Page 28 of Lies That Bleed
Her name was Liana and she had found her equal, someone she would die for, protect with her life. And I felt the same.
I was so excited to have actually survived this that laughter bubbled in my chest as she began her descent and the colors around us began to fade.
We were about ten feet from the ground when she peered down at me with compassion.‘Be strong, Aisling. For the both of us.’She spoke into my mind and I frowned just as she exploded into a ball of fire, encompassing my entire body in the flames. Pain like I’d never felt before consumed me, and then everything went black as I greeted death with surprise.
Chapter
Nine
Iwas dead. Just a ball of awareness floating in the void. There was no pain, no light, no long-lost relatives to greet me. I was floating in a black sky with no stars and only the voices to keep me company.
“What happened to her hair?” It was my father’s voice.
“We think she partially bonded before she died,” a stranger said.
“Bless you, child. May you have your place among the stars with your mother.” It was Elaine.
“I can’t announce this yet. The city is still reeling about Kohen bonding with a Talanagi,” my father said.
Shock laced through Elaine’s voice: “What will you tell the people? They’ll wonder where she is.”
“That she’s healing from extreme wounds. We can announce her death next week. I don’t want to start a panic,” my father said.
“What creature did this? Do we know?” Elaine asked.
“She was burned alive. And considering Kohen Badshah just bonded a dragon…” the stranger mused.
Elaine gasped. “You think Kohen killed her?”
They had it all wrong, but I was helpless to comment, floating in my black void.
“Or they fought for the same creature and he won,” the stranger said.
My father sighed. “Dammit, Aisling.” The words were angry, but his tone was not. His voice was broken. Like maybe the wordsI love youwere burning a hole in his tongue just as they had on mine so many times. “Zip her up. I can’t look at her like this anymore.”
Zip.
Silence.
I floated in the darkness for hours, maybe even days, my mind subdued. I didn’t have any entertainment yet I wasn’t bored. It was like I was frozen in this moment and fully content with it. Only when a golden glowing sun appeared on the horizon did I feel my mind become fully alert. I began to get memories and thoughts. I remembered being in The Wilds and watching Kohen fight a dragon, I remembered the firebird.
Liana.
My heart hammered in my chest as if I were suddenly thawing from a long winter’s sleep, like abear about to leave hibernation. Panic rushed through me as my mental faculties became sharper.
Where was I?
I… died. My father and Elaine, I heard their voices but… the sun lifted higher in the sky and I began to grow warmer.
Be strong, Aisling. For the both of us.Liana’s words came back to me as the sun suddenly wasn’t a sun but a ball of fire. And I was no longer floating in darkness but on top of Liana’s back. Her wings flapped madly as she turned in the opposite direction of the fire and tried to get us away from its flames. Was she there the whole time? Carrying me on her back?
The flames licked across the sky like lightning and I instinctively pulled my sword with one hand and gripped the feathers on her back with my other. Standing atop her shoulders, I turned around, rocking to keep my balance, and held the sword out to fight off any danger.
“What’s happening?” I asked her. There were no mountains below us, only clouds, as if we were above the world I knew and loved, in a different place I couldn’t explain.
‘You have to be strong. I will survive but you might not. Others haven’t. Fight, Aisling. Fight!’Liana said.
“Fight what?” I yelled, terrified as the now wall of fire rushed towards us.
