Page 218 of A Soul to Guide

Her home was high up in the central tree. They were fortunate the hallways were empty due to the alarm telling everyone to hide in their homes.

“How did he get here? Do you know?” she asked, clinging to his neck while his arms threaded around her knees.

She could feel how quickly he was sprinting by how much air passed over them and how much his body moved. She felt as much as she heard how hard his footsteps were thudding against the ground with each foot fall. She constantly bounced on his back.

“Mericato ordered for his skull to be brought here. I heard his translator say he was going to give it to Ulair to study, since we’d never seen anything like him.”

Raewyn’s lips thinned in annoyance. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“How was I supposed to know he’d come back to life?” Cykran snapped back. “I didn’t think it would be a good idea to tell you I saw them bring back your dead lover’s head, okay? Your face was all gross from crying, and I was worried you were going to start hitting me again.”

“Gosh, you make me so angry.” She reached up and yanked on his horn.

He stepped to the side as he stumbled. “Hey! I’m running here.”

“Can you go any faster?”

“I’m going as fast as I can!” Just as fresh air rushed against her face, Cykran halted. “I don’t know where they are. It’s too dark, and I don’t see any beacon lights.”

Raewyn squinted her eyes, as if that would help her see. Funnily enough, it did. Since no other lights, like those of the city, were able to distract her, she noticed a handful of magical glows to the left.

She pointed. “Go that way.”

Cykran spun and headed to the left. As they met the top of a rise, dozens of glows emerged and circled a black spot in the middle – a spot with sparks of red and white.

Merikh.

“I need you to be my voice,” Raewyn said as they got closer. “If he hears me, I’m worried he’ll try to get through the soldiers like back on Earth. I’ll only be able to speak quietly.”

“You know Mericato will be leading them.”

That will pose a problem. “I know, but you just have to get him to let me through.”

Cykran nodded, only a metre away from the mixture of glowing colours.

“Let us through!” he demanded. He shoulder-barged against soldiers’ backs, none of which got out of his way. “I bring councilwoman Raewyn Daefaren.”

She winced at her name being shouted, but it didn’t appear Merikh had heard or understood it.

The first line of soldiers parted, and they were swallowed up by people. The clanking and grinding of metal on leather creaked in her ears, as the smell of armour oils penetrated her nose. With how much sweat was clinging to the air, she worried how much fear they were producing.

“I can’t move further in,” he said over his shoulders. “There’s Rankae blades everywhere.”

“All civilians have been warned to retreat into their houses,” someone yelled as two sets of footsteps stomped closer. Armour jingled and jangled upon their approach. “Take her back inside the palace.”

“She’s here to defuse the situation. Let her pass.”

There was a silence shared between them as Mericato signed. Raewyn knew sign language, but unfortunately, it became difficult for them to communicate once she could no longer read his hands. When they wanted to communicate privately, he’d write with elbraille ink on a piece of paper, or he’d use his finger to write on her palm, and then she would speak back to him.

However, he often had a translator with him, and Cykran was still learning it upon her request.

“I told you he’d be leading the team,” Cykran whispered.

“This is not your jurisdiction,” Mericato’s translator said, although he lacked the anger in his voice that was surely written on his face. “I am the councilmember in charge of the city’s safety. There is no need for you, a civilian, to be here.”

She wasn’t pleased to hear this. She was also still cranky, since he was the one who’d pushed her through the portal.

“Tell them he can’t speak our language. I can calm him down and translate.”

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