Burnt Devotion (Imdalind, #5)(68)

I turned onto a seedy side street, the old buildings closing us in as I ran through the crowd of desperation, narrowly dodging a shovel that was dripping with blood.

It was madness, everyone running in zigzags in their attempt to escape, even though I could tell by the look on their faces that they knew there was nowhere.

The streets where littered with belongings as a foolish few had tried to take belongings in their flight, only to end up bleeding and writhing beside their precious things.

The street ended at a yellow flower shop, the building I clearly remembered being a church at one point in history blocking the street, leaving only two narrow alleys on either side.

The pitch black caverns called to me as I ran, the depth of the haunting color screaming anything other than safety. I had to trust that was what I would find. Perhaps, mercifully, the forgotten spaces would be forgotten by the rats, as well.

Ebony blackness enveloped us as we ran into the narrow side way, the screams of the battle dimming as the high stone walls swallowed everything whole. I fought the urge to flare my magic, to bring light to this space, knowing it would only call them to us. However, the dark was too much for the shadowed sounds of terror. Everything was too heightened, the reality of what we were trapped in only growing in the supposed safety of the alley.

Gravel crunched under my feet as I walked with one hand against Ryland and the other against the cool brick surface of the building beside us. Taking us forward step by step, closer to the clock.

Beyond this alley was another narrow street. Beyond that was the large courtyard that would connect us to the famous attraction. Only a few more minutes, and we could be there.

That was, if nothing else went wrong.

I would say jinx, I would call for wood or throw salt or whatever else superstitious people did, yet given the situation, everything had already gone wrong.

Someone had handed me moldy lemonade, but I was definitely going to make the best of it.

I almost expected someone to jump out of the dark, a wall of the poisoned Vil?s to erupt and take us down with no recourse, but there was nothing. Nothing except blackness and the haunted echoes of the battle I was doing my best to escape.

Nothing but the sound of my shoes against the gravel.

The screams grew as we reached the next road, this one as seemingly empty as the last two. If only it would stay that way.

I could see the little things hanging from the eaves. I could hear the heightened sounds of their teeth gnashing together as they echoed back to me.

It was only empty because the Vil?s had done their job. I could see bodies—alive or dead, I wasn’t sure—strewn over the street. I could see the rivers of their blood, but nobody moved. Everything was still.

There was nothing other than the mutated bats as they waited.

Steeling myself against what was coming, I took one step into the dimly lit road, the sound of my feet against the pavement soft, and yet, somehow, they heard. Even though they couldn’t see us, thanks to the powerful shield we were shrouded with, they heard.

They heard it as if it was a battering ram.

Tiny heads snapped toward me as one, beady eyes narrowing as if they could see me. For one terrifying moment, I was sure they could, until their lazy focus snapped back to the bodies that already littered the street, the desperate hope they would somehow awaken and give them something else to bite clear on their face.

Their change in focus should have been calming; instead, it merely boiled underneath me until my heart ached with the fierceness of the beat. They might not be able to see me, but they sure could hear me.

It was a death march.

I guessed I should have said jinx.

Luckily, I already had a way around this.

Wind swirled around me with one pulse of my power, the element growing warm as it intercepted with my ability, creating a small whirlwind of hot air that lifted me into the air enough to soar through the street. Perhaps make it to the clock.

The power grew as flags and overhangs that lined the buildings began to whip around, the force of their unsettlement growing as the power did.

One after another, the little beasts turned their heads to me. Eyes wide as they searched, several of them hissed into the air as they tried to decide what was going on, as they desperately searched for something else to attack.

It only took a moment for them to figure out what was going on, but it was a moment too late.

The wind moved as I did, pushing myself into the street, soaring past the store fronts, past the bodies, past the carnage with Ryland at my side as I towed him along.

The wind followed us as we moved, sweeping through the air as it supported us, the movement so fast and calculated it didn’t take the Vil?s long to figure out what had happened.

I heard their calls as they descended from the rafters, speeding after the wind, past their enemy they couldn’t see.

The force of the wind grew as they moved over me. The unstable gusts pulling at my hair and clothing, shifting the flow of my own powerful surge until it almost sent me off course.

It almost would have been better if it had.

Even through the blindness of my location, the rats had thought ahead, forming a wall before us. A wall of black and leather, a wall of fangs and claws. Vil?s that were so intertwined it was nothing more than a web to catch us.

It was a good plan.

Unfortunately for them, I was stronger.

The shield around us dropped with only a flick of my magic, the tiny creatures screaming louder at our sudden appearance, only to have their hungry calls silenced by the ball of fire I sent at them. The fire magic travelled on the back of my powerful ability, the destructive force speeding towards them.