Page 36 of Shadows so Cruel

Goddess, the pain.

It was everywhere—in my chest, at my core—but nowhere more than my arm. A roar of agony coiled around it, spreading down along my ribs. My fingers… They wouldn’t move, wouldn’t respond.

“Sebian, say something.” Malyr’s face appeared above me, frown lines between his brows, his open black strands dusted in gray snow. No, not snow. Ash. “We have to get you to a healer. See if we can save that arm.”

Arm?

I followed Malyr’s gaze over the soot-covered right side of my cuirass. Beside it, a remaning leather strap of my bracer hung pitifully around my upper arm. Shoulder, biceps, elbow, underarm, knuckles, fingers… My entire fucking arm lay steaming beside me, the skin blistered down to the exposed flesh, oozing blood and who knew what else.

A sickening lurch buried in my stomach, every nerve ending along my arm screaming in torment, but it had nothing…nothingon the sudden stab beneath my breastbone. “Ravenna.”

Malyr’s lips narrowed, pressing together before he hooked his arm under my good one, and pulled me up. “Come on, we have to get you to a healer.”

“No, I… I have to… have to get Ravenna out of… out of…” The forest spun around me, faster when I glanced over my shoulder at my hut. Nothing remained but a blackened frame and smoking crossbeams. “Where’s Ravenna?”

Supporting most of my weight, Malyr walked me toward a clearing. “She’s not in there, Sebian.”

Good. That was good. “Zaima?”

“She’s not there anymore, either,” Malyr said. “We only just found you. The others already carried your sister away.”

They took her away.

I waited for relief to infuse my chest.

It didn’t come.

Instead, a black heaviness expanded at my core, slithering around the pain that kept stabbing beneath my ribs. “So Ravenna escaped? Where is she?”

I clenched my eyes shut, letting Malyr guide my wobbly steps as I sensed for our bond. But it didn’t pull me in the direction in which we were going.

It didn’t pull at all.

It only hurt.

Hurt so fucking badly.

A keening wail sliced through the quiet forest. It was the raw, desperate cry of a heart shattering, a sound that spoke of soul-crushing despair and unbearable grief. It echoed in the chilly air, rising and falling in a broken rhythm, mixed with choked sobs and unintelligible words.

A pang of dread squeezed my heart as I opened my eyes, gaze catching on the source of the sound: a woman kneeling in the snow, her arms frantically moving about over the blackened body by which she wept. But she was not just any woman.

Marla.

Because Asker stood beside her, his hand resting on his mate’s shoulder, his stare fixed on the ground. Until it lifted.

Then, it fixed on me.

My stomach twisted violently, a wave of bile threatening to work its way up my throat. “Wh-wh-where is Ravenna?”

Asker stood tall, his body trembling harder the longer he stared at me, his brows pulled taut over red-rimmed, glistening eyes.

“You…” He stormed toward me, drawing his arm back. “She’s dead because of you!” His fist shot forward, slamming straight into my face. “You left her unprotected! You leftall of usunprotected.”

I stumbled back. The world distorted. There was a dullthud. My body quaked. Pain gnawed at my entire arm like shards of glass dragging over the blisters and pustules.

“Get away from him and sort yourself out!” Malyr shouted.

“You left her to die alone like the irresponsible, drunk, good-for-nothing you are,” Asker barked down at me under spitting rage, his cheeks as red as his eyes. “Pregnant! Unable to shift, she burned, Sebian. They burned her down to nearly nothing, and where were you!? You’re still swaying, even now! I’m going to—” His fingers clasped around my throat, yanking me up by it until my feet dangled off the ground. “I should kill you for—”

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