Around him, fire rained. The city was blurred with smoke, everything chaotic, disorienting. Venick had never been to the far west, nor had he seen the volcanic eruptions those lands were known for, but he imagined that they must look something like this: as if the world had been cleaved in two.
He put on a surge of speed. He crashed into someone, caught them by the upper arms, spun and kept going. Venick’s pulse was so quick that he couldn’t feel the separate beats. He thought of Dourin back at the tavern. Branton and Lin Lill and all the others. He thought of the danger they were in and how this, too, was his fault.
“What are youdoing?” A voice to his left brought him up short. Venick spun to find his mother marching towards him. Her words threaded high. “Where are you going? The exit isthat way.”
“My friends—”
“Damn your friends. We need to evacuate!”
“I can’t just leave them.”
Lira strode closer. Nearby, a building lay in splintered ruins. Overhead, ropes pulled and snapped, the city’s rigging all unwinding. His mother’s face shone chalky white. “This is no time to be noble.”
“It’s not about that.”
“If you think—”
“They’re only herebecause of me,” Venick burst, flinging out his arms. “Because I brought them south, I asked them to come into the city, and then…” He thought again of Rahven’s coded messages. Ellina luring him to the shore. Their most precious weapon currently hailing from the night sky. “There isn’t time. I have to go.”
Lira grimaced. “Alright.” And then again. “Alright. If we can make it to the tavern, we’ll use the escape tunnel.”
The escape tunnel. That single hidden passage built under every manmade city, meant to sweep dignitaries away in case of an attack. There was an entrance to the tunnel inside the tavern, but it wasn’t the reminder of its location that startled Venick, nor his mother’s suggestion that they reveal that human secret to the elves. It was her use of the wordwe.
“You’re not coming with me,” Venick said.
“Of course I am.”
“It’s not safe. The tunnel—there are risks.”
“There are always risks.”
“There’s still time for you to get out by the main road if you go now.”
“Would you choose my path for me?”
Venick shut his mouth. It was the start of an old human saying, to which he was supposed to reply,Not I, but the gods. He couldn’t bring himself to speak the words.You’re all I have left, Venick wanted to say instead. He couldn’t bring himself to speak those words either. “Mother, please. Go. I’m right behind you.”
At last, Lira relented. “Alright.” But she had hesitated, and it was a gift, couldn’t she see that it was a gift? Venick realized that he hadn’t believed, before, that his mother could ever love him again. Now he knew that she did.
She gathered up her skirts and raced away, and Venick watched her go, heart in throat. She’d almost made it to the main road when a fresh trail of debris plunged from the sky, sending fiery shards into her path.
Into her.
The street was smoky. The night was dark. Venick couldn’t quite see the chunk of metal impale her. He couldn’t quite see her open-mouthed surprise, the tiny grimace as she lost her footing, stumbled to the ground, and went still.
But he saw enough.
???
Ellina’s face was in the dirt. Her limbs were a weak tangle. She coughed wetly, spat, and tried to roll over.
The building lay on top of her. Everything was dark. Yet somehow—miraculously, she did not understand the miracle of it—she was unhurt.
Again, she attempted to roll over. Wood heaped over her. She tried to lever it off. Her arms shook. They gave out. She could see the fleeing townspeople in slices through broken slats, heard their shouts.
And a new awareness.
Heat coiled around her boots. It snuck through the leather of her soles, her trousers, all the way to her skin. She tasted smoke. Realized, with a sense of unreality, that the building was on fire.
