Page 224 of Shadowblood Souls
As we wait, restless anxiety ripples through my limbs. The ache in my chest expands to encompass more than just my feelings about Jacob.
Is it my fault the shadowkind are afraid of us? I’m the one with the most brutal talent.
I’m the one who’s refused to attempt the steps Rollick’s asked me to take toward controlling it.
Why wouldn’t they see me as a threat?
When we get back on board, when Rollick can sort this out, I’ll do the practice he’s asking for. I’ll deal out a little pain to make sure I don’t slip up when it really matters.
It’s the least I can do when the shadowkind are risking so much just having us around.
The uneasiness tangled inside me doesn’t loosen until Dominic and Andreas appear at the mouth of the side-street several minutes later, carrying several items wrapped in foil paper.
Andreas starts handing his cargo around, the heat of the contents seeping through the paper into my hands. “I caught a few happy memories from people who’ve stopped by this food stall a gazillion times, so I think it was the best of the bunch around here. If you?—”
With a sharp hissing sound, a streak of silver sears through the air and plunges into his shoulder.
Twenty-Five
Riva
Andreas stumbles, a splotch of red blooming on his shirt sleeve. Even as the foil-wrapped food falls from my hands and I leap to him, more bolts hiss through the air.
Another strikes him across his temple, digging a gouge through his dark skin. Then there’s a clattering sound like a shower of hail.
I fling my arms around Andreas to pull him closer to both the nearest wall and the ground. Dominic is already racing over to us, his face tensed.
As I press my hand to the wound on Drey’s shoulder, as little as I can do for him withmytouch, my head jerks around to seek out the source of the shots.
Jacob is crouched on the ground between the rest of us and the depths of the alley, his hands raised defensively. Several more gleaming bullets whip toward us and crash into the forcefield of telekinetic power he’s pushing them back with.
Those aren’t tranquilizer darts. Someone’s trying tokillus.
A clammy sensation squeezes around my gut.
“I can’t see who’s attacking us,” Zian says in a rough voice, his head swiveling as he scans the narrow street. “It looks like they’re shooting from someplace above. There!”
There’s a flicker of movement by a window. An arm jerking out, flinging something down toward us.
Alarm blares through my nerves. “Get out of here! Onto the street—where there’s more people.”
We hurtle out of the alley like one being, desperate for the shelter the crowded throughway can provide. Whoever’s attacking us, they won’t risk shooting innocent bystanders, right?
Aboomreverberates from behind us, jolting the ground beneath my feet. I sling Andreas’s arm over my shoulders, holding him awkwardly with my lesser height even though my muscles are up to the challenge.
He curls his fingers into my shirt but runs alongside me, only swaying a little. But the sight of the blood streaking down the side of his face makes my stomach churn.
Dominic dashes next to us, gripping Drey’s hand. “I need something—” he gasps out. “The wounds are too deep—I have to get the energy from somewhere.”
Oh, hell, I didn’t even think of that.
The people on the sidewalk jerk away as we plunge into their midst, murmurs and exclamations rising up in our wake. I don’t need to understand the language to recognize that they’re disturbed.
Who wouldn’t be?
I spot a sapling growing from a pot on the far side of the street. That’s got to be enough, right?
I jab my hand toward it, and Dominic veers in that direction. Zian and Jacob thump along behind us.
