by C. R. Grey
Whit whit whoo!
And then Gwen took off, scrambling down the rocks and charging toward Phi. Bailey tried to see if Phi had heard the whistle, but his view was blocked by a cloud of bats. Gwen whistled again as she ran.
The bats swerved, and Bailey’s breath caught in his throat—Phi was struggling, flapping frantically and tethered to a pole by a leather strap. It was her. He made a run for it, ready to cut the strap with the tiger claw he clutched with his hand.
TIME SLOWED. PHI’S SHARP eyes took in the sight of Bailey and Tremelo in danger, and the haze of Dominance fell away. She remembered how she’d gotten here, and who she was. She was a bird and a girl, straddling two worlds—and right now her friends needed her, because she had the key to defeating Viviana’s army.
At the thought of Carin, her friends, her family, those she loved—it awoke something in her that resisted the Dominance. And not only that, but memories came flooding back to her. She remembered how she’d changed into a bird, and why she’d changed. Yet none of it mattered. These would be her last moments as a falcon and it didn’t matter.
She closed her eyes and remembered the forsaking spell. She remembered the chant as the words formed before her, and she felt a sense of understanding. Release me, she thought. I want to be a human again—and suddenly her body was stretching and contorting. A reversal of what she’d wanted. Her talons elongating and fingers forming; her skull growing and her brain expanding; her body stretching. She felt all her organs contracting, growing—and the pain was so excruciating she thought she might implode. There was no way to live through this agony, no other side. And when she’d passed the point of no return, when she was certain the last sensation she’d feel was like a thousand knives cutting into her skin, the worn leather strap around her ankle tightened and burst.
Phi feared she would die. But she needed to tell her friends that there was a way to drive back the Dominance.
Her first words were the names of her two best friends.
“Bailey! Gwen!” she called out in her human voice. And when she saw their faces, she knew it was worth it. Even if she could never shift back to her falcon form, being here was worth it.
BAILEY TORE HIS EYES away just as Phi transformed back into her human form. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her tear away the piece of the white canvas tent and cover herself as she broke into a run. Gwen grabbed her hand and pulled her off to the side of the battle. Before she disappeared into the trees, she stole a glance at Bailey and nodded once. It warmed his heart with triumph.
They ran to the cover of nearby trees and scrambled back up the ravine.
“Look at that,” said Taylor. He pointed to the treetops at the far edge of the ravine. In the sky, the black outlines of birds flew overhead.
“What is it?” asked Hal, running up alongside them. Tori was at his side, and all of them squinted at the cloudy sky.
“It’s people’s kin,” said Tori. “They’re not Dominated, though. Not yet.”
A rustle to their left caused them to gasp; out of the undergrowth ran a herd of brown and white rabbits. They dashed to the rocks and then began hopping down along the steep cliff face, into the ravine. Bailey leaned over the rock and saw that a pack of wolves had already joined the Allies on the battlefield, despite the Velyn’s attempts to keep them out of the Dominae’s reach. Other forest creatures appeared at the foot of the cliffs, drawn by the adrenaline of their human kin.
“They’ll only become weapons,” Bailey said. He sensed the tigers back at camp, pacing relentlessly among the tents, flashing their teeth at the sounds of fighting happening just yards away. They stayed where they were, but other animals began to appear on the rocks and from behind the trees, watching the battle unfold just like Bailey and his friends.
“I don’t know about that,” said Tori, pointing through the bushes to the field. “Look at the animals fighting in the front lines.”
The two armies clashed at the foot of the cliff face, and though Bailey expected to see each rabbit, fox, badger, and more that had joined the Allies falling prey to Dominance, they were fighting alongside the Allies, advancing on the Dominae with no sign of being controlled. While the front lines clashed, however, the animals inside the perimeter of the fire horses stood still, unblinking.
Bailey showed his friends what he saw; Hal and Tori nodded as the realization dawned.
“It’s like the machines are controlling how far the Dominace can go,” Gwen said.
