Josh made a sound at the back of his throat, fingers so tight on my wrist I could feel the bones grinding together. “Easy for you t’say, Belle.”
“Hey!” my father shouted, clapping hands. “To me, bird! To me!”
The flock-leader tilted his head, glancing over his shoulder.
“Keep pushing!” came a shout from the tunnel. “They cannot be allowed to escape!”
When the Caledonians spilled into the courtyard, it sent the entire flock into a new wave of two-toned screams. Screams that convinced the flock-leader the time for bluffing had passed. His beak snapped shut a few meager inches above Josh’s left shoulder—hardly a hair’s breadth from the tip of my nose—and it happened so fast, I hadn’t the time to blink, let alone think of ducking clear.
In the next seconds, three things happened all at once. The flock-leader screamed his rage as he readied himself for a second strike, great, orange eyes fixed upon my face.
My father charged forward with a battle cry worthy of either the very desperate, or exceedingly foolish.
And then, in a rush of static-wind, a blast of brilliant green plasma soared over our heads, striking the flock-leader in the center of his chest. Without another sound, he dropped dead in a puff of smoke and feathers, rendering the whole flock still.
Eyes wide, I glanced over my shoulder.
Captain Rawlings. On one knee at the mouth of the tunnel, weapon braced over left wrist. When our eyes met, he lowered his weapon and struggled to recover his feet, the link pulsing in my chest deplete. Even from this distance, I could see the sweat fresh on his brow.
Before I could process any of it, however, Josh swept me off my feet and tossed me over his shoulder without so much as a single word of warning. “Up, Belle.Up!Quickly now, while we’ve the chance.”
Hand pressed to her throat, eyes fixed upon the corpse of the flock-leader, Belle didn’t move from her knees in the dirt until my father stooped and wrapped a hand around her bicep.
“Up, Priestess! We’ve got to go!”
“Don’t take another step!” General Tilcot hollered in his deep, booming voice. “You’re under arrest by the order of the Emperor—”
“Shoot, and you’ll kill two Priestesses with one strike!” Josh roared, halfway to hysterical. Dragging Belle behind him, he pressed forward, sprinting flat-out.
Twisting as much as I could, I raised my head. Watching a dozen Elites file out of the tunnel, weapons raised, swarming around a deflated Captain Rawlings as he was forced to sit there and watch us go, hand planted against a tree. Dark eyes burning into mine, panting with the exertion required to save my life.
General Tilcot snarled, raising his weapon. Taking aim.
“This way!” Belle cried, barreling through a wrought-iron gate at the end of the courtyard, tugging my father through, her slender hand clasped in his. “The parking lot isn’t much further!”
The now-familiar sickly glow of green ki lit up the general’s weapon and I screamed a warning too late.
A burst of hot wind sailed over our heads, sucking the breath from my lungs. It struck my father square between the shoulder blades, tearing a ragged hole in flesh, muscle, and sinew as it passed through his chest. He collapsed without a sound in a tangle of twisted limbs, face down in the dirt. Eyes wide and staring at nothing.
Nothing at all.
My heart stopped beating as his ki was torn from my mind, taking with it the only link I’d known since birth in a torrent of anguish.
The last thing I heard before—again—losing the battle with the darkness, was the echo of my own broken screams.
Chapter 14
“Watch her head!”
“Get in the fuckin’ coach, Belle!”
I landed with a thump on carpet, the familiar scent of my father’s coach filling my nostrils.
“We’re in! Drive!”
Josh engaged the Glaith, piloting the coach forward before the engine had finished whirling awake. A green flash of light announced an explosion behind us, and I groaned when my whole world shifted to the right, damaged hand striking something hard.
“Goddess, is that a road block? We won’t be able to get to the senator’s house. Not through that.”
