It was hundreds of feet straight down. Alexi angled herself hands first, and made her body as rigid as possible. If she could reach terminal velocity faster and have less resistance, she might catch her. The ground rushed up to them entirely too fast.
She didn’t have time. Come to me. The pure light of Heaven cut through pre-dawn clouds to shine on her as she fell. Brilliant flashes of energy exploded and swirled about her as her armor formed from the light itself. Her back itched and she knew her wings would answer her commands.
She only had seconds to act. Savanna fell fifty feet from her, hands outstretched to her.
Alexi folded her wings in, stiff feathers cut through the air increasing her speed. In a heartbeat, she blasted past terminal velocity. She had to pass Savanna, she couldn’t simply grab her ankle.
Alexi urged herself on. The ground was rushing to meet them too quickly. She only needed a few more—
There.
Alexi reached out and held her friend tight. With a grunt, she flipped over and spread her wings wide. Her back wrenched as she fought to slow them both down. She wasn’t in time. Alexi flipped them both over and took the fall in her back, placing herself between Savanna and the ground.
They hit—hard.
The ground wasn’t perfectly flat, it sloped down. Alexi folded her wings around Savanna as they tumbled down the hill to come to rest at the bottom.
“That… was… amazing,” Savanna said. She heaved large breaths trying to still her heart.
Alexi let out a groan. Everything hurt. Her back and shoulders felt like they had been crushed. She had to return to the peak, she couldn’t fail Sydney. She cried out as she stood, her legs wobbling under her weight.
“What can he do with a lock of Sydney’s hair?” Alexi asked.
Savanna’s eyes went wide, “Anything he could do in person.”
She shot up into the air like a bullet, leaving Savanna behind. She couldn’t risk the additional weight as she beat her wings against the air. She needed speed, even as her body healed it would still slow her down too much to carry Savanna. Her right wing strained, having nearly been pulled its socket when she used them to slow her fall. A dull throb burned in her and she knew she had broken something… possibly several somethings.
The climb back up was agonizingly slow. Every second it took she imagined a different horror being inflicted on her little girl. She finally reached the top and stumbled to the ground, her right wing retracted involuntarily.
Shaughn was there, standing by the stone. He clutched Sydney’s hair in front of him, frantically shaking the lock as he spoke.
“I still have her hair, plunge your sword into the stone and set us free!”
Alexi reached out, the white light stretched out from her gauntlet and coalesced into Verum, her sword. The blade ran four feet long and six inches from edge to edge. It burned with an orange fire not of the Earth. She looked to the stone, then her blade. She couldn’t do it.
Something in her shifted. She couldn’t let Savanna die, and she wouldn’t let any harm come to Sydney, but she wouldn’t murder every man, woman, and child on Earth to do it.
“No.” She said
“Then I shall curse—”
Alexi charged forward, leading with her blade. She couldn’t let him have time to do anything but defend himself. Eldritch power crackled in the air around him. Lightning rippled up and down his arms as he gathered the electricity to him.
“I will place your sword in the stone with your dead hand!”
Lightning ripped through the air with a deafening roar. Forks of lightning struck her in the chest, sending her flying back to crash against an outcropping.
Alexi whipped her sword up in front of her, the broad blade caught the lightning. The energy shattered against the blade, sparking out to either side. Rock exploded as the energy displaced into it.
She struggled to her feet, holding the sword in front of her to deflect the now continuous bolts of lightning. Electricity arced off the sword to carve furrows in the ground to right and left.
Pain in her hands told her that not all the energy was bleeding off. Her fingertips were numb from the constant onslaught. The smell of burning flesh reached her nose, and with horror she realized it was her own. The metal in her gauntlets melted to run down her arm burning her skin.
Heedless of the pain, Alexi took one step forward, then another. Shaughn’s roar of rage was lost in the crack of thunder that shook the mountain top. Boulders exploded as he brought lightning down from the sky to join the ones he summoned with the Well.
One more step. The armor around her forearms blackened and fell off, then her skin charred and burned. Another step. She lost her balance on a loose rock and shifted slightly to the side. A bolt blasted past her sword to strike her shoulder. She fought to stay standing as her muscles convulsed.
Alexi screamed in pain as fire ran up and down her body. She dropped to one knee to keep from falling over. The constant crash of thunder left her ears ringing. The bolts were bright enough to burn after images across her vision.
Somehow, she regained her footing. He was close, only a few feet away. His visage was screwed up in a mask or rage.
Verum glowed bright red from the heat it absorbed. She could no longer feel her hands. She was too afraid to look to see what was left.
“Shaughn,” she screamed, “it’s not too late. Stop this madness!”
Her sword burned bright enough it obscured her vision. The heat from it burned her face and singed her hair.
“I want my garden back!” Was his only reply.
Alexi struck. Her blade arced through the air. It’s razor sharp edge heated to a fiery temperature hit flesh. He screamed. The lightning vanished and Alexi stumbled back, to stunned to move. Shaughn’s severed arm twitched on the ground. Blood seeped from his shoulder in spurts. The faerie’s eyes were wide with alarm.
Alexi pulled herself together. Her sword glowed with the heat of the lightning strikes he had rained down on it. Alexi leaped forward, spun on the ball of her foot, and sliced her blade through his neck.
He fell in two places.
The light finally broke over the horizon and bathed the top of the mountain in sunshine.
Alexi sunk to her knees, her sword clattering to the rock next to her. It unraveled, along with her armor, and vanished. Last to go were her wings, burnt and blackened from the battle.
As the emblems of divinity left her, she thought she would feel their loss… but in their wake, she felt only peace. She closed her eyes, and both warmth and weakness flooded over her.
With the dawn, something else came. Light crawled up Alexi’s skin, and her mind expanded. Memory flooded her mind, sweet and vivid. Meeting Malcom… her seventh birthday… joining the Army. They were jumbled and out of order, but they were there. She rolled onto her back and closed her eyes.
She remembered.
Alexi and Savanna’s story continues in Fall of 2017!
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-Cassy
Cassandra is an award-winning journalist, veteran of the armed forces, and jane-of-all-trades. She lives in Idaho with the love of her life and their three kids. After writing day in and day out for ten years, her spouse strongly encouraged her to try to make a living out of it. Since then, she's written under various pen-names and sold several stories of werewolves, witches, and the arcane. She plans on writing until the day she dies. Possibly after, if that's allowed. Learn more about her on Facebook or on www.CassandraSkyWest.com
Wreathed in Flame (Faith of the Fallen Book 3) Page 21
