Page 35 of Realm of Crows (Wings of Ink #5)
“I’m surprised they didn’t kill us when they had the chance,” Tori grumbles. His hair is sticking out on top of his head, and the shoulder pieces of his leathers hang askew, but there are no signs of blood on him.
“They probably prioritized getting their king out.” Royad picks up Tori’s sword from the floor and hands it to him. “And they’re probably planning to return and pick you up for questioning later.”
An icy shudder runs down my spine at the thought of Tori back in Erina’s dungeon. More important than to know what they might have planned is to know who we’re dealing with and where they went. “Crows, humans, or Flames?”
Clio grimaces. “Crows.”
“Shit.” Silas joins Herinor by the door, gaze on the hallway like he’s expecting the Crows to show up any moment. “If they used the drug on you, we can assume they have more supply.”
Clio shivers as a surge of nausea rakes through her body, and she grabs for Ayna’s hand as she bends over the washbasin on top of the dresser and empties her stomach.
The knowledge of what the drug does to one’s body is so deeply rooted in my memory I nearly throw up myself, but Ayna’s hand finds mine, and the sensation subsides. I’m no longer in Erina’s dungeon. I’m free to fight for the ones I love.
“They can’t have vanished. Crows can’t site-hop,” I say after a long, deep, stabilizing breath. “They can’t be projections either, or they wouldn’t have been able to use the drug on the two of you.”
Tori nods his agreement while Clio takes a sip from the jar beside the basin to rinse her mouth. Shaking out her arms and legs, she tests her balance, but she’s weak, and so is Tori. They won’t be able to fight.
“Kaira, Herinor, stay with them,” I order before they can get any ideas of putting themselves in harm’s way. “The rest of us go find those bastards. Erina must be with them.”
Within a moment, we’re out the door and on our way down the hallway.
It’s unnaturally quiet, almost like someone put a shield around each room to muffle proof whatever is going on in there, so I summon the dark haze within me and send it to scout ahead, while Ayna, Silas, and Royad sneak along the hallway with me.
The first room we enter is clear, as is the second, but when we make it to the other side of the staircase, my magic picks up on some movement in the room at the end of the hallway.
“There.” I point at the door in question, using the mind link to talk to them, so Herinor and Kaira also know what’s going on. “They must be in there. Last room on the other end of the building.”
“I’ll knock down the door,” Silas offers.
Nodding at him, I stop to let him pass. Royad gets into position beside the threshold, sword raised in front of him. Ayna and I take the other side.
Silas takes a few steps back then breaks the door from its hinges with a powerful kick. Wood splinters and rains from the doorframe, piling up on the floor, and when the dust settles, the silver glow of a thick shield appears instead.
“Six Crows,” Royad counts the males jumping to their feet from the various pieces of furniture in the small room and getting into a triangle formation, blocking the view of the rest of the room. “I don’t see any vials on them, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t carrying the drug.”
“The ones storming Erina’s room didn’t have any on them,” Kaira notes from afar. “Maybe they brought only a limited emergency supply and already used it on Clio and Tori. They said they freaking ambushed them in the room Erina fled into.”
I try not to think of what will happen to us if we all come in contact with the magic-nullifying serum.
“It’s been a long time, Myron,” one of the Crows, Ladlow, says with a smirk. “I’ve been starting to believe we’d never see you again, you know, you partnering with the filthy fairies and all.”
“Shut your fucking beak, Ladlow,” Silas hisses, and Ladlow has the decency to pale at the male’s tone.
I use the moment of distraction to let my magic probe the shields and shake my head an inch. It’s too thick to destroy with a single blow. We’ll need to combine our efforts, another obstacle that will drain part of our powers and leave less for fighting.
“Quite a surprise, isn’t it?” I put on my least bothered tone and take a casual stance right in front of the threshold, Royad and Ayna flanking me while Silas has my back. “I thought the next time I’d see you, it would be on a battlefield.”
“You could call this a battlefield,” one of the others says. I don’t bother addressing them all by name since they are clearly not interested in discussing coming back over to our side. On the contrary, every word spoken seems to increase the enmity between us .
“Let’s break the shield and kill them,” Silas suggests through the mind link. “Every moment of talking is one moment Erina has to disappear.”
He isn’t wrong. We’re four Crows against six. Ayna alone is more powerful than any of them. She’s proven that more than once.
As if in confirmation, the mate mark on my chest tickles, and fierce warmth streams through me. When I glance to the side, Ayna nods. “Let’s get this over with.”
“On the count of three.” Aloud, I say, “If any of you want to switch sides, now would be the time.” Pulling up my magic, I smirk at the Crows inside the room. None of them as much as acknowledges my offer. All right. So be it.
“One.”
My vision darkens.
“Two.”
Silver and black collect in my palms.
“Three.”
A flash of blinding silver crashes into the shield, cracking it wide open. From the room, caws of surprise sound a heartbeat before the song of steel being drawn from its sheath.
The Crows are upon us before the light fades, but my own shield catches their first assault of magic. Silas and Royad are taking on three of them while Ayna and I fight the others.
My darkness sneaks up one Crow’s body, squeezing the life out of him, and I welcome the monster inside of me that provides me with such strength to protect what’s mine.
Ayna’s daggers already found their mark on the second Crow.
She is just lifting her arm to strike again when one of the Crows fighting Silas and Royad breaks away, darting for her, and shoves her into a chest of drawers.
The sound of her spine crashing into the wood makes me sick, and a familiar panic rises inside of me.
“Ayna!”
She isn’t moving, except for her chest rising in fast, shallow breaths, and a drop of blood is hanging on the corner of her mouth. Shit!
Before I know it, I abandon my own battle to make sure the bastard scrambling to his feet beside her never touches her again.
He’s fast. Faster even than the Crows in Erina’s room. Faster than I remember anyone having been during the curse, when all of them still lived in the Seeing Forest. But I’m faster.
My magic locks around his throat, yanking him back, right into the tip of my sword. Steel scrapes against bone as my blade pierces between his ribs, and the male’s dying scream echoes through the room.
Pulling back my sword, I bend over Ayna’s limp body.
“You’ll be fine,” I whisper, my healing magic already flowing into her where I place my palm against her side.
Slow like honey rather than a gushing stream.
Fighting the soldiers at the border then the Crows in Erina’s room and then this—my cache of power is emptying faster than I’d hoped for.
“You’ll be fine,” I repeat, wiping the blood from her pale lips.
My chest is so tight I can barely breathe, and the only thing that can ease it is the look in Ayna’s eyes when they finally open and she gives me a weak smile. “Did we get them all?”
I don’t need to glance around the room to know we did; Silas and Royad coming up to our side tells me the room has been secured.
So I nod at her and hold out a hand to help her up. No matter the temporary relief, we still have four Crows to hunt down and one missing Tavrasian king.