Chapter 13
He dreamt of Soraya.
She was in her golden gown again, but this time they weren’t in the training room. They were on the backs of the war eagles, breaking through the clouds above the snowy grey sky...and into the morning light.
There was the sun again, a ball of brilliant fire that rose just on the other side of the Sawteeth’s highest peaks.
“Come on, Arawn!” Soraya shouted.
She was laughing, and she was beautiful, no longer the girl of his childhood, but a grown woman he wanted to hold, and care for, and—
“Arawn!”
His eyes shot open at the sound of a voice.
Because it wasn’t hers.
It was Kinlear who stood over him, in the near darkness.
Arawn had left the curtains closed, and the fire had dimmed.
He had no clue what time it was, whether it was day or night.
..and for a moment, in his sleepy stupor, Arawn thought they were kids again.
He thought Kinlear had found his way into his room this time, freshly awoken from a nightmare.
“Arawn!” Kinlear was saying, as he shook him awake. “She’s gone.”
“What?” Arawn blinked.
“Oh, gods, she’s gone. She was talking about strange things, other places. She was begging me to go with her, but of course I wouldn’t, and—” He paused, pressing his hand to his mouth.
He was crying, Arawn realized.
He hadn’t seen his brother cry since they were boys.
Arawn sat up, his heart in his throat. “Slow down, Kinlear, and tell me what happened.”
“I can’t!” Kinlear screamed.
His eyes were haunted. He ran his hands through his dark hair, and then he was sobbing so hard he could barely breathe. His cough came back, and he slumped against the wall, too weak to hold himself up.
“She left. You have to go after her. She’s going to die, oh gods, I’ve seen it all in my dreams, and I didn’t know—” He moaned as if he were in pain, his hands slamming the sides of his skull as if he could shake the thoughts from it.
As if he could give words to what he felt.
“I didn’t understand, in my dreams, but I see it all now.
..and it’s too gods-damned late! She took an eagle. ”
“Who?” Arawn asked. He rushed to Kinlear’s side, took his too-thin shoulders into his hands, and practically shook him. “Who took an eagle, Kinlear?!”
“You have to promise me. Promise you will save her. I’m so sorry, oh gods, I’m so--”
“Who godsdamned is it?” Arawn shouted, as he shook him.
And he felt like he died inside as Kinlear whispered her name. “Soraya.”
He ran.
Like hell was at his back, he ran to get to her.
The snow poured into his vision as he raced through the Citadel, into the courtyard and up the stone steps between cliffs, faster than he’d ever pushed himself.
It was already nearing the end of the day again, the light sharp as it cut across the sky. It was almost time for battle, almost time for the darksouls to rise from behind their veil of shadows and darkness.
His aerie wasn’t supposed to fly tonight.
It was their night off, their chance to rest, but Soraya...
He made it into the Eagle’s Nest and found her stall empty. Her eagle, gone.
He took Cyrra without a saddle, for there was no time to waste. Every second was fleeting and precious, and why had she done it? Oh, gods, why?
He prayed to Vivorr as he took to the sky.
As he soared, clinging to Cyrra’s neck with all the strength in his arms and legs, and hell itself couldn’t have ripped him from her.
He would make it to Soraya.
He would get to her, and bring her back, even if it killed him.
He could see the shadows already gathering as he dove through the Snow Gates, pulled up, and pushed onwards, upwards and into the sky again.
He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t think, he couldn’t see beyond his own damned tears.
You cannot fail.
You must not fail.
He saw her when he was halfway across the Expanse. The Sawteeth closed in, and her eagle was alone, and for all the magic Soraya had, all the power of the wind she’d been given...
She couldn’t take on the Acolyte alone.
What is she doing? his mind screamed. Why now, why this?
“Wait!” he screamed.
And it felt like the gods were pushing at his back, helping him get there faster, faster, for it was impossible, that he’d have been able to catch up to her eagle like this.
She was always faster than Cyrra. But he could see the strands of her dark hair now.
He could sense that maybe, just maybe...
she’d waited for him, hoping he would come after her.
That he’d appear at her side, as he always did, and she would fall into place behind him, and go home.
Home, where the gods kept them safe.
Home, where he could spend his days with her, where he could love her, even if it was from afar. As a friend that would never become something more.
It was better that way.
He felt like he died inside when darkness suddenly fell. When a terrible, roiling crack sounded from the Sawteeth, and that veil of living shadows, that horrible, infernal storm...
It struck.
And from the Sawteeth came the darksouls.
They were close enough that Soraya, alone on her eagle, didn’t even see it when one attacked. A blast of shadow magic soared from its claws, and Soraya’s eagle screamed.
He felt it in his own chest as she dipped.
And went, tumbling in a clump of feathers, to the Expanse below.
He couldn’t catch her in time.
There was nothing he could do, nothing he could conjure up to stop her fall, because she was the one with wind magic, and he was nothing but useless godsdamned flames.
So why wasn’t she breaking her own fall?
She could have conjured something up, a blast of wind, the righteous power that had emanated from her hands in the war, just yesterday.
But Soraya did nothing.
She crashed against the snow, so hard, it looked like a wave of white swallowed her.
Her eagle was dead on impact, and Soraya...
Arawn landed, screaming her name.
He didn’t give a damn about the war, about the darksouls that were already pouring from the Sawteeth, a spiral of shadows and wings, because the Sacred had arrived behind him. They clashed in the sky, setting the world alight as Arawn leapt from Cyrra’s back before she even landed in the snow.
And then he was running to her.
“SORAYA!”
She was there, covered in blood, her legs twisted at an awkward angle, and if she was dead, oh gods, if she was dead...he swore to Vivorr that he would never use his magic again.
Not without her.
