Page 30 of Mother of Death and Dawn

I couldn’t see through the flames. But I was fighting based on something deeper than sight now, something more like intuition. I didn’t know how I had called my magic to me. Didn’t care at this point. I drove my spear between its ribs, deep into its core. Fire roared from my fingertips and through the veins of the spear.

The creature’s shriek became an echo. Its body ruptured, moving in a thousand different directions at once, as if the boundaries between its form and the air had been disrupted. Licks of flame tore through its shadowy insides.

I held on for as long as I could, until I couldn’t maintain the connection to my magic any longer. Then I withdrew the spear and fell back, just in time for the creature to release a final wail and collapse. The flames fell away. My breaths came in ragged, aching gasps.

I turned around. The boy was on the ground, staring up at me with big blue eyes through tendrils of fair hair. Ascended above, he was young. Too young to be wearing a military uniform.

Certainly too young to die here.

I knelt beside him. There was so much blood that at first, I couldn’t see the wound. Closer examination revealed a slash that cut across the boy’s entire abdomen.

Fatal, maybe. Unless he got to a healer fast.

I looked around to see only a mass of violence and chaos. No one was coming for him out here. But…

My gaze lifted towards the Towers. There was lots of death between us and there, yes, but the boy would certainly die if he stayed here.

I ripped my shirt off over my head.

“What’s your name?” I asked the boy.

A wrinkle of confusion deepened over his brows, which framed terrified blue eyes. “Wh-what?”

“Name?” I asked again.

Finally, he rasped out, “Moth.”

A flicker of recognition passed through me, gone before I could look too closely at it.

“What kind of a name is that?” I asked, giving him just enough time to look indignant before I pulled the shirt around his wound, tight.

He let out a wordless grunt of pain. Beads of sweat broke out over his face.

“Sorry,” I said. “I can’t let you bleed to death before we get where we’re going.”

Ascended, it was odd, the way the boy stared at me.

“You aren’t going to die today, Moth,” I said. “We’ll get you to the Towers and get you to a healer there. But you can’t walk. So… I won’t lie, this is going to hurt.”

He swallowed and gave me a grim nod.

Brave kid,I thought, with an odd sense of pride.

“Ready?”

I didn’t wait for an answer. I picked up the boy and hoisted him over my back. Fuck, I was out of shape. I felt his body go rigid with pain, but to his credit, he didn’t make a sound. And then I ran, bobbing and weaving through dying men and attacking creatures.

I didn’t believe in miracles, but if I did, the fact that we made it the other side alive would qualify.

Once we made it to the Towers, I gently let him down and grabbed the nearest person I could find wearing a healer’s patch.

“He needs help,” I barked. “Right now.”

The man nodded, a little frantic, and hurried away.

But before I could turn, the boy grabbed my wrist, stopping me.

“Max,” he rasped out.

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