Page 250 of Born of Blood and Ash

Out of reflex, I shot toward the railing and tracked theguard’s rapid descent. The heavy smack of a body hitting the ground turned mystomach. My heartbeat stuttered. The guard must have been a godling becauseheat flared against my palms when the all-too-familiar urge to intervene, tosteal the guard’s life away from death, slammed into me.

My hands curled into fists as the thing flew up, letting outa grating, crackling noise. But I was locked to where I stood, staring at theguard on the ground as I reminded myself that I couldn’t intervene. Icouldn’t. I started to force myself to look away, but something washappening.

A flicker of light seeped out from the guard, forming asmall orb of softly glowing golden light. What was I seeing? The skin of myneck tickled as the small ball of light floated up several feet before fading.Instinct told me the light hadn’t really disappeared.

It had only moved to the Pillars, where it would take theshape of the man once more.

I’d never seen anything like that before, but I’d heard whatit was called here and in every realm—even the ones beyond the Primal Veil. Itwas the spirit of an individual. Their inner consciousness.The psyche. The self. Sóls.The soul.

I’d finally seen what I’d always sensed upon death. Theseparation of the soul from the body.

“Get to low ground!” a guard shouted from farther down theRise. “Everyone.”

My head snapped up. Now was not the time to be distracted bywhat I’d seen. I knew what this creature was. I’d seen them after I’d been withthe riders. It was a sekya, and they werenot allowed to leave the…

To leave the Abyss.

Shit.

This was what I’d felt upon waking. They were the source ofthe unrest Ash had eventually sensed. No souls were trying to escape theconsequences of their crimes. Instead, it was those delving out the punishment.

The sekya flew toward thepalace as others drew closer, their shrieks rising with my fury.

Guards flooded the courtyard, one of them shouting in avoice I recognized as Kars’. “Get off the Rise! Now! Go! Go!”

My heart lurched as the guards on the Rise ran for thenearest steps, scattering in each direction, but I knew—gods, I knew theywouldn’t make it. The sekya were too fast,and it didn’t matter what they were called, because there were rules…

Rules that had nothing to do with the eiriniand were a part of all that information fed to me during the Ascension. Therewere so many godsdamn rules, but only one wasimportant to me at the moment.

The sekya were notsupposed to attack the living—be they Primals, gods,mortals, or anything in between.

But like with the dakkais, theycould only be controlled to a certain point.

Several reached the Rise, chasing down the guards there.Half of them dropped from the sky as the first tucked its wings back, divingstraight for the guards in the courtyard.

A Rise guard’s scream was cut short. The awareness of deathpressed down on me as pieces fell to the ground. Pieces of whatremained of the guard.

Kars threw a shadowstone dagger,striking the sekya in the chest. It let outa howl of pain and folded its wings as it got knocked back. It spiraled down tothe hard earth. I didn’t feel its death, nor did I see its soul.

But the others echoed its cry. The whole damn mess of themveered, following the ones aiming for the palace.

A flash of intense silver cut through the darkness of thecourtyard—an arrow of pure Primal essence. My head jerked to the left.

Rushing across the courtyard, Bele leapt onto a boulder, hershoulder-length braid slapping against her rounded cheek. She crouched, one armoutstretched as she held a bow made of crackling essence.

“What ugly…” She pulled the string of eathertaut and released another arrow. “Motherfuckers.”

I would’ve laughed, except I could see we wereoutnumbered—even with Bele’s arrival. I sensed another death. With every blowlanded against a sekya, another came fromthe sky, more pissed off than before.

I had to do something. If not, the courtyard would belittered with pieces. Possibly even Primal ones. I turned to thebedchamber doors just as the eather thudded heavilyin my chest. A wail of pain stopped me, and my anger took hold.

There wasn’t time.

Eather pounded through my veins. The corners of my visionturned silvery-gold as I spun back to the railing. I grabbed it, and energyramped up inside me as I sprang forward.

Cool night air rushed up, catching the sides of the robewhile the sekya shrieked overhead, and theguards shouted from below.

Like before, my body knew what to do. My knees bent tolessen the shock of the impact as the rest of my body relaxed.

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