I nod, tightening my grip around his waist as our timberwing follows the lead of the one ahead. Ravinger starts our descent, cutting through the gray clouds until we break free and the land becomes visible once more.
Below, the landscape is a scrollwork of invasion.
Littered along the cracked and gaping ground, army tents border the entire area around the ruins of Cauval Castle. The bridge itself looks like a dammed river, with fae soldiers bunched up around the snowy entrance like it’s their own personal gathering spot.
Dommik nudges our timberwing, lining up our beast with Ravinger’s until we’re side by side. “We should pick a spot to do some reconnaissance!” Dommik shouts over at him. “Then we’ll come up with a plan!”
Ravinger glances over for the barest of seconds. “I already have a plan.”
Without warning, he drops away, his timberwing nose-diving toward the ground.
“Dammit,” Dommik hisses as he pulls up on the reins, making our timberwing circle the air. “What the fuck is he doing? He’s going to get himself killed!”
I watch Ravinger’s tense shoulders that carry the steady weight of his rage, and I shake my head. “No. He won’t.”
Right now, he’s untouchable, fueled by more than just his ire.
He sweeps his timberwing down, veering toward the castle, and it doesn’t take long for the fae to look up and notice him. Shouts ring through the frosty air, and bolts of flame are thrown at him.
Fools.
The timberwing dodges easily and lets out a roar, not even slowing its descent. Then, a second before crashing, the beast swoops up parallel to the ground, and Ravinger leaps off the back of the bird.
The very moment his boots land in the snow, power expels out of him with great force. Even from up here, I feel its scrape of deathly charge as if it runs through the air like lightning.
Black roots twist and mangle through the tents, through the soldiers, through the ground itself, exploding out in every direction. The snow browns, the tents collapse, the soldiers bloat and buckle.
So quickly. His power kills so much, soquickly.
More fae try to put up a fight, tossing magic in his direction. Green clouds of mist blow toward him, snow moving like waves ready to slam into him, and levitating objects are thrown his way.
None of it touches him.
He has an eerie, innate ability to sense the threats, and his magic hits them before their attempt can even come close. Rot drops them, making the soldiers succumb as their bodies decompose while they still live.
Their screams butcher the air into agonizing pieces.
“Gods…” Dommik says as we both stare at the destruction below.
It started so fast and ends so quietly.
Roots stretch out for hundreds of feet, spreading over the already split earth and spilling down into the cracks. Bodies lie prostrate and still, crumbled like discarded branches hacked off from the trunk. Even the ruins of the castle have rot lines stretched up its crumbling gray stone with a promise of poison.
When Ravinger’s timberwing lands next to him with a screech, I nudge Dommik. “Let’s go.”
My assassin pauses for a moment, as if he doesn’t want to get close, and I don’t blame him for his hesitation. When our timberwing descends to join the rotten king, we land with generous space between us.
Dommik helps me down, and then I head over to Ravinger, eyeing his back as I walk warily forward. I’m well aware that one needs to use caution when approaching a predator from behind.
“King Ravinger.”
His head turns to look over his shoulder at me, and I can’t suppress the gasp that passes my lips. He looks terrifying, his black veins thicker than before, stretching up his neck and pinching against his cheeks. The gray scales along his cheek shimmer with a sharp outline of gold, looking even more defined than before, and his eyes flash a deep green, almost iridescent.
He looks utterly fae, and utterly menacing.
Eyeing his sharp spikes, I clear my throat and look around, the stench of the bodies already permeating the air. “Everyone is dead?”
“Everyone here. But more will come,” he says, jerking his head in the direction of the bridge.
