*Ryatt*
Twin Rivers is nothing but ash and stone as I walk beside Westfall through a wall of heavy fog tinged with smoke. It ripples around my boots as each of my steps echo in the nothingness the last battle left behind.
Over the mind-link, I hear the voices of my commanders rattling off the names of their dead. My father’s royal army has pushed into the Roguelands like I expected, and I had my own forces retreat to the Deadlands, the last holdout before the coven, and Veiled Valley.
Through the fog, I see the flickering lights of Rifthold across the bridge, the very bridge one of my commanders begged to have destroyed. It wouldn’t have prevented this carnage. We are mere wolves against an enemy with power stolen from others and manipulated to mirror death at every turn.
In the end, there will be nothing left of my territory. Those packs that do survive will have to rebuild.
All I can do is give them a final parting gift by destroying Rifthold in its entirety, even though it will kill me. I will drag my father to hell with me when I go.
“Granger says his group will reach the Coven by morning,” Commander Westfall says beside me, his voice carrying through the fog.
I step over a body as I nod. It’s a woman, young and beautiful, her arm outstretched and fingers brushing the fingertips of the man lying dead a few feet away.
The spires of the bridge come into view, choked by fog. There’s no one left to cross. If refugees from Rifthold haven’t made the journey, they’re far too late now.
“Are you sure about this?” Westfall asks.
“It’s the only way.” I stop walking and turn to face him, pulling my sword from its sheath. I lick my lips, gazing down at the pure black metal and gem encrusted hilt. “I must ask you to do something for me.” I extend the sword to him, the metal cool to the touch against my hands.
“Once his mask has been destroyed, I am confident I’ll be able to bring down the veil.”
“That will kill you, Ryatt–”
“I know,” I whisper, closing my eyes for a moment. “I know it will.” The words taste like acid, but I continue, “Hide this sword. Throw it in the river in Veiled Valley.”
“You know I cannot do that–”
“My line ends with me, Westfall.”
This sword came into my possession upon my mother’s death. I was told it belonged to her father, and his father before him, so on and so forth. The Sword of Shadows, the mark of the king of the ancient city of Veiled Valley, the Kingdom of the Shadowsyngers. Had my mother known what her father was? Had she shown I’d possess these powers, as well as her own Firestone gifts?
“There is no need for this sword to exist any longer.”
“Your child–”
“Will not know me,” I cut in, meeting his icy gaze. “She will not know me.”
Westfall stares at me, and I swear I see the corners of his mouth twitch in a ghost of a smile. “It’s a girl?”
My nostrils flare as I bite back the regret weighing down my body. I regret so much of what I’ve done, but I swore to never regret sending my mate away, knowing she and our girl will be safe.
“Please,” I tell him, begging him. “Everything is going to change. People like me–like us–shouldn’t come into possession of it. I need to prevent something like my father from rising again. His mask, the sword–all of the ancient artifacts and weapons–they all have to be destroyed. Swear on your life that you will–”
“It was my sword,” Westfall says.
Silence settles between us, heavy and thick.
He meets my eyes again, his gaze hard and demanding. “The sword was mine.”
“What?”
A blast sounds behind us, over the bridge. The fog arches and ripples with energy as howling cuts through the silence. Westfall turns to the commotion as frantic footsteps echo across the bridges, a female’s voice lifts in panic. I turn, wielding the sword, as a woman carrying two small children in her arms bounds out of the fog, chased by six wolves.
“P-Please!” she screams in terror, nearly dropping her son, who looks to be no more than three or four years old. A baby screams in her other arm, naked save for a ragged blanket, its tiny feet exposed to the cold.
I break into a sprint, Westfall banking to the left. He disappears in a burst of shadow and appears behind the woman in his midnight black wolf form, hackles raised and teeth bared at the incoming wolves.
I catch the woman in my arms, dropping my sword, just as she begins to drop her son. “Hurry,” I tell her, picking up the little boy and whirling us toward the debris of Twin Cities. Then, we’re running as the sounds of battle erupt behind us. There’s an outpost close by where some of my warriors have been stationed. The woman is frail, rail thin, and sickly, but she runs as fast as she can, oblivious to the shattered glass and splintered metal cutting deep into the soles of her bare feet.
“How many more of you are there?” I shout.
“I–I don’t know–” she sobs. “My-My mate, he–he tried to get us out earlier but–but–” her face twists with despair so deep it slices through my heart like a heated blade. “I don’t know. I don’t know! I don’t know!”
We reach the outpost and are met by four of my men, all of them haggard and exhausted.
“Get her to the Deadlands. We’re taking down the bridge, now,” I pant, and place the half-starved little boy in the arms of one of the warriors. I don't spare a glance at the desperate woman before sprinting back the way I came, leaping over rubble and bodies, the fog lifting as the seconds pass.
Rain starts to pound the street, lifting dust and ash in its wake.
But now, the view of the bridge is clear.
And we are grossly outnumbered.
