Page 209 of The Stolen Throne
I imagine a hundred giant terravores shoveling together.
The tremble becomes a quake that slows the fighting. The din around me drops to a quiet rumble. I push my hundred terravores harder, and the quake becomes a violent shaking that knocks me to my knees.
“Watch the cliffs,” I gasp to Cain. I’m not sure if I can keep this up.
One more shove and I drop to my hands and knees, panting hard, and look up.
“Holy hells!” Cain’s exclamation is awe.
Water, so much water, rises like a white-tipped mountain over the top of the cliff. For a moment, I think I see the seven heads of the Devourer called the Revenant in the ocean beyond. Then the massive wave crashes down into Tropikis. Too much water to be reabsorbed by the cliffs. I can see the way the mighty trees fall in its wake, and I regret all the animals in its path.
“Aim it at the enemy!” I yell. “Try to keep it off the city!” I won’t kill innocent people if I don’t have to. Even the Flesh Reapers. Luckily, the palace is closest to the cliffs directly behind it. That will help.
Cain’s hands are already brilliant, too bright to look at. But the water is coming in a massive wave, fast and hard. It barrels through the jungle that covers the sides of the cliffs with no control.
Cain yells as he wills the water higher. The wave rises up over the trees, but it’s coming right at us. A massive moving wall of death that will decimate whatever it hits.
“As soon as you take out the soldiers, force it back to the ocean.” I lift my own hands again, even though my arms feel like overcooked noodles. Dead weight.
“The water will just keep coming,” Cain says.
“No,” I grit out. “It won’t.”
Time to build the cliffs back up. Now my imaginary terravores are plowing that sand from the bottom of the ocean, driving it, wedging it back under the dominion, packing it hard. I’m pushing them. Hundreds of them.
With no warning, I pitch forward and vomit from the effort.
Achlys is suddenly at my side. “Get up. It’s not finished.” With her help, I force myself shakily to my feet and keep going. I can’t stop. The water is still coming. Arms back up with her help, I keep shoveling sand, hoping it’s working.
The roar of the wave coming for us grows louder and louder, and I try not to let fear make me run away in terror. Because that’s what instinct is gnawing at me to do.
“Hold on!” Cain shouts.
The water blocks out the moons for a single, ominous moment before it crests the palace walls with a roar to wake the dead, louder even than the Whirlpool. It hits the ground and fills up the palace courtyard, but Cain has it. The wave parts in the courtyard, circling around our people gathered at the center, like there’s an invisible barrier protecting us, only to crash into itself on the other side, surrounding us in a torrent.
Those of our enemies mixed in among my people are the only ones safe from the torrent that takes out their fellow soldiers. They stand, gaping and damned lucky. No way could any of King Panqui’s people struck by the waters have survived that.
The violence of it is too much.
But I’m not done. I take back up my own power that I lost hold of in the wake of Cain’s wave. I keep pushing the dominion up, filling in the gaps in that cliff face as fast as I can. At the same time, Cain pushes the water back.
The thundering of the water grows fainter as we work in tandem. He pushes it back as I build up. Black spots dance in front of my eyes until I can hardly see. The last of the water finally goes over the cliff edge and disappears. But I keep working the land up. Building and building so that the ocean isn’t a threat.
I don’t stop until those black spots threaten to take my vision completely.
Until Achlys lets go. Until Cain is in front of me, his face in mine. “Stop,” I think he says. I can’t really hear him. “Meren, you can stop.”
I can?
I pause, staring over his head at the cliffs illuminated in moonlight.
By Nova… It worked.
89
Domina
My body goes wobbly, and I drop to the ground, or more like collapse. I manage to drape my arms over my updrawn legs, panting hard, stomach still heaving. I lay my cheek on my knee. Beside me, Cain flops to his back with a grunt.