“But we saw what happened at the Fair,” said Tori. “Viviana could control this whole valley if she wanted. Why would she limit her power now?”
Bailey scanned the battlefield; past the flank of fire horses, riding on her own mechanical charge, sat Viviana. He remembered the trace of panic in her demeanor when the Reckoning had grown beyond her restraint.
“She’s afraid of herself,” he whispered. “She lost control at the Fair.”
“That may be,” said Hal. “But she’s also more powerful if she reins in the Dominance like this.”
Bailey and the others looked at Hal. After a moment, Tori gasped.
“Of course!” she said. “It’s just like the orbs. The energy of the Dominance, when it’s contained, can react to itself. It builds power.”
“Right,” said Hal. “So horses are like the walls of the orbs.”
Bailey stared at the unmoving soldiers within the Dominae’s core, and shuddered. The Allies had a fighting chance as long as their animal kin were outside that perimeter, but he hated to think what might happen if they actually fought their way through. Their side didn’t have enough orbs to ward them off. And all the kin who had joined in the fray would be at the mercy of the Dominae. The Allies wouldn’t stand a chance.
“Guys, we have trouble!” Tori said. The fire horses were unleashed onto the crowd. In the distance he saw one of the horses advancing on his father from behind. Its rider fought at the torrent of kin, but the eyes of the fire horse were focused, unwavering, on Herman.
“DAD!” Bailey called out just as Taleth roared. His dad turned a split second too late; Bailey saw his body slammed down to the ground. He lost sight of his dad and his adrenaline spiked. He slid down the rocks, hopped over two animals pawing viciously at one another, and sidestepped archers and soldiers who fought the Allies. There was a cloud of feathers and claws blocking his view; the kin were frantic.
He was vaguely aware of Gwen calling to him, but he could only focus on reaching his dad. He saw the Tully and a group of women overtake the horse who had attacked his dad. Then two women heaved up his dad’s body, and Bailey saw his dad could not lift his head. His clothes were covered with blood.
Around him he saw that many other kin, however, appeared to be swirling back against their will, pulled by the Dominae’s growing force. Bailey grabbed the tiger’s claw from his belt and hacked at a vulture who attempted to swoop down at him. The claw tore through its chest and it fell to the ground with a thud, flapping its wings violently. There was so much blood. It made him sick to his stomach.
Bailey reached his father and propped him up to sit. The Defiance women beat back the nearby possessed kin and Dominae soldiers, though the danger was immediate.
“I’m going to get you out of here,” Bailey assured him.
“I know you will,” his dad said, trying to smile. He cradled his right side as if he’d broken an arm or a rib. He had bloody gashes all over his neck and chest, and his face was contorted with pain. Meanwhile, from where Bailey sat he could see the vulture he’d slashed; its movements were slowing, and it could barely flap its wings. It was as if he’d ripped a gash in his own chest. The agony he felt watching it struggle was overwhelming. I’ve taken its life, he thought when it finally lay still.
But just as soon as he thought it, the vulture lifted its head and scanned the area until it locked its eyes on Bailey.
“No,” Bailey whispered. He was certain the bird had died; he’d felt the life drain out of it. Yet now it extended
its wings so that Bailey could see its bloodied chest in full glory. It jumped up in the air and dove toward him.
Cutting through the air, it extended its talons and tried to claw at his face—but one of the Defiance warriors stepped between them and brought a pan up and over, smashing the bird down before it had reached them. It was Myra, the woman he’d met once they crossed the canyon.
“Thank you!” he breathed.
“Behind you!” she yelled.
Bailey spun around, the claw in his hand—but it was a metal horse, and against that he was practically defenseless. Myra ran to his side and lifted the pan up once more, but it would do no more good than his own weapon.
As the steed reared back on its hind legs, snorting flames from its welded nostrils, Bailey tucked his head down into his dad’s chin. He waited for the heat, for a fire that would burn him with his dad in his arms—but instead his ears rang with a high, long note not unlike music. He looked up and saw Tremelo, swinging the sword up toward the horse with all his strength. Bailey expected sparks to fly as the steel of the sword met the silver enamel of the horse’s neck—but they didn’t. Instead, the sword met no resistance at all, slicing cleanly through the fire horse as if it were slicing through a piece of wobbly custard in the Fairmount dining hall. The rider let out a yelp of surprise and fell backward as his steed’s metal head went sliding, then crashing, down to the ground.
