Page 81 of Heart of Dawn
I broke into a run, repeatedly trying to connect to my gorgeous fae. Just to hear his voice again…
…even if it had to be the last time.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
ORION
Skeletons crawled from the sand, their bones as white as the grains.
By the stars!
They were the ancient dead fae from a time before sunbathers, markets, and the grandeur of Majestic City. They didn’t look real, almost dreamlike, too pristine. But those pink lights in their eye sockets told me all I needed to know.
This was real.
This was Dawn.
The first wave rushed the gates, the second attacking the fae on the beach. Three came at me, jaws snapping as if they were speedies.
Crap.
I darted for a discarded parasol on the ground a few feet away, cursing myself again for dropping my axe.
“Get away from me!” I bellowed, smashing the first skeleton apart with a mighty swing.
Reflexes on fire, I jumped back from the lunge of the second skeleton. The third circled me, leaping at my back. I sidestepped, striking this third assbug in the face with the pointy end of the parasol. Its skull fell to the sand, bony hands in a flappy panic.
Take that!
The second one hissed, coming at me, clawing at the air frantically.
I managed to knock it down, smashing it to pieces.
Phew.
I seized the moment to catch my breath.
The woman who’d questioned me got wrestled to the ground by two skeletons. They bit into her, blood spraying their bones. Almost instantly, the bones collapsed, black goo pooling beneath their remains.
But that didn’t change the fact that they’d torn through the poor woman’s neck, severing the carotid artery.
I prayed to the stars someone on that beach could heal a fatal injury.
More long-dead crawled from the sand, a riot of screams and chaos overwhelmed my senses, taking me back to the first days of Dawn on Earth. My heart lurched, my ears ringing. Memories flooded me, terror tensing every muscle.
Oh, stars. Faery… Faery was falling.
A skeleton grabbed my arm, snapping me out of it. Before it could bite me, I whacked it with the parasol’s handle, and made for the gates.
The majority of the skeletons swamped the gates, eighty percent of them trying to avoid the guards, clearly vying for the lever.
Clever. If Dawn couldn’t take over the living fae because of our blood, then it would use the bones of the dead. It always had dominion over the dead anyway.
Using the dead to open the gates.
To let a horde in.
Pixie balls!
