by Grace Martin
He drew me into his arms and pressed a kiss onto my lips so hard that our teeth clashed. I tunnelled my fingers into his hair and held him even closer to me. His chain mail beneath the surcoat was rough against me and I was glad I was wearing my leather tunic to save my skin, even as I wished I could climb into his skin and live there.
He dragged his lips from mine to press his face into the curve of my neck. ‘Meet me on the roof tonight,’ he said in a desperate whisper. ‘Be there for me tonight, Emer, or I’ll never forgive you.’
I stroked my hand over his neck, where his head was bowed tight against my skin. ‘You better not keep me waiting,’ I replied.
He pulled away to examine me. ‘Whatever happens today, I want you to know that I love you with all my heart. However long I live, every moment of my life is yours. Anything I do today, I do because I love you.’
‘Don’t,’ I said, frightened a little by what he was saying. ‘Don’t be a hero.’
‘Look who’s talking,’ he replied with a smile that was too tight to really be a smile.
I whispered, ‘I have to go.’
He kissed me again and released me and we went our separate ways.
Elisabeth took me up to the parapets that overlooked the gates to the city. Aoife was already in position, surrounded by guards. I was going to have to be careful freeing her, because she looked like she was going to kill the next person who came within her reach.
‘Don’t be a hero, Hawk,’ Elisabeth whispered in our last quiet moment as we stood there.
I laughed at her. ‘You know the stories of the Bach Chwaer as well as I do,’ I said. ‘You were the one who gave me the name. You know she could never resist an opportunity.’
Her face was serious. ‘Here’s to changing history,’ she said.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Darragh was right on time, flying over the mountains and bellowing a call to arms. I felt the sound go through every person on the wall, every last one of us shivering together. Behind him flew six of his sons. I’d only seen dragons a few times in my life, but you don’t need to read the manual to know they’re scary.
Darragh was flying in the lead, just as we’d hoped. Every Librarian in the city was hoping for it. He flew overhead, his sons just a moment behind him. A burst of blue light erupted from the centre of the Librarians’ star, where they were gathered on top of the tower in the centre of the city. A shield spread out to cover the city, falling over it like a blue rain. Darragh was trapped within the shield… and his sons were trapped outside.
The younger dragons flung themselves against the barrier, but every Librarian in the Thousand Counties was holding onto that shield and the young dragons couldn’t penetrate it. The dragons threw themselves against the shield, but they were pushed back and every time they struck the barrier, they howled with pain.
Darragh swung his massive head around to see what his sons were complaining about. When he saw the blue shield, he twisted himself so sharply in the air that he nearly fell out of the sky, his wings spreading out and catching him before he could fall onto the buildings below. He trumpeted his frustration.
His sons called back to him and then they flew away. My heart fell, because I knew they were going to Cairnagorn and I had just doomed every soul living there.
I took Umbra out of my hair and let her shine. The eyes of the world were on me and when Umbra went as bright as a supernova, it felt like the whole world was cheering.
A streak of ice shot from my wand to slice into Darragh’s side. He bellowed in pain and darted out of the way with surprising agility. I shot another blast of ice into the space where he was heading and caught him right in the chest. It hurt him, leaving a white star on his chest, but didn’t pierce his thick hide. He followed the line of ice to where I stood on the parapet, heading right towards me.
He lowered his head and breathed over the city, making it bloom with fire. I drew in a deep breath, because I wasn’t sure how long it had been since the last time I dared breathe. He flew directly overhead and breathed in.
Dozens of archers fired volleys of arrows, but they glanced off his thick hide. Spears cast from the parapets clattered uselessly to the ground. I shot off another blast of ice, just as Darragh opened his mouth to breathe out.
Caradoc and the Camiri were there to protect me. They cast another, smaller shield, like the one the Librarians held over the city, and protected me. I wondered how many of their families were still in the city, unprotected, while they were here protecting me.
