“I’m not—” A high-pitched keening rang from the building, followed by a bellowing roar. The building shook, the ground tremoring. Cold claws raked down her spine. She knew that roar.
It was a Zeras.
Allaster was already running across the square, the arrow nocked. And though facing a Zeras with nothing but a wooden staff was akin to sticking herself inside its jaws, she ran after him. They burst into the carnage of the storage building. Crushed barrels of barley and crates of root vegetables were strewn across the floor, mingling with silver blood.
Near a stack of crates in the back stomped the Zeras. It was easily twice the size of a horse, with a craggy gray hide and a horned, bullish head it was slamming into the crates, sending them flying. Its venomous, clawlike tail snapped erratically, easily the length of its body.
“We have to neutralize its tail.” Allaster drew back his bowstring. “If it feels its tail is threatened, it will retreat.”
“Your arrow isn’t going to do anything against a Zeras’s hide,” she replied, sorely missing her vylor sword.
The bowstring twanged. The Zeras moved impressively quickly, and the arrow missed, striking a crate and encasing the entire thing in ice. Kasira had one moment to wonder at the power of the weapon before a two-ton animal came racing toward them.
Allaster seized her arm, snapping his fingers, and they reappeared on the other side of the warehouse. The Zeras tried to turn aside too late and slammed lengthwise into the wall they had been standing by. The building shook, cracks spiderwebbing across the stone.
Allaster released her, breathing a little heavier. He’d had to touch her to move her, and what had looked effortless in the Library now seemed to have exacted a toll on him. “You’re weaker away from the Library, aren’t you?” she realized.
He nocked another arrow. “I need you to distract it.”
Kasira clutched her staff. “If you wanted me dead, there are quicker ways to do it.” She didn’t stay to enjoy his stunned expression. As the Zeras cleared its head with a shake, she darted across the warehouse. It followed with a roar, the world shaking with its heavy steps.
Allaster’s bowstring twanged, and she threw a glance over her shoulder in time to see the arrow transform into a weighted rope. It tangled around the Zeras’s back legs, but the beast strained all of one moment before ripping the bonds apart. Allaster nocked another arrow and fired. His aim was true—until the Zeras’s tail knocked the arrow from the air. It clattered uselessly to the ground, the tip glowing a faint blue.
Kasira cast aside her staff and dove for the arrow. Her fingers curled around the shaft, and she rolled, coming up in a low crouch. At the same moment, something moved in the corner of her vision. A small, silver-white form edged out from behind a crate, its leg a mess of fur and silver blood.
One of its eyes was a knotted scar.
Kasira smelled rancid flesh and heard the sickening thud of metal into bone, saw the Alkatir mother fall in a bloody heap, its cub wounded and afraid. Saw herself let it go, only for it to end up here. The cub hobbled for the door, one wing dragging limp and useless on the ground. The Zeras lifted its head, scenting the air, and locked its beady black gaze on its prey. Kasira was forgotten as it charged after the other beast.
She leapt, sliding to her knees before the cub as the Zeras ground to a halt, its venomous tail whipping around. She caught the edge ofit with the arrow’s shaft, the blow jarring her arm nearly numb and cracking the wood. Then she drove the flat-tipped arrowhead into its tail. Ice sprang from the point of contact, encasing the tail up to the Zeras’s hindquarters. The beast bellowed and backed away, then fled through the open door. Allaster vanished after it.
The numbness in her arm grew stronger. It crept toward her shoulder, accompanied by a feverish exhaustion. She fell back, her legs splaying out before her. Distantly, she was aware of the heat of the Alkatir cub against her side, and some part of her knew she needed to move. Even young and wounded, Alkatir were dangerous beasts, but her body wasn’t responding.
Allaster reappeared before her. “It’s gone back into the forest. The ice should melt soon, and it’ll be fine. The back gate is open, and there’s a trail of silver blood leading here. I think—Corynth? Corynth!”
His words reached her as if through honey. He seized her hand, lifting it to reveal a black, angry wound. It was the last thing she saw before darkness overtook her.
CHAPTER 16
ALLASTER
ALLASTER DIDN’T MOVE.
The Zeras’s venom spread from the wound in lines of black, tracing Eirlana’s veins in a deadly design as he crouched over her. If they left now, he could get her the antidote in time. The toxin would be neutralized, and she would recover.
Or he could let the venom do its work.
If he let her die, his responsibility to Kalthos would be fulfilled. He could select a new Assistant from Ayador, one whom he could trust. Vera would cry foul, would think he’d let Eirlana die on purpose or killed her himself, but she wouldn’t have any proof. He could blame it on Vera, say this whole debacle fell on Kalish heads for signaling the wrong beast class, for lying about what they would find inside the town’s walls, for sending an untrained candidate.
Eirlana shuddered, the venom beginning its work on her body. Behind her, the Alkatir cub’s breathing was ragged and slow, its fur matted with silver blood. Allaster had to move, if only for the beast’s sake.
The beast Eirlana had saved.
He’d expected her to be a good fighter from their sparring sessions, and she had handled herself well today. If not for her, the Alkatir would be dead and the Zeras rampaging through town. So why didhis doubts immobilize him? Why did every ounce of his being warn him not to touch her?
“Mora wouldn’t have left you here,” he said at last. “But Mora is dead, and you—” He gritted his teeth as Eirlana groaned, her entire body tensing up. She murmured something, too soft for even his hearing.
Then a little louder. “I’m sorry.”
