Page 65 of Wings of Cruelty and Flame

I turned and ran, pushing my body to the limit, ignoring the crack of pain through my crushed ribs. I tore off the glove on my right hand, my arm like jelly beneath, but dangerous, always dangerous. If I could sneak up on the wyvern, somehow get behind it, I might be able to kill it before it could roast me alive. Not that I’d ever killed anything as big as a wyvern. Wyverns were legendary creatures, and it was pure delusion to think something as small and insignificant as one fae could kill a legend, but it was all I had, the only bit of hope I had left.

I ran, and swung around the side of the storehouse, racing in a circuitous route—

I screamed when the wyvern dropped from the rain-dark sky to land in front of me. My throat burned with the sound. I tasted blood.

The emerald hit the earth so hard I was knocked off my feet and landed with a sob on my ass on the wet ground. I was so panicked I’d forgotten the wyvern could simply fly. Fuck.Fuck!

I scrambled to get my feet underneath me, but my arms buckled when I put weight on them. I was shaking too hard to get up, and I hated myself right then, hated my fear, my limitations, my mortal body.

Fire burned gold in the wyvern’s throat, and I knew it was the end. My senses sharpened, the taste of blood, sweat, and ash intense on my tongue, the wind hitting me like a furnace until I shook harder, all my hairs standing on end, the beating of wings hitting my ears like explosions.

I sucked in a final shuddering breath and screwed my eyes shut, trying in vain to push off the ground, to fight to my feet, torun.I made it to my knees when an earthquake sent me back to my ass, and I sobbed.

Terror made me shrink in on myself when a fierce wyvern cry cleaved the air, filling the world until there was nothing but that scream, that rage, that warning. With near-death clarity, I knew the exact meaning of that scream.

Touch my rider, and I will end your entire line.

Wait.

I tore my gritty eyes open, air hitting my lungs when I gasped. A second wyvern had landed in front of me, crouched low between me and the emerald with a powerful growl rumbling from its blue-silver throat. It was smaller than the other, but its size gave it speed; I flinched when it slashed out a wing and raked wicked claws across the emerald’s throat. Blood spilled, not enough to kill but to serve as a warning. The emerald roared its rage but… backed off.

A shiver of ice went down my spine. Had the blue wyvern decided it wanted to devour me itself? Did it think my bones would be especially crunchy, my skin sweetened by sweat?

My stare jumped from sky blue to emerald to sky blue to emerald, surprise jolting my heart when I realised neither bore a rider.

I shook so hard my teeth knocked together, crawling backwards when the sleek blue wyvern turned to face me. The sheer size of those feet, those talons… My stomach cramped, vomit rushing to the back of my throat.

“I—I would taste—rotten,” I gasped, my head spinning, my hands shaking so hard I stood no chance of pushing off the ground.

The wyvern let out a rumbling sound like when Makrukh laughed. A shot of pure terror hit my system, allowing me to get to my feet. I swayed, but I was standing.

My head spun. I was so scared, so breathless, so full of pain, that it took me a moment to realise the wyvern had dipped its head to look at me closer. Not snaking violently like the emerald but assessing me.

The short grunt it let out hit me with that eerie understanding again.Well, come on, then. Let’s go.

“Go… where?”

I swore exasperation entered the blue’s quicksilver eyes.

“Where’s your rider?” I whispered, trying to stay on my feet when the whole world swirled and tilted around me. I craned my neck, searching the wyvern’s back for a rider in familiar House colours, for a legion rider instead of one of those dark clergy, but there was no one sat astride the wyvern.

And it hit me when the wyvern nudged her face forward, bumping my stomach with her scaly snout like Mak did. Her soft noise very clearly saidright here.

“You’re mad,” I told her in a rushed breath, not entirely sure how I knew she was female. I meant to say something else, come up with a better protest, but a heavier, much larger wyvern landed behind me, and the quake knocked me off my feet.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

VARIDIAN

The crowd was so dense I couldn’t fucking breathe, or maybe the lack of oxygen was because Ameirah’s hand was ripped out of mine, my wife swallowed by the chaos and carnage. I’d barely had enough time to process the murder of the man; that got pushed to the back of my mind to examine later. Now, I needed to find Ameirah and get us the fuck out of here.

Wyfell had always been a peaceful city, far enough from the Wall of Hydaran to avoid being touched by the conflict, home to many riders but never to battle. As expected, the people of Wyfell reacted with animal panic, and I was trapped in the middle of it. All my training and strength was useless.

My marriage mark stung on my chest, a constant reminder of what I had to lose. I wouldn’t recover if I lost her. Five days married to her and I was already enamoured. She was mine because of more than our fathers’ signatures on a piece of paper. She was mine because she made me laugh and captured myinterest with her casual threats, and because when she smiled, I wanted to murder everyone around us so I was the only one who got to keep the memory.

She stole my heart that first night, somewhere between putting a knife to my throat and telling me she’d never had a wyvern. The sheer nerve she had to mount Mak after our ceremony, when she’d never flown before, knocked the breath out of me. She was so fucking brave, so strong. A warrior, down to her bones. A fighter and survivor like me, like all my legion.

It certainly didn’t hurt that she was as beautiful as sin with eyes like magic, her smile a curve of wickedness, and her skin so soft I couldn’t stop touching her. And that hair,fuckthat hair. As colourful as sunset, as rich as the night sky, thick and waving, tempting me like a siren. It looked damn good splayed across my pillow.

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