Chapter 26 #2
This—this was what Blake wanted. This was what he still hoped to exploit.
This unimaginable hellscape of destruction and death had come about solely because of his thirst for power, and it sickened me that I’d once sat in solidarity with this man.
We’d shared our fears. Comforted each other. Survived together.
A rush of nausea had me retching in the gutter, believing the worst, but then Shane called out, “Look!”
He was pointing overhead, where for the briefest moment the smoke parted, granting us a glimpse of the skies above the ballpark…
And the pair of red dragons circling in the air overhead. A golden gryphon perched on the top of the walls like a vengeful guardian, and my fist punched the air as I nearly gasped with exultation and relief.
It was Ryker, Deverin, and Angelica. Patrolling the airspace, ready to defend the crowds of refugees huddled below.
Somehow, in spite of everything, Faris had held the city’s defenses and put our plan into action. He’d managed to protect the human protesters, holding off their attackers long enough to lead them to safety.
Now it was simply a matter of defending the perimeter until we could whittle down Blake’s numbers.
But we couldn’t count on human support. Faris had warned them of the dangers, so somewhere in the distance, a lone helicopter hovered, watching.
Waiting for the outcome of a battle the humans could do nothing to stop.
Thankfully, most of the entrances to the ballpark had been barricaded by a combination of tree roots and concrete—courtesy of the dryads and earth elementals among our allies.
But on the ground in front of the main gates, the battle still raged, and for a moment it appeared that my initial fears had been justified.
There were far more of the enemy—far more combatants pressing forward than there were defending the walls.
And with no more reinforcements coming…
It was up to us.
Without any need for words, Shane and I charged forward together.
I somehow matched him stride for stride as we cut through the smoke, hurdled the cracks, and threw ourselves at the enemy’s flank—Shane with daggers that he produced as if by some strange new magic, and I with the tiny trickle of fae power that answered my call.
It wasn’t enough for a sword or a shield, not enough to overwhelm or crush, but enough for the long, slender lash of a whip that snapped and curled around its targets, leaving cuts and burns behind.
And as we fought our way through, I began to recognize the stadium’s defenders. Not just members of the Shadow Court, but members of every court, standing shoulder to shoulder in defiance of Blake’s army and their arsenal of stolen magic.
Faris had made calls to every delegate who’d attended the Symposium—everyone who’d witnessed Blake’s ruinous ambitions firsthand and might be willing to stand against him.
Yolande, the bear shifter who’d helped us take him down the first time, fought side by side with the troll delegate—an older woman wearing armor and swinging a hammer with unnerving agility as she dodged shots of air magic.
Jasper and Isis—earth and water elementals—stood back to back, Isis holding a spinning shield of water in front of the gate, while Jasper trapped an attacker by sinking him into the concrete up to his knees.
As I watched, an enormous gray lion leaped from the upper windows over the stadium gates. He landed on the shoulders of an enemy wielding fire magic, taking him to the ground with a snarl and…
I didn’t watch the next part. I was too busy dodging a barrage of glowing blue fae darts shot at me by a human wearing a dark uniform. One of the darts clipped my arm, and I staggered, leaving me open to attack by a gargoyle, who swooped towards me, claws reaching, eyes burning a fiery red…
Only to be smacked right out of the air by a softball-sized chunk of ice.
A hand reached for mine, and I looked up into the face of a woman over seven feet tall, with brown skin, wild dark hair, and glowing blue eyes…
Talia—elemental queen and once my enemy. Her expression was fierce and feral as she pulled me to my feet, still gazing over my shoulder, never taking her eyes off our attackers.
“Thanks.”
She inclined her head regally. “We’re even now, Raine Kendrick.”
“Where is Faris?”
Her eyes turned bleak, and her chin jerked towards the street. “Out there somewhere. I don’t know. Last I saw… He was shielding a woman from a falling building and was buried in the rubble.”
No.
He couldn’t be dead. I wouldn’t allow it.
Faris was the glue that held us together. The only one who could have forged this alliance—bringing every court together and ensuring the cooperation of the local government. The only one powerful enough to fix everything Blake had broken.
