Chapter 29

Ivomited in a side alley, heaving what was in my stomach until there was nothing left.

"I am never time traveling again."

"I'd say you get used to it, but you don't," Coz muttered, his tan throat bobbing as he swallowed hard. "Now stick to the plan and we'll leave here with the pendant and our lives."

We watched my soldiers approach Trubahn's barricade, my shout of warning dying in my throat as they were blown backward through the air, the sight even worse the second time around.

"Keep your head down, Commander," Cosimo ordered. "Stick to the shadows. Whatever you do, don't let our past selves see our future selves. And don't interfere."

"So you've said. Multiple times," I complained. "I don't see what one has to do with the other."

"Must I explain everything ad nauseum? Fine. Anything we change now affects the future. Even the smallest thing could be devastating. Like end of the world devastating."

I rolled my eyes. "We could save a lot of lives tonight. Prevent Southwell from burning."

"We could also doom this entire realm," Cosimo countered. "Now, do exactly as I say and with some luck this will work."

I had to admit, this experience was…odd. There was the past-Cosimo, halfway down the street sending tendrils of blue power over the barrier, revealing the trap we'd missed before.

Trubahn's reanimated body advanced jerkily into sight as our past selves froze in horror.

My now-self wasn't doing much better, watching the reanimated mage with his clawed-out eyes, dragged unwillingly down the street by some unseen force.

I tried to block out the sound of my own voice, the shock that I felt watching the mage stumble over the cobblestones, choking out pleas for help, hands outstretched like claws.

And the smells…the choking stench of rot, the burn of ozone, the cutting reek of dragonfire. Worse than before somehow.

Everything mixed together into a noxious fume until I could barely breathe.

"This is…I thought tonight would be better the second time. Because we already lived through this. Somehow, this is worse."

"You see what you missed the first time, what shock and adrenaline initially masked. The second time you miss nothing, and yes, it is much, much worse. Now once the barrier falls, we'll go around to the alley and through the back door. Let's hope he left the pendant somewhere we can find it easily."

Coz caught me by the arm. "I don't need to tell you, Commander, you can die here, as easily as you can in our present time."

"Duly noted." I watched Tavion shift into his wolf and Anaria's power cloud the air with stars, the shadows beyond the barrier beginning to undulate like ink-stained water.

"The pendant should be somewhere in Trubahn's front room, on the table by the look of it."

I ducked down, Zephryn's roar loud enough to make my ears bleed. Then the street filled with toxic flames, hot enough I wondered how we'd survived. Luck, I decided, as fire blasted down the main street, crawling up the fronts of shops and spilling over rooftops. My past-self's cursing echoed over the roar of fire as we moved closer, keeping to the shadows.

Trubahn's barrier gave way with a groan, and Zephryn lumbered down the street, leaving behind a trail of flaming footprints.

"Let's go while we're—they're—focused on the fight." We worked our way along the shadowed shop fronts, staying to the darkened doorways and alcoves, only darting out when necessary. I glanced one last time over my shoulder and found Anaria staring straight at me, her mouth hanging open.

"This one," Cosimo muttered, diverting off to the right down a tight alleyway lined with unmarked doors, overflowing with bins and heaps of trash. I gagged from the stench of rotting food. "We'll have twenty minutes or less to search. We don't want to be inside when Zephryn decides to incinerate the place."

The first door revealed a family cowering in the back room, eyes flaring wide when Cosimo flung open the door, the father throwing himself in front of his wife and children. "What do you want?" he demanded. "We have nothing of value for you to steal."

"Get out of here—that way." Cosimo pointed behind us as chaos reigned out in front, screams punctuated by the bellowing of what could only be one very pissed-off dragon. "This entire block is about to go up in flames. You'll have to get three streets over to be safe."

"What's happening?" the dazed man asked, pulling his wife to her feet, hefting a small, weeping child into his arms. "Are we under attack?"

"Something like that," I muttered, lifting their daughter up and thrusting her into his wife's arms, eyeing the heavy bag the woman was carrying. "Leave that, you'll need to move fast. Head toward the main market. There are soldiers there who will help you find shelter. Go now."

We watched until they disappeared, then moved to the next door. I hesitated, my hand resting on the doorknob, heart pumping adrenaline like a fucking bellows as the roaring got closer.

"The Oracle could be inside," I cautioned. "If she interrogated Trubahn…she might still be here."

Cosimo ran his hand over the device hanging from the chain, eyeing the door with the same resigned dread as me. "If she is, get yourself to a safe distance. I'll hold her off as long as I can, then find you."

"We need the pendant," I reminded him. "That's all that matters tonight."

"We'll find the pendant." He shot me a conspirator's grin. "Or we come back and try again."

I flattened my back to the wall while Cosimo turned the knob and flung the door wide. It slammed against the inside wall, hard enough to rattle my teeth as I peered inside at nothing but darkness.

"Subtle," I muttered through grit teeth. "Nobody heard that, I'm sure."

"No Oracle, so I suppose we're safe enough."

We felt our way through the back room, more storage than anything, then finally reached Trubahn's overwrought bedroom. The front room, with its front-facing windows, was already flooded with golden light from the fires blazing outside, along with flickers of pale-blue magic.

Enough we saw what we'd walked into.

A single chair stood in the center of the small room, coated with blood, soaking the woven rug beneath.

Smears of wetness led to the front room then out into the street beyond. My nose wrinkled at the faint stench of rot still hanging in the air.

