Page 119 of Rage of Her Ravens

Chapter Nineteen

Ember

Ember gasped when shelanded on soft dirt. A chill swept through her bones when she saw they weren’t just outside the castle, but on the other side of the castle walls standing in front of that big river their uncles called a moat. Even worse was that it was almost dark. The fireflies had come out, swarming the sky like hundreds of little floating stars. She recognized this section outside the castle walls. She’d seen it that first night she and Aurora had been stuck up on that turret. Though it had been poorly lit, Ember and Aurora had wolf-touched vision and could see in darker spaces. Why did Aurora bring them there?

She released her sister’s hand and spun toward her. “We can’t be outside.”

“But it’s pretty here.” Aurora picked up a stone and tried to skip it across the moat, but it sank with athunk. She turned and waved her hand through a swarm of fireflies, laughing when they danced around her head.

Ember followed after her sister as she skipped across the embankment. “Rora, we’ll get in trouble.”

Aurora turned on her with a laugh. “Don’t be such a scaredy sprite, Em.”

Ember crossed her arms, Bethamy number two flailing with the movement. Her arm had come loose, and Mrs. Euphemia had yet to fix it. “I’m not a scaredy sprite.” She stomped her foot, angry with her sister for being so dumb.

“You are.” Aurora turned up her chin, jutting a thumb in her chest. “I’m brave like Auntie and our uncles.”

Ember was so mad, her eyes practically crossed. “You’re not being brave. You’re being stupid.”

Aurora made her even more mad when she laughed and skipped away toward a patch of tall grass. But then she stopped, letting out a terrified scream. Ember chased after her sister. She didn’t need to guess what had made Aurora upset, for she saw the two spirits hovering over their lifeless corpses. The bad nurses who had treated Uncle Nikkos. She plugged her nose at the stench as she frowned at the flies swarming their decomposing bodies.

Their spirits blinked in and out, and though they didn’t speak, she recognized the warning in their bulging eyes. Danger was near.

Aurora stumbled back, her jaw slackened from shock. “What happened to them?”

“They crossed the wrong mages,” a deep voice bellowed.

Ember spun around, crying out when a strange winged mage snatched her and jumped into the air. She kicked and screamed, smacking his chest with her doll as they rose higher and higher until they were almost above the treetops. Her heart shattered and tears sprung to her eyes when he snatched Bethamy from her, and her doll turned to ash in his hand.

“Well, well, well. Who do we have here?” The mage flashed a wicked grin. He didn’t look like her uncles. He had short hair and a missing ear. Even scarier was the red in his eyes and the dark aura that encompassed him.

Ember’s friends blinked in and out.Demon!they warned her.

“Let me go!” She struck him again, and he laughed and laughed.

Aurora screamed below as another mage chased her into the nearby forest, swooping down like a hawk about to snatch up a mouse.

“Go get help, Aurora!” she screamed.

Aurora disappeared behind a bush of thick brambles, and the mage landed hard in the dirt, swearing.

He jumped into the sky, snarling at the mage who held Ember. “I’m not going after her in there.” This mage looked even scarier, with an ugly, jagged scar that dissected his bald head and wings that looked like shredded sails.

“Yes, you are!” the other mage commanded, clutching Ember so hard, he hurt her bones. “Go!”

The other mage swore and grumbled before swooping back to the ground and lighting the entire bush on fire. Ember screamed and screamed, tears streaming down her face. What if Aurora hadn’t gone for help? She’d be burned up like her doll!

The demon mage hauled her up against him, his rotten breath making her gag. “You look just like an Avias. Are you related to the bitch who killed Mantus?”

“Let me go.” She’d never been so terrified in her life as she squirmed in his grasp. “You’re hurting me!”

He growled in her ear like an angry dragon. “Who’s your mama?”

She angled away from him, her heart racing so fast she thought she’d die of fright if he didn’t drop her first. “Let me go! Auntie! Uncles!”

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Draevyn

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