Page 139 of Swords of Soul and Shadow (Gate Chronicles #3)

Her ankle throbbed, and her shoulder screamed, but she steadied herself against the wall. She couldn’t stop. A flash of metal underneath an overturned crate caught her eye.

There were no gray shapes or people in the alley with her. She still limped toward the metal. It might be a weapon, and she prayed it was a flashpistol, something she could use if forced.

Her fingers clasped the handle. Blue. The metal was blue.

She aimed for the sky and fired it.

Blue fire, and immense cold flowed over her.

She dropped the Cerl weapon, her hand blazing from its icy touch.

Samuel wailed, and Clara thrust herself against the wall, but no one came around the corner.

No one seemed to care that she’d foolishly given her position away.

She breathed heavily as she assessed where she might be.

She wasn’t sure just how far she’d run, nor was she sure how many turns she’d taken.

No street signs were posted on the buildings, but a few of the shops still had their own signs hanging from doorways—those that had survived. There were a few with only a door, no sign. Most had neither.

The nearest one was missing half of it, but she read, Beckh—Boo—

For some reason, the name sounded familiar, though she wasn’t certain as to why.

She looked around some more. She looked inside the store only to find ashes and a few scattered book pages.

She looked further down the street. A row of townhouses and apartments, most missing walls or roofs, lay tucked around the bend.

Zeke. This was the road Zeke had lived on.

She knew where she was.

If she could just make it back to the nearby marketplace, she could find her way to the Jayde Center and back down into the Catacombs.

She fetched the pistol, a grimace on her face.

She could do this.

She would not let her panic assault her now.

Kissing Samuel’s head and shushing him best she could, she left the protection of the doorway.

Jove

THE CATACOMBS WERE TOO EMPTY. Many of the lower city citizens had returned to the surface, but Jove hadn’t expected the tunnels to echo so much as they traveled up through the passage from where he, Saldr, and his father had entered weeks ago.

It felt more like an eternity.

He needed to plan with the remaining City Council members now that his father was dead.

With all of their cooperation, they could organize the city and find a way to rebuild.

He’d need to contact the City Governors and others like his father-in-law, the Shield Marshal of southern Jayde.

With the entire High Council dead, they were running blind.

First, they needed to handle the Cerls. Kase’s patrols had been helpful in keeping the flyovers minimal, and with Correa’s death, maybe the others would surrender. But that was only a hope, not a certainty.

If only Hallie Walker had restored the electricity, they would’ve been in much better shape.

His father, for all his faults, had been a competent leader.

He put his country first—just to the detriment of his family, but apparently, that had been the only way he could cope after so much loss. Now it was Jove’s job.

Hopefully Miss Walker and Kase returned soon.

And hopefully the world wouldn’t fall apart before they did.

Jove lost count of each step as he scaled the winding stone stairs, his lungs and legs struggling the further up he went. Saldr’s glowing orb guided them up the spiraling staircase. Jove touched the Cerl pistol holstered at his waist. Surely he wouldn’t need it.

He didn’t want to use it, not knowing the secret behind it—the secret his uncle had delivered to the Cerl queen—but he didn’t have a choice. He was rubbish with a sword. He wasn’t his father, nor was he Zeke.

He was Jove Harlan Shackley, and he would find a way to make this right. He would do what he could for his country and his family.

He had his family to protect and lead.

The closer to the surface they hiked, rumbling and thumping sounded above. Muffled clangs and distant roars leaked through the wall. Tremors rocked the door above. It was almost as if Jove’s ears were submerged in water.

Saldr looked back, fear widening his eyes. “Jagamot has come.”

Jove’s blood ran cold. “But I thought…wasn’t Eravin…”

Saldr nodded but said, “In the Dawn, he had many forms and an army of shadows. I fear…”

Clara was up there. And if those sounds were what he thought they were…

Jove charged past Saldr, drawing the pistol at his waist and cocking it with one smooth motion. He wrenched open the door at the top. Cold air, anguished screams, and the wet, hot smell of blood slammed into him like an ocean wave.

He caught himself on the doorframe as his eyes took in the destruction.

The city hadn’t yet recovered from the first attack, but what little progress they’d made had been undone.

The screams of the dying rang even louder than they had that first time.

There was no dragon today, but the gray shadows fighting alongside those with black veins crawling up their necks scared him more.