I turned my face away as the fire billowed over me. Beyond the shield of protection, I heard people screaming as they were engulfed in flame. The wind from the magic was creating tornadoes that ripped through the city. I hadn’t realised it before, but the famous Bach Chwaer might as well have been a mass murderer.
When Darragh had to breathe in again, the shield was raised so I could use Umbra’s power and my own to try and wound him. He brought his tail down low to sweep behind him and casually knocked over a water tower. A huge wave barrelled through the streets, knocking down houses and a bridge in its way. Even with Umbra’s power, I couldn’t seem to do anything to him except make Darragh angry.
The next time Darragh’s flame washed over us, something pushed me and I was thrown sideways. My feet tripped beneath me and I scrambled, hopelessly, to get my balance. I fell backwards, into the courtyard.
The Empress screamed. I looked up to see her leaning over towards me, her hand extended, using her magic to stop me from dying when I fell.
But while Elisabeth was distracted by my fall, she hadn’t noticed what had caused me to fall. Aoife had gotten free from her guards somehow. She came up below me and used her magic to pull me backwards. Now she rose until she was right next to the Empress, where I had been standing on the parapet.
Aoife didn’t use magic ‒ she used a knife. She thrust it into the Empress’s belly, stabbing her again and again. I tried to cast magic towards her to stop her, but I was still falling, despite the magic the Empress had used to slow my descent. Aoife held me off with one hand, using the magic she had harvested from the dying Camiri children.
The Empress fell against Aoife, looking almost like she was embracing her daughter while Aoife continued to stab.
Aoife shrugged the Empress off her. Elisabeth fell from the parapet, her body disappearing over the other side of the wall.
I screamed. I screamed and screamed but it was too late. She was gone.
I used Umbra’s magic to lift myself up, to float back up to the wall. Aoife was already striding towards the Camiri. Caradoc was the centre of the Camiri star now and power streamed through him. I heard him screaming defiance at Darragh. I heard his scream cut off when Aoife cast her own magic at him. I didn’t even see him fall.
I screamed too.
Elisabeth was gone. Caradoc was gone. I only had one chance now or I was going to lose everything forever. I had to get back to Cairnagorn and get to the Portal. I couldn’t stop Cairnagorn being destroyed. I couldn’t stop the devastation of the world. But maybe I could stop Elisabeth ever coming back through the Portal and if she never became Empress, then maybe Caradoc wouldn’t need to raise a rebellion against her, maybe the pair of them would never stand on that wall and die.
I gathered all my power, all Umbra’s power and released it all at once. I turned myself into a dragon.
No one had ever done it before. A dragon was such a massive creature that only the most powerful magic could transform a person into that shape. I should have known that anger would fuel me more than love. I sped towards Darragh.
I caught up to him quickly and ripped into him, biting him so savagely I felt the flesh come away in my mouth. I had nothing to lose now.
I cast a spear of lightning towards Aoife, where she still stood on the battlements, covered in the blood of the people I loved most in the world, but Darragh saw my vulnerability and sank his teeth into me. I only just managed to twist away at the last moment, so that he
caught my shoulder and not my neck.
This was all Darragh’s fault. I turned back to him and ripped him to pieces.
Darragh wasn’t ready for my sudden savagery. Before, I’d been attacking him to try and stop him from hurting people. Now I just wanted to rip him apart. I didn’t care if he hurt me. All I had to do was survive and make him pay for all the pain that was tearing through me right now. I took him to pieces and I’m not proud of what I did. By the time I was done, he was dead and that was that.
I still wanted to scream, though. I flew over the city, just once. I felt like it was almost expected of me. The Librarians were all unconscious on the top of the tower. The Camiri who had supported Caradoc were in a similar position. I wondered how many of them were dead. It was impossible to tell from here. Everywhere, buildings had been flattened, either by Darragh, by me, or by the tornadoes that had ripped the city apart. Large swathes of the city were still on fire and I knew that not even in twenty years’ time would all that devastation be rebuilt.
