Page 69 of Flight of Fate

“Perhaps he enjoys riling us up before he strikes us down,”Ayna suggests, but I fear that’s not enough of a reason.

“Want…” Ephegos slides his blade free from his weapons belt. “You’re smart, Ayna. You have probably already figured out the deal I made with the God of Darkness. What do youthinkI want?”

Ayna’s eyes dart to the side, colliding with mine as we both realize that Ephegos might want Askarea and Tavras and Cezux, but there is something he wants even more. Something that drove him to betray his own people. Something that he hasn’t been able to get, even when he kidnapped Ayna and sold her to Tavras then captured and tortured me. Revenge.

It all comes down to revenge.

Hurt Ayna to hurt me. Hurt me to hurt Ayna.

And even worse: the deal with Shaelak.

I’m not fast enough to hold Ayna back as she pulls her hand from mine, adjusting her grip on her dagger and sending that shield of liquid silver right at the traitor Crow who intends to kill me so Shaelak will honor his promise and make Ayna his.

Forty-Two

Ayna

That bastard.He can go suck Shaelak’s cock for all that I care, as long as he disappears from this world right now.

“I will kill you.” I don’t care about the violence in my tone or Kaira’s shriek of warning as I break free from our reduced formation. I don’t care that Ephegos hasn’t commented on the disappearance of Clio and the rebels. I don’t care that Myron’s power is engulfing me in a solid layer of protection as I send my own magic right at Ephegos’s cold, dead heart.

Ephegos’s grin disappears behind a bright white and orange flash as my power hits the wall of fire the Flames pull up in front of him. For a moment, everything is consumed by light, my heart pounding hard as my fae senses slither through the inferno of power consuming the ice in the air and on the ground.

“Fuck it, Ayna,”Kaira exclaims in my mind. She doesn’t get any further than that, because swaths of fire surge for us, beating against our collective shield.

I can sense Myron reaching deep into his power to hold up the wall of magic, reinforcing it where the barrier sizzles into nonexistence, sword in one hand, and silver light laced with inky black rising from the other.

Ephegos disappeared somewhere behind the smoke of colliding powers, no trace of him visible as the explosion of light fades, and I want to shout my anger at the world. But visible or not, Ephegos finally gave the order to attack, and the Flames are coming for us, circle of fire-wielding fairies ever tightening around our spot at the center of the clearing.

We can’t run. We can’t fight our way out. The only thing we can do is make sure we don’t survive and get captured—and to take down as many as we can as we go.

“Where did he go?” Kaira asks aloud, but neither Myron nor I answer, our focus on the lines of Flames approaching with their fire raining on us and their blades ready to take over as soon as they get within reach.

Myron’s magic is racing across the battlefield now, swirls of silver and black battering against the onslaught of fire. To my left, Kaira’s power is humming as she siphons from the flames licking at our shields. Under different circumstances, her power could have been the one to turn around this battle, had that Guardiansdamned serum not coated the enemies’ armor. She could have sent their flames right back at them and watched them burn. Instead, all she can do is throw up a stronger shield with the hijacked magic, pushing it out farther to keep those bastards from our hides.

Another volley of fire hits my silver shield, the heat melting right through it, and I need to draw upon my reserves to patch it up fast enough to avoid being burned alive.

Myron’s curse suggests he’s either not faring any better or he noticed the instability in my shield. The way black and silver lines thread through the air before me tells me he’s taking care of the holes I’ve missed. It’s a whole lot of little gaps the Flames burned into the layer of protection, but they aren’t pushing any harder to put me down. As if they were ordered not to harm me.

But Myron—my heart all but stops as I realize that the holes in my own shield are nothing compared to what they are doing to his. Half of the side has been melted away, Myron drawing the layer of silver and black in closer and closer to his body, a retreat of a different sort when we have nowhere to run.

“They’re going to kill you.”The words taste like poison, even when only spoken in my mind.“You’ve got to shift and fly to safety.”Even as I think it, I know there is no way he’ll slip through the fire surrounding us, drawing tighter in a circle. Clio could have frozen the ground over and the air. She could have created ice crystals from the fog and sent them to douse the fire. But Clio isn’t here, and I must rely on myself to get us out.

Two Flames are close enough to reach us with their swords now, and sure as Eroth’s Veil, they swing their weapons at Myron and Kaira, artfully sweeping past me as I push out my power once more, regardless of the risk of touching their cursed armor. My Crow magic won’t be what saves us. Neither will my daggers if we don’t manage to reduce the number of opponents. If only?—

Tuning out Kaira’s pants as she struggles to juggle both her own power and the magic she siphoned from the Flames, and Myron’s growls and grunts as he parries blow after blow, I reach for the cool sensation of Vala’s water magic. I haven’t felt much of it since I turned immortal, haven’t managed much of wielding water, but the tiny droplets clouding the air are calling to me the way Vala’s voice once had.

So fast a spell of dizziness sways me, I delve into the thin string of power that’s not Shaelak-given and disperse it into the haze before me. Like growing crystals, the haze collects and hovers above us until heavy balls of water float toward me.

“Douse the fire,”Kaira shouts into my mind, but I have something else on my mind.

The Flame closest to Myron swings at him again, gaining a foot of space as Myron is forced to duck under the blade. Myron twists out of his path, knocking the side of his own sword against the fairy’s arm. Bones crack, and I want to take a breath, but two more Flames have made it to the front, working their way through Myron’s frayed shield.

They are my first targets. I don’t hesitate as I direct the balls of water right into their faces, savoring the splash followed by muffled screams and coughs as the liquid trickles down their throats. The first Flame goes down, drowning, while the other two realize where the attack came from and turn toward me.

They make it all of one step in my direction before Myron sneaks up on them, reaches around their necks, and slits their throats. The spray of blood evaporating on my shield is nothing compared to the puddle forming on the ground where the two Flames drop and roll over, life leaving their eyes.

“That went well,” Myron huffs as he pulls up his shield again, my magic knitting into his to stabilize it.

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