"We just missed the Oracle, it seems. Looks like she worked on Trubahn for a while." I measured the amount of blood left behind. "A long while. I'm surprised he didn't give up the location of the pendant."

Coz peered through the front windows with a sigh as dark forms raced past. "What a fucking waste of life. I swear, I'd better live long enough to see that bitch get what's coming to her."

"Let's hope we both do. But without that pendant, we're dead, so stop worrying about what's already happened and start looking."

I eyed the tapestry draped bed in the corner, a sumptuous affair better suited to the king's chamber at the Keep than a dingy mage's bedroom at the back of a Southwell alleyway. "The pendant should be somewhere in this room." My gaze fell on the small bedside table groaning with a pile of books shoved against an oil lamp.

"It's a wonder this place didn't burn to the ground years ago." I yanked open the bedside table drawer. "I'll start here; you search the dresser."

In truth, there weren't many places the mage could have hidden the pendant, given this room was about the size of a prison cell. The brightly painted pitcher filled with water sat waiting on the small sideboard…waiting for the owner who never returned.

I studied the blood. Trubahn might have been a right bastard, but I'd never wish his death on anyone.

The bedside table held a sundry of odd devices, including some inventive sex toys that made me blush before I slammed the drawer closed. "Nothing. What about you?"

"The arsehole loved his foppish clothes, but no sign of a priceless amulet." Coz braced his hands on his hips, studying the cluttered top of the dresser, while I turned my attention to the sideboard, the only furniture in the room we hadn't searched.

Muffled screaming came from directly in front of the shop, the clang of metal on metal, creative cursing, and then a deafening roar as a plume of fire raced past the windows, hot enough to make the air inside the room ripple.

"Hurry," Coz warned, flinging books onto the floor. "That was Zeph."

I pawed through the shelves inside the sideboard, laden with even more books, hand-scribbled notes, rolled up parchments, and notes that looked like they'd come from an owl's leg.

"I don't fucking see the damned thing. It should be right on top if it's here."

"Godsdamn should be, but it isn't."

Something crashed nearby, timber and glass and slate being crushed beneath an immense force.

"Zeph's tail," Coz muttered, sweeping his hands through the dust left on the dresser. "He's close. And I still don't see anything."

Every drawer and door stood open, the floor littered with books and clothes soon to become nothing but ash. "We're out of time, Zor." Coz slammed his fist into the wall. "It's not here."

"It has to be," I muttered, moving to the spot where I'd found the hunk of melted metal. "Right here. It was right here."

I swept my eyes over the room one last time, and then the front windows blew inward, moist, noxious heat flooding the room.

Cosimo scanned the table, and our eyes fell upon the pitcher at the exact same time. I dove for it, dumping the water into Cosimo's cupped hands.

The pendant gleamed in his palms, perfect and untouched, a tiny fire glowing in the heart of the spinel stone. "Fucking finally. Let's get out of here."

No sooner were the words out of my mouth than Cosimo shoved me to the floor, my shoulder cracking as it took the brunt of the impact. A black-scaled tail swept overhead, ripping through the walls like paper.

"Crawl for the door," Cosimo ordered, his voice slicked with fear. "Now."

I shoved the pendant deep into my pocket, dug in my elbows, and pulled myself toward the rear of the shop, broken glass and slivers of wood embedding themselves into my flesh as I dragged myself along.

"Faster," Cosimo grunted. "We can't be in here when?—"

The world disappeared beneath a haze of pain as blue-hued fire swept over us like it had been belched up out of the Pit, hot enough to melt flesh from bone, to turn us both into charred husks. Every breath seared my lungs with acrid fumes, every sound muffled.

The ground beneath me heaved.

Not an earthquake but Zephryn thundering through the front room, fire and wood and shards of glass turning the air above us into a death zone.

"Faster," Cosimo grunted, and I realized…my back was burning, but I wasn't actually on fire.

A thin layer of magic stood between me and Zeph's devouring flame, thin enough to keep me from turning into a charred corpse but not my flesh from blistering from the intensity of the heat. I crawled faster, feet shoving against whatever I could find to propel myself forward. Cosimo was behind me where the flames were at their worst.

"Go," Cosimo groaned, and I stopped, reached back, and wound my fist into the collar of his silk robe before yanking, the smooth fabric slipping precariously between my fingers.

"Next time, wear something fucking appropriate for the occasion," I snarled, but he was already unconscious, nothing but dead weight as I dragged him the last few feet into the alley.

Zephryn raged, but through some stroke of luck we probably didn't deserve, the back wall of the shop held, a brick barrier between us and the consuming dragonfire.

I dropped Coz onto the cold stones, checked his pulse, and lifted a lid to find his eyes rolled back into his head. Our backs were scalded, his seared with the definitive pattern of the metallic threads woven into his robe, and it served the bastard right for wearing such a ridiculous getup when he should have fucking known we'd be running for our lives tonight.

I winced with every movement but managed to push upright, sparks spilling over the brick wall, filling the alley with light as they poured down over us like fiery rain. I pulled the device off Cosimo's neck and draped the chain over my head before I squatted down beside him and gripped his hand.

"No knowing where we'll end up, but it's got to be better than this hellhole."

I tapped the device twice with my index finger, spoke the words Cosimo had told me to only use as a last resort, and time claimed us both as darkness rushed past, propelling us—hopefully—back into the future.