Page 19 of Fire to the Stars

“You stole my dagger!” I shake priorities back into my head. “I told you to stay with the horses!”

“You’d be dead if I’d listened,” she snaps over the sparking collapse of a nearby store. A wave of ash flutters her swallowtail coat and makes us cough. Lucygekkers and paces, panting at Claire’s arrival. I’m still struggling to comprehend the scope of Claire’s criminal repertoire when I take her hand and let her help me stand.

She killed someone. She saved my life.

Criminal? Savior? Whoisshe?

“We have to go!” she shouts. “The fire will reach the horses!”

I run with her back the way we came. Lucy bounds after us. Over my shoulder, I glance at Hanna’s body. My shattered crossbow. Embers fall near Claire’s victim, dangerously close to the silver mask.

Ravinfort will be burned off the map. I can’t let the evidence burn with it.

I double back to the body and swipe the weapon. Removethe mask. Rosy-blond curls fall around a smooth, freckled face. Not a man. A woman, sweat-streaked with effort and sticky with ash. Blood gushes from her throat. She twitches, then stills. Her ice-blue eyes stare at nothing.

“Abel!” Claire grabs my arm, wild eyes desperate. But she’s not looking at me.

I follow her stare over my shoulder. Three, four, five more figures emerge from the shadows. Silverwolves growl and shake their black coats into a lifeless gray.

“Attaquez!” a figure shouts. His silverwolf lurches into a sprint.

We run for the burning bushes.

“Attaquez!” shouts another.

Lucy bolts ahead. Devours a short-lived path through the flames.

“ATTAQUEZ!”

I command Lucy to go left and then right, bruised throat aching as we duck and dodge falling branches. Flames lick at our heels. Claire coughs and stumbles. I catch her by the shoulders and pull her against me, shielding her head from a collapsing tree. Forced to find an alternate route, the masked figures grow quieter. Breathless, Claire and I help each other jump and skid down a rocky side slope.

Our boots hit cobblestone. Residential outskirts, a toppled ghost town. “Through those trees!” Claire gasps. I follow.

When we get to a small clearing, she stops short and covers her mouth in horror.

“Where are the horses?” I demand. Anger boils my already heated skin. “Claire, tell me you tied them so they couldn’t bolt!”

“I know how to tie a horse!” She runs a hand down sliced ropes, then rummages through a nearby bush. “They must’ve been cut loose.”

I clutch Micah’s skull, unable to run my hands through my hair. Even if we escape this, those saddlebags carried all our food. Our camping supplies. My pack. My spare weapons. Noctu end me. Myjournal. I nearly fall to my knees.

“I told you to watch my pack!” I roar. “Half of those things are irreplaceable!”

“I know!”

She throws something large and tan at me. It hits my chest with a thud. My arms grasp it tight when I realize what it is. My pack. She hid it in the bushes as a precaution. I’ve never been this relieved in my life.

Claire pushes bloody hair from her eyes. “You’re welcome,” she snaps.

Silverwolf howls break through the night. Shouts in the Old Tongue follow.

My relief cuts short. “We can’t outrun them,” I say.

“We can’t hide, either. The silverwolves will sniff us out.”

I adjust my grip on my daggers. “Find a tree to climb. I’ll fight them off.”

What am I saying? I can’t win this. But there’s no other choice.