Page 74 of Secrets of Graves and Gold

Another mass of clay topples onto the cobblestones.

I whirl around, trying to regain my sense of where my allies are. At another glimpse of dark red hair, I hustle through the crowd.

When I get a clearer view of the two men, it takes me a moment to figure out what’s going on. Casimir has drawn his sword, but he’s mostly reaching out to people with his empty hand, guiding them past him.

Directing them to a nearby pub where they can escape the chaos if they want, I realize. Of course the courtesan would be more focused on making sure the innocents are safe than murdering the villains.

Stavros is just charging farther into the crowd to slam his sword through the torso of another man with a charred blotch where some of his hair should be. The conjured body collapses in a burst of clay shards.

I expect the former general to look my way so I can flash him a quick smile, but his stance abruptly stiffens. Without warning, he dashes off.

I try to follow, but a current of bodies pushes between us, jostling my scrawny form. Squeezing my way between the furious citizens, I hop up on my feet here and there to peer over their heads.

Over by one of the stores, a teenage boy cowers on the ground while a man kicks him and bashes at his head with the pommel of his dagger. If I had any question about which side they’re each on, it’d be answered by the tattoo inked on the side of the man’s neck: an inverted All-Giver sigil.

That’s the symbol the scourge sorcerers use to try to call the Great God back to our realms.

Stavros lets out a roar of rage loud enough for me to hear it over the tumult of the crowd. He rams into the attacker and knocks the man off his feet.

In my next glimpse, their blades are clanging together. I grit my teeth and shove through the milling bodies with more force.

I stumble into the less-packed fringes of the crowd just in time to see Stavros dig his blade into the man’s throat.

This body doesn’t transform. It simply slumps, gushing blood.

And Stavros is so intent on finishing the man off, he hasn’t noticed another attacker who crashes into him before I can even shout a warning.

My cry breaks from my lips, too late. Julita yelps like an echo of it.

I sprint over, my fingers tight around my knife. My heart hammers against my ribs.

My magic wrenches at me to unleash it, to let it fend off the attacker, but the impulse comes with a cold jab of fear. I didn’t plan for that—I can’t stop to concentrate on a counter-action?—

The two men wrestle each other, blood splattering the cobblestones around them. I shove down my power and lunge forward with my blade raised.

Just before I can plunge my knife into the attacker’s skull, Stavros heaves the man off him with a meaty rasp of his sword.

The man collapses, the short sword he was clutching clanging on the stones. Relief surges up inside me for just an instant before Stavros sags backward too.

Blood gushes from a cut on his side, drenching his tunic red.

My own blood freezes in my veins. A flood of terror and anguish sweeps every other thought from my mind.

“Stavros!” I cry, dropping down beside him.

No, gods, no. Not like this.

Not again.

What am I supposed to do to save him?

Twenty-Three

Stavros

Even as pain burns through my abdomen and blurs my sight more than usual, I can’t help jerking my gaze toward the boy. The boy whose shaggy blond hair and freckled face make memories of another teenager swim up from the depths of my mind.

Michas, some part of me calls out, but this isn’t my old friend. It isn’t the boy I watched a riven sorcerer rip apart.

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