The ground at the middle continues to rupture, the snow giving way. It starts collapsing in on itself, further and further out. The stinking soil of slush caving in, pulling down hundreds of fae in its wake.
They try to flee, but their running steps get swallowed. Their hands scrabble at the disintegrating edges, but they drop into the festering depths anyway.
And the ground isn’t done splitting.
The stench of rot is now exposed to the air and lets off its putrid smell of death as it spreads more destruction.
“Out!” Tyde shouts, alerting me that he’s out of his arrows and he needs to grab the extras kept in the side saddlebag.
I level Kitt out so he can shift safely and fill his supplies, and I take note of Lu flying ferociously. She’s letting her timberwing glide low to the ground, snatching up running fae before knocking them into their fellow soldiers or tossing them into the crevices.
Gideon and Varg are flying in circles, focusing their arrows on a group trying to run in the direction of Cliffhelm. But a thundering crash makes me jerk, and I whip around to see that Osrik has launched the catapult. The hunk of stone smashes into the ground, striking the fae retreating on the other side of the rift. Within seconds, Osrik is reloading and letting loose again.
I turn, searching the sky for Finley and Maston’s timberwing, but I can’t see them. They should be well off the ground by now, picking off fae with us. They should’ve been back up on their timberwing the split second the ground started to give way.
Worry slams into me, my shoulders tightening as I keep looking through the spitting snowfall, counting the timberwings dipping in the air.
I still don’t see them.
“Fuck,” I say into the wind as snow drops down thicker, coating Kitt’s feathers.
Gripping her reins, I pull her around and lower, searching the slope where the worst of the rot disintegrated the ground. My breath freezes and I feel the blood drain from my face when I see that the entire dune where they would’ve been is just…gone. There’s more than a three-hundred-foot gouge where that spot used to be.
I aim Kitt in that direction anyway, determined to find them, even though my gut is telling me they were already swallowed up. That they never even made it to the back of their timberwing again.
That there’s nothing left to rescue.
“Fuck,” I grit out again, dread and anger tightening my throat.
Kitt takes us closer, but a volley of arrows suddenly comes through the air in a downpour. We try to dodge, but one strikes Tyde right in the arm. Blood sprays out of him as he cries out in pain, his back slamming against mine as he jerks in the saddle.
“I’ve been hit, Commander!”
My nerves triple, the tension in my body bunching my arms and making my pulse drum. Another arrow nearly slices through Kitt, her chest only saved by the thick chained armorworn at her breast. Tyde flinches from her jerky movement, and his bow and arrows fall from his grip.
“Hold on!” I call over my shoulder to him.
Sparing a quick look down, I spot the group of fae shooting at us. They’re on our side of the split, a dozen of them aiming arrows at our timberwings. Roland and Gideon manage to strike two of them, but we’re outnumbered.
When I start to redirect Kitt, my gaze catches on black chest plates and helmets. Black—not the drab color of the fae’s rocky armor.
Maston and Finley?
I try to see, but the snow is falling down faster, and I’m too far away. “Tyde! My left flank!”
Tyde strains to get a look in that direction, and my heart beats wildly.
“It’s them. Stranded. Their timberwing’s down. They’re under fire and vulnerable.” He gives the report through grunted gasps, and I know his arm must be hurting like a son of a bitch.
But I can’t leave them out there.
Setting my sights on the dots of black armor, I direct Kitt their way, and she flies as fast as she can. As we get closer, my men become clearer, and I see what Tyde already did. Their timberwing, dead on the sliver of broken land beside them. They’re surrounded by cracks that are far too big to cross. They’re sitting ducks, using their dead bird as cover, but the fae attacking them are relentless with arrows.
We race through the slapping snow, my attention pinned in place, but my stomach drops when I see one of the men go down with an arrow at his neck.
Maston.
“No!”
