Page 6 of Shadow Fall: Part Two

I could.

But I shook when I reached for my shadows, afraid of what I'd find—who I'd find.

"What the fuck is going on?" a coarse woman demanded. "What are you doing here?"

"Rescuing you, you ungrateful bitch," Haley hissed. "Are you alright?"

"I'm alive," the woman replied. Renna. We’d found her.

I surged forward, but bodies crowded in front of me, the exit blocked. I gasped for air, my head spinning and knife dancing in my hand so badly that Harvey took it from my fingers and returned it to my sheath.

"You're alright," he told me in a low murmur. "We'll get out of here, he won't catch us."

But he would, and he would cut Harvey's wings off this time, he'd cut him apart and force him to the very edge of death before dragging him back, and I couldn't handle it. I couldn't do it again, not with my family here too—

Shield Haley.

I reached for shadows, bile rushing up from my roiling stomach when I grabbed a fistful of power and wrapped it around my mate. He was there in the darkness, taunting and gleeful.

"What's this?" Verena asked. I was shaking too hard to see what she meant.

"Gunpowder. Light it and throw it into the pit," Wynvail shouted over the screaming. More and more voices had joined, a chorus of suffering and unbearable pain. Would my mate be next? Would Verena?

"Move!" Haley yelled, her voice deeper and louder than before. It was enough to make my head jerk up, enough for a breath to reach my lungs. "Move out of the fucking way; I'll open up the exit."

The crowd surged, and my stomach roiled with them, nausea making sweat drip down my forehead.

"I'm here," Harvey reminded me, sunlight filling his palm. Lethal magic I'd seen burn the heart from our abuser and destroy the whole town that shielded him. "Em's right behind you, and Wyvail's with him. We're here."

But the titan was here, too. I felt it in my magic's deep, vibrating cry, tasted it in the acid and blood that lined the back of my mouth. The scars on my back throbbed. Blood rolled down my skin, hot and fast, and I couldn't tell if it was a memory or real.

A man in front of us screamed, and I sucked in a ragged gasp, shaking harder. He was going to find us, he was—

I flinched when ruby light attacked the wall in front of me—Haley's magic. Haley. My mate. The cave wavered in my dizzy vision, but I saw enough to know she burned a blistering hole through the cave wall ten times the size of the previous channel.

The crowd in front of us fell over themselves to escape. A young fairy-winged woman beside me was pushed down by the sudden rush. Shaking all over, awareness of the titan’s approach making me want to cry and scream and howl, I bent and grabbed the woman. I set her on her feet, and even as we surged to the exit, I glared at the man who'd pushed her down. Whatever he saw on my face made his throat bob. Good.

Ahead of us with Kai at her side, Verena twisted and threw a matched set of chrome salt and pepper grinders over our heads. An explosion rocked the chasm behind us. I blinked in surprise, and all at once I remembered the satchel I had on my own shoulder.

"I'm right here," Harvey panted as we were pushed and shoved through the crowd.

The chasm seethed with power—his power. I dug through my bag, shaking fingers brushing the cool glass of a potion bottle. I didn't know what was in it, but it didn't matter. I hurled it behind us and hoped I nailed the titan in his cruel eyes, hoped it crashed down his throat and he choked on the broken glass.

I groped around until I found a teardrop shaped phial and threw that next, my heart skipping when smoke erupted through the tunnel, deep royal purple and opaque.

Turquoise lightning flashed through the smoke and Wynvail shouted, "Nice, Wane!"

The dread pressing on my chest lightened for a moment with satisfaction and a strange, alien burst of pride, but I could feel the titan creeping ever closer.

When his deep, thunderous voice ruptured through the cave just as we reached the exit, my stomach cramped and I clutched my head, the pain sudden and brutal.

Forgetting something...? he taunted.

Oh god. I twisted, searching everyone around us. Haley, Em, Harvey, Kai, Wynvail—

No. Gods, no, please.

But I counted again. Haley, Em, Harvey, Kai, Wynvail—

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