Page 106 of Feathers and Thorns

Enara was standing over Baz’s body, surrounded by a ring of carnage. She was a woman possessed, and anyone who dared to get close to her was cut down with such force it made Soren flinch.

She could make out the sheen of Baz’s armor from her vantage point in the clouds, and her chest felt hollow. She did now allow herself to think of all the things she would miss about the silly, sweet boy who had snuck his way into her and Enara’s lives. The big guy with the even bigger heart would hold a permanent place in hers.

She pressed her eyes together, and when she opened them again, she refocused her sights on the man who had killed one of her best friends in this life and let another arrow fly.

* * *

Enara bathed in the blood of her enemies, her armor a deep shade of crimson, veined with the ichor of the beasts, made her look like a goddess of death. She snarled as wave after wave tried to get between her and Baz. Bodies already created a line in the ashes, a dark caricature of the sparring ring she had fought in only days ago.

The majority of the warriors from Xian-Dao had their blades set on her now. They saw Baz as a betrayer to them and wanted to string him up as a warning to those who did not follow Bao-Ren. Their loyalty to their leader was unwavering, and as one body fell, another took its place.

Blood and ash filled Enara’s eyes, and her arms strained with every swing of Coraxis’s blade. She could feel her body giving out, but she couldn’t let them have him.

His body was hers to love, hers to mourn, and hers to burn and bury. Thoughts of his mothers and how she would have to break their hearts by telling them their son was lost fueled her fight. She would bring him back to them.

As metal cut into flesh and beak met bone, her heart tore itself from her chest. Breathing was laborious, and grief was clawing at the back of her throat like a demon trying to escape from hell.

There was a beauty in grief that people often overlooked. For grief only came to those who had loved and lost. To those whose hearts beat for another. To those who had been met with a benevolent hand and a warm embrace. Those who, against all odds, had found a kindred soul to whom they would be forever connected. Grief did not belong to those with hatred in their hearts, but to those who had the capacity to love and be loved in return.

Enara’s shoulders screamed as Coraxis took down another body, and she clenched her teeth, the muscles in her legs straining from the effort. She did not have much more in her. She was only human, after all, and the adrenaline in her body would give out soon.

There were few Xian-Dao warriors left. Most had been killed in the first wave of the attack, being the easier targets than their Celestial allies. A few traitors had run when the rebellion had arrived. The fifteen or so left stalked around the circle of bodies, waiting for Enara to fall.

Two more jumped in, but one fell to the ground at her feet, an arrow protruding from his skull, the metal of his helmet crushing into his face on impact.

Enara flicked her eyes to the sky, tracing the arrow’s trajectory. She smiled thankfully to Soren who held up her bow triumphantly from above.

She wiped the dead warrior’s fresh blood from her mouth and let out a cry before slamming Coraxis into the second soldier’s chest.

She was winded from the kill and took a knee, her lungs struggling to oxygenate her blood. I can do this, she thought. I can finish them. In the time it took her to struggle back to her feet, three more warriors had entered the ring, one of them sneering at her.

“The battlefield is no place for a woman,” he said, his eastern accent lacing his discriminatory words. From the insignia emblazoned on his armor, she guessed he was the major general. His armor had barely a scratch. He had clearly been watching from the sidelines.

“That’s an odd thing to say when it’s your men’s bodies at my feet,” she spat.

The general’s eyes darkened as he lifted his double-edge sword, his brows pressed together angrily. “And you shall join them,” he threatened, lunging toward her.

His men stood by, knowing better than to join the fight when their leader was trying to prove a point.

Enara struggled against the blows of his sword, her feet catching on a hunk of severed flesh, making her trip backward, landing hard beside Baz’s body. She lifted Coraxis to defend another blow, but the weapon fell from her hands, skittering to the side. Her body finally gave out.

“I will carve your tongue from your mouth so no one will hear you scream when we hang your lover’s body from our leader’s walls. You will beg for death, and only when his body is nothing but rotting flesh, hanging from bone, will you find your end. You will be buried on opposite sides of this earth so your souls may never be reunited in the after.”

“Torture me, kill me, remove my tongue if you wish. You may be able to stop my heart from beating, but the love we have for each other can never be taken from us!”

The general did not even grace her with a response before arcing his blade down toward her, his bloodlust taking over. She welcomed it with open arms, her thoughts drifting to Baz. I’ll see you soon.

Enara felt heat coat her skin, and her heart warmed knowing she would soon be with him. She could almost hear his voice calling to her.

“Enara,” it whispered, and she smiled when she felt his strong hands on her shoulders.

“Enara,” the voice said louder this time, the grip on her arms tightening. “Sister, get up.”

Rook’s voice rang clear in her ears, and her lids shot open. His blue eyes assessed her, and she realized he looked just like their grandmother on her mother’s side. She had passed away when Enara was just a child. She had forgotten she’d had white hair before her day, as well. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed it before.

“Enara, are you okay?” he asked more sternly now.

She mentally gave her body a once-over and realized that the warmth she felt was the general’s blood. She grimaced.

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