The Book Eaters(115)
“Stay hidden!” Devon called out as she reached the top. “We have company!”
Cai dropped like a rock, instantly obscured by the low walls. “What happened?” he said as they half collapsed onto the platform. “You were ages and then we heard gunshots and, Devon, look, the house is on fire!”
“Hester, my girl!” Mani exclaimed simultaneously. He was already—very sensibly—crouched low, his arms wrapped tight around the luggage. Sweat plastered his thinning hair.
All of them were framed in a halo of orange light; flames infested Traquair, casting shadows and beams even at this distance. The house must truly have been in terrible shape for the fire to spread so quickly, or else the knights had set it alight in multiple places.
“Me, indeed,” Hester answered thickly, as Devon set her down. She leaned against the journalist, clutching reflexively at the Chanel purse. Already, the expensive leather was grass-stained and crumpled.
“Where were you?” Cai dragged a scuffed sleeve across his nose. He’d found a pair of ancient, rusted hedge shears from God-knew-where and was waving them uncertainly. “I was so worried!”
“Told you I’d come back,” she said, pleased that he’d thought to arm himself. “Keep down, men are following!”
“They’re here,” Mani said tightly.
Devon peered over the wall as two dragons emerged from the maze, through the hole she’d created by barreling through the dense shrubbery.
“Where are the knights?” she said. “Why are they on their own?”
“Worry about it later!” Hester levered herself upward, revolver tilting over the edge of the tower barricade.
Devon clapped her hands over Cai’s ears. The gun went off twice. Her own ears rang louder than ever. One dragon fell but the second had ducked, crouching just out of sight. Hester fell back against the wall.
Devon let go of Cai and fumbled with the crossbow she’d stolen. “Christ, how do you load this thing?”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake! Take my gun, and give that to me,” Hester said. “All that time on Family estates and you never went hunting?”
“You’re joking, right?”
“I have a weapon, too!” Cai waved his hedge shears. “Let me help!”
“Help by staying put,” Mani said, resting a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Don’t get in the way or distract your mother.”
“Listen to the man, and don’t move.” Devon snatched up Hester’s revolver and fired, right as the second dragon tried to sprint from the hedge to the foot of the observation tower.
The shot went wild and she should have missed, except the dragon dodged sideways again—straight into the path of her misfire. Bullet met head and exploded his skull, patterning the hedge wall in brain matter.
“That,” Devon said savagely, “is what luck feels like!” The revolver was out of bullets, there were more knights and dragons coming, and she was trapped in a toy castle with a critically injured friend. But it’d been a banging shot.
“Loaded up.” Hester clutched the crossbow; her sleeve was streaked with dark blood. “I could do with a doctor, or something.”
“Knights!” Cai shouted. “They’ve circled round through the woods—”
The dragons had only been a distraction. Knights had taken another route to circle through the trees. Devon spun as Ramsey and Ealand vaulted up and over the tower’s railing from the north side.
Hester pulled the trigger of the crossbow. Her shot punched through Ealand’s throat and knocked him backward over the wall.
“E!” Ramsey shouted, and then he was firing, too. He’d lost the gun, or maybe spent his bullets on Killock, and had reverted to a crossbow. His bolt skewered Hester’s chest, pinning her to the stone like a collector’s butterfly.
Hester made a noise like a hooked fish suffocating and Devon, blazing in fury, launched herself with fists flying. Let him see how well he used that stupid crossbow in hand-to-hand. She was vaguely aware of Cai shouting and Mani trying to hold her son back; the rest of her attention was for her brother.
She fell on him like an ocean wave.
Years ago, as young children, she’d fought with her brothers when they disagreed, or sometimes just for fun. A bunch of scrawny children scrapping in the dust.
This was a whole new level. He caught her in a grapple as she charged, and for a moment they teetered at the top of the spiral stairs, strength straining against strength, devastatingly matched.
She sank her bookteeth into his collarbone. The repulsive taste of blood filled her mouth and triggered unwelcome memories. Ramsey hollered and lost his footing. They tumbled backward down the tower steps in a struggling heap of limbs and anger. His fists rained blows on her back and she jammed her knee into every rib.
They bumped down all twenty-odd stone steps and landed on the ground beneath the observation platform, both swearing and sweating and bruised. Devon had lost the grip of her bite at some point, and before she could grab down again, her brother bunched his feet up under her belly and kicked her off.
Devon rolled away, retching. Ramsey scrabbled to his feet. The crossbow was hopelessly broken, reduced to little more than a wooden club with jagged edges.
“The hell are you doing?” Dark hair streaked his face, plastered down with sweat. “Because as far as I can tell, you’re stabbing every fucking person in the back. Is there anyone or anything you’re faithful to?”