Page 96 of Fate and Flame
“Don’t be sexy right now, Fen. I love you, but there’s no time for all the things I want to do.” I yanked him to our room so I could change. I needed all my weapons.
By the time we got to the study, Temir and Rhogan were already waiting for us. Greeve and Gaea still hadn’t arrived, and Aibell was standing, wringing her wrinkled hands, impatiently waiting.
“There are three to kill. Two are moving through the Marsh Court, one is nearly here.”
“Do we know what they are?” I asked. “More banshees?”
She shook her head. Actual fear shone from behind her ancient eyes. Aibell was foreign, but I always believed she was from some place far worse than Alewyn. Whatever the king had released upon us, whatever had caused this reaction from her, was likely something close to death. I looked around the room. As Greeve and Gaea walked in, I realized we likely wouldn’t all be standing here once this was done.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Temir
Rhogan was easy. We’d spent so much time together recently, we knew how to fight together. His great, long sword was his favorite weapon, and though I was skilled with my own, we both knew he was a far better fighter. My magic was what brought me here. Why I was included in the hunt for the creatures the king had released. Locked away for thousands of years, and now somehow, we were supposed to hunt and kill them. I doubted the probability considering those who fought them all those years ago, though they had more potent magic, were unable to kill them. Still, as I looked to the dark draconian fae appointed to our team, felt the breeze constantly surrounding the darkness that encompassed him, and heard the clinging of the weapons he was trained with since birth to fight with, I wondered if we might actually have a chance.
“I know where we are.” Greeve looked around us studiously. “That rise over there leads to the borderlands.”
“At least when the old lady dropped us, she didn’t plant us in the middle of a barren desert.” Rhogan wiped beads of sweat from the side of his face. Neither of us were acclimated to the dry heat. His wings shifted as he pulled a sword longer than me from his back.
The sound of metal rubbing against metal pierced my ears.
“We aren’t in the middle.” Greeve’s voice was lethal. “But if there’s something near, as far as I’m concerned, the fewer victims it has, the better.”
“What’s the plan?” I asked, blocking bits of sand from my eyes as the wind blew around us in waves, my teeth grinding along the grains blown into my mouth.
“We go hunting,” the drac answered, completely unfazed by the nature of the desert or the breeze surrounding us. “We walk, you fly,” he told Rhogan.
He shot into the sky, his wings opening so fast a feather drifted to the ground. He circled above us, the batting of his wings became the cadence to our march through the scorching desert. He carried his long sword in his hands as he flew. He was born for this. Ready.
I was not.
A scream came from somewhere behind us and then another.
“Fly toward the sounds,” Greeve yelled at Rhogan as he grabbed my arm turned us to dust on the wind.
My body ripped through a rush of pressured air until we landed smoothly, Greeve already running. My feet sank into the sand, and though I pushed through my thighs, I wasn’t nearly as fast as he was.
But then he slammed to a halt.
“Fuck.” Rhogan dropped beside him. “Is that what I think it is?”
“Yes.” Greeve pulled a curved blade from his sheath. “A gods-damn tharraing. Do not let her get her hands on you.”
Ahead of us, a group of ranchers stood together surrounding a creature I’d never seen before. There were two shredded bodies already on the ground as the tharraing, a beautiful female being, hovered above them, enthralling the remaining group with her smooth movements and seductive eyes. The generous curves of her body, her long black hair, the way she moved, everything about her aided her attempt to lure the small group closer so they were within reach.
We continued slowly forward, my eyes darting through the gathered fae trying to swing weapons at her.
She lashed forward, a crack audible as she grabbed one of the males. Her face became sinister. Her smile wicked. She spun him around so quickly he was a blur, an insect in a spider’s invisible web. She whispered into his ear as she continued, the crowd moving back as we edged forward.
A female screamed again as the tharraing’s unfortunate victim was suspended midair, his head tilted to the sky and his body limp. The creature towered over him, blocking the sun as she plunged her needle-like fingers into both of his eye sockets. The sound of his skull cracking reverberated through the dry air as his body jerked from her invasion. She slowly pulled a silky, delicate substance from him.
“His soul,” Rhogan breathed, though I wasn’t sure he meant for it to be out loud.
“Please, no,” the female in the crowd begged. She tried to run forward, pushing and pulling, but several males held her back.
Her sobs were the only sound to the tharraing’s movements as she held that fae above the ground. Her nimble fingers seemed to dance in the sunlight as she gathered the tendrils of his faerie soul and wove them into string. She held the gossamer-like ends high in the air until the unforgiving sunlight shone through them. She sliced his soul with those fingers. The corpse she held in front of her shriveled into a hollowed heap as deep red blood streamed down his empty face. Done with her victim, she dropped him to the ground with a thud, the cold chill that shrouded me a direct contrast to the heat from the endless desert.
“Get back to your homes. Save yourselves!” Rhogan expanded his wings, trying to block the creature from the ranchers.