A few necks boasted a triple diamond tattoo.

The back of Jove’s throat burned with bile, and a shudder rent his body.

He couldn’t move, only stare at the horror in front of him.

Saldr joined him, breathless. One of the shadow specters clawed at an older gentleman bleeding from the head and a gash in his neck.

Thrusting his hand in his pouch, Saldr slung dust in their direction, shouting in Yalven.

Golden light burst from his hand and shot toward the shadow creature.

It burst into mist, and the older man slumped, the relief and pain overwhelming him.

Jagamot’s shadow army.

Jove sprinted into the fray, his pistol firing into the gray, but his bullets only grazed the demons. They worked on the black-veined men and women, though.

A soldier with solid black eyes like Eravin Gray’s turned the corner, his bloody sword waving in the air. Jove didn’t think, only took aim at him and fired. No time to grieve the necessity, to feel any guilt. He needed to find his wife and son.

Where would they have gone? The townhouse? If Clara had been thinking straight, she would’ve tried to leave the city. Could she have made it to the front city gates? Jove swung in and out of the chaos, focused solely on finding a woman with brown skin and braids and a baby in her arms.

With each person he passed who wasn’t his wife, his panic heightened. Was she already dead? The city was too large. He would never find her.

He should be grateful he hadn’t found her in the piles of the dead. But not knowing where she was? It was worse. His heart hammered, and his stomach roiled.

Losing track of just how many shadows or others he killed, he fought through the city.

He stole a dying soldier’s sword. He was rubbish at swordplay, but it still made him feel better with two weapons instead of one.

With the pistol in one hand, the sword in the other, he leapt over rubble and shot another one of those shadows.

Blue fire zinged out and blasted a hole in the specter.

It slowed him enough for Jove to careen by.

Bursts of gold mist dusted his peripheral vision. The Yalvs were doing their best to beat back the invaders, but would they be enough? He hadn’t seen Saldr since they’d reached the surface, and he hadn’t seen the healer, Kainadr.

Jove fought his way underneath the towering gates to the lower city and down the streets until he found himself in one of the larger market squares. The trampled and blackened awnings were the only evidence it had once been a thriving center of trade and culture.

Jove sprinted over dead flowers and broken glass bottles. The marketplace was a chaotic mess with shadows and citizens alike. Those not infected with the Yalvar fuel were fighting best they could, but they were almost inconsequential compared to whatever demon ran in their enemies’ veins.

“Jove!”

His heart stopped as he wiped blood and sweat from his brow. He whirled around, his sword flashing in the air. He scanned the massive crowd.

“JOVE!”

Where was she?

His arm stung as a woman with black blood leaking from her mouth clawed at him. Jove shoved her away. He swiped his sword at one of the shadows and followed it with a blast from his pistol.

His way was clear. He leapt on an overturned cart.

Finally, he saw her. Samuel was strapped to her chest, and she was covered in blood. His heart thumped in his ears.

“Clara!”

That blood was fresh.

Ice-cold rage encompassed him as he leapt down, pistol firing into the crowd, sword swinging.

Now he knew exactly how his father had felt when Correa had attacked his mother. He would mow down anyone in his path to reach his wife.

He only saw red. The blood on her face, on her clothing, on her hands.

He would kill whoever was responsible for shedding that blood.

Someone shouted his name, but it wasn’t Clara, and he didn’t care. He needed to get to her. He shouted his rage with each thrust and each blast.

Finally, she only stood a few strides away from him.

Her eyes met his, so beautiful yet terrified, relieved yet hollow. His name was on her lips.

A soldier stepped in front of her, a trio of diamonds tattooed on his neck, his blond hair braided back. Cerl. He swung his pistol toward Clara, his finger on the trigger. Black blood filled the man’s veins.

Clara fell to her knees, her body turning to shield Samuel.

Jove bellowed his fury and terror. “ Get the stars away from her !”

With a speed he hadn’t even realized he possessed, Jove whipped his pistol up and fired at the man.

His aim struck true, the blue fire nailing the man in his chest, but the man’s pistol still fired. The twin echoing cracks were buried by the chaos at hand, but in Jove’s mind, the second one deafened him.

His heart didn’t beat.

His lungs didn’t fill with air.

“Clara!” He tried to scream her name. Instead, her name wheezed out on the winds of death.