“Just like you won’t succeed in bringing back your own grandmother,” I fired back.
I was forced back two steps in the squelching mud when she swung that shard of razor-sharp magic at me like a sword, like her arm itself was a weapon. Overhead, a wyvern screamed, loosing a screech so loud it caused ripples on the surface of the water.
Nabil—where was Nabil? I spared precious seconds scanning the riverbank for him. Only instinct had me throwing up a shield of flame, intercepting the dark, glittering magic before it could gut my stomach from edge to edge. I watched in surprise as those dark magics connected, and the tip of her wicked weapondisintegrated.My next grin was fierce. I shoved aside my fear for Nabil when Xiu swung at me again, her broken shard repairing itself before my eyes.
I surrendered another step in the mud, gritting my teeth at being on the defensive, but retreat was better than being skewered by that magic. Rage kept my shield in place, sweatrolling from my upper lip as I summoned a deadly inferno at the same time, building a black, furious pyre. Xiu didn’t react.
I bared my gritted teeth in a smile, ignoring the strain, and said, “Oh, she’s not your grandmother, is she? My mistake. She’s so ancient she doesn’t even know who you are. Do you think she’ll see you as her faithful family, or a simpering fan?”
Xiu snarled wordlessly and came at me harder, pushing me back along the riverbank. Further from where Nabil vanished. Further from where Varidian dove into the river. But she was angry, not thinking clearly, exactly as I wanted her.
“What would you know of family?” Xiu said with a forced laugh. I was getting under her skin. “You, abandoned by everyone? You, who Falaelloathedso much he wished you would die, so he turned a blind eye to my treatment? You, who was so despised after your sister’s tragic death, that it waseasyto make your brothers harm you. They were so eager for vengeance, so full of disgust for you, that it only took a delicate suggestion for them to target you.”
I swallowed, memories hitting me from so many angles, but my feet slipped in the mud and that was all it took to rip me out of that dark history. I should have realised she’d twisted them, taken their anger and made it into hatred and violence. I should have realised all theaccidentsthat left bruises on my body and my bones fractured were caused by her poison.
So I forced a shrug and said, “I came out stronger because of it. I call it character building.”
Xiu’s snarl came from deep in her throat, a rattling echo of rage that made my head thump, pain like a spigot punching through hair and flesh and skull into my soft brain. I scrambled for another rush of deathfyre, encouraging it to burn, to kill, toconsumeher, but it had barely erupted from me when black, glittering magic rose up behind me like a scorpion’s tail. I sawit from the corner of my eye. It struck so fast I couldn’t twist to deflect the blow, couldn’t get a shield in place.
A lick of fire glanced off the barbed tip, but deathfyre could do nothing to stop, or even slow, the magic that slashed at my exposed back. Sweat dripping from my upper lip, I threw more power into the shield at my front, letting rage course through my veins and alchemise into magic. I waited for pain to rip through my back. And waited.
Xiu paused in confusion, too. I didn’t stop to question my good luck, just dove deep into my rage. My red dagger was cool in my palm when I tore it from the sheath at my thigh and slashed it at her. Dark flame roared down the blade, my arms shaking as the magic gathered force. The dagger wavered, but my aim was close enough that the blade slashed a neat line on her throat.
Xiu whirled away, teeth bared, but I hadn’t expected that to kill her.
“Your faithful handmaiden died that way, you know,” I said conversationally, driving my shield up when she slammed a spear of sharpened metal at my chest. It dissolved on impact, turning to ashes and glitter, and I smiled. “I slit her throat and left her body to cool on the steps before the gate.”
Xiu tilted her head, enough of a pause in her actions that I continued in a smug tone.
“And then I went through that gate into the world where your ancestor came from. It must have takenweeksto build an army as large as the host in the mountains. What a pity it took minutes to destroy them.”
Xiu’s rage was sibilant, a rattling hiss escaping through clenched teeth. It was a sound echoed by twenty wyverns shrieking in the air. I felt the temperature with mere seconds warning, and flung my head back to stare at the sky, estimating the path of flame. Was Xiu seriously mad enough to riskincinerating herself along with me? She didn’t budge from her position on the riverbank even as I burst into a run.
The wyvern stalked me, its bare wings cutting the grey sky like tree branches in winter. They should have been too flimsy to keep it in the air, but this wyvern was a creature of dark Zalaam magic and defied all rules of nature.
I zigzagged as I tried to outrun those rapid wings, my stomach compacting into a sickly knot when I saw the flames in its throat—the red of fresh blood with a heart of void. My hand turned slick on the dagger but I tightened my grip, running frantically.
The air grew so hot that sweat dripped from me, my leathers clinging to my skin, and the press of my hair beneath the scarf became uncomfortable.
Xiu’s laughter echoed, coming from everywhere, as if she was a goddess able to see everything in the world, to mould it to her shape. But even with all this power, all this evil bowing to her command, she was one woman. She was no god.
Heat singed the back of my neck and I dove on instinct, rolling through the mud as fire poured onto the riverbank where I’d just been. A whimper left my throat, the shaking in my limbs intensifying until the straps and buckles on my leathers rattled. Alive—I was still alive.
I panted, hauling air into my chest and wincing when it burned, the scent of hot iron and death filling my nose, overriding every other sense. Where the fire had hit the mud, a crater remained, the ground utterly cremated. The gaping hole went down three meters. Fuck.Fuck,I had to get to my feet.
My hands slid in the muck, but I hauled my jellied body to my knees, then somehow found my footing. I would have appreciated a lightning soul guiding me right now, offering reassurance and reminding me to be brave, because terrorsapped all my strength. Seconds—I had beensecondsaway from dying an instant, hellish death.
I turned in place, searching for Xiu, for Nabil and Varidian. How long had he been beneath the water? Too long to survive? The shaking moved to my teeth, making them chatter. I had to find my rage, had to wrap it around myself like a shield. At least my deathfyre hadn’t faltered; it still covered me from head to toe, a wall that would melt any magical attack. And the dagger remained in my hand. I could have sworn the metal warmed, could have sworn it whispered, but I couldn’t make out any words.
But I was still armed, and I had a job to do. I straightened my spine, focusing on my senses. Wind whistled through bare wyvern wings, and in the distance the battle raged, but there was no other sound. Nothing until a low voice came from down the river, resonant and chanting.
“Shit,” I spat, wiping as much dirt from me as I could and ripping my boots from the thick mud. Xiu had resumed her chant. I couldnotlet her finish it.
I scanned the cloud-dark sky as I made my way back down the riverbank, surprised by how far I’d travelled while fleeing the wyvern. The wyvern… where did it go? I could make out a cluster of them where Xiu resumed her ritual, but where was the one who tried to burn me alive? I watched for shadows in the sky, my pulse pounding in my throat, in my chest.
This time, I was sure the dagger warmed in my hand, a pulse of heat passing from metal to my palm. I eyed the red dagger, the longer style of blade than the current fashion, the prayers that spiralled around both handle and blade, carved in painstaking accuracy. Prayers for strength and courage, I remembered Kamaal saying as he gave it to me. Well. I’d wished for reassurance from another soul, but I’d gladly take courage from a dagger as old as the continent itself.
It was only because of that dagger in my hand that my bravery didn’t flee entirely when I located the wyvern. Much, much closer than it ought to be. Practically on top of me. They weren’t simply deadly because of that fire, but because they moved soundlessly, not a beat of leather to warn me of its approach.
