Siren's Song

by Mary Weber

  There’s a crack where he was just standing that’s fast becoming a gaping hole, much like Colin used to create. In fact, exactly like Colin used to create.

  Before I can see who’s causing it, the crack enlarges to race toward me and the rest of the unit.

  “Move!” a soldier yells, and we’re promptly all jumping out of the way just before the earth crumbles beneath us.

  Another shout—this one from a guard who scrambled straight into a wraith’s snakelike teeth. Bleeding hulls, we’re getting annihilated.

  I take out two wraiths nearest us, then tell one of the men, “Hold them off!” before standing on my tiptoes and turning in a circle to get a view of who the Terrene is.

  I don’t see him at first.

  In fact, I doubt I ever would have had he not lifted a hand right then to split the earth like a torn seam straight at me. The look on his face is unreal. Despicable. Heart-stopping.

  Because it speaks of a power-intelligence that can only be of a Uathúil, or of one having been a Uathúil.

  Litch.

  Draewulf can turn Uathúils into wraiths.

  The horror of that reality doesn’t have time to sink in—I’m too busy trying to evade the disgusting dead Terrene’s earth-moving prowess.

  I send one, two, five blades of ice at his head, but he merely blocks them with clods of dirt.

  My lightning strike at least makes him lurch and jump, and I catch sight of one of my men behind him, stalking to finish the job.

  Except the wraith-Terrene seems to sense him—to sense something—because he bends down just as I’m drawing in a mist to shield the man and shoves into the ground so hard that everything outside a fifteen-foot circle begins shredding and crumbling into a chasm.

  I stumble back but not soon enough, and as the earth beneath my boots gives way, I’m clawing, grabbing, grasping onto the pieces that are dropping into a thirty-foot pit. Bleeding hulls.

  For a moment it stops, and my foot finds a chink in which to lodge. I hug the wall of dirt and catch my breath, thinking the soldier has gotten to the Terrene. But then the rocks I’m barely holding on to are moving again, and I know I am in the undead Terrene’s sights. He’s going to finish it.

  I shut my eyes and call down flashes of hail and lightning to pelt the area behind me. Please move out of the way, I silently beg Gilford and the other soldiers. But while the snarling cries suggest I’m taking out wraiths, the earth shakes harder.

  My foothold’s loosening. My handholds are crumbling. Oh hulls, I’m going to fall and this is not how it’s supposed to be. This is how I’m going out? By a blasted Terrene-wraith?

  I continue to clamber and climb until the whole space feels like a landslide I’m swimming through—

  And then a snap in the atmosphere stops it.

  The forest around me melts away into a wide-open space of green lawn and lights and party dancers. Even the crumbling cliff I’m clinging to appears to be gone, as does my body—and in its place is a pond of water and fish and starry lanterns reflecting off the surface. It’s a scene from Adora’s—one of her outdoor parties Colin and I attended. And Myles.

  Myles. I gasp for breath and glance around for the oaf.

  He’s alive?

  When my gaze finds him, he gives me a tipsy-looking wink as if to say we weren’t the only ones he was fooling. I whisper a word of gratitude his direction, then strengthen my grip on first one rock, then another and slip my toes along the cliff wall until I find a space to fit them. It takes a solid half minute to haul myself up and onto the dirt that looks like grass. And another half minute to realize the sounds of fighting have diminished to grunts of confusion.

  I peer around at the soldiers who are panting and attempting to see through the illusion, while the wraiths have begun wandering aimlessly. Bless you, Myles.

  I stand and search the Uathúil out.

  He’s disappeared.

  Hulls. I turn to aim at the wraiths.

  I’ve taken out two when a human cries out. It’s another one of our soldiers. The next second a wraith has found him and taken his head off.

  I lift a hand just as Gilford utters a yell.

  Spiders.

  Crawling in masses toward us along the tree branches.

  They look eerily like the spiders from my hallucinations when I’d ingested the dark power.

  I swerve my gaze to Myles, only now instead of concentrating, he’s merely standing, covering his face with his hands and pressing against his head as if he can tear it apart before the wraiths do. The spiders are dropping down around him and onto him. I begin to raise a hand to flick static at them, but something tells me it won’t help. He’s lost control.

  Blast it, Myles!

  I turn to the soldiers who’re now not just lunging at the wraiths but cringing to avoid the crawling vermin as well.

  “Ignore the spiders. It’s Myles!”

  “Ignore the what?” a soldier asks, shoving his blade through an arachnid that appears to have fallen on a wraith’s face.

  “The spiders! They’re not real!”

  “And the wraiths?”

  Poor man, the soldier’s voice sounds so hopeful, even as we both know the cut of his sword through their bones proves they’re physical enough.

  I call down a wind against the broadening mass of undead, and with it more ice picks than I’ve ever created. Focus, Nym. I hold them in the air, leveling them above the heads of the wraiths, until a tearing, burning, ripping sensation gouges through my back and down to my torso.

  I cry out and fall forward, flipping over on moving earth as I do to lift my hands in defense against the bloody claws coming down to finish me off. I shut my eyes because I’m too slow, it’s too late.

