His strong hands collide with my side, shoving me out of the path of the descending wind tunnel.
I hit a solid surface—Thaden’s chest. He must have lurched to his feet a moment after Gallium. His arms close around me, and he whisks me to the side, propelling me away from my brother, who now stands directly in the path of the storm, and no matter how fast Gallium moves, he won’t evade it.
Fear for my brother fills my heart, and in that moment, there isn’t time to scream.
There’s nothing I can do to stop the dust storm crashing down on him.
Gallium’s form disappears within the dust storm.
My scream is whipped away in the wind that crashes across the clearing, forcing me into a crouch with Thaden’s body curved around mine even as I shout at myself to get back to my brother.
The raging ash has formed visible ropes within the swirling tornado, each one appearing covered in sharp, thorny barbs, all of them writhing and flailing. The mire is so thick that I can’t make out Gallium at all.
Then there’s a bright flash of copper. A streak of metal cuts through the mire, and my breath stops.
“Gallium!” I scream against the wind, my voice snatched away, and my hair whipping sharply across my face.
I make out another slash of copper within the storm and then another. Each one faster than the last.
Gallium.
And then?—
Light explodes between the dark ropes, and I can see my brother’s silhouette backlit in a copper glow. He’s rising up within the darkness, his entire body covered in copper armor that flows around him like liquid skin, protecting him.
My eyes widen as I realize that he must have made that armor from a single medallion.
He grips a dagger in each hand—undoubtedly formed from his other two medallions—and he’s whirling, the blades flying back and forth, cutting through the storm, slicing across the ash ropes, piercing the darkness. Faster than I’ve ever seen him fight.
Just as the ash thickens again, he drops to the ground, crouches, and then leaps directly upward.
Up through the darkness and into the sky above the tornado.
High above it.
In an instant, his daggers transform into swords, both of them pointed downward. His biceps are bunched—every musclein his body is tense and strong. The sheer concentration on his face, his pure determination, takes my breath away.
And in that moment, I truly believe he has a chance.
He soars downward, gravity taking him back to the storm, but this time, he’s arcing toward its stem—closer to the edge of the ridge.
His blades slash downward.
At the last moment, the tornado splits into two, forming a second, thick rope that swings across the air.
It smacks into his side and thethudit makes is as if the tornado is made of solid wood and not ash.
Gallium shouts, and I can only watch as pain floods his face and his body flies backward.
Out into the dark sky.
And then he’s gone. Over the edge.
Chapter 8
“No!” My scream is full of desperation, my arms reaching toward the spot where Gallium fought the darkness only seconds before.
My cry is drowned in the wind, but only for a moment.
