Chapter Fifteen #2
Collateral. Oh gods. He had killed them. He had killed them both, trying to get to me, and Caelan was –
“Right,” Caelan snorted, then sighed. “Best get on with it I s’pose. Getting late.”
My heartbeat set a blurring pace, head swimming with confusion.
He leaned in to me again, taking another long, appreciative inhale and this time I knew the gesture for the act it was. I might have missed his whisper beneath the heave of my own breath if I hadn’t felt his bristled lips move against my temple. “Be ready.”
Ready for what?
I reached for my Flame in a panic, and this time it came at once, immediately understanding that I was not arming myself to harm Caelan.
It poured into every limb, every nerve ending, and even when it burned beneath each fingertip I felt it spilling forth.
Endless waves of magic, more than I’d ever known I held, unspooling into every cell until my entire being was humming with magic and my jaw creaked with the effort of holding it in place.
Fischer tilted his head as he closed in, leaning forward so slowly I could almost imagine he meant to kiss me.
His huge, hairy hand closed around my jaw, and though my heart felt poised to shoot through my chest like a hummingbird, I held fast to the boundless fire simmering beneath my skin, waiting for Caelan’s word even as Fischer lifted his blade and–
“Glow for me, Rosie.”
I let go.
The explosion of firelight was so blinding that even I had to screw my eyes shut as I burst from Caelan’s embrace, Fischer’s screams ringing in my ears.
I fell to the ground in a burning heap, and rolled just in time to see Caelan lunge blindly forward, sword raised, aiming for the one part of Fischer not encased in bronze armour – his throat.
But Fischer turned and caught the blow on his back, and though the force of it sent him sprawling facedown he remained whole.
He had a frightening advantage over Caelan, who had chased after me with such haste that he’d never donned his own Captain’s armour of steel.
“What the fuck?!” Fischer shrieked, but there was not a moment to spare for his confusion.
He and I scrabbled to our feet in unison, a scream ripping through me with another burst of Flame as he flew at Caelan with his dagger held high. Caelan swung at his armoured arm this time, knocking the dagger from his hand with such vigour that it went spiralling across the tavern floor.
Fischer gave a vicious snarl, but even unarmed, he still had the protection of his armour and it gave him the mad courage to dart into Caelan’s space and land his grip over his former Captain’s fingers.
They grappled over the sword hilt for a moment, grunting and hollering before Caelan caught sight of me in his peripheral and his head turned, attention splitting.
“Rosie, run, get out of –”
Fischer’s fist sent his head snapping back, the sword wrenched from his grasp.
He was entirely exposed, and at the sight of Fischer’s triumphant sneer, I leapt.
The decision hadn’t registered until I was already wrapped around his broad bronze back, my flaming arms tight around his neck and my teeth bared at his ear.
“I’m going to roast you alive, you flaccid little fuck.”
Even with his roaring I could hear the skin crackling beneath his armour as it heated and glowed, and my magic soared with vicious delight.
The glory of it was too short-lived; Fischer stumbled back into the bar and knocked us into it with all his might.
I fell off him and rolled backward off the counter with a thud, the air whooshing out of me as I landed behind the bar.
“Rosie,” Caelan roared.
My head was ringing, my spine screaming even beneath the fire.
But I gritted my teeth and rolled over, crawling beneath the entry plank and dragging myself back onto the tavern floor, past the bronze armour that Fischer had discarded like a burning shell.
I staggered to my feet as I cleared the bar, but my vision was washed out with the glare that still shone from every pore.
I could just about make out the struggle before me, the two large figures spinning about the floor fighting fist to fist. Then one of the figures lashed out and the other – shrank.
Fischer’s fist swung through thin air where Caelan’s head had been, barely ruffling the hair of the little boy who stood in his place.
“I knew it,” Fischer hissed. “Slimy fucker.”
“You didn’t know shit,” laughed the boy in Caelan’s familiar lilt.
His laughter distorted and deepened as he lunged forth again, his skin shimmering as he moved, rippling like iridescent scales until he was Caelan once more and his fist connected with Fischer’s face.
They fought on and on, Caelan’s form shifting and shimmering between one skin and the next each time Fischer managed to catch hold of him.
He was a gangly soldier I half-recognised, then a young woman, then a child, then a wizened and stooped old man.