  Boom!

  What the—?

  Boom!

  The ground rattles along the tree line and up into the humid air. I open my eyes to see the Uathúil-wraith above me stalled midmotion, staring up at the sky. I scamper backward as the bombs’ vibrations move beneath my feet. I peer up at the single airship. From the smoke behind it, it’s dropped a bomb as it’s flown in an odd, zigzagging line toward us, and by my calculations the next will hit our group. The wraiths are watching it too.

  “They’re heeeere. They’ve commmee,” they hiss.

  I flick a hand toward the ship and draw lightning to tear through it. Only the thing is more agile than I expected and it swerves just enough for me to miss. The bolt hits the ground and explodes to our right.

  Litch.

  I launch another and another, but the thing moves more strategically than any I’ve ever seen. As if the captains know where I’ll aim next.

  Before I’ve time to consider that further, my gaze has already snagged upon two more ships through the treetops, hovering over the northern waterway. They’re so far out I’d be unable to see them if not for the sunlight reflecting off their hulls or the smoke rising up beneath them. What I assume were once our warboats have been struck and are now sinking, and those airships are headed for us too.

  Blast it. I don’t care who I hit or what boats may still be water sure inside all that smoke. I merely direct five strikes at those airships along with a strong gust of breeze to blow them in the direction I need.

  They’re in flames and dropping before the fifth hit lands.

  “Nym, that one!” Gilford points up.

  I squint but don’t see where the ship above us went. Then—there. Dipping below the flash of the sun. Except by the time I get a good glimpse of it, the thing has already moved agai
n.

  Except . . .

  I pause my hand in the air as something ripples in my blood. Whoever’s captaining that ship knows every move I’m about to make. And before my thoughts have registered it, my mouth is already speaking: “That one isn’t Draewulf’s. It’s Eogan.” My realization is short-lived as a roar beneath me signals the crumbling away of earth. I jump aside just as another chasm opens up and pulls one of the soldiers into it.

  I swerve toward the Uathúil who’s no longer enamored with the ship—his focus is back on me.

  One, two, three slashes of lightning explode near him, but he interrupts each of them with rocks that rupture into sand.

  From the corner of my eye I see the airship’s plank drop down approximately ten seconds before Eogan’s beautiful self comes striding down it. It takes exactly four seconds more for a blade created from stone to slam into the ground next to me, skimming my arm and yanking a cry from my throat.

  I shove five ice arrows at the Uathúil, but they hit a wall of stone that appears out of nowhere.

  The wall crumbles as fast as it was erected, and the Uathúil is suddenly right in front of me, bending over. He tips his head with hollow eyes and sharpens a rock-blade midair.

  From behind him Eogan dips his gaze my direction, then gives the slightest tip of his head.

  I slam an ice pick through the Uathúil’s face at the same moment Eogan shoves his sword through the beast’s jaw, and together we relieve him of his half-mortal, earthly bone coil for the rest of eternity. Next thing I know the beast has dropped onto me, oozing out hot oil and slime onto my chest and skin, and I’m screaming at the disgusting beast crushing my lungs.

  Eogan yanks the thing off me before offering his hand to pull me up. He peers toward the mass of wraiths and spiders and his soldiers descending the plank from above them. “You well enough to keep at it? Otherwise . . .”

  He doesn’t have to say it. I already know that otherwise we’re not going to make it.

  I lean up to slap a kiss on his chin, in case it’s the last one I ever give him, then stagger forward as the bloody claw marks across my back from earlier burn. I call up the wind and ice picks again. This time Eogan guards my backside, which I’m only now aware is dripping blood and making me woozy.

  Gritting my teeth, I let loose the ice. The pieces find their homes and ten wraiths drop.

  I do it again and another dozen drop, except by the time I’m readying the last load, my arms are sagging too much. I let them drop lest I release ice picks on Gilford, who can’t stop looking at the spiders on his legs, and the surviving soldiers who look nearly as confused.

  “Myles!” I scream at the oaf. But it’s no use. His blackening eyes are vacant.

  I send a static shock over anyway, but it does nothing.

  With a second, third, fourth static shock, I knock down the rest of the wraiths and, with Eogan, finish them off.

  I grab Gilford and start running.

  “Take the ship. We’ll get back faster.” Eogan is going for Myles. When he reaches the Lord Protectorate, he grabs his arm to simultaneously calm him and drag him with us. As he does, the visions cease.

  “We can’t. Mia and more soldiers are waiting with the horses. And Kel and Tannin are farther out awaiting our return lest they have to inform King Sedric we’re dead.”

  The Bron and few remaining Faelen soldiers stare at us in shock.

  Eogan nods at me and promptly commands ten of his men to go with us and the rest to reload and follow above the thick forest and wait for our signal.

  Finished, he looks over. “What in hulls just happened?”

  I shake my head at him. “Nothing good.”

  When we arrive at the clearing where we left the horses, the soldiers are waiting for us, wearing expressions of terror.

  “We heard noises.” Mia’s eyes grow large at the sight of Eogan beside me. “Your Highness?” The next second her eyes flash red and that’s followed by a look of understanding. “You’ve come from Tulla.”

