Page 256 of The Cradle of Ice
Still saddled atop her mount, Nyx twisted around and saw the huge sphere violently rattling, only a moment from being torn loose. Her heart clenched. She didn’t know if Shiya had the strength to stop what the Root had started—then a scream rose above and behind her.
Nyx ducked from it, shivered from its timbre. It was a cry rife with madness and power and fury. She knew it came from no raash’ke.
She turned as a huge shadow swept down through the dome’s opening. Black wings spread wide, brushing the copper to either side. It was all darkness and hatred. A steel helm mounted its skull. Jagged bolts of fire drove it down into the dome, coming from the barge overhead. The energy struck that steel helm and frazzled across the hundreds of copper needles drilled into bone and brain, creating a crown of emerald fire.
As the monster swept lower, it drew the residual green fire still skimming across the dome’s inner walls. Energy arced through the air from all directions, drawn to the helm, further fueling its fire.
The winged beast screamed as it hung in the air.
Framed in fire and crowned in inimical glory.
In that savage cry, the horde-mind discovered a name buried deep and shouted it out in warning to all.
Kalyx.
* * *
RHAIF CRINGED NEXT to Shiya as the monstrous bat screamed overhead. The nearby clash of steel in the smoke fell silent as combatants retreated apart, likely all gazing up.
Rhaif never lifted his face. He cradled Shiya’s upper torso across his lap. Her bronze crushed his knees, squeezed fire from his stabbed thigh. Still, he held her as her body quaked and shivered. She seemed unable to fully escape the tortured horrors of the chrysalis. He clutched her hand, sensing no warmth, only frigid metal. Her eyes were open but looked cold.
Krysh crouched on her other side. “We must get her back into the cocoon.”
The alchymist stared with concern at the giant crystal turubya. While Shiya’s tremoring had calmed, the orb’s rattling had worsened. Rhaif felt the shaking in the floor, in his bones, all the way to his skull.
He understood the urgency.
“Even if we wanted to,” Rhaif said, “she’s too heavy to move ourselves.”
Krysh shifted to the smoky fighting as it resumed once again. Graylin, along with Vikas and the other men, continued to guard the chrysalis. They had used the smoke and feints to lure the Hálendiians aside. They now fought a fierce battle at the mouth of a nearby tunnel. But none of it would matter if Shiya failed to stop whatever dire machinations the Root had set in motion.
Krysh grabbed Shiya’s shoulder and struggled to lift her torso, but it would not budge.
Rhaif pushed him away. “That’s not going to work. A lady should be treated with respect.”
Despite his flippant tone, his heart knotted in his chest. He feared what he must do next—not that it was any risk to her. If he failed, it would only confirm what he secretly feared. That Shiya had no real connection to him, that whatever sense he had that she cared for him was not real, just his desires reflecting off her bronze.
If I must die, leave me at least this illusion.
Still, he’d rather not die.
So, he lifted his hands and rested his palms atop her naked chest, between the swell of her bosom, where he imagined her heart would be, where he wished it to be.
Rhaif was far from gifted in bridle-song, but there was one melody that the two had shared in the past. He started it as a whisper, nearly breathless with fear. With each few words, he let his voice grow stronger, lifting his mother’s lullaby out of the past and offering it to Shiya. It was a song of comfort and assurance, of a love that would never fade.
Hear me, Shiya …
He had done something like this half a year ago, coming upon her broken and dying in the Cloudreach forest. It had taken the strength of Xan—his great-grandmother—and four other Kethra’kai to revive her back then. He had joined them, too, offering what little help he could.
But now it’s just me, Shiya.
His hands glowed faintly, a few tendrils wafting forth, stirred by the lullaby. He let them settle and warm this most tender of spots.
Back in Cloudreach, he had hardly known her. They had barely met. Since then, they had spent a half year together, most of it confined aboard the Sparrowhawk. He had found comfort in her company: in quiet talks, in silent meals, in touches that were perhaps more meaningful to him. Still, she had seemed to find some measure of contentment with him. Her smiles deepening, her touches more lingering. She often sought him out first, rather than the other way around, as if she needed him, too.
But was it just me, Shiya? Was I fooling myself?
He continued to sing, his hands glowing a richer golden as he remembered those moments. He stared into her eyes and offered the only gift left to him.
