46

It’s not raining, and the sky is clear. That crack isn’t weather.

I sit up.

Jadon is already on his feet, searching the sky. Before us, one wave after another of distorted air whooshes across the now-scorched earth.

There’s a thing above us, a badly drawn caricature of a vulture—like a child’s drawing—hovering over us with haphazard feathers, a mottled bald head, and a cowl with red, black, and brown feathers that crackle with bright-white lightning bolts that create thunder the moment a bolt hits the ground.

I know this bird. A gerammoc! A predator and a scavenger.

A bolt of lightning and a boom , and the gerammoc swoops to the ground and rolls back up to the sky with something in its claws… Waving arms. Faraway shrieks.

A soldier?

The gerammoc disappears into the sky, stopping only to drop that soldier into its hidden aerie, where it will peck and shock the man, who will suffer a slow, agonizing decline from wounds festering with worms and decayed flesh… Mercifully, days from now, the gerammoc will gobble the barely living soldier.

“We need to hurry,” Jadon says, offering his hand.

He helps me to my feet, and as I stand, the gerammoc returns, its luminescent eyes like bright-white lamps lighting the land below. The creature doesn’t caw or shriek, no. It sizzles. And those crackling wings! They would span the length of Jadon, Veril, and me if we stood on one another’s shoulders, and then added the lengths of this nook and the creek, too. One tail feather would cover my arm. A farmer could build a chicken coop on that boulder of a head.

Where did it come from? Where does it roost? Is this overhang one of its nesting places?

“Wake them up,” Jadon whispers, eyes on the sky.

I crawl over to sleeping Philia and shake her while keeping my gaze on the gerammoc. I shake Veril, who instantly wakes and gawks at what he sees crowding the sky.

Light from the creature’s beaming eyes falls upon rocks and trails and trees. The gerammoc banks left, and the creature focuses elsewhere. Darkness falls over us again.

“Put out the fire,” I whisper.

Philia and Veril dump water and dirt on the fire to snuff out the flames.

“What does it do?” Philia asks.

“Makes you beg Supreme and all the gods for death,” I say.

We watch the dark sky, not daring to breathe, hoping that flying death won’t return.

Flaming arrows streak from the ground up to the sky, altogether missing the terrible bird.

“Hunters?” Veril asks.

Philia shakes her head. “I don’t know a hunter with arrows like that .”

“No,” I say, “it looks like Wake’s soldiers. He’s already snatched one.”

A flash of light is followed by the crack of a massive bullwhip. The gerammoc pivots in our direction. The sizzle intensifies, and the flashing bright-white light from its eyes brightens. The fiery arrows miss their mark and fall back to earth, causing small fires to spark across the plain. The creature speeds toward us as more fiery arrows light the sky.

We move farther back beneath the overhang, where the air chills and ripens with smells of rot and musk. Like grapes and barley fermenting in some creature’s belly—a creature that is now growling somewhere deep in the cave behind us. The sound rises from the deepest, darkest part of the cavern and vibrates from my feet up to my neck and across my cheeks. My nerves spiral beneath my skin.

Why couldn’t a cavern be empty this one fucking time?

“Help Veril cross the field,” I tell Jadon. “Philia, you follow. I’ll take the rear and fight.”

The cave creature is close enough for me to see its glow, all blue and… amber , like that of a man whose heart still beats… barely .

Outside the cave, the gerammoc swoops over the hills.

We race to the light of the cavern’s opening.

Veril trips.

Out of the dark, the creature’s long, hairy arm swipes at the old man’s leg.

I hurl wind at the beast, but not before the creature’s claw drags across Veril’s calf.

The old man shrieks, his cry high and never-ending. Blood sprays from the new wound and darkens the fetid ground.

“No!” I throw another ball of wind to knock the creature back even more.

“I got him,” Jadon shouts, draping the old man’s arm around his neck.

“Go!” I scream.

Jadon races from the cave with the injured Renrian in his arms and Philia at his heels.

I run behind my group, my hands burning as hot as the lightning racing along the gerammoc’s wings. I look over my shoulder, but I don’t stop. My feet move like the wind, and my breath burns hot in my chest, pulse thrumming as I dash from the cave.

We burst out onto the open field.

The creature lunges from the cavern. He is confusion manifest, his brown coat shaggy, his talons as thick as a dragon’s. And that face… Gilgoni!

I freeze, incapable of looking away as all feeling drains from my hands and feet, face, and gut. I snap out of my stall and throw my hands at him.

Gilgoni wheels back, hitting the cave wall, courtesy of my crackling blue wind.

The flying gerammoc races over the plain, its incandescent eyes tracking us, that light so bright now that I can’t see my hands before my face. The aburan, Gilgoni, waggles his head, then roars, sprinting toward us. He grabs rocks with his strong hands and hurls them at us.

I throw my hands and the air crackles blue, my power sending those rocks the gerammoc’s way. My fingers buzz as though they’re scraping the crags of these boulders now soaring up…up…up to strike the gerammoc. But only one rock hits its wing, the impact producing an arc of flying sparks. That’s enough to make it mad.

“Hurry!” I urge those ahead of me.

