Page 121 of Cursed Shadows 4

I still.

At an incline, leaned forward, I am held up only by his grip—a grip that borders ontootight.

Fingertips digging into the sides of my neck, he forces a wince through me, then holds it, that pressure cutting into my flesh, my muscles, my bones.

The mist shudders around us.

Samick pauses, Dare stills…

And Caius yanks me upright with enough force that I can use the leverage against his bulking weight.

I flip backwards and, digging the soles of my boots into the edge of a rock, I throw every ounce of my body weight back.

I smack into his chest.

I am not particularly heavy, nor strong—but I do know how to manoeuvre and manipulate my weight. Dancing saves me again.

Caius grunts as he staggers back one step, two, and his boots slip over the smooth rock surface.

I don’t give him a moment to right himself before I spin around—

I boot him square in the chest.

Caius’s face flares with rage… then the sight of it is stolen from me… He falls.

And I don’t waste any fucking time.

Before anyone can react—before Samick can get a handle on the dispersing, shattering mist; before Dare can do more than throw me a wild, startled look; before Caius can slam onto his back, out of the protection of the breaking mist—I turn on my heels…and I run.

26

DAXEEL

††††††

A black boot flattens on the blood-spattered terrain. The frost that layers the blades of grass crimps under the soft leather sole.

Ocean eyes sweep the crimson drops of blood peppered over the frosted forest floor. Only some black droplets here and there, but not enough for the death of a dokkalf.

His brothers are safe.

But Nari…

He can’t be certain.

There is too much crimson. And he can smell her, but only faintly, threaded through the scents of other litalves. Impossible to peel through the layers and learn exactly how much blood came from her.

She is injured.

That is a certainty.

Her blood tells that story, speckled over the frosted grass, the frozen soil, reaching back to flat rocks of the plateau.

Daxeel stands in the shade of the treeline, shrouded in his darkness. The shadows are restless over his shoulders.

He studies the plateau, as though it can tell him something, whisper Nari’s fate to him.

In the way of the mountain, the proximity to the gods perhaps, he cannot feel her—and so cannot be sure if she has survived what appears to be fallen arrows that now litter the plateau.

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