The pure sound hung in the air. It seemed to be coming from the sword. Then he noticed that the birds and bats who had clouded his vision before were now giving him a wide berth. In fact, they circled him in a perfect formation, but from several feet away on all sides. Gliding and dipping, they seemed to echo the sound of the sword with their movements, participating in a dance that only they could understand, but that Bailey felt growing inside of him too. The song of the sword was protecting them and their bonds.
Bailey whirled around, meaning to thank Tremelo. But his teacher had lifted the sword over his head once more. The way he held it was unnatural, as though it were against his will—and he had a pained look on his face.
“Bailey, run—” he managed to say in a strained voice.
Myra and the other warriors were now fighting off soldiers and the reanimated kin. Behind him, at the top of the hill, the true force of the Dominae army stood silhouetted against the pink-streaked clouds: an impenetrable formation of fire horses, with a mass of dead-eyed beasts behind them. They would never stop coming.
Then, Bailey saw the mounted figure on the rocks behind his mentor: Viviana was watching them. Ash from the mouth of her fire horse swirled in the air around her, mixing with the ash from the other horses that had followed her down the riverbed. They stood in a loose formation, each one only yards away from him. He and Tremelo sat inside Viviana’s web. Everything seemed to Bailey to be taking place in slow motion: he looked up at the cloudy sky, and saw several birds flying around him and Tremelo in a perfect, uniform circle. A horde of foxes, rabbits, and other kin were creeping on all fours or slithering from the woods, joining in the slow, meticulous circle as they neared where Tremelo stood. They watched Bailey with lifeless eyes.
Taleth stirred, and lowered herself in the distance—as if she was ready to break into a sprint. Bailey couldn’t tell who she’d attack or what she was thinking. Viviana’s influence was blocking him. He remembered what Clarke said, that Viviana and her metal steeds were impossible to defeat. That they were tainted, evil, and fed off of fear. But Bailey couldn’t accept it.
“Tremelo,” Bailey whispered as he clutched the orb in his hand. He kept his eyes on Tremelo’s fists. “Don’t be afraid. You can resist this—you can resist her.”
“Surrender to it!” Viviana called out. She wore armor made of the same silver-enameled metal as her horse. The flickers of flame from its nose reflected in her breastplate.
The air around Bailey felt thick, as though he could actually sense the warping of the bond happening around him. Viviana’s power radiated out from her, and then doubled back again as it reflected off the horses in the circle. It made Bailey’s skin tingle and his hair stand on edge. Taleth lunged down from the rocks and ran toward them. The ash from the horses rose off the white rocks, buffeted not by wind but by an invisible electro-current that emanated from Viviana herself.
Tremelo lifted the sword. “But I am afraid,” he said with a grunt.
Every muscle in Tremelo’s face and neck seemed to shake with the effort of resisting Viviana. Bailey glanced to his side: the possessed animals circled in closer—he couldn’t escape without them tearing him to pieces.
“I’m not,” Bailey said. And it was true. He’d worried about the people he loved, and the fate of the kingdom, but his faith in Tremelo had never wavered. He was their king. He believed in the bond. There was no one in all of Aldermere more fit for the job of repairing what they’d damaged through Dominance. The book of prophecies told him he was the Child of War, but only now did he know what it meant. It meant to prevent wars, and to remind people that their bonds would overcome the darkness.
Tremelo lifted the sword higher and made a ragged sound halfway between a breath and a cry. Bailey closed his eyes as the song of Melore’s sword rang out. He heard Gwen scream and felt Taleth’s anger. He tried to hold steady to this feeling of unshakable faith, but it was harder and harder the closer Taleth came—the tiger was preparing to lunge.
