The horrible sound that emanates from us must be heard throughout the mine.
My hand flies to my own side as I feel some of her scales crack. I sense the reassuring weight of the armor shielding my growing child within. Hot tears well up, threatening to spill, while a surge of fierce determination floods through me, fiercely protective of the life blossoming within my womb.
When another rock hurls at us, I am more careful. We evade it with more ease. My blood pumps, and I’m coated in sweat.
The wall is mostly broken, but the stone benders’ attack wasn’t enough to thwart the use of the catapults.
Another stone nearly hits us as we rise over the compound, looking for a place to land. My senses are heightened as I look at the arrows, spears, and rocks preparing to be launched at us.
How are there still so many?
My question is left unanswered as the hiss and wizz of lethal objects flying past us quickly depletes the energy I thought replenished.
It’s then that I notice movement from the mouth of the mines. I had seen humans fleeing, but now hundreds of them begin pouring out of the caves.
Some of the giants who were fixed on us now turn on them, and with swipes of their massive weapons, begin to cut them down.
“No!” I scream.
Teo’s mind reaches out to carress my own, and together, he helps me angledrathorinnadown toward the ground. His hand slips around my midsection.
I suck in a breath.
We’ll do this together,I say.
I’ll keep both of you safe.
I feel the nudge of my power, but I’m acutely aware of my limitations. I know that I can’t both hit the giants and avoid the humans.
The ground gets closer with every second, and I cast my thoughts back to my husband.
We need to jump,I shout down the bond.
Not yet, it’s still too high. You’ll both get hurt,Teo pleads.
The wind blows back the skin on my face, burning it from the sheer speed and force. Just as the screams of those worrying we are about to crash touch my ears with shattering magnitude, I pull up.
“Now!” I scream, ready to go, only fordrathorinnato be violently shoved to the side with the impact of another boulder.
The collision throws all three of us from our seated positions. My heart stutters, and I scream at the weightless horror.
Death, death, death, death comes.
The voice that had been quiet for weeks whispers.
I hear, not feel, the ground rumble beneath me. It moves and shifts like a torrential wave, part of it reaching up to cradle me and the men.
The breath is still knocked out of me when I crash into it, but the shifting formations of stone guide my body to the ground unbroken. My hand goes to my midsection.
Nothing feels wrong, so I leap up a second later, surrounded by fallen humans and giants. There are many more still fighting than we had anticipated while we landed.
When I look at the manor, I find it surrounded by blackmist.
Damn.
Teo and Vann are faster than me, and I watch them draw to each other like moths to a flame. I’ve never seen them fight together, but they move in synchrony as they slice through scarred flesh.
A leg is cut away from a body, a stomach stabbed. They plow through the field like the terrors that I have only heard about.
