The Heart Forger (The Bone Witch #2)(65)

“—battering the doors. They’ve gotten into the palace—”

“—must leave.” The empress’s voice broke through the fog. “This must be the duke’s doing.”

“What makes you think this is the duke’s doing?” Zoya asked. “We would have sensed if he were capable of magic.”

“It’s too much of a coincidence for there to be an attack so soon after your arrival. My scouts are reporting Odalian colors in the field. If this is not the duke’s doing, then someone is doing this with his approval. He’s after Khalad and Tea, we know that. Kance’s heartsglass too, I warrant.”

“No asha can pry his heart from me,” Inessa argued. “I’m going with them, Mother.”

“Surely Althy can think of some way—”

“I cannot,” Althy cut in, and something cool was pressed against my forehead. I heard hammering at the door, interspersed with sounds of fighting. “There are limits to what spellbinding can do, and matters of the heart stand high on that list. The princess is right. Where Prince Kance’s heartsglass goes, she must go along with it.”

“The azi,” I croaked, staring up at the ceiling.

“Tea?” Rahim’s voice drew close. “What is happening? Even my assistants I had to fight off—”

“The azi’s coming,” I gasped, my voice thick as sandpaper. I was seeing double, the throne room overlapping with my vision of the city of Kion on the horizon. “It’s going to—”

And then I felt it, the reason for the daeva’s anger. Underneath its wings, I saw the army, twice the size I knew Odalia’s army to be, spread out for miles around us.

And over half the army was visibly rotting. Strips of armor rusted on their bodies, and their faces were of those long since dead, decaying and desiccated. Those closest to the city gates threw themselves at the walls, heedless of broken bones and torn flesh.

“They’re dead!” I cried out. “All of them dead! It isn’t an army of soldiers at the city walls, Your Majesty. It’s an army of dead.”

“Impossible!” the empress said. “No one could summon that many—”

“Yes, they can,” Althy said with a grim smile. “The Puppet rune, wasn’t it? To do this successfully requires immense power.”

“Seeking stones.” Through the azi’s eyes, I saw soft globes of light wafting from among the corpses. “They brought seeking stones with them!”

“What’s a seeking stone?” Princess Inessa asked shakily.

“It amplifies an asha’s power,” Althy told her. “Whoever controls the corpses is channeling through them. Tea, how many do you see?”

I concentrated. “Seven.”

Althy grimaced. “A normal spellbinder would already be suffering from darkrot. No one can command seven stones at once and retain their sanity. Your Majesty, we must be prepared for the worst.”

“I am not leaving Kion and my people to these hordes of undead, Altaecia!”

I squeezed my eyes shut. To concentrate on two perspectives was draining, so I struggled to focus on the one where I could do some good. The azi purred when it felt me graze against its consciousness, opening its mind to allow me entrance. We headed straight for the undead horde amassing outside. They battered the city gates without mercy, and all three of the azi’s mouths opened.

The undead soldiers made no sound as they burned, consumed almost immediately by the blazing fireballs that slammed into them from overhead. We cawed in triumph and dove toward the city entrance. I saw the Ankyon soldiers manning the towers, fear etched upon their faces as death approached, the bravest of them shooting arrows at us in desperation.

I ignored their attacks and turned at the last minute, lashing out with our claws and ripping away most of the undead still hammering at the gates. I circled around and unleashed three more streams of deadly fire. The undead died again, lost in the inferno.

We next directed our ire at the pulses of magic amid the throng, at the seeking stones. I guided the azi through the air, using its winged body in place of my hand as it wove the Strangle rune in my stead. The rune shone large in the sky, and through the daeva’s eyes, I could see the telltale flickers of the seeking stones dotting the army below us. At my command, the daeva landed before one of the soldiers that carried a seeking stone, and the azi’s middle head snapped out to grab the glowing orb in its jaws before rising up again. I flew the daeva straight into the center of my rune, and the seeking stone exploded into oblivion. Again and again, we singled out the dead warriors, and soon, a greater part of the undead stopped, unmoving, until we put them out of their misery with more flames.

Dimly, I felt someone grab hold of my human body, attempting to shake its shoulders, and sensed someone pushing them away. “No!” Fox’s voice said, cold and clear in the confusion. “Let her be. She’s saving us.”

I swooped down and sprayed the men with fire until bonfires dotted the fields. We circled the city hungrily, awaiting more signs of movement, but nothing else stirred. The undead army lay smoldering. I sent my mind out, probing, but I was certain none of the seeking stones survived the onslaught.

A babble of voices erupted again, excited and joyful. I was more cautious, arrested by a sense of wrongness.

They are coming, the azi’s mind boomed, already reaching out to the horizon.