Page 60 of Savage Crown
The word pulsed through me as Valkaryn heated in my palm. I switched her awkwardly to my left hand, biting back a yelp. If she melted before I did anything, this whole insane plan would be pointless.
‘Blast him,’I told her, desperation licking at the edges of my thoughts.
‘I’m trying. I’m also fighting him melting me, while keeping Mind Render from controlling either of us. He’s powerful.’
So she was tied up doing three jobs at once. Perfect.
Which meant the distraction part was up to me.
“Look out! Chicken!” I shrieked, pointing behind him with a face full of horror. My voice cracked like I’d seen death itself.
He risked a glance over his shoulder.
I lunged.
I shot forward, intending to stab him straight through, but Valkaryn froze mid-swing—my entire arm locked in place as if someone had hit pause. Probably a safeguard preventing a controlled wielder from simply stabbing her captor.
Fine.
No sword?
Then feet it was.
I kicked him right between the legs, sharp and upward, as hard as I could, still holding my arm rigid and useless behind me. My boot connected with soft parts. He let out a strangled, choking groan and folded, eyes bulging. Valkaryn jerked free of whatever hold had frozen her, and the blistering heat vanished in an instant.
Before he could recover, a pulse of purple light shot from her tip, clean and precise. It ripped through his forehead, right between the eyes. He didn’t even gasp. He just dropped, crumpling into a heap as blood dribbled down his nose and lips, soaking the cobblestones beneath him.
The shield around us collapsed like cobwebs dissolving in rain.
Shouts erupted from the guards outside the courtyard. Metal clanged. Voices rose.
Val stirred in my grip, urgent.
‘Okay, I think Mind Render is watching everything that’s gone on through these soldiers’ eyes, and he’s going to send anyone in your path at you.’
‘Anyone?’I balked.
‘Like bees, thousands of bees in this city, but we need to find the queen.’
I couldn’t help it. I grinned.
King Harrow being called a queen was the best insult I’d heard all week. He’d hate being called that.
‘I don’t want to kill innocents,’I told her as I clanged swords with one of the soldiers nearest me. The metal rang like a bell, jolting through my arm. Howls rose up in the night air, eerie and layered, and I wondered if he was sending wolves after me. I thought shifting into wolf form was against the rules here, but maybe he allowed it in this case.
‘You need to hide out somewhere, then sneak into the castle,’Val told me.
I parried a blow, sparks flying, then cracked the soldier across the side of the head with enough force to make him slump. My lungs burned as I rushed to the back of the courtyard, darted past the bathhouse, and leaped over the wall. My boots landed on hard earth, knees bending to absorb the fall.
Sorry, chicken, you’ll have to find your own way home.
I asked Val:‘Hide where? He has eyes all over the city if he’s using everyone.’
‘Not everyone. Remember what you found when you first came here?’
Children.
My stomach dropped.
