52. Myron
Myron
I’m running. How I’m running with the remains of an arrow wound in my chest, I don’t know, but I’m on my feet, palm pressing against the hole between my ribs as I leap off the wagon and stumble in the direction Herinor pointed.
Royad is kneeling in the dirt, staring at something together with Tata whose back is blocking my Ayna from view.
“You’ll tear that wound right open again, and I don’t think I have any magic left to heal you all over again,” Silas warns. It’s the least sarcastic I’ve heard him in ages, and it scares the shit out of me.
I don’t slow, though. The thin thread that is our bond is pulling me directly toward her. In my shoulder, a dull throb reminds me of the times when we were connected through the tattoo, when Herinor had used it to set me on the right track to find her. I haven’t thanked him for that questionable kindness. Maybe, one day, if he ever follows up on his promise to kneel to Ayna and me, I’ll speak those words of gratitude. But for now, I wave a dismissive hand over my shoulder at Silas.
A few squishy steps and I’m there, mud splattering my leathers as my knees hit the ground.
“Where is she?” I’m expecting to find my queen sprawled on the ground, but when Royad pulls back his hand, exposing a small, black, feathered body, my heart stills in my chest.
Mud covers her, beak to claws. Mud … and blood. I swallow the momentary relief at the sound of her heartbeat.
“What happened?” I’m not certain I want the answer when Royad opens his mouth and a long, deep sigh preempts his response.
“We’re not exactly sure. One moment, she was clawing out Jeseida’s eyes, and the next, she was up in the air. An arrow hit her in the wing. It went straight through, and Tata mended the damage, but she’s not waking up.
She fell. The onslaught of panic should feel familiar by now, but I’d rather face the Flames all over again than fret for Ayna’s life. Any number of bones could have snapped in a fall mid-flight. I don’t want to even think about what damage an uncushioned impact on the hard ground could have done to her inner organs, her brain?—
It’s a delicate organism, that of a Crow. In both forms, we have the same vital organs, but the difference in size and our overall physique changes the way we react to injuries in either form.
“Why didn’t she shift?” That’s what a Crow would normally do, try to carry the weight on the wings until the last possible moment, then shift and run the final steps or roll to ease the impact.
Royad shakes his head, and Tata shrugs.
“She might have already blacked out from the arrow wound,” Tata suggests. “It was bad. ” She shudders. And this is a seasoned warrior used to battle injuries of all sorts. “It’s a Guardians-damned miracle her bones aligned that easily when I healed her.”
Damn the Flames and their magic-nullifying serum. With my powers intact, I could easily sense if there’s something wrong on a deeper level.
“She used a lot of power up there, summoning the clouds,” Royad puts into consideration. “Perhaps she’s exhausted.”
I beg the Gods he’s right.
“And if that’s not it, we’ll have the healers back at the palace take a look at her. They have more experience with fairies of all different sorts.”
“We’re not ‘ fairies of all different sorts, ’” Silas objects from behind her. Focused on Ayna’s motionless bird form, I missed his approach. When Tata glances at him over her shoulder, a deep frown furrowing her brow, he adds, “We are fae. ”
“Who happen to turn into feathered birds that stalk the night. Lovely.”
Exhaustion is evident in every last one of her words, and Silas surely didn’t need to correct her about our heritage at this very moment, but he has a point. “We are more similar than you would think, Tata,” I say gently, my eyes never leaving Ayna. “Our magic might be different, but we’re from the same world.”
“Where exactly is the corner of the world you came from?” No judgement clouds Tata’s question, so I respond, hands reaching for Ayna yet hesitating when Tata holds up a finger to stop me. “I need to double-check her wing.”
It’s a test to be patient, but I manage. For Ayna. “East of Eherea, far across the oceans where no Ehereans have ever dared sail, lies a continent named Neredyn.” My chest aches.
“Think of the Askarean forests but wilder and lusher. Think of the blossoms of spring and summer but with more color and stronger scents. Think of islands of beauty where the Gods used to walk before they made us. You might like it there.” Trust Silas to be stepping in. He knows much more about Neredyn anyway. “One day, I will fly there again.” He pauses, face grave like he doesn’t truly believe it. “One day.”
Carefully, Tata’s hand covers Ayna’s wing, fingers wrapping around the length of it and flexing it. With a nod, she turns to me. “All right, Crow King. You can take her now.”
My hands are shaking as I reach for the miserable bundle of feathers in the mud and pick her up, fingers sliding around her form with ease.
She’s so small—so freaking tiny in her bird form. One squish, and she’d be crushed beyond repair.
The thought makes me hold her out in front of me like she’s made of glass. Her wing hangs limply over my blood-caked thumb while her head rests against my index finger. This is perhaps the most completely I’ve ever held her … and it fucking breaks my heart to see her so fragile. My strong, beautiful Ayna. The female who can stand on her own legs, no matter what the winds blow her direction. Defeated.
The soft touch of Royad’s comforting hand on my shoulder reminds me of his presence. “We need to get out of here, Myron.”
