The Shadowglass (The Bone Witch, #3)(86)
But the savul was a much more brutal beast; it clawed eagerly into anyone close enough to obstruct its path, and I could hear General Lode over the din, yelling at the rest to fall back, to keep away from the daeva.
The zarich breathed ice and mist. The crackling stole up Drychta legs, rendering them useless as it sliced through their scaled bodies. And still, the azi above us continued its pillaging, promising more infernos.
The others had not been idle. Arcs of Fire and Ice and Wind and Lightning filled the sky as the asha and the Deathseekers attacked, halting the Drychta’s progress. Lord Agnarr and his men knelt, hands firm against the ground. The nearest Drychta took a step and sank into unexpected quicksand. The earth shuddered as spikes jutted out without warning, impaling others.
“Tea!” Lord Fox rode into view, cutting down every Drychta in his path. His eyes were trained on the azi flying overhead, and he exchanged his blade for a bow that was strapped across his shoulders. He strung an arrow and loosened it quickly when the three-headed daeva sailed nearer to the ground. There was no visible wound, but the azi veered away.
“Tell your pet to stop burning the Hollows, you idiot!” the man roared up at the sky. “You’ll burn everything!”
The Dark asha heard him. The zarich stomped forward and took a deep gargle of air. Mist formed around my mouth even as the cold extended into the mountain, containing the conflagration for the moment.
But her brother was far from done. He leaped off Chief and sliced his way through the rest of the Drychta. His eyes were on the savul, still on its rampage. He cut down the remaining blighted—and drove his sword into the daeva, bloodying its shin.
Its roar was one of surprise. For a moment, it seemed recognition blazed behind its yellow, bulging eyes. Its maimed claw, after all, had been responsible for the man’s death. Still caught in its bloodlust, the daeva swung at him. Lord Fox did nothing to deter the attack. Its talon slashed through his chest.
Both reeled back unexpectedly. The savul shrilled from some invisible pain. The undead general sank to the ground with his hand over his lacerated chest and his mouth pulled back in a snarl, gulping air he did not require. From above, the azi’s reaction was immediate. It landed beside the savul, stumbling in its haste. The first to jump off its back was Lord Kalen, slamming his blade against a blighted Drychta’s unprotected side when it ventured near.
“Fox!” She had changed much since the last time I had seen her. Her hair streamed behind her like the night, clothed in the hua of three dragons she had worn at our first meeting, dark eyes still a mystery, but her cheeks had hollowed and her skin had lost some of its luster. An unspoken thought passed between her and Fox, between her and Kalen, between her and her daeva—and both savul and azi turned to protect the three, snapping and clawing at the dwindling Drychta still putting up a fight.
“You did it on purpose,” she seethed, her voice cutting deeper than the Deathseeker’s knives of wind.
Lord Fox smiled grimly before the azi obscured them from my view.
I don’t remember how long the battle lasted. I cowered behind the Deathseekers as they wove rune after rune after rune, blanketing the sky with barriers invisible to my eyes. Occasionally, I caught sight of a flare of debris when it came into contact with those magical shields, the way a sword’s tip might drag against another blade and send up sparks. I huddled with the wounded and injured, scrabbling to bring them closer to the blockade the Odalians had erected, hoping that no wayward rune or daeva attack would find us. I could no longer see the trio; the azi and the savul still blocked my sight, snapping and slicing at anyone or anything that drew too close.
The zarich won its war against the flames. Smoke rose from the mountains, and the Drychta who were still unchanged staggered out coughing, averting their faces, lifting their hands to plead surrender. Only the blighted continued their losing fight, assaulting the combined armies until every last one of them were killed.
Bereft of enemies, all the daeva—save for the azi—turned their backs on us and moved rapidly toward the sea. They waded in with little preamble. The waves washed over their heads, and they were gone before we could react.
Were they running away, I wondered, or toward something else?
It was only when one of the Gorvekai—Solveiga—nudged me gently with her foot that I realized that the battle was over. “The Faceless has gone too far this time,” she said soberly. “To change a nation of people into abominations—now do you understand why the strongest is not always the worthiest?”
There were heavy casualties on both sides of the conflict. Many of the soldiers had been ripped apart by the beasts, but among the blighted, none survived. The still-human Drychta, now docile, sat on the ground, watched over by a group of asha. General Lode questioned one, and the prisoner was all too eager to respond.
“Aadil is missing” came his terse report. “They do not know if he still remains in the mountains.”
“He does not.” The Dark asha stood before us, her face smudged from dirt and ash. Her familiars stood beside her. The generals and commanders of the army lifted their swords as one, watching the bone witch with distrust. Only Khalad and Lord Agnarr were nonplussed.
The horrific wound on Lord Fox’s chest that would have been mortal on anyone else had vanished. “I remembered this,” the familiar said. “On Mithra’s Wall—you reached out to me—”