Page 4 of Winds of Destiny

“Stay up there!” I shout to him.

He smiles and salutes me with his flute. “I will!”

I don’t know if I believe him or not, but Idoknow that I need to go. It hurts to leave—I only just came back to him this morning—but I turn Lulu toward the fight and ready my bow. I tap the bird with my heels and she leaps forward, long, clawed legs eating up the distance in enormous strides. This beast has clearly beendyingfor a run. I’m going to make sure she gets one.

I nock an arrow and fire at the driver of the closest chariot. The arrow strikes his back, and he slumps forward, falling right over the front of the chariot on the next bump. He’s crushed beneath its wheels, and the man behind him who had been menacing one of Zephyth’s guards with a javelin moments ago has dropped it as he gropes for the reins.

Excellent. On to my next target.

Riding a jaka is exhilarating, but fighting from the back of one is harder than it looks. Half my arrows miss due to Lulu suddenly shifting beneath me or tossing her feathered head back and obscuring my vision. I still manage to take out a second chariot, although I have to get so close to do it that Lulu literally jumps over the downed chariot and its riders to avoid running into them.

I catch the eye of one of the wounded men as I wheel heraround. He grins at me, blood coating his teeth, then lashes out with his sword and cuts the harness holding the snarling lion to the wreckage.

The lion turns on him immediately, biting his torso with such ferocity I’m surprised the man isn’t completely torn in two. The other man in the chariot screams and tries to crawl away, but the lion savages him as well, leaving a disemboweled corpse mere seconds later.

I’m so stunned by the violence of it that for a moment I can’t move. How do they make these lions work for them if they’re so feral?

A second later the lion turns toward me, and I realize my mistake.Don’t stare, get out of range!I kick the jaka to get it to run, but the lion reaches us before we make it more than ten steps. It’s immense, larger than its brethren that live wild in the south, and its fangs have to be as long as my hand. I fire an arrow into its shoulder, but it ignores it completely. Sure that Lulu will be killed in moments, I free my sword and prepare to jump.

I underestimate my mount. She screams with a ferocity to rival the lion’s roar and flaps her wings heavily. Jaka can’t fly, but their wings help them make tremendous jumps. Even with me on her back, we’re lifted ten feet in the air. I cling to the saddle as we fall, Lulu twisting just so, and—

The jaka’s clawed feet rake the lion across the face as we hit the ground. It reels from the blow, shaking its head woozily, and Lulu presses her advantage and strikes at it with her long, scimitar-shaped beak. The lion slashes with a paw, Lulu jumps again, and—

I can’t hang on. I’m airborne.

I roll to take the sting out of landing and come up sword in hand. Lulu and the lion are a whirlwind of combat, both forgetting that I exist in the heat of their duel. I turn toward the caravan just in time to see a familiar figure cry out and fall as a javelin punches through his side.

Doric!

I switch weapons on the run, nocking an arrow and loosing it before he’s even hit the ground. The man who wounded my mentor takes the shot through the eye—the arrow penetrates all the way up to the fletching. He’s dead instantly, falling from his chariot to the dusty ground like a stone. The driver, thinking better of attacking us alone, wheels his chariot away—

And then smashes it to pieces against the whelver that appears from nowhere right behind him. Not just the one—more are following it, putting themselves between the chariots and the caravan. Every one of the “bandits” I can see is backing away, unsure of what to do against these behemoth-like protectors.

I stare in amazement up at Cam, who’s standing exactly where I left him and smiling at me like he’s pulled off a massive joke. I would be enraged if I wasn’t so impressed. How did he do this with just his soundless flute?

My ears ring with the suddencrackof a whip. A coil of gold appears around Cam’s waist. There’s just enough time for his eyes to widen in pain before he’s jerked off the back of the whelver, pulled somewhere I can’t see him.

A scream splits the air with fury and fear.

It takes a moment to realize it’s me.

Chapter Three

Cam

It’s funny the things that fly through your mind as you’re about to die.

Should have worn armor, I think to myself as I fall to the ground.

Should have stayed away from the fighting like I said I would.

Should have said goodbye to my sister.

Should have told Turo I love him.

Should have told Turo I—

“Oof!” To my own surprise, I don’t hit the ground. Instead, I’m gathered into a strong pair of arms and pulled against a broad, armored chest. The overlapping bronze scales of my captor’s armor dig against my torso as I try and fail to squirm out of his grasp. I glare up at the man holding me, and my throat tightens so much that, for a second, it’s impossible to even breathe.

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