Chapter Eleven
WILDER
T here was nothing like the weight of steel in hand to ground a warrior amid unyielding darkness. Gripping his sword, Wilder Hawthorne planted his feet apart, taking his place at Thea’s side, where he belonged.
The look of betrayal on her face was fleeting as she flung herself back into the fight.
Despite the blows she’d dealt, all three wraiths prevailed, their sinewy bodies twisting, contorting along with their shadows.
They hissed viciously in his direction, sniffing through the slits in their faces, scenting the Furies-given power on him.
The first monster lunged and Wilder met its talons with a resounding clash, his Naarvian steel singing through the icy air, cutting through the darkness with swift precision.
If he could immobilise them, Thea could carve out their hearts.
They had done so before in the woods outside of Tver, as a team.
He shielded his mind against the lashes of onyx power that threatened to bring his worst memories to the surface and delivered a flurry of attacks, slicing through the veil of darkness that enveloped the road and the surrounding forest, ignoring the screams of despair that sounded from the royal carriage.
Amid the symphony of steel and shadow he could feel Thea fighting alongside him, whirling his second blade against the treacherous creatures, fighting back the tendrils, forcing her way to the heart of the fray.
Wilder followed her, as he always would.
Their blades swept in radiant arcs of silver against the waves of obsidian, the wraiths hissing and recoiling, only to strike out again.
Wilder spun on his heel, pivoting to deliver a powerful overhead swipe that shattered the inky essence around them, creating a window for Thea, who sliced through the outer defences.
At last, the opportune moment presented itself and Wilder feinted right, thrusting his blade up in between one of the monster’s ribs.
Thea was there in an instant, leaping upon the falling body, her dagger already carving through the creature’s torso to its heart.
Shadows flickered as she wrenched the bloody, still-pulsing mass from the chest cavity.
But Wilder didn’t stop. He channelled all his strength into another devastating slash and was rewarded with a cascade of hot, black blood hitting his front. With his free hand, he punched through the wraith’s torso and closed his fist around its throbbing heart, tearing it directly from its body.
The beast screamed. High-pitched and ear-piercing.
Wilder tossed its heart to the ground and turned to the final wraith, whose shadows still clawed at the carriage.
Thea advanced, blood leaking from her nose, looking every bit the warrior he’d come to know she was. But something wasn’t right. He had seen her take on this many monsters before with less effort, with less of her own blood spilt.
His gaze lingered on her a fraction too long, long enough for a cord of shadow to strike with teeth-rattling intensity, slamming him onto the road, sending him rolling across the gritty surface. The gravel and ice scraped at his exposed flesh and tore at his clothes —
‘Wilder!’ Thea screamed.
The wraith was upon him, pinning him to the ground, ribbons of darkness lashing at him, drawing his worst fears, his most traumatic experiences to the forefront of his mind, so that they started to take shape before him.
Gods, these wraiths were strong. Stronger than those he’d fought before.
They almost held the full power of a reaper.
He tried to pull his sword arm back so he could thrust his blade into the monster, but he was beneath the full weight of the creature now, its dark tendrils locking him in place, its shadows creeping closer and closer to his face, and to his heart.
He closed his eyes with the force of his effort, trying to hold the attack off with his bloodied hands —
A high-pitched screech pierced the air, an agonised wail that nearly burst Wilder’s eardrums and sent an icy shiver down his spine.
His eyes flew open to see the tip of his own sword protruding from the wraith’s chest, and Thea standing in its wake.
The grip of the shadows weakened and a flash of silver blurred in his vision. Suddenly he had Malik’s dagger in his hand, had caught it by reflex as Thea had thrown it to him.
Without thinking, he palmed the dagger and lunged for the incapacitated creature, piercing flesh, muscle and bone as he sliced through its front, digging deep with the blade to get to its heart.
The overwhelming scent of burnt hair and blood filled his nostrils, but Wilder didn’t stop until he tore the wraith’s heart from its body and flung it across the blackened snow.
Panting, he watched as the swirling masses of shadow disintegrated, leaving behind mutilated corpses and mangled monster hearts.
‘Princess!’
Thea’s voice carved through the chaos, and Wilder suddenly remembered why they were there in the first place.
Princess Jasira was in that carriage.
Still clutching Thea’s dagger, he sprang to his feet, rushing towards the carriage, where Thea was already breaking the door open.
The young princess fell into her arms, sobbing.
‘I thought…’ she gasped. ‘I thought I was going to die.’
‘I would never let that happen,’ Thea vowed, holding the princess upright.
For a second, it hit Wilder: a princess of Delmira had saved the Princess of Harenth, but no one would ever know it, except him, and —
He whirled around, scanning the roadside. Where were Cal and Kipp? He remembered their shouts at some point during the battle, but they had never made it past the initial shadows, had they?
At last, he spotted them beneath a towering oak. Cal knelt before Kipp, who was hunched over his knees, head hung to his chest. With Thea occupied by Jasira, Wilder jogged over to them.
‘Are you hurt?’ he asked the pair.
‘He’ll live,’ Cal replied, with forced lightness, Wilder noted.
He surveyed Kipp. He couldn’t see any blood, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t an internal injury. ‘What happened?’
‘Our swords do fuck all against those shadowy bastards,’ Kipp grumbled. ‘The big one got in a swipe at me. I ended up in the damn canopy.’ He was holding his ribs.
‘Anything broken?’ Wilder demanded.
‘You mean besides my pride?’
‘Didn’t know you had any of that,’ Wilder quipped, gripping the lad’s shoulder gently.
Kipp half laughed before he gasped in pain. ‘Didn’t know you made jokes.’
‘Who said I was joking?’
‘Hilarious.’
The tension in Wilder’s chest eased. If Kipp was up for verbal sparring, the damage wasn’t permanent. He looked to Cal. ‘And you?’
‘I’m fine,’ the archer said, voice strained.
Kipp wheezed. ‘Fine… You were practically sobbing when I came to.’
‘I thought you were dead,’ Cal replied, passing a hand over his face with a grimace.
‘It’s touching to know you’d weep for me —’
‘I was not weeping —’
Wilder clapped a hand on Cal’s back. ‘Sounds like you both have it under control,’ he told them, turning back to where Thea was talking softly with Princess Jasira.
‘The only time I’ve seen a wraith before was at Thezmarr,’ the princess said between ragged gasps, her face still wet with tears.
‘You were at Thezmarr twenty years ago?’ Wilder asked, wiping black blood spatters from his face with an equally grimy sleeve. ‘You could have only been a child. You remember them? That’s —’
The princess looked up in surprise and backed away, horror etched on her face.
‘It’s you,’ she managed, retreating another clumsy step, her slippered feet sliding in the slush as she spun towards Thea.
‘He’s the fallen Warsword you’ve been hunting.
’ She surveyed the carnage around them with wide eyes. ‘Was this his doing?’
Wilder cringed at that. He could only imagine what he looked like to the princess, covered in wraith blood, holding Thea’s dagger as he half limped towards them.
But he couldn’t let her believe the worst. ‘I —’
‘He’s my prisoner,’ Thea said sharply.
The princess’ gaze darted between them. ‘He… he doesn’t look like a prisoner.’
Thea tensed, her own eyes flicking to the manacles he’d discarded in the snow.
With a heavy weight within pulling him down, Wilder did the only thing he could think of. He went to the irons, scooping them up from the sludge, handing them to Thea.
And then he offered her his wrists.