TREMELO LOWERED THE SWORD just as Taleth slid to a stop a few feet behind them. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. My hands—they weren’t my own. It was almost as if the sword was helping me, though. It wouldn’t let me give in.” He looked at it with wonder.
“The sword didn’t resist her Dominance. You did,” Bailey said.
“Horses! Formation!” Viviana called from the rocks. Even from here Bailey could feel her anger, and the heat of her stare.
Tremelo stood tall to survey the ring of fire horses that surrounded them. The horses and their riders were closing in. “They’re creating a circuit,” he said. “We must flee.”
“But my dad’s been hurt,” Bailey said as he looked down at Herman in his arms.
Tremelo knelt down and looked into Herman’s eyes, and the two men nodded solemnly at each other. “We’re going to get you two to safety,” Tremelo told him. He eased his shoulder under Herman’s arm as if to help him walk. “Stay with me.” Then he rushed Herman to the nearest edge of the circle and tried to evade a parade of Dominated animals—but they abruptly stopped their movements and began to follow him instead. At the edge, Tremelo plunged the sword into the flank of a fire horse with his free arm, then swung himself around with Herman in tow—“Duck, Bailey!”—and sliced off the head of the one next to it. The soldiers dismounted, panicked. Bailey looked back as Tremelo left the circle: the animals were now rushing toward them and the remainder of the horses plodded slowly, mechanically in their direction as well.
“They’re following the sword!” Bailey said. “The bond is pulling them with us now!”
Together, the three of them half walked and half ran down the rocks. It was obvious that his dad was in pain. They went as far as the riverbed could take them, and came to an abrupt stop at its ending; what had surely once been a waterfall down the mountain was now nothing but a steep, high cliff. Bailey staggered as he looked down and saw the tops of trees many, many yards below. The clatter of metal hooves pounding the rocks echoed up to Bailey’s ears.
“I think we should step back,” his dad said. The ground underneath them began to shake. Bailey thought he heard someone call his name from the trees, but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the oncoming army. The stampeding metal horses reminded him of the dust storm he and his friends had endured in the Plains—menacing and unreal, like a mountain suddenly given the power to move. The fire horses charged across the rocks. Their red eyes gleamed. Behind them came all the animals whose lives had been taken in the battle, but whose bodies had been forced to keep fighting.
Tremelo stood at the edge of
the cliff and planted his feet firmly on the rocks.
“Get close,” he ordered. “Hold on to your father.”
Bailey wrapped his arms around his dad’s other side as Tremelo held Melore’s sword high with his free hand. “Don’t let go!” he said.
Suddenly, they were surrounded by fire and blackness.
“Bailey, I was afraid!” Tremelo yelled over the noise of animals that stampeded toward them. “I was afraid I couldn’t be the king my father was.”
“And now?” Bailey yelled back. He could barely hear himself as he held up his father. The animals were closing in.
“And now I know I won’t be the same kind of king. I’ll be my own king. Knowing that makes me less afraid.”
Just then the horse stampede arrived and split around them like water around a river’s stone. The contraptions leapt into the chasm below. Stumbling, the wounded, mangled animals that had no life left in them except Viviana’s will came charging after the ponies, drawn by the hum of the sword. The kin were still Dominated, but the sword created a barrier of protection—a safe bubble in which they could stand without fear.
The animals swarmed around Bailey and followed the horses to their final rest. The current in the air snapped around the sword. Bailey felt the Dominae’s power draining away as Tremelo’s grew stronger. When finally the last of the metal steeds had launched themselves off the cliff, Bailey let go of Tremelo. Breathless, they peered over the edge. All they could see was a black cloud of ash that rose up the cliff and unfurled over them.
Bailey’s dad slumped to the ground.
“Dad, are you okay?” he asked, crouching down next to him.
“I’m fine, Bailey—just a little scratched up and overwhelmed, is all.” But Bailey thought he was a lot more than scratched up. Now as his jacket fell open, Bailey saw he’d been trampled on his left side by the metal horse, and could barely move his left arm or even walk.
