Page 145 of The Eye of the Fifth
Rage became her.
She screamed, raw and deafening enough to wake the dead as undiluted power shot from her chest. A terrible crunch of bones echoed through the air as Zuriel was catapulted away from her. Shelanded in a heap on the floor on the other side of the crypts, limbs twisted unnaturally.
Utterly still.
That red haze faded as quickly as it had come, replaced instead by horror. The earthly power that had risen with her fury ebbed away too. ‘Zuriel…’ she breathed, sprinting to the spot where the Eternal lay unconscious.
What had she done?
Shaking fingers fumbled at Zuriel’s throat, searching for a pulse-
She was alive.
Kyra hung her head, sagging with relief as a sob retched out of her. She was alive. Thank the Mothers, she was alive. Tears spilled onto her cheeks.
What the fuck had she just done?
Zuriel’s bones were broken. Snapped. Crushed. The power within her had called to the earthly matter in Zuriel’s body and destroyed as much of it as it possibly could. But the Eternal’s heartbeat was strong. She would live. She would heal. It was likely she already was.
Kyra sat next to Zuriel, mind racing.
Someone would come running soon. There was no chance her scream had gone unheard, nor the blast of power that had shook the very temple gone unnoticed. There would be questions. Too many questions. Kyra might even be thrown in the ice cell with the Fire Warden for her crimes.
Violation of Naal’s mind. Thievery. Assault.
Two faithless Wardens.
She took a steadying breath, shoving a dreadful rising guilt deep down into a pit of darkness in her soul. Then, slowly, she fished the Eye of the Fifth from Zuriel’s pocket. Icy on her skin, it seemed to pulsate with an excited, perverse energy. As if the prisoner within had known what she had done to obtain it.
Kyra swiped at her wet face with the back of her hand. Maida would fix Zuriel up. She would heal. She would be fine.
But Oslan… Oslan would die if she did not leaverightnow.
‘I’m sorry, Zuriel…’ Kyra whispered thickly, looking down at the Eternal’s face, her spiralling red hair tangled around her. ‘Forgive me.’
Her dagger lay discarded on the other side of the room. She picked it up and sheathed it once more.
Then she ran.
Chapter Forty One
Lady Of Shadows
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Gallena’s Temple, Phaenon.
Naal.
Naal did not trust herself to speak as she stared down at Zuriel in a comatose state, having just had to endure hearing her daughter scream in agony whilst Maida’s power seared through her body, re-breaking bones that had fused wrongly, in order for them to heal correctly.
Naal’s fingers grazed over Zuriel’s sweaty brow. She was resting now. The worst was over.
Body broken. Healing, yes, but broken.
By Kyra.
There was a ringing in Naal’s ears that had begun the second Mankar had awoken her, spouting about a fight between her daughter and the Earth Warden that had ultimately left Zuriel twisted on the floor, her bones crushed by a power Naal had only ever seen used by an Earth Warden as a last resort. In the midst of battle.
