Page 164 of A Reign of Roses

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Find and focus on three things you can name.

One:Evendell. Freed of Lazarus. Safe, for my friends. My family. For all.

Two:The man I loved. His dark, unruly hair, so like his spirit. The truth that he had loved me, too, for whatever little time we’d had together.

Three:

46

Kane

It was the sound I’dwaited over fifty years for—and the most horrible one I’d ever hear.

My eyes blinked open and only Griffin knelt before me. His eyes were ringed in red.

No.

Perhaps I’d said the word out loud. Perhaps I’d pleaded—

It didn’t matter.

I couldn’t think.

Not with the screeching, the roaring, the beastly skyborne howls of pain. Not when I didn’t know who they were splitting from.

I took off in the direction of that sound, Griffin bellowing after me.

The clamor of men’s warfare had all but faded. But those of the battle in the skies—those screeches and thatclashingonly grew louder. My feet propelled me through icy fog and trampled over packed snow and the errant branch or twig. Only pale light from amagnanimous harvest moon lit my pursuit, gilding every leaf and trunk and frozen patch of pond water in silver.

I couldn’t see much of their fight through the dense tree cover. Only flashes of a rippling gray wingspan and…

And something golden.

Like molten embers glowing in the dark night sky.

And through a clearing of trees—

My bird. A gleaming, feathered firebird. Mighty as the dawn, lit with rapturous fire.

A phoenix.

Of course. My heart kicked up speed as did my legs.Faster, faster—

A hideous rip of agony sounded through the night, shaking the trees, dousing me in snow that slid under my collar and down my neck. I hurtled around wide, old trunks.

Another wail of agony. Feminine, melodic, haunting—

The sound of a dying bird.

I knew then it was the sound I’d hear every night for the rest of my living days.

It was the sound of my soul being severed.

My roar shook the ground. Toppled oaks. Rent through the clearing and the soil and the roots beneath my knees. I craned my neck up—

I couldn’t fuckingsee—

But in the end, I wouldn’t have to. One moment, a roar I knew in my soul to be my father’s split the night like an axe through wood, and the next…

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