Rain Changed and finished off those left with his swords, fighting with delirious fury and roaring in triumph as blood filled the air like hot scarlet rain. His teeth flashed in a savage grin. Bloodlust rose high. Tairen Souls killed with fire at a distance. But this close, intimate dance of death brought the savage predator in him screaming to the surface.
Dead allies were scattered like leaves across the ruins of Orest. Too many of them wore Fey faces. Friends’ faces. This battle must stop. Here and now. No matter what.
He Changed again—his wings re-forming whole and untorn—and leapt back into the sky. This time when he dove for the Mages andsel’dorfilled the air, he didn’t try to dodge the missiles. Thistime he simply Changed into formless mist and let the spears and arrows fly through him.
The burn still hurt. Some sentient part of Rain scattered to the rainbowed gray cloud of the Change felt the acid brush ofsel’doragainst each tiny droplet of his being, but the foul black metal passed through him without doing harm.
When it was gone, he Changed back into the midnight black tairen with death in his eyes, and dove towards the knot of Elden Mages, spewing a furious jet of flame that incinerated everything in its path. The Mages’ shields lasted a scant three chimes before crumpling like seared kindling, leaving the hot, fierce licks of tairen fire to consume the vulnerable red- and blue-robed sorcerers beneath. He screamed in triumph, put on a burst of speed, and raced into the sky.
Rain used the same tactic to destroy three of the trebuchets and their flanking bowcannon, but when he swooped down upon the fourth, the Eld had adapted to his attack. Theirsel’dorbarrage came in a continuous stream rather than a single, dense burst, so that he emerged from the Change into a stream of arrows and took a dozen of the barbed missiles in one side. His flame burned the rest, but as he dove to set fire to the trebuchet, portals opened on every side, revealing bowcannon targeted directly at him.
His body twisted, and foursel’dorspears raked deep cuts in his side as he swept by.Sel’dornets fired from another two portals, and the weighted wire mesh wrapped tight around him and dropped him to the ground. His attempt to Change to escape the net ended in writhing agony as dozens moresel’dorarrows thunked into his side.
Eld surrounded him, brandishing black metal pikes and barbed blades.
A deafening roar drowned out the cacophony of battle. Bright, boiling clouds of flame burst from the Faering Mists, heralding the arrival of eight great tairen. With screams of fury, they dove towards the battlefield of Lower Orest. Steli led the way, white andfierce, and on her back she carried a slender, shining figure clad in studded scarlet leathers.
Flaming cyclones of Air and Fire shot from Ellysetta’s fingertips, driving back the Eld circled around her mate.
Rain closed his eyes as tairen flame poured over him in searing jets. The heat and fire enveloped him, burning thesel’dornet and barbed ends of the arrows from his body without raising so much as a blister on his tairen hide. Moments later, he sprang into the sky.«You should not be here, Ellysetta,»he chided as he circled close to Steli’s fierce form.
«Where else do I belong if not by your side?»Ellysetta tossed her head and gave him a blinding smile.«Tairen do not abandon their mates. Tairen defend the pride.»
He gave a snort and blew smoke. Stubborn woman. Headstrong woman.
His woman.
And he would have her no other way.
«You bring pride to this Fey.»He set every thread of their bond singing with the vastness of his love.«In truth, I can use your help at the Veil. There are wounded in need of a shei’dalin’s care.»
She didn’t hesitate or argue.«I will go.»Her eyes narrowed on the blood-soaked arrows quilling his side.«Finish this, and join me, shei’tan. I will be waiting for you.»She stroked a hand down Steli’s neck, and the white tairen wheeled towards Upper Orest.
«What shall we do with the Eld?»asked Pella, one of the other seven tairen, as Steli winged towards the mountain city.
Rain glanced down at the battlefield where so many had been lost. From this height, the Eld looked like nothing but ants scurrying across an anthill.«Burn them,»he commanded.«Burn the Eld and scorch the ground. Leave no finger span unscathed.»
Chapter Twenty-Five
With the reenergized Fey forces keeping the bowcannons, archers, and Mages busy, the nine tairen made short work of scorching Lower Orest.
Most of the Eld broke ranks and ran for the nearest portal when the pride fired the battlefield. Those who did not died ablaze and screaming. To Rain’s great relief, blanketing the entire battlefield in tairen flame seemed to destroy both the portals and whatever had enabled them to open. No more gaping holes in space opened. No more foul armies of the Eld poured out. Lower Orest was left a barren, smoking wasteland, as was the fortified Eld village across the river, but he and the pride did not stop burning until they’d scorched every last remnant of the Eld army from the soil.
Rain sang the same instructions to Fahreeta and Torasul in Teleon, and they burned the Garreval, and the mountainsides, and the valley around Teleon to the edge of the Mists.
When they were done, the Fey in both Orest and the Garreval walked the smoking battlefields to collect thesorreisu kiyrof their fallen brothers. Many had been stripped and stolen by the Eld during the battle, but the rest were gathered, to be sent back to the families and loved ones left behind. Among them were dozens ofkiyrfrom sixtylu’tanswho had died defending Orest. Ellysetta packed theirsorreisu kiyrin a silk-lined pouch and asked the tairen to take them back to Fey’Bahren, to be placed with honor alongside thekiyranisof the pride.
Leaving Rain and the Celierians to begin the process of cleaning and repairing the city, Ellysetta spun healing on the wounded. Sadly, there weren’t nearly as many as she’d expected. Mage Fire, like demon touch, killed rather than maimed. She spunshei’dalinhealing on those in direst need, and by the time Marissya and Dax arrived on the back of Xisanna, most of the remaining wounded needed little more than rest and a hearth witch’s care.
To Rain and Ellysetta’s surprise, Marissya and Dax had not come alone, nor empty-handed. Xisanna’s mate, Perahl, bore the Massan Air master Eimar and his mate, Jisera, on his back, and Dax had strapped a large trunk behind Xisanna’s saddle.
Dax slid to the ground on a cushion of Air and set the trunk on the ground.
“I don’t understand,” Rain said as Dax lifted the trunk’s heavy lid to reveal the shining golden armor of the Fey king. “The Massan banished me for weaving Azrahn. I amdahl’reisen. I no longer have the right to wear that armor or lead the Fading Lands in war.”
“Apparently, you do, my friend,” Dax said with a smile. He nodded to the white tairen crouched at Ellysetta’s side. “Talk to her.”
Steli sniffed and ruffled her wings.«The golden steel does not belong to the Fey-kin, Rainier-Eras,»she said in Feyan. Her blue eyes scanned the gathered Fey as if in Challenge, and a low growl rumbled in her throat.«It is not theirs to give or take. The golden steel is pride-made. It belongs to the Tairen Soul.»