  “Yes, and we need to warn Sed— Wait, what?” I turn from her to Eogan, who hands off Myles to the waiting soldiers, then scoops me into his arms. “Eogan, what—?”

  “We came just in time, too, from the look of it.”

  “Where are the other men?” One of the soldiers who’d stayed behind peers beyond us, as if waiting for the rest of our unit to arrive.

  Eogan puts me down. “Dead. We’ve lost more than a few men today.”

  The way he says it . . . How many lives did he lose today? Doing what?

  I peck a kiss on his cheek before glaring at him. “I almost killed you. What in hulls were you thinking? I could’ve shot you down! And what does she mean that you were in Tulla?”

  “Aye, but you didn’t. I knew you wouldn’t.”

  “Okay.” I stare at him. “But how did you know? And for that matter, how’d you know where we were?”

  His tone is calm, but his emerald gaze is flickering from adrenaline. “We were headed back over the waterway when I saw your lightning storm. I assumed you were in trouble or else some poor soul had seriously put you off. I came to rescue one of you.”

  “Uh-huh. And you came from Tulla?”

  “He rescued Princess Rasha,” Mia breathes, and she’s suddenly searching the forest around us, as if Rasha’s somehow been hiding there.

  I frown. He did? And turn to search the forest too.

  “She’s on the ship.”

  “Above us?”

  He smirks and walks over to pat Haven. “Hey, girl, how’ve you been?”

  Haven whinnies and stamps her pleasure, bringing me back to the reality that we need to be moving.

  As if reading my mind, Eogan says, “I’ll explain on the way,” and hands me Haven’s reins. I cool the air as he helps Myles mount up, then turns to help me do the same. He murmurs to my mare while pressing his hand against my back, exuding a calm that flows over my skin like a healing balm. “You sure you’re okay to ride?”

  I suddenly don’t have the energy to answer. The soldiers with us are climbing onto their own mares, but it’s the sight of those few riderless horses that reminds me what we’ve just lost. Those men. I may have known going in we wouldn’t all return—and they did too—but it doesn’t make the guilt and solemn emotions any less.

  I swallow. “Thank you,” I whisper back in their direction.

  I cool the air further and quicken Haven into a trot. When the forest has thinned enough for faster riding, we push the horses along the path, and Gilford pipes up. “Okay, so how? How’d you rescue the princess?”

  “When I left Faelen I made my way up to Tulla through the mountain passes where the wraiths were less prominent. They can’t run the airships without the Bron captains and soldiers—and it was those men’s loyalty that enabled us to find the princess. She was being held on a ship in the center of the destroyed capital. Although, surprisingly, she was less guarded than one would think. It seems Draewulf’s growing a bit too cocky.” Eogan shrugs. “Or else Cashlin’s giving him more fight than he bargained for.”

  Yet even as Eogan’s speaking, there’s a weight to his words, his tone, his expression that tells me it wasn’t as easy as all that. As do the claw markings that are healing across his neck.

  “You nearly died.”

  His jaw tightens.

  Hmm. Good guess.

  “Twice it seems,” Mia says behind me.

  “Why?” I glare at him. “What were you thinking? What happened to you going to Bron?”

  He snorts. “So first you were angry I w
as leaving for Bron, and now you’re angry I didn’t? Good grief, woman—”

  “I’m angry that you almost got yourself killed. Or worse, caught. You should’ve taken me.”

  Behind me Gilford clears his throat. To announce he’d like to hear the rest of the story, I presume.

  “I did not almost get caught.” Eogan’s face is a ripple of insult. “I made War General at age twelve, so I’d appreciate a bit more trust in my prowess, if you don’t mind. But regarding Bron . . .” His tone turns serious. “I sent Kenan with my seal in my stead. He’ll have far more influence over the Assembly than them suddenly seeing me halfway through their war against Tulla. It would only add to the confusion and divisiveness, whereas Kenan will be able to communicate with the weight of my unseen authority behind him.”

  Oh.

  His voice drops even further. “Either way, I agreed with you—that what I accomplished in Bron wouldn’t affect the outcome of what’s decided here. So while—”

  “Wait. Repeat that first part, where you said you agreed with—”

  “As I was saying, while I am still afraid for my people and I still very much believe they deserve the presence of their king, I ultimately believed it wiser to rescue Rasha and prepare Faelen for war. And in doing so, give Bron and the whole of the Hidden Lands a fighting chance.”

  “So you lied to me.”

  “I did.”

  “And you let me argue with you about it.”

  “I did.”

  Well, at least the bolcrane admits it.

  Behind me one of the soldiers has the gall to snicker.

  “No offense, Nym, but you’re a hardheaded, stubborn slip of a wench, and I actually hadn’t fully decided—not until I saw the determination on your face at the Assembly the other night. Which is when I knew.”

  I purse my lips and wait. Knew what?

  “I knew you’d want to follow me or insist on coming to find Rasha. Except your people need you to raise them into an army if they’re to have any chance of surviving this war. And you are the only person to do that.”

  I snort.