Page 3 of A War of Crowns

But that moment wasn’t now.

Bodies passed him in the dark. Boots thundered on the stone steps. The warning bell had stopped ringing some time ago, and its absence left an eerie chasm in which he finally heard the low thrum of war drums in the distance.

His heart hammered out a frenetic reply.

This shouldn’t be happening. This wasn’t supposed to be happening.

“Out of the way, boy!” someone snarled in the dark before shoving Hedley aside and into the wall bordering the stairs.

A cry of pain exploded past Hedley’s lips when his left shoulder crunched against the stone. He hadn’t had time to grab his armor before he left the barracks.

He regretted that now.

Screams beyond his own pierced the night. Screams of pain from behind him. Screams of frustration from in front as too many soldiers retreated to the Gate of Exiles looming above.

“Fall back to the mid-ring!” The cry went out, passed from mouth to mouth. “Fall back to the gate!”

“They’ve breached the wall!”

“They’re here in the outer ring!”

“Fall back! Fall back! Fall back!”

Hedley looked up at the tangle of bodies fighting to make it through the great gate crowning the flight of stairs. The air reeked of a collective fear—a worry they might not all make it through before they barricaded the gate against the Arathian horde sweeping through the outer ring.

He wasn’t going to make it.

Still wedged against the wall, Hedley snarled to himself. His shoulder smarted. His arm burned from being shoved into the stone.

His hands already ached at the thought of what he had to do next.

Turning into the wall, Hedley dug his fingers into the grooves between the bricks. He found a hold there while his booted feetscrabbled for purchase. Hissing through clenched teeth, he hauled himself upward, one hold at a time, making for the edge of the roof.

There was a reason Sir Hunte had commandedhimto make for the Roost, out of all the men in his unit.

He was a farm boy.

Farm boys were strong. Farm boys were fast. Farm boys were resourceful.

Farm boys were expendable.

Pulling himself onto the roof with a groan, Hedley rolled to his back just long enough to spy a sliver of moonlight fighting to pierce the cloud cover overhead before he sprung to his feet.

He scanned the way forward. The slope of the rooftops rose ever higher until they finally reached the Gate of Exiles. He scanned the way back and spied in the distance, amidst the flicker of scarlet flame and the dance of smoke, that the tower housing the Roost looked to still be intact.

His body had already decided for him before his mind had considered the sheer stupidity of doubling back to the outer wall and following Sir Hunte’s orders instead of just fleeing to the mid-ring, where he would be safe.

The subtle downward tilt of the rooftops leading back toward the now smoldering ruins of the outer ring lent Hedley a sense of falling as he raced across each roof, leaping from edge to edge. There was no crowd up here. No press of bodies through which he had to fight.

He had only the open air, the smoke, and the acrid tang of something dark and foreign on the wind.

Somethingwhistled through the air nearby. Something far too close for comfort. But this time, the something didn’t zip past him in the night. There was a thud, an impact, a burning pain lancing through Hedley’s shoulder.

He bit back a scream.

Shooting a look behind him, he spied a looming figure in the darkness two rooftops over, wielding a bow. But before the figure could loose another arrow, Hedley ducked and rolled straight off the edge of his own rooftop.

The world fell away, leaving Hedley tumbling into a stomach-lurching drop that ended far too quickly when he crashed into the alley below. With all the grace of a drunken sailor rather than a cat.

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