I grit my teeth and slide across the splintered cobblestone street, my outstretched hand reaching for my sword. The second I touch it, I shift, and the sword is absorbed by my wolf powers, turning my talons to pure steel, my eyes glowing like the glassy gems in its hilt.
Then I race toward Westfall, mowing down every single wolf in my path.
It’s total carnage. Their moonstone collars full of my father’s magic make it difficult to catch them before they disappear in clouds of mist, but those I do catch with my claws and teeth meet their end within seconds.
The power in their collars belong to me, power stolen by my father when I was a child. Powers of shadow, of darkness. I keep my mind trained on the task at hand, trying to not think about what needs to happen next.
‘Westfall,’ I say through the mind-link, ‘Get back to Twin Cities–’
‘There are too many of them, Ryatt–’ his voice is strangled as he fights ahead of me, trying to clear a path, but he’s right. Mindless, soulless wolves have swarmed the bridge, and we’re outnumbered completely. I can’t die here. Otherwise, all of this will have been in vain. Ella’s life will be nothing but bloodshed and torment if I don’t kill my father and end this war, end his reign. If I die now, he will turn his attention to her, hunting her like he hunted my mother so long ago.
Westfall yelps ahead of me and is pinned on his back by three wolves that begin to tear into him. I leap over six enemy wolves toward him and land on the wolves attacking him, sending them rolling over the edge of the bridge and into the turbulent river. ‘Get out of here, Westfall!’
He darts toward Rifthold instead. Damnit. I take off after him, reaching the far end of the bridge as he turns, his shadow’s coiling around his wolf form.
‘Stop!’ I shout through the mind-link, but it’s far too late. He sends his shadow’s spiraling forward, snaking up the spires of the bridges and bending the metal until it snaps. I barely have time to run forward and leap into the air as the bridge collapses, sending dozens of my father’s warriors to their deaths.
I land on my feet and skid to a stop, panting as I watch the river absorb the metal, carrying it away. ‘Are you fucking serious, Westfall? I told you to stay behind. That was a command!’
He’s not looking at me, though. His head is turned to gaze up at the giant fortress looming in the distance, the building nothing more than a spiraling column stretching into the clouds. All around us, piles of clothing are left behind in the wake of the royal warriors who shifted to meet us at the bridge, everything rain soaked and eerily empty, like the industrial city that hugs the shore of the river.
A strange sensation courses through the air, causing the hair along my spine to stand on end. My wolf ears prick to attention, then lower, as I slowly turn my gaze to the heavy rain clouds choking the sky.
A ripple of red light shoots through the clouds, then flickers of crimson drift down with the rain. Electricity hangs in the air, and I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that Ella made it home.
My chest sags with mingled relief and severe regret. She has to know, right? That everything I did, and everything I had to do, was for her. That I loved her more than I could put into words.
Westfall watches the lights flicker out, disappearing into the clouds. His icy blue gaze locks on mine when I lower my gaze. ‘You're a goddamn fool for letting her go.’
‘What did you just say?’
‘You heard me,’ he says sharply into my mind, turning to face me. ‘You have no idea what you’ve given up.’
‘You think I don’t know? You think I have no idea what I’ve done? What I’ve lost–’
‘It was supposed to be different for you,’ he says hurriedly, his eyes lowering to the ground. ‘I promised her… I swore.’
‘What are you talking about, Westfall?’ Promised who? What? Ella?
I step closer to him but then feel like my bones are suddenly failing under my weight. A pain I’ve never felt before flares through my body. Westfall senses it to–like there’s something sharp cutting through the air. ‘Ryatt–’
I shift back to my human form and fall to my knees. Westfall drags a pile of clothing toward me, shifting back to his human form and pulling on a pair of pants before covering me with someone’s jacket. I can’t stop shivering. I feel like I’m torn apart. I’ve never–this pain is– “Westfall–”
“Look at me, Ryatt,” he says sharply, taking my face between his hands as rain beats down on us. “Tell me what’s happening. Is it your power?”
“No–No its–it’s–”
I hear her scream inside my head. It rips down our bond and erupts in my mind. I curl into myself, gritting my teeth to stop a scream from leaving my throat.
“Ryatt!”
“Ella–Ella–” I reach for her through the bond, and I’m met by nothing but black, ice-filled nothingness. She’s hurt. Something is wrong. Something went terribly, horrifically wrong. “ELLA!”
Her name leaves my lips in a scream that echoes through the cavernous city, bouncing off the walls. Westfall is trying to get me up, saying we need to move, that we’re not alone. I hear him snarling and threatening someone nearby, but all I can see is black. I can still hear Ella begging–begging for her life. Pleading on her knees.
Oh, Goddess. What have I done?
Hands touch me, calm and tender. I’m lifted into the air and carried into one of the nearby buildings as my mind begins to fracture around the pain ebbing down the bond.
“Where is the King of Eastonia right now?” Growls Westfall to whomever is nearby, and then everything goes black as I’m sucked into the darkness, and the bond between us snaps, shattering in my chest.
She’s gone. Not away, not to safety. She’s just… gone.