“There!” she snapped, already moving.
They worked fast, clearing smaller pieces first, then bracing against the larger beam that lay across the center. It groaned under the strain as Symond pushed with everything he had, muscles straining.
It moved just enough.
Beneath it, she saw him.
Rell, crouched under the wreckage, one arm braced against the board above to keep it from crushing them. His other arm was wrapped tight around Elora, shielding her body with his own.
His face was pale but steady, a flicker of pain behind the usual sharp eyes.
“You’re alive,” Violette breathed, the knot in her chest loosening just enough to let her move again.
Rell gave a crooked half-smile. “It’d take more than a glorified bonfire to get rid of me.”
Violette reached in and pulled Elora out first, cradling her with a soldier’s steadiness as she dragged her into the open air. Elora’s body was limp but breathing, her skin smudged with ash and riddled with cuts. The girl’s eyes fluttered open—wild, disoriented—but locked on Violette.
“You’re okay,” Violette murmured, steadying her. “You’re safe.”
Symond reached down and offered Rell his arm. Rell took it, letting Symond haul him out from under the wreckage. He stumbled once, then steadied, brushing soot from his coat with a wince.
Elora trembled, clutching Violette’s arm like she might fall apart if she let go.
Rell turned toward them, expression unreadable. “Fane?”
Violette’s jaw clenched. Her gaze flicked toward the dark field, where smoke still curled into the air—and where the creature waited, unseen for the moment.
Chapter 21
Elora
“I…” Elora blinked hard, her vision swimming. Her limbs felt heavy, like her bones were soaked in lead, her thoughts crawling through molasses. “Is… is Fane dead?”
Violette’s mouth drew into a thin line, her eyes cutting toward the smoldering wreck of the barn. She didn’t answer.
Rell’s voice cut through the haze. “Not yet.”
Elora followed his gaze, and the fog in her head began to burn away. In the field beyond the ruins, Fane still stood—massive, monstrous, unyielding. He swung one of his crackling coils with deadly force, the electricity flaring like a whip of lightning.
But it wasn’t Fane that made her breath catch.
It was the creature facing him.
The glowing ripple of its wings. That sleek, speckled black coat that shimmered like starlight. Those fierce, golden eyes.
Viliam.
Her heart skipped, then stuttered into overdrive.
He came back.
She couldn’t move. Could barely think. Her mind reeled, too many questions spinning all at once.How? Why? He was supposed to be far from here—safe in Al’tera.
Rell’s voice snapped her back. “We might just want to make a run for it before that thingturns on us.”
“It won’t,” she said quickly. “I know it won’t.”
“Elora—” he growled.
