I’m yours, Tristan, a gentle voice whispered.For as little or as long as you want me. I’myours.
His own response rang out through his head, his heart.
His soul.
For eternity.
A tidal wave crashed through him, filling his veins and bursting from his fingers. He mixed the streams with his gusts, crafting a cyclone of wind and cloud and water.
A wicked grin spread onto Ione’s face as she seeded it with lightning in the rapidly darkening chapel.
The door pushed inward, then slid aside.
And it wasepicallysatisfying to see Eamon’s smugness distort into wide-eyed shock as he and his guards were blown backward, swords crashing and helmets clattering.
Torrents of rain, cracks of lightning, and gusts of wind filled the hallway, ripping at Tristan’s wings as he pulled Ione to his side and they rushed out of the chapel.
Eamon rose, his wet black clothes plastered against his body, and erected a wind-shield around himself to block the storm. His Vasilikans and a few Windrider guards did the same. The Beastrunners and Deathstalkers were unable to rise against the battering wind and thrashing rain.
“Follow them!” Eamon shouted.
Tristan and Ione tore down the hallway, feeding their magic into the storm at their backs.
A blast of energy whined through the din and Tristan turned back to see it ricochet off a gust and take down a Vasilikan brandishing a stun pistol.
They reached the wooden door they’d entered through, and Tristan shattered it with a concentrated blast of wind. He helped Ione through the jagged hole and into the stone passageways beyond.
He looked back over his shoulder. “Let’s end him,” he ground out. “No one else has to get hurt if we just kill Eamon now. Our storm?—”
Ione’s lips parted to answer, but before any sound came out, she was seized by the surge of a stun pistol. She crumpled, paralyzed, at his feet.
Tristan cursed low, watching as his brother and the guards clanked toward the blown out door. He couldn’t fight them off aloneandprotect Ione.
He swore again, then hauled her over his shoulder and raced through the labyrinthine tunnels beneath the palace. Behind him, the storm fizzled while ahead, light began to glow.
The cave entrance. And just beyond, their boat.
He glanced over his shoulder, wiping rain from his eyes. Eamon and four guards were right on his heels.
Tristan burst out of the cave and tossed Ione into the boat. He redirected his wind into the water, a makeshift motor that powered their progress as he guided the little boat through the canal and into the open waters of Lake Phaeban.
The cuff at his wrist heated the moment they passed through the shield.
Brother!a voice roared into Tristan’s ear via windwhisper.
Eamon stood on the shore hundreds of feet away, wings splayed, dark hair in disarray. Far enough away that neither he nor his guards would be able to reach Tristan before the cuff could portal him back to Lebaedia. Eamon seemed to discern as much as he whispered furiously into his palm, then waved over another message.
Tristan pulled Ione into his arms as his brother’s words floated into his mind.
I hope you’ve prepared for this particular ending.
There was a manic edge to the message, but in typical Eamon fashion, it was cryptic fucking nonsense.
Tristan chose not to respond. At least not with words.
A crazed smile burst across his face as he lifted his middle finger to his brother.
Then tapped the opal on his cuff and disappeared in a flash of rainbow light.