He’s right. We might have gotten away with our lives, but it’s only a matter of time until someone will come looking for the remains of the battle when the Flames don’t show up with the weapon.
“Is all of it destroyed?” I ask between my teeth, unable to tear my gaze away from the crow in my hands.
“The weapon?” Royad gestures at the burned-down wagons. “The big delivery is completely shattered. There’s not a single drop of liquid left.” He pauses, rummaging in his jacket and pulling out a small vial very much like the one Jeseida used to pour the serum over me, face victorious. “We saved this. One of the guards by the wagon had it clutched in his hand when I ran him through. I plucked it from his grasp. Maybe we can figure out an antidote.”
He sounds less hopeful than he looks, but Royad has always been the cautious type.
“Maybe,” I echo. My mind is on Ayna, though, on my failure that led to her sacrifice. “Come on.” I turn north. “Let’s go home.”
Home, it turns out, is a loaded word for a Crow to use when speaking about the Fairy King’s palace.
It’s been an hour since the last Flame took a breath, the ground is still slick with their blood, and Recienne perpetually frowns at his own hands as he tries to send out his dark wind to test if his powers are returning—he’ll vomit his guts up soon enough again when the effects of the drug fade.
Tata’s black braid swings along her back as she stalks back and forth in front of her king, features unreadable as she muses about the inconvenience of not being able to site-hop after all the healing she’s done and how, perhaps, letting a Crow die in order to keep enough of her strength to site-hop back to Aceleau and get help would have been the smarter choice.
“It better not be our queen,” Silas warns with more bite than I’m used to, even from his generally sarcastic mouth. He means it. No matter how soft Silas has gotten over the past weeks, he’s ready to return to being the ancient, slaughtering menace who used to serve in my father’s guard. It’s a miracle he sees me as a fit ruler with all the horrors he’s used to from my father.
“Of course, not your queen. Do you think I want to incite a new war? No thanks.” Tata turns on her heel and marches to the rocks from behind where the attack was launched. There, she plants her ass on the hard stone, gazing at the sky. “Wouldn’t be a very fair war—five against an army of thousands.” Before any of us can respond, she continues, “Can’t you just shift and fly to get help?” Her gaze slides to Silas, whose features have changed into a grimace .
“I have exerted my strength healing your king, thank you very much.” He spreads his arms in an obviously gesture, which Tata promptly responds to with a turn of her head to the Fairy King.
“Do something, Recienne.” It’s the first time I actually hear her call him by his name, but the familiarity was there the first time I saw them together. It no longer surprises me to see the Fairy King so familiar with his court. He’s proven in every way that counts he isn’t the bloodthirsty monster I believed him to be.
Absently, my finger glides over Ayna’s back. “So, there is no way for us to get back to Aceleau other than wait ?” It’s ridiculous that a bunch of magical creatures should be stuck in the human lands, yet here we are. “Won’t Tori and Clio come looking for us?” No one responds, but I already know the answer to that one: They were in such bad shape; they probably never made it all the way back to the palace. “Shall we send a search party?”
“I wish someone would send a search party for us,” Tata groans, bracing her hands beside her hips and hanging her head. “We don’t even have water rations on us.”
“Beginner’s mistake,” Recienne chides and flicks his fingers, probably trying to summon a glass of water, a jar of water, or maybe even a whole pond of water, and curses when he remembers his powers are gone.
Thankfully, I’ve lived every minute of my life improvising during the curse, so I know how to pivot. “There’s a forest a bit back east,” I say with as much an upbeat tone as I can manage with my unconscious mate in my palms. “I’m sure we can find rainwater collected in leaves or between roots.” Not in the mud beneath our feet—not without magic to filter it. “We’ll walk until dawn; then we’ll rest. Tomorrow either Silas can shift or Tata can site-hop. Whoever is first will get us help.”
Nobody objects when I start walking with Ayna between my palms, Royad falling into step beside me and Silas and Herinor at my back. Tata and Recienne bring up the rear. The moon is our witness as we leave the battlefield behind, muscles sore, multiple cuts on various parts of our bodies, and stranded in the human lands.
“You’ll need to do something about that wound of yours,” my cousin says after a few minutes of me suppressing the cache at the center of my chest where the hole in my flesh is still bothering me. “No one will benefit from you falling over with your last breath in the middle of our escape.”
Naturally, he’s right. I’ve become all too used to him being right over too many centuries. But he isn’t right about this.
“You’d be king,” I say flatly, and Royad almost stumbles over his own feet.
“Not while your mate is alive to rule.” He doesn’t pause long enough for me to inform him my mate might not survive the night. “She’ll bring you back from the dead just to kill you all over again for leaving her behind among these wrecked remains of a people.”
My teeth cut into my lip as I bite back a response I know I’ll regret. “Let’s find cover first. Everything within sight has been burned to cinders. We need a place to actually hide until we recover enough to shift or site-hop. Then we can dwell on who might or might not make it through this hike. Because, once someone finds the melee we left behind, we won’t get far.” We’ll be hunted down and brought back to Erina’s dungeon. I don’t need to add that, though. Royad can put two and two together.
