Jonah slows the van but keeps driving closer. I squint at the beings who briefly emerge, but I don’t recognize any of them.
“The way they’re acting, being careful in their strategy rather than just barging at the soldiers—they’ve got to be higher shadowkind, right? Do you think they’re warped beings from the rift?”
Jonah’s forehead furrows. “Maybe some, but I don’t see how that many could have come through all at once or without us realizing it earlier. Have you seenanywarped higher shadowkind other than Viscera?”
I shake my head. He has a point. Viscera didn’t exactly arrive quietly.
Subtlety is not a typical quality of the warped shadowkind.
Hail must have been following our conversation from the shadows. He materializes to lean between our seats, his expression somber. “Plenty of humans are making their own groups to harass and capture us. It’s not totally surprising that a bunch of shadowkind who don’t feel like answering to Rollick might have decided to lash out, is it? Especially now that this rift situation is messing things up in the shadow realm too.”
I hadn’t thought of that. “They might blame the humans here for what’s happening, just like the humans are blaming us.”
Hail nods. “It’s not as if humans haven’t given many of us plenty of reasons to dislike them before now.”
His own animosity toward humans doesn’t ring quite as sharply through his voice as it used to, but I know he still would rather stay as far away from most of them as he can get.
The rattle of gunfire penetrates the van’s walls, louder by the second. Jonah grimaces and pulls over onto the shoulder of the road. “I don’t think we should get any closer. Not in the van, anyway.”
I hug myself. “We can’t let them keep fighting, can we?”
“I don’t know if there’s anything we can do to stop them. Maybe Mirage…” Jonah glances over his shoulder as he hesitates. “But most of the soldiers will be immune to his illusions with their badges.”
I slip after him when he steps out of the van, peering toward the battle. “If I could project enough calming emotions to get all of them to settle down…”
The possibility of me ending the fighting with my power feels too huge for me to wrap my head around—so many beings both mortal and shadow, so much rage crackling through the air.
And then the idea becomes moot, because the tanks have jerked to a halt, their guns pointing toward the raging shadowkind.
A new line of humans appears amid the soldiers. Across the distance, I can’t make out more than a mumble of the syllables they holler out, but the unnerving jitter over my skin tells me it’s not words but sorcery.
The magic must be calling on the opposing beings to show themselves. The shadowkind on the attack emerge into physical form—here, there, and everywhere. Their heads whip around in confusion while their limbs jerk out defensively.
They definitely aren’t warped beings if the sorcery worked that well on them.
I only have time for that one thought to pass through my head before the tanks open fire.
Their artillery booms even louder than the chorus of rifles, with puffs of smoke around the muzzles of their guns. Explosions flare amid the shadowkind force. Bursts of essence flood the air where several beings disintegrate beyond the point of healing, just like that.
A few of the rounds hit the factory buildings at the edge of the city. One roof crumples with a thunderous crash.
I wince, anguish squeezing my heart. The humans don’t seem to care whotheyscrew over while winning.
And the mutual screwing over is happening on an even larger scale than they probably realize. Because as I watch the flames dance amid the plumes of smoky essence, I notice something else that clenches the tension in my chest tighter.
The edges of murk around the city shiver—and creep a little forward.
At first, I think I must have imagined the effect in my horrified state. Then the tanks fire again, and I see it clearly.
One swath of thickened shadow looms closer, shifting from a porch across a lawn to the edge of the road.
The flood has never done that before, not since the original deluge. Even when more shadows belched from the rift, they only stirred up and condensed the darkness over the city rather than pushing it farther out.
My heart leaps to my throat. “Oh, no. The mess is spreading.”
25
Raze