I saw Elisabeth’s body, a mass of scarlet wounds staining her white gown. Caradoc lay on the parapet, no wound visible on his body from Aoife’s magic, but his skin had gone grey in death. I threw my head back and bellowed. Beneath me, understanding nothing of what I was going through, people cheered.
I couldn’t see Aoife. If I saw her, I was going to kill her and I didn’t have time for that. I had to get back to Cairnagorn before Darragh’s sons flattened it. I turned away and flew away from the city that held nothing for me now. I stayed in dragon form. I might need the strength of this shape to break a path into the Portal if access to the Library had been destroyed.
With wings so massive, Cairnagorn wasn’t even an hour away. From a distance, I could see Darragh’s six sons as they ravaged the once-fair city. The Librarians had left the city undefended, but help had come from an unexpected quarter. The Camiri army fought to save the Meistri in Cairnagorn.
It was a thing that had never been seen before. The army of the Dark King fought in the streets and squares of one of the strongholds of the Meistri ‒ not to conquer it, but to save it. Camiri and Meistri fought side by side.
I remembered reading about that. It had seemed for one brief moment that the war was over and we were going to have peace, like we were going to fight on the same side as brothers, but it didn’t last long. As soon as the Meistri army recouped, they would be sent into Camiri territory. Camaria would finally come under Meistri rule and the Dark Queen would become the leader of the rebellion, just as Caradoc had been before her.
I saw Aine briefly, dressed all in black in a chariot pulled by a Pegasus, just like her father, casting magic all around her, but I flew straight past. I wanted nothing but to return to my own time. As I flew, I changed shape until I was a falcon again. I didn’t want to be killed by a friend because I was in dragon shape.
Parts of the Library were already destroyed. Great chunks of rock had fallen to crush large areas and I thought I recognised what had been Kiaran’s quarters as I flew past. I reached the section where the great doors were shut. I had to change back into my own shape for this, but I was quick. I landed and changed and held my hands out all in one movement and the gates responded by swinging open.
I closed the gate behind me, but I wasn’t quick enough. Another bird flew into the tunnel with me and I was sure it was Aoife. She’d killed everyone I cared about and now she wanted to kill me. She wouldn’t let me get away.
I was right. She landed and changed as quickly as I had and flung a blast of fire at me the moment she had hands again.
I threw up a shield ‒ just a quick one, because it didn’t have to last long. I wanted to kill her, but I knew I wouldn’t be successful. I hadn’t been able to change anything else about the past, all I could change was the future. I kept the shield around me and ran as fast as I could through the tunnel towards the Portal.
It was so familiar to me now; it was as easy as running over smooth ground. I knew every pile of fallen books, every heap of rubble, every stone in the way and leaped over them with the ease of long practice while Aoife had to struggle to catch up. Every now and then I felt the impact of magic on my shield, but I kept running.
I reached the room where the Portal stood. I ran up the stairs to the Portal, running through my mind the steps I would need to take to reach my own time accurately. I’d hoped I’d have time to prepare myself, but Aoife was right behind me. I heard the great gate opening.
I threw myself into the Portal, but Aoife grabbed my foot and dragged me back out again. She threw magic at me and I threw magic back again.
When soldiers poured into the room through the great gates, I knew a moment of real fear. They wore different insignia from the Empress’s guard. These wore the emblem of the White Queen. They were already loyal to Aoife. It would be impossible to guess the machinations she’d been carrying on in the last few weeks. At least I knew, now, how she’d managed to escape, and get up onto the battlements to reach Elisabeth and Caradoc.
My pulse raced even faster. I could kill a dragon today, but I couldn’t fight two dozen soldiers, not if they all had magic. They cast a net over me, its fibres woven with feathers so I couldn’t reach my magic. I screamed and tried to rip at the net.
Aoife laughed. She pushed her hair back from her sweaty face. ‘You don’t like feathers, do you, Emer?’ she asked. She leaned down and drew Umbra out of my hair.