And he was the heart of this family I’d been lucky enough to become a part of. If anything happened to him? I had no idea whether we would recover.
Or whether Kira would ever forgive herself. She’d agreed to stay back—along with Hugh—to guard Morghaine, Kes, Ethan, and the kids. But if Faris fell without her…
I wouldn’t let it be true.
“I’ll find him,” I promised. “Can you hold the walls?”
She nodded. “For now, we have enough. But only because the skies are safe.”
Only until the black dragon put in an appearance.
But where was it? Who was it? And why had Blake not yet deployed his greatest weapon?
The answer came in the form of a wailing siren—one that didn’t remain in the distance but drew closer and closer, until a black SUV emerged from the smoke, crunched its way over the debris, and came to a stop a few dozen yards away, just outside the ballpark’s main gates.
The passenger door opened, and Blake Masterson stepped out.
Still in his casual, everyday office-worker clothing, still with his tie loosened and his hair slightly rumpled, a small smile tugging at his lips.
Talia let out a cry of rage and produced spinning blades of water between her fingers, but Blake jerked up a hand, and the rear door of the SUV opened.
Two of his people jumped out, dragging a body between them.
Limp and covered in dust and blood.
Broken. Barely recognizable.
“No!”
The scream ripped involuntarily from my lips as they dragged Faris forward by his elbows and dropped him on the ground right in front of Blake, who crouched at Faris’s side and laid a blade of glowing blue against his throat.
“And this,” he said mildly, “is where your resistance ends. Or I… will kill him.”
A part of me simply hadn’t believed that Faris could be stopped. He’d seemed immovable as a mountain. And the sight of him lying there broken and still… broke something in me too.
As the sounds of battle fell away, leaving only watchful silence, I was forced to clench my fists until my nails drew blood from my palms.
I would not cry. Not yet.
“Surely…” Blake said into the silence, “surely you understand that this battle is now over.”
I heard feral cries from overhead as the dragons recognized the danger and dove nearer…
Only to pull up short when they realized there was nothing they could do. Not fast enough to stop Blake. They could only settle on the wall and wait, while Blake looked around at the chaos and death and destruction he had caused… and smiled.
The bastard smiled.
“Today has been everything I dreamed it could be,” he said, his eyes bright with wonder and satisfaction. “Everything I hoped for since the day I discovered my calling. Now, if you want me to spare Lansgrave’s life, you’ll stand aside and let my people do what they came here for.”
When no one moved, he looked almost comically confused.
“Are you honestly going to stand there and protect these protesters with your lives? Sacrifice one of your own for the sake of a few thousand humans? Humans who hate and fear you?”
I don’t know what he was expecting. Perhaps he was counting on us to do as he said without question. Or perhaps he thought he understood what we valued, after we’d refused to trade Kes’s life for those of the protesters.
But he understood nothing, and he most certainly did not understand Faris Lansgrave—a man with a heart so enormous that he’d risked everything to protect these humans who wanted him caged.
He would never have agreed to this trade. Never have allowed Blake to win by threatening his life. So as deeply as it hurt me, as harsh and impossible as the words felt when I forced them from my lips, I took two steps forward and said them anyway.
“Go to hell, Blake.”
He must not have seen me before that moment. Or maybe he simply hadn’t recognized me beneath the sweat and dirt and blood of battle.
But when he realized who had spoken, his mouth opened, his jaw went slack, and his eyes widened with the horrifying knowledge of exactly what my presence here might mean.
A million calculations flashed through his eyes. A weighing and then a decision.
The hand not holding the blade rose to his neck, his fingers tracing that dark and twisted burn scar as he reached for the jewel hidden beneath his shirt. And for an instant I thought he intended to run. To abandon his plans and his people.
But no.
His head jerked back, he let out a grunt of pain, and then…
Disappeared into a mountain of black scales that lunged forward before I’d even registered the truth.
That burn scar…
…had been caused by Kira’s dragon fire during the assault on The Portal.
Blake was the black dragon.
And an instant later, he caught me up in his terrifying claws and launched himself into the sky.