and stars glitter in my vision, but I spin and stab and this one falls, too. Another one attacks at my back, and claws latch into my armor. I don’t think I’ll be able to spin in time, but I hear the thwick of an arrow, and the scraver jerks, falling away.

I shoot my gaze toward that stone alcove. Definitely Malin.

I don’t have time for relief. A light-winged scraver is diving for Grey, and his back is open, unguarded. Malin is shooting away a scraver that’s aiming for him, and the king’s sword is busy driving away a scraver that’s attacked from the front.

I slip a throwing knife out of my bracer, and it spins free of my hand. I don’t even wait to see it land, I just throw another. One goes into the light-winged scraver’s back, and I lose track of the other.

It doesn’t matter. The scraver falls to the ground behind the king, shrieking.

Grey whirls, and he doesn’t hesitate. He thrusts his blade into the creature, a killing blow.

His eyes are already lifting, questioning, seeking, and they settle on me.

“Tycho!” he calls, pulling his blade free. “Get to cover.”

“You’re welcome ,” I say, jerking another knife out of my bracer to throw it. “Right shoulder. Now. ”

He spins without looking, blade already arcing, blood spraying when he makes contact.

It gives me time to reach him, and another thwick sounds from above. The scraver shrieks are nearly deafening, but I draw my sword and shout over them.

“I’ve got your back,” I say—and that’s all I have time for, because more descend, and my entire being dissolves into nothing more than a fight for my life—and his. We barely speak, but we don’t need to. Much like the way I could feel his anguish, I’ve trained by his side for years. When he says, “ Left ,” I don’t need to look, I just stab. When I say, “Drop,” I don’t wait for him to move; I just swing my sword because I know Grey will get out of the way.

This is nothing like the time I fought Nakiis in the arena. That was one scraver, and I don’t think he was trying to kill me. Here, I can feel Grey’s magic in the air, but I can feel theirs, too, and there are so very many of them. The air is biting cold and hard to breathe, and frost keeps forming on my blade. Every time I kill one, it seems that another appears.

They call taunts now, too, words that find our ears by virtue of their magic on the wind.

— Prepare to die, magesmiths.

—We followed you here.

—You will no longer control us.

Grey says nothing, but I can feel him weakening. I am, too. Every time the scravers draw blood, we heal the damage, but we’ve been fighting for so long. I can’t remember the last time I heard Malin snap an arrow. The scravers are gaining ground, and our magic begins to tremble. I can hear his breathing, a bit ragged, and I’m sure mine matches. I remember the night we galloped hard to ride for Lia Mara and Sinna, how he burned out his magic. He collapsed, unconscious.

If that happens now, we’re both dead.

Just as I think it, a scraver slams into him—which sends Grey crashing into me. We all go down in a tangle of armor, weapons, and wings. The scraver’s fangs brush against my face, and Grey cries out.

But then I hear a blade pierce flesh, and the scraver slides sideways.

Malin stands over us, his breathing ragged. His face slick with blood from a wound over his eye, but a sword is in his hands.

Grey and I scramble free. We’re both speckled with blood—our own, as well as from the dying creatures that surround us.

A dozen more remain high in the air, but these aren’t attacking—yet. I don’t recognize any of them, but a male scraver at the center has deep rust-colored skin, with vibrant red-and-purple wings.

Words find our ears.

—Your magic won’t last much longer.

I’m panting like I’ve sprinted a mile, and so is Grey. The air is still so cold, and our breath makes quick clouds. A deep wound across my left shoulder is burning. When I try to send magic to heal it, my vision flickers dangerously.

“Why aren’t they attacking?” says Malin.

“They’re assessing how much longer we can last,” Grey says bitterly. He glances at us. “You should get under—”

“If you tell me to get under cover again,” I say, “I really am going to punch you.” I look past him, at the sky, and frown. “I thought Nakiis and his scravers might help.”

If Nakiis is anywhere nearby, he’ll hear me. But if he is, he doesn’t respond.

Overhead, the red-and-purple scraver seems to smile. A blast of ice-cold wind tears across the field.

— Nakiis won’t face us , he says.

“Are you Xovaar?” I call. “You don’t have to do this. You don’t have to—”

—We do have to do this. You took our magic. And we want it back.

Then he dives, and there’s no time for thought. There’s no time for anything. I just brace for the attack.