Page 55 of Kingdom of Ash

The Yellowlegs’s head halted near his boots, the blue blood gushing onto the snow and dirt.

He didn’t hear, didn’t care, that the fourth wyvern soared toward him.

Manon bellowed his name, and Crochan arrows fired.

The Yellowlegs sentinel’s eyes stared at no one, nothing.

A gaping maw opened before him, jaws stretching wide.

Manon screamed his name again, but he couldn’t move.

The wyvern swept down, and darkness yawned wide as those jaws closed around him.

As Dorian let his magic rip free of its tethers.

One heartbeat, the wyvern was swallowing him whole, its rancid breath staining the air.

The next, the beast was on the ground, corpse steaming.

Steaming, from what he’d done to it.

Not to it, but to himself.

The body he’d turned into solid flame, so hot it had melted throughthe wyvern’s jaws, its throat, and he had passed through the beast’s mouth as if it were nothing but a cobweb.

The Yellowlegs rider who’d survived the crash drew her sword, but too late. Glennis put an arrow through her throat.

Silence fell. Even the battle above died out.

The Thirteen landed, splattered in blue and black blood. So different from Sorscha’s red blood—his own red blood.

Then there were iron-tipped hands gripping his shoulders, and gold eyes glaring into his own. “Are you daft?”

He only glanced to the Yellowlegs witch’s head, still feet away. Manon’s own gaze turned toward it. Her mouth tightened, then she let go of him and whirled to Glennis. “I’m sending out my Shadows to scout for others.”

“Any enemy survivors?” Glennis scanned the empty skies. Whether his magic surprised them, shocked them, neither Glennis nor the Crochans rushing to tend to their wounded let on.

“All dead,” Manon said.

But the dark-haired Crochan who’d first intercepted them stormed at Manon, her sword out. “You did this.”

Dorian gripped Damaris, but made no move to draw it. Not while Manon didn’t back down. “Saved your asses? Yes, I’d say we did.”

The witch seethed. “Youled them here.”

“Bronwen,” Glennis warned, wiping blue blood from her face.

The young witch—Bronwen—bristled. “You think it mere coincidence that they arrive, and then we’re attacked?”

“They fought with us, not against us,” Glennis said. She turned to Manon. “Do you swear it?”

Manon’s golden eyes glowed in the firelight. “I swear it. I did not lead them here.”

Glennis nodded, but Dorian stared at Manon.

Damaris had gone cold as ice. So cold the golden hilt bit into his skin.

Glennis, somehow satisfied, nodded again. “Then we shall talk—later.”

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