Jadon’s breathing is labored as he carries Veril across the field. Behind them, Philia trips on a gopher hole. She hits the ground with an “oof” but rallies, pushes to her feet, and limps on her twisted ankle to catch up. I follow, while behind us, the aburan continues to throw rocks. I swoop my fingers, blue bolts now chasing the wind, and the wind propels the rocks into the flying otherworldly.

Eventually, the gerammoc spots the giant aburan, then darts down like an arrow with sharp talons and feathers that crackle and click.

Gilgoni roars, then springs from the ground into the air. He barely misses the gerammoc.

The bird shoots a bolt of lightning. At a full sprint, I don’t look back to see it strike the aburan, but I smell the stench of burning fur and hear the anguished cry of a beast struck with crackling death. After one last circle, the gerammoc rises into the sky and disappears behind the clouds drifting below the nightstar.

We finally reach a copse of tall spruces. The forest offers protection, but all these trees… They look the same. I don’t know where we are. That tree with broken branches looks just like that tree with broken branches. That tree is just as tall as the other. Nothing makes one stand out from the other, but at least we are relatively sheltered here.

Jadon settles Veril onto a log and gawks at the bloodied hem of his trousers. Blood pools in the dirt beneath the Renrian’s foot. He is panting, and his eyes are glazed. His quivering lips move as he mutters, “Blighted grounds…tender…space…part…part…”

Jadon and I exchange looks, and his blue eyes are wide with alarm. I don’t think he’s aware that he’s shaking his head over and over again. His thoughts careen and crash into each other. “Too much blood. This isn’t good. Too much blood. Fuck. Why? Too much blood.”

“We’ll die if we stop moving,” Jadon says, holding my gaze for a moment more before looking back at Veril. “We need to go.”

I bend over to peer at Veril’s violent laceration. The blood is clotting, but he’s lost so much already. “I’ll tend to his wound, fix what I can.” I peer up to Jadon, whose eyes are bright with heartache. I try to smile. “Go. We’ll catch up. Don’t stop. I won’t.”

Jadon sighs, bends before Veril, setting a hand on his shoulder. He opens his mouth to say something, but he swallows it and stands. He nods to Philia, who picks up her satchel and pushes to her feet. “You got him, Kai?”

I nod, not wanting to meet his mournful gaze, or Philia’s mournful gaze, or Veril’s bloody trousers. There’s no resting place for my eyes. “Yep. I got him.”

“Kai,” Jadon says again.

I frown and my eyebrows crumple as our eyes meet.

He mouths, “It’s okay.”

My nostrils flare, and my throat burns.

“Don’t stay too long.” Then he’s off, Philia limping behind.

I smile back at Veril. “A little interruption.”

“Really? I didn’t notice.” The old man’s eyes have lost some of their earlier gloss, and now he strokes his beard with a bloodstained hand.

I roll up his soiled pants leg again and wince. “Okay. So.” I rummage around Veril’s bag, finding a canteen of clean water, gauze, and a tin of mystery paste. “I’ll do as much as I can, okay? When we get to our campsite, I’ll dress it better.”

The old man’s eyes focus on me. “Campsite?” he asks.

“Yes,” I say. “First things first.” I pour cool water onto the wound, and blood-tinged runoff soaks his boot. I open the tin and sniff. Smells like cropleek and elk hair. Binder. Anti-nausea. I slather the dressing over the wound, packing in as much as possible.

“How?” he asks. “How?”

I wrap clean gauze around his leg. “I’m gonna carry you.”

That sobers him a bit. “Our packs and our weapons and me?” Veril shakes his head. “If you were at your peak maybe—” Unsteady and faint, his eyes gloss over again.

“Let’s not worry about that now,” I say, arranging Warruin beside my longsword.

Veril grabs hold of my arm and sways as he stands. “It has been wonderful serving you again.” His head droops.

I tie his pack to my pack. “Again?”

“Twilight…pain…ethereal,” he says, his tongue thick.

My fingers grow numb, and I slowly lift my eyes to meet his shiny lavender ones.

“Hmm?” he says, blinking.

“You served me before?”

He squints at me, confused. “Of course. When you were just a little one, and then, when you stewarded all of Vallendor, keeping watch over the realm from the top of Mount Devour.” He gives me an amused grin. “I taught you everything. Languages. Writings and music and alchemy and lore of every race, every discovered realm…” He looks at me, clear-eyed again. “You felt so familiar to me the night you sought refuge in my cabin, and now, I know why.”

My mouth hangs open as I remember the night Veril and I ran into each other after the burnu fight. He’d looked at me, wide-eyed, and said, “You’re here.” That’s what he meant. And now, my mind fills with the vision of the castle, the party, the old man… “I do remember.”

Veril bows his head. “But we’ll catch up later. Are we ready?”

I’m not ready. I stand and then crouch to lift him.

Veril flaps his hand and starts on our way. “I’ll walk for as long as I can.” He shuffles beside me, quicker than before, his revelation spurring him on. “When we get to Caburh—”

A hiss. A sucking sound. A thump. Veril gasps and whimpers and falls to the ground.

I turn around, alarmed. My heart drops, and I go cold.

Standing behind me are the emperor’s men. Sinth, the Dashmala, still holds the long handle of his pike, the pointy end lodged deep into Veril’s back.