Dragon's Storm (Legion Of Angels #4)(44)

“They aren’t following us,” I said. “They were just trying to drive us away from the Fire Mountains.”

“Which is precisely why we should go there.”

I looked back at the tidal wave of monsters between us and the mountains. “How?”

“First things first. We need to take out the monsters.” He said it casually, as though it were a small matter for two people to take out several hundred monsters. “We have to kill every single one. We cannot allow monsters to live here, on this side of the wall. They will breed and overwhelm the lands. If their numbers grow, we won’t be able to contain them.”

“Their numbers are pretty significant already. How do we stop them?”

“You need to control the beasts like you did back on the Black Plains,” he told me.

“I thought I wasn’t supposed to show I had that power.”

“No one will ever know. Not out here.”

I looked around, but all I saw was nature—and monsters. “There sure are a lot of them, Nero. I’m not sure I can control them.”

“We’ll do it together.”

“Do it,” I said without hesitation.

He took my hand, flipping over my wrist. His eyes traced my arm, his gaze sensual, penetrating. Before I could blink, his fangs pierced my skin like two hot irons. A flash of pain shot through me. One hand was on the steering wheel; the other held mine in a hard, almost ruthless grip. With every draw of his mouth, heat flashed through my veins, consuming me in a firestorm of sensations.

His mouth lifted too soon. He flipped over his wrist and offered it to me. My pulse racing against my skin like popping popcorn, I grabbed his hand in mine. My fangs descended. The icy hot sweetness of his blood ignited in my mouth. I gripped his hand with desperate thirst, like I hadn’t drunk anything in days. It poured down my throat like liquid lightning—hot, smooth, deadly. I was drowning, a feverish madness taking hold over me.

“That should be enough,” Nero said, pulling his hand away.

No, it wasn’t. I didn’t want to stop, but if I held on, my fangs would tear open his wrist. That would make it harder for him to fight the monsters. He was right. It was enough. We’d exchanged enough blood to link magic. I licked the last drop of his blood from my lips.

“Are you ready?” His voice was steady, but his eyes were burning silver.

I reached out, allowing his magic to help me find the beasts’ minds. I could feel them all, their primitive minds flicking like hundreds of angry stars.

“Yes. I can feel them,” I said.

“Take the wheel. I need you to drive. Use your power to get the monsters to follow you. Drive toward the Legion base at the center of Desert Rose,” he instructed me. “I am going to fly ahead to the base and have them put up the Magitech barrier.”

Gods, he wanted me to slam the beasts against the base’s barrier. All Legion bases and buildings had a Magitech barrier in case of an emergency. They just never thought they’d need them. And throwing beasts against the barrier was definitely not in the Legion’s handbook. It was the sort of plan I’d have come up with, not by-the-books Colonel Windstriker. My maverick behavior must have been wearing off on him.

“Will the barrier hold?” I asked him as we switched places in the truck.

“I don’t know. It should. And it’s the best shot we have. We don’t have any other weapon with so much magic at our disposal. The barrier is all we’ve got.”

He brushed his hand across mine, then rose to his feet. His wings spread out from his back, and he shot up into the air.

The monsters aren’t heading for the base, I told him in frustration. I’d been trying to get them to change direction without success.

Keep trying, he said in my head. I’m going to put up magic barriers to encourage them to change direction. That will help us direct the beasts where they need to go, but you have to send them at that barrier. It’s the only way we can kill them all. If we allow any of them to live, they will breed so fast that the lands on this side of the wall will be overrun.

Yeah, no pressure then. I’ll try, I promised.

I could feel the beasts’ consciousnesses. The weight of their minds inside of mine was overwhelming, crushing. Controlling them was like trying to move a mountain. Nero set off a few magical explosions, and I felt the monsters change direction to avoid the blasts. I went with that, nudging the herd toward the base. Surprisingly, they responded. Wow. It really was like moving a mountain—hard to start, but once you got it started, it flowed like an avalanche.

I drove the truck full-speed across the desert. In the distance, I saw Nero setting down inside the base. A few moments later, he flew up again. Magic flared up on the wall built around the base, surrounding it in a golden glowing bubble. Psychic blasts pounded at the horde’s flanks, speeding up the avalanche. I herded the river of monsters toward the base. I could feel the sparks of other monsters’ minds in the distance. I reached out with my magic, pulling them into the horde.

The monsters’ minds smashed against the walls of my control, trying to get free. Blood dripped out of my nose, splashing against the dashboard. My head pounded like a mountain of rock was slowly burying me alive, but I didn’t let go. I gritted my teeth and clutched the steering wheel with my shaking hands.

The truck wasn’t faring much better. It thumped across the cracked, bumpy earth. My seatbelt was cutting into my skin like a hot knife, but I didn’t have time to adjust it. I held onto the steering wheel—and the monsters’ minds. I couldn’t allow a single beast to escape. I had to push them at that barrier or they’d survive—and a lot of people would die as a result.