I’m grateful it’s alive, although… I’m not sure what I’m going to do with it since it hasn’t given any indication that it’s going to fly away.
Erik reaches my side and folds his arms across his chest, but his smile fades as he turns his attention to the sky.
The heavy scent of blood-rain has remained in the air. “Something isn’t right,” he murmurs.
“I don’t understand what’s happening,” I say. “This creature was clearly impacted by Blacksmith magic, but… where could it have come from?”
“There was never anything like it in these forests when my family hunted here,” Erik replies. “And nothing like it in the mountains around the city. I’d never seen a thunderbird until we stayed with the fae.”
“Could the fae have created it somehow?” I ask.
“With Blacksmith magic they don’t control?”
I shake my head. “If Milena was their ally, and not the humans’, it might have been possible, but she wasn’t. What about farther east, where the blight has taken over?” I ask. “Could it have flown from the poisoned land out there?”
“Maybe.” He rubs his chin for a moment. It draws my attention to the shadow of growth across his jaw and the tiredness around his eyes that I suspect he’s trying to hide from me now. “It’s a long way from there to here.”
I grimace, murmuring, “The chances of it coming all that way are slim.”
Erik’s lips press into a worried line. “The most likely option is the wasteland.”
I turn in that direction, even though I can’t see it because of the trees.
“If it came from the wasteland, then it means a thunderbird died there at some point.” I shudder. “The fae said that Malakassassinated their former Queen. Could he have taken her thunderbird?”
Even as I ask the question, I don’t expect Erik to have the answer. Neither of us was alive when the assassination happened.
To my surprise, he nods. “Actually, he did. He told me so.”
I consider Erik’s grim expression. On the night I first met Erik, he made it clear that he knew all of Malak’s secrets. He forced Malak to tell him everything before he killed him.
I try to suppress another shudder. “So he killed their Queen, took her bird, and buried its body in the wasteland alongside so many other creatures. Quite probably right next to a wolf in this case.”
And now they rise.
All of the monsters are malformed by the creation magic churning within that soil.
I consider the bird with a new sense of dread—my focus now on the fact that the city bells aren’t ringing, which means this creature didn’t raise any alarms.
Which means there’s a high chance that it flew straight to me instead of attacking the city.
“Blacksmith magic is attracted to itself. If this bird rose from the ash all the way down on the plain and didn’t understand its existence or know what to do…” I cast Erik a worried glance. “Would it avoid the city and seek me out instead?”
My stomach sinks as a horrible realization dawns on me, and I continue speaking before Erik can respond.
“All those monsters… If my siblings and I hadn’t been in the city, would the monsters have even attacked? Would they have turned away and come looking for us instead?”
Erik’s hands are firm around my shoulders. “You don’t know that for sure.”
“But—”
“Asha, listen to me.” He points at the bird, which has—rather impossibly—continued to obey Erik’s command to stay where it is. “This is a creature of the air. It has the ability to fly to you without harming anything along the way. But other monsters—wolves, bears, stags—they could have razed the city on their way to you. Or just because it’s in their nature. Trust me.” He releases my shoulders to thump his chest. “I know the mind of a beast.”
Erik is a wolf.
He’s whole now, his mind no longer splintered, but it wasn’t always so. He understands what it means to wake up changed and overcome with rage and want nothing but blood.
I push at my fear, trying to find the light in the dark. “Well, other than the time Thaden arrived, at least only one monster has ever risen at a time. And regardless of the reason, this one didn’t attack the city, so?—”
