Page 165 of Of Empires and Dust

The wyvern tilted its head to the right, strips of flesh dangling from its teeth, blood dripping. A moment of calm passed as he stared into the creature’s eyes, and then the wyvern opened its jaws and shrieked, the frills on its neck and back shaking. The light vanished once more, leaving Petrick’s pulse scrambling.

Mikhail grabbed him and yanked him backwards into what must have been an alley.

He dropped to the ground, panting like an exhausted dog, his back pressed against the wooden wall, his hands clasped behind his head. “What is happening? What is happening? What is happening?”

“Petrick.” Mikhail grabbed him and shook him. “Petrick, shut the fuck up.”

Bloodchilling screams and howls filled the air, wingbeats and wyvern screeches answering.

“We’re dead.” His hands trembled furiously as he pulled them away from his head. He tried to stop them shaking, but he had no control.

“No, we’re not. We’re going to make it out of here. I just need you to stay quiet and stand up.”

“No,” a third voice said, a touch of sadness to it. “Your friend’s right. You’re going to die here.”

Mikhail jumped backwards, and Petrick jerked away from the voice, fingers digging in the dirt, feet pushing.

A woman stepped from the dark, close enough for Petrick to make out her face. He saw dark skin and long, braided hair. Narvonan. She moved like a lion stalking its prey.

Mikhail took a step towards her. “Who… who are you?”

Her lips curled into a sad smile. “On any given day? A woman trying to finally do something worthwhile. But tonight? Tonight, I am death. So very sorry to meet you.”

Petrick didn’t see what happened next. There was a flash of movement, and then Mikhail was holding his neck. His friend looked back at him, a vacant expression on his face, and when he pulled his hand away, blood spurted.

Petrick pushed himself back in the dirt as Mikhail reached for him, stumbling, blood spurting from the wound in his neck.

Mikhail crashed to his knees, and the woman stepped over his body. She eyed Petrick, a soft sigh escaping her. “Wrong place, wrong time.”

Petrick scrambled backwards and hauled himself to his feet, springing from the alley and back into Ankar’s main thoroughfare.

He crashed into someone, scrambling to stay on his feet. Wingbeats sounded, a screech, then a gust of wind swept across his face and the person he had bumped into was gone.

The sky was a bit brighter now, his eyes adjusting to the dark. Those scaled beasts soared over the town, swooping only to tear people apart.

The gates weren’t far. He could make it.

He pulled his gaze from the sky and made to run, footsteps sounding all around him.

That same white light burst into life once more, and there stood Dayne Ateres in the street before him, looking like a demon that had crawled from the void itself. The man – if that’s what he truly was – swung his spear of light and smashed it into a fleeing soldier’s head. Petrick assumed the pieces that exploded outwards were bone and brain.

As the man walked towards him, Petrick tripped over a body, feeling acrackas his elbow slammed hard into stone. He tried to haul himself to his feet, but something held him down. Something he couldn’t see or touch. He’d been around mages long enough to know it was the Spark, to know there was nothing he could do.

This was where he would die. Thousands of miles from home, in a place for which he cared little, surrounded by the dead bodies of men and women he had once called friends. Worse, even as Dayne Ateres stood over him, that white spear pulsing light, Petrick still wasn’t quite sure what he was meant to be fighting for.

If he’d been the given choice, he would have died fat and drunk in the arms of a woman who loved him. And a dog, he would have loved to have a dog.

Petrick squinted at the bright light of the white spear.

“I take no pleasure in this,” Dayne Ateres said, standing over him, shadows welling in the hollows of his face. “But nor will I shy away from it. Heraya embrace you.”

He raised the spear and then thrust it down into Petrick’s heart. The pain lasted for but half a second. Then the worldwent cold and black, and a strange sense of panic and unease consumed him. He screamed, but no sound came.

Chapter 38

Neither Bent Nor Broken

14thDay of the Blood Moon

---