Our fleet was splintered, a handful of vessels remaining. We’d hit their navy as well, but far fewer ships were felled or sinking, and Solace’s remaining fleet was slowly approaching, scorching ships and bombing Mages as they sailed.
But that was not even the worst of it.
My eyes locked on Solace’s ship—nearly half the distance it started—and I nearly lost control of my bladder.
“Fuck,” I whispered. “PULL BACK! PULL BACK TO ALVOR!” I screamed, my voice cracking with the force.
“PULL BA?—”
Chapter Ninety-Five
Folami
An earth-shattering, bone-shakingboomsounded throughout the streets of Alvor, so loud I heard it inside the palace, my ears popping slightly with the force. The walls rattled, shaking loose dust and debris, causing the women and children to cry out in fear. My heart jolted, muscles tensing, as if my psyche was already preparing for battle.
That cannot be. Torin and Lex will not let them come close to here.
“Stay with them,” I instructed one of the female Mages assigned to the small contingent of soldiers that decided to stay back to protect the women and children. Many of the Mages and Vessels were young—newly Awakened and some even unAwakened. It was a ragtag unit, individuals who we hadn’t trained as hard or desperately as the others, thinking they’d see little—if any—combat.
My heart thudded in time with my steps as my boots slapped against the stones. The hallways were blessedly empty, everyone either sheltering in their own homes or in the palace as Talamh instructed.
I braced myself the entire time, waiting for a second explosion, but none ever came.
That, more than anything, had my steps quickening until I was sprinting through the corridors, taking turns at lightning speed. My spear was tied tight to my back, and I used both hands to push off of walls as I careened through the palace.
I threw my weight against a small side door, opening it with a loudbang, nearly falling into one of the courtyards we used for training. While separatedfrom the rest of Alvor, it was surrounded by an easily scalable wall that overlooked the docks and the sea beyond.
I approached the wall at a sprint, not stopping as I ran up the sheer face of it, grasping protruding stones as handholds to pull myself up the rest of the way.
Perched on the edge of the wall, I gasped, nearly falling the fifteen-odd feet to the streets below, at the sight of the sea.
Black, acrid smoke billowed from slowly sinking ships; the scent of burning wood and singed flesh carried on the wind, causing me to gag. I hawked and spat the excess saliva rapidly pooling in my mouth, ignoring the turning of my belly. Waves sloshed violently, quickly dragging remnants and survivors out to sea rather than to the beaches and docks that lined Deucena’s coast.
What happened?
The sounds of the injured and dying wafted across the sea, their cries mingling with the calls of carrion as they circled the area from the sky.
One hand pressed to my mouth, the other to my brow to shade the sun, I scanned the horizon for what would have caused that type of noise, but found nothing.
Small, schooner-like ships were easily circumventing the larger Iluulian vessels as they slowly sank beneath the waves to a watery grave, but there was no evidence of whatever cataclysmic magic just struck our navy.
Peytor was on those ships.
The man was noble to a fault—there was no way he absconded his position before the dozen ships were blown to smithereens.
My stomach roiled violently at the thought, and I had to take deep breaths through my nose to fight it this time.
Surely, he was still alive, floating somewhere beneath the boiling waves. Surely, I would have felt if one of my husbands died . . . right?
He is alive. He must be. I refused to entertain any other possibility.
I watched in abject horror, frozen to my perch, as the smaller ships progressively neared the docks at an almost lazy cadence, as if they knew there was no rush, no military to stop them once they disembarked.
We were supposed to be Elyria’s last line of defense. Now, it seemed, we were first.
The gravity of the situation hit suddenly, spurring me into action as my blood ran hot with fright. I leapt from the wall with a gasp. Tumbling at the last moment to avoid a jarring impact, I sprang to my feet and sprinted through the streets, screaming for Talamh as I went.
The streets, like the palace corridors, were eerily empty, and I directed any Mages and Vessels I saw to the palace.
