Magic Binds (Kate Daniels #9)(75)

Erra swore. “Being dead has its problems. Although it does give you a certain clarity. I felt my mother when I awoke. I asked him about it and he told me he had left her by the banks of the Tigris. I told him then that if he lied to me, he would regret it.”

“He will regret many things by the time I’m done.”

“Find a way to record the words and show them to me,” Erra said. “We must learn why you’re still alive.”

“Okay. I will.”

I turned to the doorway.

“Where are you going?” Erra demanded

“I’m escaping,” I said. “He’ll probably arrive in the next few minutes.”

Behind Erra the purple blaze of Semiramis flared.

“Yes,” Erra said, pronouncing each word very clearly as if talking to someone very stupid or hard of hearing. “That’s why you have to take me with you. Because you’re an idiot and you need help and I’m the bigger idiot for promising it to you.”

I stared at the mass of her bones. “How?”

She turned away from me. “It’s time.”

Magic raged through the chamber, a furious tempest, filled with grief. The walls shook. I curled into a ball, trying to hide, but it was everywhere.

“I won’t be long,” Erra whispered, melting into the magic, her voice carrying through the room. “I’m coming back, Mother. And then I’ll take you out of this awful place.”

My grandmother wept.

I clamped my hands over my ears, shut my eyes, and tried to keep calm.

The room shook and shuddered. My body bounced off the floor.

Suddenly it was quiet. I opened my eyes. A dagger had sprouted from the center of my aunt’s bones, a wickedly curved double-edged blade with a bone hilt. A thin line of blood-red script crossed the plate substance of the blade. My aunt’s name.

I reached out and took it. It came free with a light snap. The bone flower fell apart into dust.

She’d molded her bones and blood into a dagger and sunk her soul into it. I could never let my father see this knife.

“Hurry up,” Erra’s voice snapped. “I can feel him coming.”

I yanked my spare knife out and slid the dagger into the sheath. It didn’t fit exactly, but it would have to do.

“Thank you, Grandmother.” I bowed my head and took off.

At some point the fact that I was carrying my aunt the City Eater in my knife sheath would likely hit me and then I would have a nice nervous breakdown. But right now, we had to get out of here.

Outside, red lightning split the dark sky. Wind tore at my clothes and hair. I yanked the canister with the moth out and shattered it on the stone. The tiny insect floated up, growing brighter and brighter, a green spark against the darkness.

Come on, Sugar. Come and get me.

The gates of Mishmar’s wall flew open. A sphere of fire and light rolled onto the bridge and broke apart, revealing my father. His face was dark. A blood spear formed in his hand.

“YOU DISOBEYED ME AGAIN, MY DAUGHTER.”

I’d never seen him this pissed off. Not even when I fought with him at his castle. I pulled Sarrat out of its sheath.

Behind us, Mishmar trembled and bellowed like a tornado. I turned around. The tower shuddered. The strange birds took to the sky, their guttural cries swallowed by the noise. Car-sized chunks of concrete and stone broke loose and tumbled down.

“SHARRIM!” My father’s voice rippled with magic. If the bridge had been metal, it would’ve melted in fear.

“It’s not my fault!” I yelled back.

“STUBBORN, IGNORANT, IMPERTINENT CHILD! I TOLD YOU NOT TO COME HERE. I WILL KEEP YOU HERE UNTIL YOU LEARN TO OBEY ME!”

Oh crap.

Thunder punched my ears. A massive crack formed in the tower’s wall. The purple inferno of my grandmother’s magic splashed and coiled within it.

I turned back to my father and saw the familiar winged shape behind him diving toward me.

“Can’t talk now. Grandma wants to see you.”

My father snarled, pointing his spear at me. A chunk of Mishmar the size of a small house rolled off the top and plunged down. The entire tower rocked. The purple magic spilled out, its fury mind-numbing. The prison rumbled, threatening to collapse.

My father swore, each curse word charged with magic, and planted his spear on the bridge. Golden light burst from it, battering against the purple.

I charged past him.

Sugar landed and ran toward me across the bridge. I sprinted to her. She turned, stopping for a heartbeat, and I jumped and landed on her back.

Behind us the gold and purple magic tore at each other.

The pegasi took off, huge wings beating. I pulled all of my magic out of myself, trying to shield us.

The two spheres of light exploded.

“Higher, Sugar. Higher!”

The pegasi’s powerful muscles rolled under me. She beat her wings, climbing higher and higher. Below us the glow of magic splayed out, as if a second sunrise burned down below. The edge of the explosion expanded toward us. I held my breath. The glow fell a few yards short.

“Did he kill Grandmother?” I whispered.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Erra’s voice said in my ear. “She is already dead. Besides, your grandmother was the Shield of Assyria. Even if he committed every drop of his power to it, he couldn’t stomp her out of existence. She’s buying us time. He’s got a busy night ahead of him.”