“No,” Arawn gasped, as he collapsed at her side. Her eagle’s body had taken the impact, as if the beast had done its best to break Soraya’s fall. To save her, with its very last breath. “No, no-no-no,” Arawn breathed, as he stopped beside her.
And then she opened her eyes and looked at him.
And he let out a terrible, broken moan, a desperate sound he’d never heard from himself.
She was still alive.
She was alive and he was going to save her, to pick her up and carry her back to Alaris. She wasn’t too broken, she wasn’t beyond—
A howl split the night.
Arawn spun as Cyrra screeched behind him, and he turned...
Just in time to see an entire flock of shadow wolves land on the snow behind him.
He counted five, ten, in the span of a breath, as he had yesterday. The shadows rippled through them as they growled, and their wings tucked in tight, and in seconds, they were surrounded.
“Soraya.” Arawn ground out. “We’re going. I’m taking you back.”
He lifted her, but she screamed at his touch. She screamed, and thrashed, as if he’d burned her.
And he realized, suddenly, as he pulled his hands away, afraid to cause her any more pain...
She was bleeding.
But it wasn’t red like it always was.
No, now it was a deep, oily black.
“No,” he breathed. “No, that’s impossible.”
It was the darkness around them, perhaps. It was the shadows, or...or something else, anything else.
The wolves closed in. Cyrra screeched, and charged at the ones closest to them, and Arawn knew he had seconds before she took flight. Before she left them both behind.
He turned back to Soraya, tried to lift her into his arms.
Black blood stained his hands.
She wasn’t a darksoul.
She wasn’t a monster, like them.
This was wrong, all wrong.
“It’s okay,” Arawn said through tears. “It’s going to be okay.”
Soraya moaned as he sent a wave of fire scorching towards the wolves behind her. They yelped, and skittered backwards in the snow, but it wouldn’t be enough.
Not alone.
Not without her.
“Go,” Soraya ground out.
Her voice...
It sounded different. Dark and whispering, a raw hiss, like she’d broken her back or punctured her lungs, or—
“Gods damn you, Arawn, just go!” she shouted.
He lifted her anyways.
“No!” she yelled. She thrashed in his arms. “LET ME GO!”
“Stop it, Sora, just stop—”
He paused to send another wave of glittering fire towards the wolves. And behind his back, Cyrra screeched again, dragging an injured wing.
“We have to go now,” Arawn said.
“NO!”
She shifted in his arms as he turned, almost falling from his grasp, and...
Pain.
His mind registered it before his body did.
White hot pain shot through him, and then he felt warm, and wet, as blood stained his tunic. He looked down, horrified...
To find Soraya’s dagger dragging down his chest. Cutting through him...
As if he were an enemy.
And she...
She was fighting for the other side.
“Soraya?” he heard himself say. His voice felt like an echo, like a faraway thing that did not belong to him.
And he bled, the world turning dark at its edges, as he dropped her back to the snow.
“Get...away...from me,” she growled at him. He stumbled...and he felt cold. Like his fire was dimming inside of him. Like he was going to die.
Somewhere behind him, a blast of magic struck the snow.
Someone on his side had seen the fallen eagles, had come to his aid. He had seconds to get away...to save himself before it was too late.
He reached for Soraya, his own blood dripping from his hands.
“I said get away!” she screamed. She tried to call to her magic, invocating as if she’d use her wind to shove him away from her.
But no magic came.
As if the gods had heard her cry...and said no.
As if that connection, that claiming from Avane, had been severed from above.
“Soraya,” Arawn whispered. “Please.”
He was heaving for breath now, as his blood stained the snow. Red, his mind whispered. Red, because you love the gods, because you have not defected in your heart and soul, like her. “Please, Soraya,” he sobbed.
But the truth was there, all over him. He knelt, holding his palms before him as if he were praying. Begging the gods, without words, to take back what she’d done to him.
Because it wasn’t an accident, that carving of his body from cheek to chest. He’d seen her do it a thousand times, to their enemies.
But the way she looked at him now, as she lay there, face-up in the snow?
It was hatred.
Cold and deep and certain as the grave.
And maybe it was shock that held him here, that kept him from turning away. Or maybe it was the breaking of his own heart, because he couldn’t accept that Soraya, his Soraya...his greatest friend...
Had just tried to murder him.
“Don’t,” he whispered, as she moaned, and gave a rattling breath. And he knew she was going to die, a traitor. A defector. Perhaps he would die right beside her in the snow...
The broken Windmage and her Crown Prince.
“Don’t leave me like this,” Arawn begged.
But she’d closed her eyes now.
And the wolves...
Cyrra’s screams would haunt him for the rest of his days. The wolves had pounced on her, his beautiful, golden war eagle, and shredded her with their claws and teeth. He begged Vivorr for fire.
For saving...
And it was a gift when he felt the flames surge from the depths of him, and he charred the wolves from Cyrra’s back. They wouldn’t die, not unless he removed their heads, but it was enough time that he made it to her.
She lowered herself close to the ground, so he could fall upon her back. And then she was soaring away with him, his blood staining her feathers.
His tears, already frozen on his face as the snow swirled against him. As he reached for Soraya’s cold, lifeless body.
The last thing he saw, before his eyes fluttered closed, was her face.
Her eyes were open, as if she were watching him. But she wasn’t. Not really.
He knew, he felt it in his soul...that she was gone.
His heart broke.
And then he let out a final cry – a groan that came from the very pits of him – as that ember inside of his chest went out. He felt it...like he’d had wings all his life, and they’d just been clipped.
Help me, he begged his god.
But he didn’t know if Vivorr was even listening, if his god could even hear him.
Because Soraya was dead.
And his magic, nestled in the core of his heart, had died along with her.