Page 104 of The Last Wish of Bristol Keats
Before he could speak another word, Julia and Hollis sank their swords into his hideous back, and the sharp tips punched out through his chest. His smile and his glory were gone, and his patched-together body crumpled to the ground.
How many times has he died this way?Bristol wondered. Maybe clinging to his infamous name and past glory was the only solace he had in his miserable existence.
Glory. Kormick searched for the same thing. And he used anyone in his path—like her mother—to get it. The fury inside her burned to a sharp point.
“Gods, they stink,” Hollis said, wiping the rancid mucus off her sword onto Braegor’s shredded pants. Julia did the same, and then Rose pointed in the other direction, at the ring of warriors.
A barrage from a platoon of spear bearers above them took out four Fomorian shield warriors, a split-second gap in their human wall appearing. Bristol lifted the hood of her cloak and ran for it. Her squad already knew what to do—stay behind, stay invisible, and listen for her.I’ll search between the stones and the shadows for her. My mother will balk if she sees you. If I scream, you’ll know I need help. Bristol knew it would be excruciating for them to let her go—they were a team—but she had to do this part on her own. She would not be delivering false hopes and dreams to her mother this time. There would be truth between them. She had to reach the woman she had once been. Beneath the hard exterior, she knew her mother was in there. Somewhere.
Dahlia and Reuben stood on a protected plateau just below the rim of the valley. From there, they had a view of it all, especially the hottest battlegrounds. Their hands were busy casting blinding mists over stampeding Fomorian warriors just entering the valley. Word had reached them at their fortress, or they had been nearby all along. Dahlia prayed to the gods that their numbers would dwindle soon.
She and Reuben also provided cover for injured knights as they were carried away to be treated by Esmee, Olivia, or one of the other healers in the tents above them. It kept the witch and wizard alert and busy. Dahlia glanced at the sky fighters at the north end of the valley. Eris was somewhere in there, but the blur of battle and blood made it impossible to see him. Every time a body fell, her heart fell too.
“Now they’re coming from the south as well,” Reuben groaned, sweeping his arm out and casting a mist so thick it would blind them. Unfortunately, wizards who traveled with them dispersed those same mists with spells of their own. It was a task that was never finished.
Dahlia noticed a ward on one of the supply tents was fading, and she cast another spell to strengthen it. All magic was being tested beyond limits. They had all heard Kormick’s shouts,summon them all, and she hoped that Bristol had reached her mother and was able to prevent the Abyss from being reopened. No magic or will could survive an endless assault of evil.
“Maire!”
She heard the faint shout, chopped up by the sound of screams, clanking metal, and her own pounding temples. More Fomorian warriors flew overhead, joining the battle.Maire!A fist tightened in her heart, the sound too familiar. Too impossible. Maire angled her head, listening, but the screeches high above her wiped out the sound.
She stood between two of the standing stones, hidden by a shadow.Summon them all!
She had never done that before. A small number of the demons were deadly, but all the evil of millennia would block out the sun—and she liked the sun. Still, she would release a large number of the restless dead, enough to end this quickly.
The small cloud of demons she had summoned last night had already spread across the valley, but when she summoned more from the Abyss, she didn’t feel the usual tremor in her veins, nor the intoxicating surge of power in her lungs. She tried again, calling the demons to her, but there was only deadness in her chest. The thrum that made her safe—that made her invincible—was gone. Cold sweat sprang to her brow. She panicked, searching for the rush of power. She needed it.Come to me! Come to your liberator!There was nothing. No hum, no rush, no exhilaration. Was it her crown? Was the ward blocking her power? She reached up and threw it from her head, and tried again. Only an empty echo. Her belly turned to ice. Why couldn’t they hear her?
A clear voice spoke behind her.
“They’re not coming, Mother. I closed the Abyss.”
“Where’s Tyghan?” Dalagorn shouted as he maneuvered his horse through the sky. “He should have been here by now.”
But neither Eris nor Quin had time to answer as they slashed and dodged one restless dead after another. The cloud may have been small from a distance, but it was dense, almost a solid wall of stench, claws, and blades, swirling around them.
Melizan and Cosette fought in tandem, as they always did, not far away. They were a machine together, stabbing and slicing methodically, more united and determined than ever not to be headed for Paradise anytime soon, even if it would be together. The bloody remains of their victims fell in a steady stream below them.
Cully fought on the other side of the valley, leading platoons of archers from Eideris through the sky, targeting warriors below, their aim so perfect their arrows slipped between the seams of thick leather vests.
“He’ll be here!” Eris finally called to Dalagorn, then yelled to Quin, “Watch below!” Dalagorn and Eris made a nosedive, circling to stop two restless dead speeding up from below. They speared them both before they reached Quin, but the thrashing hyagen slashed Eris’s shoulder on its way down. “I’ll tend to it later,” Eris said when Dalagorn told him to have a healer search the gash for claws. It could wait. Eris knew exactly how long a claw could remain in his flesh before it started consuming him, and right then, more important things mattered.
Only seconds later, a mist that Dahlia had cast cleared in a breeze, and Eris saw her working as hard as he was to save the nation they both loved. He felt a tug in his chest and wished he hadn’t been so sharp with her outside his tent. On the heels of that thought, a demon dove past Dahlia. Its hyagen grabbed her in its jaws, then tossed her over the plateau to the ground below.
Eris’s heart plunged as he raced to reach her.
Tyghan couldn’t nightjump, not in the midst of this chaos. He might jump right into the path of a swinging blade. And his sword was beneath the enormous boots of one of the outsized warriors.
The brutes closed in on him and his hand swept the air, barreling a ball of fire into the face of the closest warrior. With his other hand he sent a freezing mist into the eyes of the next one. Both of them fell to the ground screaming, but the third stabbed a spear toward Tyghan’s head that he barely escaped by rolling, and the fourth swung an ax toward his chest. He leapt to his feet and summoned his now freed sword back to his hands. More warriors descended on him. He couldn’t get a break. And then he felt heat behind him. A secure shoulder against his.
“Always have someone covering your back. Isn’t that what you taught me? I’ve got your back, brother. I’m here to help.”
The voice made Tyghan’s breath stop up in his lungs. An ache squeezed his throat. “Better late than never,” he answered. “Horses are on the way.”
And then they moved in synchrony. Like they always had.
“On the count of two,” Kierus said. And they charged forward, beating back the enemies, one after another.
CHAPTER 80
