A graceful smile spread across his lips. “Little crow queen,” he said in a voice of warm honey.
Res let out a shrill cry and tried to move in front of me. Pain flared down the line between us, and I sucked in a breath, placing a hand against his chest.Stay still. I’ve got this.
Valis’s golden eyes washed over Res, his smile unfaltering. There was something slightly unhinged about the look, about the way that smile didn’t break.
“I’ve waited a very long time for this,” he hissed. “For what your family did to me.” He drew a sword from his back. It erupted with pale orange flame. “I’m going to enjoy watching you burn.”
He lunged. I shot forward, swinging low and dragging my hand through the earth. I came up with a handful of dirt and thrust it into his eyes. He snarled, swinging wildly, but I slid beneath it and came up behind him, striking for his kidneys with the limb of my bow.
He moved faster than I thought possible. He turned, sword coming down in a swift arc. It never struck. The next moment, Valis hit the ground hard from the impact of Res’s body, his blade skittering out of reach. Valis rolled, springing lithely to his feet. Res cawed, wings flaring as lightning crackled around his body. It faltered, then died.
Valis thrust out a hand, and fire gathered at his palm. I loosed an arrow, stealing his attention as he was forced to burn it. Then I was on him, my knife in one hand, my bow in the other. He moved so fast. It was everything I could do to match pace with him as my attack quickly turned to defense.
Then all at once, his body erupted with flames.
I stumbled back with a cry, tripping over a root in my haste to escape the fire. Valis drove his flaming sword down—and straight into another blade.
Elkona deflected the sword with a slash of her moonblade. Quick as a wingbeat, she’d drawn a red line across Valis’s stomach. He reared back, but her blade came around, slicing clean through his right wrist.
Valis screamed, his flames extinguishing.
I found my feet, nocking an arrow. The bowstring snapped. The arrow took Valis in the chest. He fell back a step, snarling, and then Elko was there, cutting a deep wound across his thigh. As she leapt away, I took her place, my dagger biting into his stomach.
Then with a final turn, Elko slashed her blade through his throat.
Valis coughed, blood coating his lips. He fell back against a tree as Elko pulled her blade free, slick with crimson.
I stared at the Sella’s lifeless body a moment, breathing hard. Then I looked to Elko. Blood speckled her face, turning the grin she gave me almost vicious. She held out her hand, and I took it.
“Let’s end this,” she said.
Thirty-Four
The battle sprawled across the castle grounds.
Illucian soldiers pried at the mausoleum with their blades, trying to reopen the collapsed entrance, but it would be useless—they had no Sella to operate it. Our forces had pushed through and were rushing them. Elko shot past me with a whoop of delight, intercepting a Vykryn coming for a Rhodairen soldier’s back.
A flash of blue caught my eye, two fighting soldiers parting to reveal a sight that stilled my breath.
Ericen was dueling Razel.
She struck in a wild frenzy, her moonblades flashes of silver in the light. Ericen had lost one of his swords, barely parrying her attacks with the remaining one. The sleeves of his shirt had been scorched away, his skin red and raw where the flames must have caught him.
Ericen ducked a blow, and another figure stepped forward, taking Razel’s follow-up strike—another Vykryn. But even between the two of them, they couldn’t take her down, even as they sliced her arms and legs and side. Razel fought with a wild fury, and the other Vykryn was favoring an injured leg.
Then in one swift move, she drove her sword through the Vykryn’s leg. Her other hand came up, a dagger clasped in her fingers. She drove it through the Vykryn’s neck.
He toppled to the ground as she ripped her weapons free.
“Stay here,” I ordered Res. I forced myself forward even as my body struggled.
Res lurched after me, screeching.
Stay!I screamed down the line.
A Vykryn met me as I emerged from the tree line. I caught his sword on my bow, deflecting the blade and ducking low. Then Res was there, his claws tearing through flesh.
“I told you to stay, you bloody chicken!”
