“I can’t run, Blaine. I won’t.”
He shoved his brass goggles off his eyes, leaning in close while their side exchanged fire with the Daijalans. His eyes searched hers before he bowed his head. “If I were Ashionen, I would be proud to call you my queen.”
She managed a smile somehow, knowing it was as close to a vow of service Blaine would ever give her. He was E’ridian in every way that mattered, but the Westergard bloodline had long been struck from the royal genealogies, and her name had never known its pages. Yet here they both were, determined to fulfill their duties to Ashion.
“I don’t have a throne yet.”
Blaine helped her to her feet, the pair of them hemmed in by Royal Guards and other soldiers for protection, no one ready to back down. “Then let’s get you one.”
Fifteen
CARIS
Caris faced Soren’s wavering starfire, straining to see Eimarille through it as a strange calm settled over her. Around her, the soldiers that had marched with her through the trenches and the catacombs and those that had arrived later in the streets shouted orders at each other as they readied to fight.
Honovi helped Soren to his feet, the warden looking pale-faced and bruised-eyed. Soren hadn’t been as steady since the jail, but there wasn’t time to ask how he was doing. Honovi raised his arm, pulling the trigger on a pistol that let loose a marker into the sky, purple smoke exploding over their position.
“What—” Caris gasped out.
“It’ll summon a bombing run around us. Caoimhe and the others know to look for it. Come on,” Blaine said.
The wall of starfire peeled apart in sections, holes opening. Ashion soldiers scrambled for cover in shattered doorways of buildings along the street and behind Legion-made bulletproof shields. Blaine tried to drag her off the street, but Caris dug in her heels. “No. You can’t all keep fighting and dying for me.”
She tore free of his grip and raised her hands, palms facing outward, and summoned starfire. It poured out of her, curling to fill in the gaps of Soren’s defensive wall. Gunfire erupted on the other side, but no bullets made their way through.
“You need to burn the street where they stand before Eimarille does the same to us,” Soren said.
Caris shot him an anguished look. “Nathaniel is back there.”
Soren’s gaze was implacable, no judgment in his eyes, only a ruthless sort of determination Caris knew she’d never be able to match. “You have to, or we all die.”
The choice was taken from her by Eimarille. She could sense the other woman’s power sliding along her own, the starfire writhing like a dying beast. Soren swore, his words drowned out by the roar of fire as it suddenly expanded.
Caris frantically tried to keep the starfire at bay, dimly aware of Soren trying to assist. But Eimarille’s skill at manipulating the aether proved far better than theirs, and she broke through their attempt to hold her back. The force of the push sent them all flying. Caris crashed into Blaine, who took the brunt of their landing. Her head bounced off his shoulder, heat washing over them and everyone else as they rolled over the street. She lashed out blindly, pushing back against the starfire that threatened to consume them.
She rolled off Blaine, getting shakily to her feet, watching through blurred vision as the starfire twisted and arched over the street, kept at bay by her strength of will. Screams filled the air as a handful of soldiers went up in pillars of starfire before Soren’s heavy presence against her awareness blocked any such further attacks from Eimarille. So Eimarille shifted her target—instead of people, every single rifle their side carried burst into flame. Again, Caris felt Soren trying to ward Eimarille off, and when the flames were snuffed out, she rather thought Eimarille had done it, not Soren.
“Tell everyone to get back,” Caris said, staring down the street at Eimarille, watching the other woman approach with measured strides, trailed by theKlovodand Nathaniel.
“Caris—” Blaine protested.
“Do it! Soren and I can’t fight her if we’re worried about keeping all of you alive. You need to find cover.”
“My road is your road until I see you on the starfire throne.”
She didn’t have time to argue with him. Blaine refused to move, and so did Maurus once her order was relayed. The rest of the Royal Guard stayed, too, as did the others. No one left, even when she wished they would. She didn’t want any more people to die for her in the fight to see their country freed of Daijal rule.
Honovi seemed to have the same idea as Blaine, refusing to leave Soren’s side as the warden met her in the middle of the street. Sweat beaded on his brow, and tremors made his fingers twitch, but Soren didn’t look in any danger of collapsing.
“I’ll take out their guns and the automatons as they did ours and then focus on theKlovod. The governor wants him alive, if possible,” Soren said.
“The rest of us will engage with her soldiers,” Maurus said from behind them. “Wardens and magicians up front. Let’s keep the enemy away from our queen.”
Caris met Soren’s eyes, and he stared back at her with a steely determination in them that helped steady her. “Try to get Nathaniel free?—”
She broke off as a shadow passed over them all. She jerked her head around, watching in horror as, with a casual flick of her wrist, Eimarille sent a fast-moving, snaking vortex of starfire toward the airship preparing for a bombing run.
Caris raised her arm toward the sky and desperately tried to redirect the starfire, but she was too late. The airship exploded like a bomb a few streets over, the concussive force of it rattling through the air.
