Strix?
“DON’T LISTEN, CAD. HIS WORDS ARE FLAWED. I… I MEAN NOCTURNE DOES NOT CHOOSE LIGHTLY, GOD THOUGH HE BE. THERE ARE ALWAYS REASONS…”
“Cad…” Emre raised his hand, outstretched, eyes opening, hair drenched in sweat and blood. “Cad?”
“Emre,” she whispered. Tears flowed down her cheeks unabated, flooded with all the anguish from the last twenty-four hours. All the revelations. The reconciliations. The shredding of her lies.
“You must…” Cough filled with blood. “…not give…” Another hack. “…in. For Brynn…”
It was wrong, utterly and totally wrong. Here, in this holiest of places with the twin loves in her life. Her beloved dying, her hateful love still standing mere feet away. But something in the back of her mind made her calm. Emre had been in control, manipulating everything up until this point. Could he be planning something, even now? In his dying breaths?
“USE IT. USE THIS PAIN. END HIM.”
She leveled her gaze upon the Fallen. Red colored everything in her sight. She pointed the blade at Lu Har. “This ends now.”
Lu Har spread his arms and his eyes a black void as he tapped into his aetheurgy, the surrounding mist turning an uglier shade of ebony. His hands burned white-hot. “Then your service is ended.”
But then a giant blur crashed into the Fallen and sent him flying. Lojen, in all his drakken glory, landed upon the Fallen with pure hatred. Rage carried him, propelled him just as it flowed through Cadrianna. Lojen rained punch after punch, slamming down the Hammer of Mother Marrow. Arms flailing, the Fallen fought back with aether-enhanced abilities, even though Lojen outweighed him by more than half. He walloped the elfir’s body, claws tearing at the robe, at his flesh but neither seemed to penetrate Lu Har’s aetheric defenses. Strength on strength. Guile versus tact. Instinct versus honed logic.
Cinder roared from above and folded her wings and dove, intending to skewer the drakken with her barbed tail. But before the firedrake could reach the lesser order of draconem, another drakken burst onto the scene, a simple longknife forged on the Isle of Merj thrust forward. The second light blue drakken collided with the firedrake’s neck, tearing scales asunder, which threw the diving drake off track. The higher order draconem plowed into the sandstone with a sickening crunch. The smaller drakken scampered up its graceful neck and stabbed over and over, sending crimson ichor flying.
Lu Har had regained his feet as a cloud of black mist encircled Lojen and pulled him off. Time it was for her to uphold the bargain she made with herself all those years ago. With Brynn free, nothing would stop her from killing Lu Har. All the pain he’d caused her demanded it, her prison of lies commanded it. Lu Har would pay with his life.
She leapt.
The Strix slashed at his back, but the Fallen turned, parrying it with his aether-coated hands, almost like a shield. Lu Har then went on the attack with his other hand, forming the black mist into a translucent blade aimed at her heart. She parried with the Strix, but his aetheric blade found her arm anyway, searing her flesh in molten fire, making her scream in fury rather than pain. Blood flowed down her arm regardless.
With inhumir strength, Lu Har shoved Lojen away while parrying one of Cadrianna’s ripostes, the Strix striking the shielded hand. The drakken dropped the Hammer, and the Fallen brought an elbow down, jacking him in the back, sending him straight to the ground as black-red lightning sizzled upon the drakken’s exoscales.
Cadrianna, in the throes of aetheurgy, separated the Strix into half a dozen blades, aimed at Lu Har. A wall of the mist borne of Noctis rose up in protection, the Fallen’s savior and shield. The six owl-handled blades stopped, hanging helplessly. Lu Har surged forward, bringing his white-hot fist into Cadrianna’s sternum. Her body jerked in what felt like a direct strike of lightning to the chest. She flew backward and rolled around in hurt, feeling broken inside.
Lojen stood once more, his berserker rage firing on all cylinders, claws ready to rip the Fallen apart. The second drakken, with crimson firedrake blood dripping from her longknife, circled around Lu Har. The three appraised each other.
“Ru, get back,” Lojen said to the other drakken. A sibling?
“For Father, Lojen.”
A shadow darker than anything Cadrianna had ever seen pooled under the Fallen, it sucked in the light. A void of never-ending darkness. The shadow continued to grow, not expanding but instead rising, dimensional and erect. Hand-like shapes rose from the shadow, fingers reaching for Lu Har. They grabbed at the man’s clothes, his limbs.
The Fallen smiled. “The Godsblood is ready.” His all-onyx gaze fell on Cadrianna, disappointment within the void. “Your daughter will be the greatest warrior our Divine has ever produced. Too bad you won’t be by my side to see it.”
The ground opened under the Fallen, the shadowed hands pulling him down into the void. A concussion, the shadow convulsed then contracted. A snap, an instant of intense, unbearable heat. The shadowed hands retreated into the ground again, leaving only the black mist. The Strix blades clattered to the stone.
“Where’d he go?” the smaller drakken asked in bewilderment.
“CAD, YOU MUST GET UP,” the Strix said in her benumbed mind. Breathing was a chore, her entire breastbone felt broken into a thousand pieces. She rolled to her side and spat blood. Her Void Form wilted. “THIS IS WHERE YOU MUST FIND THE STRENGTH TO CARRY IT TO THE END. FOR YOUR DAUGHTER. I CAN HELP HER.”
What?
“YES, PUT ME INTO HER HANDS. IT IS THE ONLY WAY.”
I can’t do that to my daughter, bond you to her as I was.”
“TRUST ME.”
A pale figure appeared from the mist, the bikrome, followed by her brother. They moved closer and crouched near Emre’s body, the Kanjan seer lifted Cadrianna’s beloved’s head, cradling it in her lap, his lifeblood lathered down her silver-and-gold bracelets. Emre’s lover ran his hand through his hair, tears staining his handsome face.
Emre…
“THIS IS WHERE YOU MUST DECIDE, CAD. A SOUL FOR A SOUL.”
She crawled toward Emre and gripped his hand, “Emre.” She pressed a kiss to the back of it.
His weakened fingers clutched at hers. “Brynn…”
Summoning what little strength she could, Cadrianna got to her feet, called the Strix to her, and moved toward the Temple.
LVI
Ashe
ASHE DIDN’T FIGHT, there was no point.
She limped along beside Evander through the Temple of Mother Marrow, his hand gripped her neck, constricting her air, just enough to keep her alive and moving. Evander dragged her past the impressive statue of the Forgemistress and down a stair behind the statue’s base into a dreary tunnel full of cobwebs and smelling of the grave.
“What happened to you, Evander?” A sliver of pain ran up her leg, replaced by warm healing. There was mist flowing along after her while she walked, light tendrils of haze.