I spat at her through the net. It hit the hem of her dress. She drew back her foot and kicked towards my face. I managed to roll away, so she only got my shoulder, but it was already badly wounded from where Darragh had ripped at me with his enormous teeth. I cried out in pain, despite myself. Aoife drew back her foot again…
…and was knocked off her feet by a blast from Aine’s wand. Camiri soldiers followed her into the room and battled with Aoife’s soldiers. Aoife and Aine faced one another, throwing magic towards one another without a care for consequences. Before long, there must have been half a dozen tornadoes whipping around the room.
I managed to roll out from under the net, but a soldier jumped on top of me, flattening me to the floor. I shouted and tried to force him off me, but he weighed at least three times what I did.
All of a sudden there was an enormous noise, like a huge wind or a sudden fall of heavy rain that deadened all other sound in that chamber. Into the midst of the silence fell a little girl’s shrill scream.
It was Elisabeth ‒ my Elisabeth, my Sparrow, as she had been that day five years ago, sixteen years into the future, when we first discovered the Portal and she stuck her head into it. She’d described this scene ‒ the soldiers, the magic wind whirling around the room, even me, three of me.
The soldier pinning me down was distracted. I used his momentary hesitation to slip away and ran for the Portal.
I leaped into the watery surface of the Portal, grabbing Lynnevet with one arm and pulling her with me into the future. I had to concentrate, to bring us out at the right time. I was desperate, but I was so very, very tired. I wasn’t sure I had enough energy even for this.
We came out of the Portal into silence. Lynnevet fixed that quickly enough by screaming some more.
‘Emer! Hawk!’ she cried. ‘My sister! Where’s my sister gone?!’
‘I’m right here, Sparrow’ I said and fell to my knees. I didn’t know how much blood I’d lost, but I could hazard a guess that it was a lot. I’d been going long past the point of exhaustion. It all hit me at once. I didn’t even know exactly when I was. I couldn’t be right back at the time I’d jumped into the Portal, because the Dark Queen and the White Queen weren’t there ‒ yet or still, I didn’t know.
‘You’re too old to be Emer,’ Lynnevet said. She came to stand beside me. ‘Emer’s thirteen and Emer-’ her gaze dropped to my stomach and I wondered if she realised how transparent she was, ‘Emer doesn’t look like you.’ At thirteen I’d been pregnant.
‘I grew up, Sparrow,’ I said. I coughed, just a bit, b
ecause breathing was getting pretty hard. I wasn’t sure if coughing made it better or worse. I leaned forward, resting my hands against the stone floor. ‘Sparrow, I need you to do something for me.’
‘Sure. Is Emer around here somewhere?’
‘Soon, Sparrow. I need you to… go out into the main cavern. There’s been a new cave-in there… be careful. I’ve lost my little wand. Call to her for me, find her…bring her back here. She’ll answer for you.’
‘That sounds careless. Do you always lose things?’
My head drooped because I couldn’t hold it up anymore. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to vomit because I was sick or because she was right: I’d lost everything. ‘Bring the wand… back here… Lynnevet. Use it… to heal me. I need your help.’
‘OK. But I’ve got to get back to my Emer soon, she’ll be worried.’
‘I’ll make sure… everything turns out right,’ I said. I fell forward, unable to hold myself up anymore as she trotted away to the main cavern. I heard her whistle and I heard Umbra reply. She’d be back here soon. She was a gifted healer, even at her age. She would help me. And as soon as I was healed, I could go out into the world and see when I was.
I would find out where the White Queen was holding my Elisabeth. I would talk to the Dark Queen and make sure she helped me. After what I’d done for her, she owed me that much. I would do what I’d just told my suddenly ‒ much ‒ younger sister. I would make sure everything turned out right.
I’d promised.
THE END
The Umbra Chronicles will continue in Defiance, releasing April 2021!
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