Page 136 of Ash and Feather

Couldn’t risk even a little more poison slipping in, dulling my magic, threatening my ability to transport myself back to Nerithyl.

I needed to leave before I ended up right back in the prison I’d just escaped from—or someplace worse.

Another arrow flew in, distracting me. I knocked it away just in time to look up and see Andrel racing toward me, a knife flashing in his hand.

I tried to leap, to let my wings catch the wind and carry me away as before. But the numbing poison pumping through them was starting to eat more viciously at their shape and solidness, turning them into more of a hinderance than a help. The right one crumpled when I tried to beat it, showering me in ash and glowing feathers, making me stumble.

As Andrel charged toward me, I struggled for balance, trying to decide how to stave him off long enough to make my escape.

My sister appeared before I was forced to make a decision, bursting through a wall of smoke and flame, a sword in her hand and a wild expression on her face.

She sprinted straight toward me.

But at the last moment she veered, slamming into Andrel, instead, knocking him aside.

He landed in a crouch, somehow still graceful despite only having one hand to catch himself. He stared at Savna for a long, tense moment, clearly stunned.

I was equally stunned, desperately trying to reconcile what I knew in my head with what I felt in my heart.

“Run!” she shouted at me.

I had to run.

Imeantto run.

Then Andrel leapt back to his feet and grabbed hold of my sister’s arm.

His gaze was livid as he jerked her closer, words falling furiously from his lips. Whatever he was saying was lost in the cacophony of howling wind and crackling fire and my own raging heartbeat.

They scuffled, both struggling to throw the other to the ground.

He knocked the sword from her grasp, but she disarmed him a few seconds later. Neither seemed to have the upper hand, but Savna eventually managed to throw him aside long enough to look my direction, to see me still standing in the same place as before.

“RUN!” she bellowed. “NOW!”

Protecting me. Letting me go.

But at what cost?

So many of my questions had been answered in the days we’d spent together, but now I had a hundred more.

Will she be safe?

Will I see her again?

Does it matter?

How can I leave her with him?

This last one was answered for me—I was already transcending into a smokier, less solid version of myself, somepart of me still aware of what I needed to do, despite all my questions.

As the last of my body disappeared, my sister broke free of Andrel’s hold and spun toward me, meeting my gaze one last time.

Of all the things I wanted to say, I only managed to mouth one of them:I’m sorry.

Divine fire engulfed all that remained of me an instant later, cutting me off from her response.

I tumbled through the aether, weightless and directionless, for what felt like a lifetime before finally landing on my back in one of the fields outside of the Palace of Fire.

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