Page 106 of Commanding Flame and Shield
My body boiled with the anxiety of that truth, my canines sliding into place in response to a threat not here to attack. I sucked on one and did my best not to recoil. “Yes. No matter what we do. Something. Someone. Will be enough to bring us to that killing field. And our warriors will fall.”
FORTY-TWO
BATTLE CALL
AUGUST
A scream so agonizing my blood curdled in my veins. They were breaking her. Breaking one bone at a time and forcing me to watch. I thrashed against my chains, against the cold grey hands clamped around my throat, and yanking my hair to force my eyes up. Forcing me to watch. To witness Alvara claw towards me, sobbing, her face swollen, livid purple down her cheeks, and lips bleeding. Those beautiful eyes were red rimmed, the whites turned a horrifying ruby. The blood vessels had burst as they tortured her.
“Please!” She sobbed, pulling her broken body across the bloodied mud. A pale hand outstretched towards me. “Don’t hurt him.”
A strangled sob tore out of my chest. Tears were pouring down my face. Had been for some time. The blood and salt were all that scented the air. They’d stripped our magic. Or we’d used it down to the dregs. But there wasn’t an ember, or whisper of wind, or spark of lightning between us. Not an ounce of magic left to heal her. If our friends were nearby, they had nothing left to give us. No aid was coming.
“Don’t hurt him,” she sobbed again, as the club crashed down onto her pleading, pale hand. She cried out, the sound barely audible as the air left her lungs and she cradled the hand to her chest. Her fingers were bent wrong, and red now painted her fair skin. Still, she inched forward. Still, she tried to come to me. Broken, and bloodied, and dying. Agony tearing cries from her chest, she came for me.
A thick, grey hand reached down and pulled her up by her hair. Her cry cracked through the world as he lifted her. Her body was...wrong. Broken. There was blood, so much blood. Everywhere. It soaked what they left of her ribboned clothes, the torn skin beneath.
Those horrible grey hands set her on her knees, and she cried out. Broken. They’d broken her. Her legs buckled under the weight. Another set of hands heaved her upright, and they splayed her arms open as though she would be crucified there, in that rust-painted mud. Blood dribbled down her chin, leaked from her nostrils, rivulets running down her pale throat. Her slender, beautiful throat, now marred with bruises where hands had crushed her skin.
Mud squelched under heavy boots, and I looked up into the rain to see Agamemnon standing there, the drops splattering against his deathly skin. Those obsidian stones where eyes should be sneered down at me.
“Pathetic.” He spat the word, and then whirled on Alvara, backhanding her swollen face. She didn’t cry this time. Didn’t scream. Whether it was that iron will or she was out of screams to give, I wasn’t sure.
She lifted her face to him and shot a mouthful of blood towards the demon beast. So, iron will, then. He pulled a knife from the baldric across his shoulders. She didn’t waver, those agonized eyes staring down death incarnate.
Adrastos, coming up from the side, yanked what was left of her shirt away from her sticky body, and his brother plunged the knife down to free it from her skin. He tossed the strips of linen aside, leaving the bulk of her torso exposed to the pouring rain. She was covered in wounds. Everywhere. Her breasts, covered only by what remained of a thin elastic, heaved as she sucked in a breath. The surrounding demons cackled like satisfied hyenas. I roared my outrage, but the chains held me as I hurled towards her, biting into flesh and muscle. My body barely registered the pain as I bellowed her name.
She dragged down another breath, steadying herself against the agony. The agony she was already in. Against the torment she knew was coming. A great leather whip uncurled from Adrastos’ fist. He lowered onto his haunches to look her in the eye, snarling. She just bared her teeth. For once, I wished she would just concede. Stop this. Somehow. Why was she awake? Why didn’t her mind carry her under with the agony coating every inch of her?
“Say it,” Adrastos’ low, smooth voice slithered along my bones like a serpent. “You can make it all stop. Either of you.Giveme what he wants.” Hidden in his eyes, I swore there was a plea.
Alvara’s eyes narrowed, and I willed her to stop. To stop fighting. But she spat blood in Adrastos’ brutish face instead. “Go to hell.”
The words were meant to be a snarl. Meant to be one last act of defiance. But there was barely air left in her to lift the retort off her lips. And as Adrastos stood, wiping the blood from his face, her eyes guttered. She locked on me, lips trembling. She began shaking. In fear, pain, or cold. It didn’t matter.
No. Not like this. Not this goodbye. That’s all I could see in her eyes, our minds reduced to no more than mortals. The whip cracked.
I roared, but Alvara bit her lip. Hard enough to draw blood. She wouldn’t give him this. She wouldn’t die cowering.
That horrible crack again sliced through the air as it bit her flesh. Her eyes slammed shut, and she ground her teeth against the agony. Screams poured from me, my mind vaguely aware my own limbs were growing wet and warm below the shackles.
I couldn’t. I couldn’t. Not like this.
Not like this.
“ANYTHING!” I cried out, my voice hoarse. “Anything. Please. Please!” The chains and hands that had bound me released me, and I collapsed into the mud. I dragged the icy chains forward, towards her trembling body, now collapsed in on itself.
“Anything,” I breathed, bloody hands reaching out for her.
Her eyes, barely conscious, flicked to mine, and her lips formed one word. My name…
“August!!” Clear as wind chimes, Alvara’s voice pulled me into consciousness. Thunder clapped, too close. Much too close. And then my skin became aware of the dampness saturating each inch of the bed. Colliding into me in droplets.
My eyes flew open, and I recoiled, flying upright. The storm was inside our room. Was inside...me. Breath ragged, I panted, gaze flying from one part of the room to the other. Alec came bursting through the door, eyes wild. Water coiled around his fingertips. Fae was on his heels, their hands raised, ready to fight, just as Alvara was, on her knees across from me.
The storm ceased. My body hurled forward to heave into the trash can below. I vomited again. And again. Until only bile burned in my throat. My stomach seizing. Footsteps padded across the room as our companions closed the distance. More from the hall.
They were coming for her. For Alvara. To get to me.
