“Scattered hunting parties, but coordinated, like the group we saw near Briarfen. I don’t like how organized they seem.” Kira’s eyes blazed with anger. Her grief always turned outward, seeking targets for her rage. Mine turned inward, becoming a weight I carried alone. “We need to hit them soon, before their leader’s able to organize them further.”
The ley lines were cracking under Skathe pressure, our defensive spells weakening with each assault. I should be planning our counterattack with all my focus, marshaling every resource we had. But even as we talked tactics and strategy, part of my mind remained with one certain sleeping woman.
I couldn’t stop, couldn’t make myself pull away from the connection that let me seek her, protect her, ensure she survived whatever the trials threw at her next. It was madness and my sole weakness.
I sent Gavelle higher, telling him to watch while I forced my attention back to the immediate threat. The Skathe had to be dealt with before they could gather for a full assault on another village.
“Show me,” I told Kira, and followed her away from what was left of Myrelle and the smoldering pyre, advancing toward the border with the battalion she’d commanded to fall into place around us.
Three hours later, I’d set our retaliation in motion, though I wasn’t sure it would do any more than the last. Our usual tactics weren’t yielding the same results now that they’d become organized under a leader.
Returning to Myrelle, I walked among the ruins and allowed myself to slip back into Gavelle’s mind.
Isi’s group had found Fara’s body.
Damn. I should’ve followed her into the woods. Instead, I’d given in to weakness, and I’d lost another.
Isi and her group walked around her torn corpse, covering it with wet branches and broad leaves. Jaxon’s jaw trembled with barely controlled emotion. Maddox made a sharp, sarcastic comment that earned him glares from everyone else. And tears streamed down Isi’s face, mixing with the rain that had started falling again.
My people had to endure this. Had to face death and loss and the brutal reality of what bonding meant. Not every magic-wielder could form the connection. Those who could found their abilities amplified, refined, made deadly.
The rain fell harder, both at Myrelle and on the alternate plane, there turning the ground slick and treacherous.
A hunter’s shriek echoing through the jungle—the one who’d claimed Fara.
Isi’s group cried out and bolted, scattering.
“Stay together,” Isi shouted, aiming for her closest friends whoslammed through the dense vegetation, outdistancing her. She favored her arm. Her back. I wanted tomakeher tell me who’d hurt her.
So I could kill them.
But with a fever, she wouldn’t be able to keep up with her group.
Gavelle dove after them, his wings tucked tight as he plummeted their way. He spread his feathers at the last second, screeching as he snapped at their faces, driving them back toward each other. Toward Isi. Otherwise, they’d spread so far apart they’d never find each other again.
“What’s changed?” Kira asked beside me, her voice nudging against my connection to Gavelle. “We’ve destroyed each small group that dared challenge even a village half this size for years. Not today.”
I blinked, returning to Myrelle, finding Kira beside me, a glare that had nothing to do with what had happened here creasing her face.
“We’ll destroy their leader.”
“Good,” she snapped. “Glad to see you’re paying attention. Where’s your mind been today?”
I. Said. Nothing. Only drilled her gaze until she darted her own away.
She sucked in a breath and ducked her head. “Sorry.”
Pivoting, I called to the troops. “We’re leaving. Mount and fly for the aerie.”
As I strode toward Lakast, I slid back into Gavelle’s mind, watching through his eyes as Isi plunged down a muddy incline, slipping and nearly falling as she clutched her injured arm to her chest.
She was alone. In hostile territory.
And the creature who’d claimed Fara moved through the trees like liquid shadows, its body long, flexible, jagged. Bone-plate mandibles split its jaw into a tri-sectioned mouth lined with rows of needle-sharp teeth. Its limbs bent at impossible angles, its jointsdislocating and reforming with each step. Six eyes clustered on its elongated skull, each one tracking Isi’s movement. This was a supreme, magical predator who almost always caught its prey.
A rendering stalker, one of the trials’ most lethal weapons.
Terror flooded my system as it galloped after her, down the slope, gaining speed as it tightened the distance between it and her.
