Page 93 of Of Flames and Fallacies

The rebel raises his arm to swing again, and I charge. I throw my dagger without a second thought. It flies across the distance but doesn’t go as far as I hoped. The blade sinks into the rebel’s heel, and he shrieks, swiveling toward me. It’s enough of a distraction, though, and Archie catches my gaze.

“Go!”I mouth.

Archie scrambles off, disappearing into the throng of people as the rebel races toward me. I pat my side for my weapon, panic flooding my veins as I recall giving my sword to the hostage. And I just flung my dagger, now far out of my reach.

I’m fucked.

I turn, eyeing the distance between Daeja and I. Her roar splits the air, and she barrels down the alley toward me. But it won’t matter—the rebel will get to me first.

The rebel closes the distance between us, and I backpedal, clenching my fists and readying myself for whatever fight I can possibly muster. In slow-motion, he raises his axe, the metal gleaming and swings it down toward me.

Cole slams into the rebel from the side with a mighty roar, ripping him into the ground. In the blink of an eye, Cole rears up, jumping to his feet while the rebel struggles to stand.

I watch in horror as something as quick as a burst of lightning shifts in Cole. A vicious ferality unlocks in him as he thrusts his sword into the man’s chest. The rebel falls back down to the ground with a gurgling cry, and Cole rips his blade free. A shaking rage tightens Cole’s features, his eyes entirely focused on the rebel as he swings his sword down. Again, and again. The rebel lies motionless as Cole hacks repeatedly into his flesh. A wicked shiver races down my spine. “Stop,” I whisper, the words soft on my lips as the war rages around me. But only I hear it.

The man’s blood splatters Cole with each strike, the corpse shuddering with each contact. But Cole doesn’t cease—crazed by his own wrath.

“Cole, stop!” I throw my hand out as if to stop him, but he doesn’t react. A loudwhooshand roar flares to life in the background as noise swims back to me. I lunge at Cole as he swings down again, catching his forearm in my hand and stopping him. My hand shakes at the effort of bracing against his strength.

He whips to me, his face stained red with blood. His lips are pulled back into a snarl, his teeth splattered with crimson. And his eyes…they roar with an inferno that makes me shrink back.

It takes a few moments for him to see through the haze of his anger—to see me. I watch it recede, as a fog might fade when the sun comes out. His sword falls to the ground with a clatter, his breath racing as he looks down at his hands coated with blood. They begin to tremble.

A deep, guttural horn blows into the night, cutting above the rest of the uproar. I stiffen, shooting a glance back over to Daeja whose dark figure flashes and flickers toward us. Her silhouette winking in and out of vision, as if she were a shadowed mirage.

Now wasn’t the time to be practicing her vanishing skills.

“The Carnyx...Daeja, get back to the forest! Someone’s spotted you!”

“Go!” Cole says and pushes me. His blood-soaked hand leaves a red print on my shoulder. “Take her, and get out of here, Kat!”

Before I can ponder it, I race back to the alley. “Where are you? We need to go!”

Daeja’s silhouette shimmers at the end of the corridor, and I sprint toward her. She nabs the back of my shirt in her mouth, lifts me off the ground, and bursts into a run. I bite down a shout of surprise. My feet dangle below me, and my hands grip at my shirt clenched in her jagged teeth. She leaps onto the city wall and launches into the air, her wings flapping and steering us clear of the pathways to Blackfell.

“You couldn’t wait for me to get on your back first!”

“You said we needed to go. I didn’t think we had the time.”

She flares her wings as we approach the thick of the forest, flying low, down near the tops of the trees. Flapping hard and slow to ease her descent, we land, and she sets me down carefully.

I adjust my shirt, tucking it back into my pants. “Did anyone see you?”

“No. The only two legger I saw was the one whose head I removed. The others you freed went a different pathway.”

I gaze up at her. “You…you did it. I saw you vanish a few times.”

“I did?”

Nodding, I scan the skies, but it’s blocked out by trees stretching above us.My nerves knot in my stomach at all the reasons why someone might have sounded the Carnyx. The first reason being if Daeja was spotted.

“Stay here. I need to check and see if the hostages made it out okay.”

I’m relieved she doesn’t argue.

As I run toward the open plains of the pathway to Blackfell, I make out a group of people huddled against large boulders. I recognize the man I handed my sword to, along with all the others I freed.

“You all made it out okay?” I manage through tired breaths.

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