Page 45 of Iridian

Just because I am not ready doesn’t mean I won’t win.

My thoughts slowly changed as I took in the sight in front of me, and it was incredible how much power I had when I decided to take it. It was incredible how I could control my heartbeat with a simple thought when I chose to not let the panic and the anxiety control me. I was here now and there was no going back. It was time to assess my surroundings and fight until I couldn’t anymore.

Laughter.

The sound of it echoed in the bowl valley between the mountains that had looked a bit smaller on the screen. Those excavators on the other side had dug about fifty feet deep searching for those skeletons.

Meanwhile, they were standing on the other side of them, and even though I couldn’t see them from here yet, I knew they were there.

So was Hill atop that landing farther up than I’d realized. So were his men wearing white, spread everywhere around us.

And so was Alejandro Ammiz, sitting on the same place—and the laughter was coming from him.

“Greetings! Welcome, welcome!” he shouted, waving his hands up and down and to the sides, as if he thought we might not see him.

All of us spread out in a line, and the soldiers who’d guided us here were already getting closer to where the ground began to descend into that hole.

“We’ve been waiting for you!” said the Devil, his voice echoing a million times. “Tell them, David! We’ve beenwaaaaiiiting!”

Goose bumps down my arms. I looked at Taland and he winked at me, an easy smile on his face, like always, though I knew him well enough to realize he was calculating distances and trying to come up with a plan of action just by the look in his eyes.

“Our goal is simple—either apprehend or kill David Hill and Alejandro Ammiz, and whoever else gets in your way. Justdon’tlet them bring those skeletons to life,” Helen said as she stepped forward, her hair wrapped behind her head, her dark grey leather suit zipped up to her neck.

“Safe to say he doesn’t have another bracelet. That’s the first good news,” Radock said, putting on black leather gloves.

“The second is that those skeletons hopefully will break easy,” said Zachary.

“I’m going after Hill,” said Aurelia.

“So am I,” I said because I already had an idea of how to run all around the edges of the valley to get to that mountain and start climbing. The rocks had a lot of sharp edges.Should be easy enough,I thought.

“Good luck,” Helen said, and without another glance our way, she ran.

She ran and jumped straight into the bowl just as the gunshots began all around us—from both behind and ahead. Snipers.

The IDD soldiers and Hill’s men were trying their luck with bullets first.

Taland pulled up my hand and kissed the back of it. “Let’s kill David Hill.”

I rose on my tiptoes and kissed him on the lips. “He has no chance.”

I didn’t actually believe in the words I said, but I ran. Together with Taland, I followed Aurelia and Zach all around the edge of the bowl. They had probably made the same calculations and figured that this was the easiest way to that mountain.

We would make it, I thought. There were soldiers maybe fifty feet ahead, who didn’t bother with guns but were waiting for us with wands and bones in their hands, but it was nothing we couldn’t handle.

Except…

The explosion came out of nowhere. The ground shook and groaned, and a wave of energy slammed onto my side so hard it was impossible to push back even if I had seen it coming. It picked me up and threw me to the side like I weighed no more than a feather, and then I was falling. The view in front of me moved, and I flew and I fell and I was too shocked to scream, but I realized what had happened even before I hit the ground. They’d planted an explosive spell somewhere on the ground, and we must have activated it when we ran past it.

Now all four of us were in the air—and we crashed against the soil in the bowl almost at the same time.

Goddess, it hurt. I fell on my side and it felt like my shoulder caught fire and my neck snapped and broke, and then I continued to roll and roll until I was at the very bottom, all my insides trying to come right out of my mouth.

Get up, get up, GET UP!my mind shouted at me, and I did. My body moved on pure instinct and I was on my feet even before I knew I could stand and even before I could actually see my surroundings.

A hundred blinks later, the view cleared. I did see, and somehow, I could keep standing. Taland was beside me, taking my hand in his, the other raised as he chanted furiously—putting up another ward around us.

“The fucker planted them all over,” Aurelia said from my other side as she helped Zach to his feet, and she was right. We were looking at where Helen and Radock had been leading the group to the skeletons of the Delaetus Army, and they’d been met with an explosion, too.

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