Page 117 of Kissed By the Gods
I spare another stolen second to watch Ryot with something like awe. A shield shimmers and ripples around him and Einarr, and he’s using the distraction we provided to launch a fresh attack on the Kher’zenn. He drives forward with his sword, bringing another Kher’zenn down. But he looks like he’s fading.
“How long has he been fighting?” I ask. It’s impossible to hide the worry from her, but she shakes her head furiously at me, as if to sayit doesn’t matter.
“Right,” I murmur, shifting my eyes to the Kher’zenn and their beasts. “Who do we rip apart next?”
Her vicious glee fills my veins. She beats her wings furiously, climbing higher and higher into that billowing plume of ash. Already, a thick coating of ash covers our skin. It’s not a terrible thing, as it creates a camouflage that hides us from those things screeching and chasing after us. Even Vaeloria, usually radiant in her pale brilliance, is dulled now. The ash softens her glow, dulls the shine of her feathers. Something scrapes every time I close my eyes. The more I blink, the worse it gets—ash grinding against the tender rim of my eye until my lashes are thick with soot and tears. My vision clouds, burns, screams.
My body begs me to shut them.
Ryot’s words echo in my ears:“If you’re in a sandstorm, if the heavens have opened in a deluge, if there’s blood running down your face so thick that everything you see is coated in red—Keep. Your. Eyes. Open.”
He didn’t say anything about ash, but I don’t close my eyes.
Vaeloria hits me with a glimpse of her intention before we fall from the sky like a bolt of fury, her wings tucked into her sides, spinning in a dizzying frenzy that almost makes me pass out.
Almost.
But I don’t. I keep my seat. I even manage to fist a dagger, and we burst out of the cloud of ash on top of two of the draegoths and their riders. Vaeloria doesn’t slow, doesn’t even pause. She spreads her wings and slices through the first pair with the sword-like edges, cutting them in half. I throw the dagger at the other Kher’zenn. Even as it impales him in his forehead, I’m already calling it back into my hand, and swinging up with my scythe into the draegoth’s neck.
“Leina!”
I turn in my seat at Ryot’s shout, as a draegoth flies out of the cloud of ash, its grotesque alabaster skin blending in perfectly with the surroundings. The Kher’zenn lashes out with a whip. It snaps through the air, dripping with venom pulled from their creatures.Thisis why the archons are so relentless with inflicting pain.
Vaeloria tenses beneath me, both of us preparing for the blow. But the shredwhip hits a shield, glimmering around us.
Ryot.
His shield knocks the Kher’zenn back and I throw my dagger at the same time that Vaeloria flicks out with her wing, loosing another feather-blade. Kher’zenn and draegoth fall from the sky.
My eyes find Ryot as he rams his sword through a draegoth. Draegoth and rider plummet from the sky.
I spin around in my seat, scanning the skies. There. Far in the distance—the last one. A draegoth and Kher’zenn fly for Morendahl. My blood heats, ready for a chase—it will only make the kill sweeter.
“Vaeloria!” I cry out. “We can reach him.”
But she doesn’t fly on after the escaping rider. She swings us around, and Ryot is prone on the ground. Einarr is prancing around him wildly, shrieking. I don’t have to say a word. Vaeloria swoops around, bringing us in to land next to them, her hooves striking the ruins of a decaying palace with a thud. I dive from her back, frantically running my hands over Ryot’s chest. Blood is pouring out of a gaping wound across his neck.
“You’re an idiot,” I tell Ryot angrily.
He manages a smile, but it’s terrifyingly weak. “Good… t’see you… too… r-rebel… girl…”
I rip off a piece of my tunic and press it against the wound. Hard. He grunts a littleand mumbles something.
“What?”
“I… like th' sex'dreams... bedder.”
I ignore him. His blood is already seeping through the cloth.
What did Nyrica say about field dressings? Sew it up. Apply aldersigh directly into the wound.
Simple. It always seemed so simple in training. “Do you have aldersigh? A needle?” I ask him desperately.
“Mmm,” he replies, his eyes closing. “Y’r… so damn d’manding… even in my dreams…”
“Ryot!” I smack him, and Einarr screams in his ear.
He rouses. “Inn’r… left p’cket… my r-rebel girl…”