“Why do you think they didn’t use the serum on all of us right away?” It’s a good question. One I’m grateful we need to ask, or we wouldn’t have stood a chance from the beginning.
“And that magic-repellant armor…” Silas adds. “That was nasty. If Ayna hadn’t figured it out, we might have continued wasting our power instead of simply cutting those fuckers down like twigs.”
“It seems to be a new feature,” Royad muses. Even when he wasn’t there to witness the battle, he was right there with the source.
“Did Jeseida say anything?” I prompt, well aware they were probably fighting their own battle in that wagon. One of will if what I know of the Flame Matrone is anything to go by.
Behind me, Herinor grumbles something unintelligible while Royad cringes, and anger rises in my veins, pushing so hard I can almost sense a flicker of my power, but the serum is still blanketing all attempts of it to break through. If it weren’t for that damn hole in my chest, I’d probably recover faster.
“You don’t need to share if you?—”
“Guardians be damned, they do,” Recienne interrupts me, less swagger in his tone than I’m used to. “If there is any information to be gained, I’d rather know now, before we face the Flames hunting us down, because they will. So, what happened inside the wagon?”
“He’s right.” To my surprise, it’s Herinor offering up the information willingly, not my selfless cousin.
Tata must have given the Fairy King a recap of the fight, or he wouldn’t even know Herinor and Royad were trapped there.
“They were practically waiting for us when we cut through the canvas of the wagon.”
Beside me, Royad swallows.
“Jeseida and her guards had the serum at the ready and splashed us in the face.” Herinor grimaces as if he can still taste the damn liquid. “They plucked our swords from our hands and knocked us out so fast we couldn’t even react.”
“That sucker of a drug,” Silas comments, earning a nod from Royad.
Usually, our reflexes are fast enough to react to an attack, but the magic-sedating serum is its own brand of horror. It affects our organism so quickly we can barely keep up.
“They knew we were coming,” Herinor continues, tone stony. “They were counting on all of us attacking from the air.” He pauses. “At least the Crows. Jeseida expressed verbally and with fists just how disappointed she was so few of us had plunged into the wagon. She even had the other wagons set up in a way that we’d take a bath in the drug upon landing.”
My entire body tightens at the thought of what would have happened had we not chosen to ambush them from all sides at once. Plus … she hurt them? —
“If she wasn’t already dead, I’d skin her alive. Slowly.” It’s all I have to say.
Silas growls his agreement, and surprisingly, even Recienne voices he’d gladly help.
“So, if they knew we were coming for them… Was it even a real transport?” A valid question Tata is asking.
“It was real. Very much so.” The conviction in Herinor’s tone is all the confirmation I need, but he continues. “Erina has been working with the Flames closely to further develop the serum so it’s more efficient, its magic-dampening strikes even faster, and the side effects are minimized.”
Jeseida mentioned that I’d be wide awake when Erina tortures me again and that I wouldn’t have days off from the effect of the drug.
“They had to get it to the army, though, and this was the fastest route for them, so they used the transport as a test run for their newest development: the magic-repellant armor. An invention that allows to smother all magic coming from the outside but allows magic to pass from its bearer.” Royad shudders but continues. “Jeseida had us watch the battle through a small gap in the canvas. She had us witness every time your powers failed to kill. To watch you deplete yourselves without even realizing what was going on.” He shakes his head, clearing it. “The Flames will stop at nothing to get what they want. Not even watching their own go up in streaks of fire.”
When I shoot him a questioning glance, he clarifies, “They had tested the armor before, but they didn’t know how long it would last against Crow magic and if it would impact the ability to withstand their own fire. ”
Silas curses under his breath. “They would have let them burn.” Not a question.
“Jeseida would have let the world burn to take revenge on us,” Royad replies, and my stomach tightens at the guilt washing over me for all the things my father did to those people.
“Perhaps we would have deserved death at their hands.” I hate the thought because, rationally, I know it wasn’t me who took their palace and their home in the Seeing Forest. It was my father.
“Ephegos and his flock of traitors deserve it,” Royad says before I can spiral into a hole I won’t return from.
In my hands, Ayna’s little body remains still, even when I need her to quench the rage welling up inside me. I need to look into her gray eyes and reassure myself that this storm the Flames conjured hasn’t taken her.
The Gods must be mocking me because the air changes, and a cold wind whips the plains as we march toward the line of trees on the horizon. Water collects in the corner of my eye, and the hole in my chest aches as my legs grow weak, forcing me to lean on the arm Royad instantly throws around my waist to keep me upright.
“If I don’t make it,” I murmur to my cousin, fighting the pain and the weakness and losing, “see to it that Ayna gets a proper crown. One with feathers and diamonds shaped like teardrops. Tell her those are the tears I cried for her when I held her in my palms.”