The gateway glowed with power and a constant stream of gryphons, their Riders pulling swords and knives out and following their comrades out to battle the jaklas.
Naiki landed as gently as possible, but it still made Raidyn slip to the side. I tried to hold on to him, but he was deadweight—far too much for me to manage. He toppled off, pulling me with him. He crumpled into a disjointed heap beneath me, breaking my fall, but, I was afraid, injuring him even more severely. Quickly scrambling off of him, I strained to roll him over. I nearly crumpled at the sight of his ruined body and ashen face.
“Help! Please, I need a healer!” I cried out, desperate and terrified he was already too far gone.
“Zuhra?”
I froze. My heart slammed against my ribs. It couldn’t be—
Hope shot through my body like lightning. I looked to the gateway where it had come from and everything went completely still and silent.
She sat atop a beautiful, golden gryphon, soaring into the Hall of Miracles, her eyes brilliant with Paladin fire as I’d always remembered them—powerful and poised and alive.
My sister was alive.
The gryphon swooped over to us and landed, crouching down on its front haunches, and then Inara was there, rushing to my side, her eyes moving over Raidyn with a dawning horror.
“Barloc,” she said, low and fierce. Then she looked up at me. “We can heal him, Zu. Together.”
I nodded, almost blinded by the tears swimming in my eyes.
Another gryphon landed nearby, and I barely registered that Loukas was also alive.
“No—Raidyn—no!” His guttural cry caused Inara to glance up at him.
“I will heal him,” was all she said.
“You don’t even know if that’s what power you have anymore!” Loukas cried, eyes wild, dropping to his knees with a thud on the other side of Raidyn’s inert body.
Instead of responding, Inara pressed her hands to Raidyn’s charred, bloody skin, her veins exploding with light, her power gathering and then flowing out into his ravaged body. He was barely even drawing breath anymore, his lips the bloodless white of a corpse.
Please. Please. Please.
With every painfully normal beat of my heart, that one word became my mantra, my prayer.
Then I put my hands on top of my sister’s.
I’d shared my sister’s power once before, to open the gateway; I’d joined my power to Raidyn’s multiple times, to heal and to kill. I’d felt the magnitude of both of their gifts in those moments. They had both been blessed with incredible amounts of power.
But nothing compared to what I felt when my power joined with Inara’s as we knelt beside Raidyn on the floor of the Hall of Miracles.
Whatever power she had once possessed had been a stream, beautiful and capable of bringing life to many, but so very small compared to what she now wielded—the roaring might of a waterfall, of a river, of an ocean, endless and incomprehensible in scope.
I was almost certain she didn’t need me at all, but I clung to her anyway, as images filled my mind—some I knew, from her childhood, but many were completely new and shocking in their unexpectedness. Saving Loukas on the back of Maddok; nearly dying; a voice telling her of her gift—a voice that the core of me knew somehow, though I couldn’t put a name to her; a light that was endless and eternal and powerful beyond imagination; a gift of power from that same voice that even now was pressing forward into Raidyn’s body; a kiss with Loukas that was so full of passion and need and love it took my breath away; and finally a bond with a gryphon that had carried her here.
Then we pressed on, together, her power interweaving with mine, letting me join my soul with hers as we saw flashes of Raidyn’s life together. But, even as images of his parents, of Naiki, and moments with me flew past, I felt … different. Inara wasn’t using my power at all; if anything, I felt stronger, more revitalized than I had in days—maybe even weeks.
Somehow I was still with her as her power infiltrated Raidyn’s wounds, healing with a speed and perfection that left me in utter awe. What had happened to my sister? She’d always been powerful but this … this was something else entirely. Where had it come from? Whose voice had I heard in her memories?
Always when I’d helped heal before, it had caused me pain and exhaustion—I’d felt myself being pulled out and into the person I was healing; and I’d lost consciousness nearly every time after reeling back into myself. But as Inara swiftly but gently finished her work and then pulled us both back out, turning her hands over to squeeze mine for a moment before releasing me, I felt … fine. More than fine. I felt as though she’d somehow healed and strengthened me at the same time as Raidyn, curing my exhaustion, erasing the strain of all the trauma and travel and lack of sleep and anguish.
My eyes flew open to meet hers.
Her smile was so full of joy and satisfaction—and peace. So much peace. Somehow, in that moment, I felt as though I were the younger sister. Whatever had happened to her in Visimperum had changed her, but in remarkable, breathtaking ways.
Then I looked down at Raidyn. His exposed skin was smooth, unmarred—not as though he’d been healed, but as if the injury had never occurred in the first place.
His eyes were still shut, but he looked as though he were just resting now. The color had returned to his lips and face.
“You did it.” Loukas’s murmur held all the relief and awe that coursed through me.
When I looked up, he was staring at my sister with a look so heavy with emotion, complex and full of meaning, it felt as though I were intruding on a private conversation taking place without words.
Then I remembered what I’d seen in her memories—the kiss they’d shared.
Eyes wide, I looked to her and was shocked to see just as much emotion in her gaze as she smiled that same peaceful, confident smile at Loukas.
“I told you I would.”
The citadel rumbled beneath us, a reminder that a battle was being waged outside. I wondered how much time had passed while she’d healed him. It had felt so fast …
I looked to the gateway. It was dark, closed once more.
But standing at the base of it was a handful of Paladin and gryphons—and one indomitable woman, well and whole and staring at me.
“Zuhra,” my grandmother said, soft, hesitant—but still audible even from across the hall. As different from the woman I’d left at the gateway a week ago as a person could be in such a short time.
Though I wanted to stay by Raidyn’s side, waiting for him to wake, I stood, my gaze never leaving hers.
She didn’t run, but she did hurry forward, and when she was only a foot away, she opened her arms. Before I even knew what was happening, my grandmother wrapped me in a hug as tight as it was shocking. I stiffened in disbelief for half a heartbeat. Ederra—my implacable, emotionless grandmother—was hugging me?
But then I quickly wrapped my arms around her narrow waist.
“I’m sorry,” was all she said, but it was enough.
I squeezed her tighter, until Inara said, “Zuhra, he’s waking up.”
Grandmother released me and stepped back. There was too much to say, and no time for it. She was already rushing back to her gryphon, to join the battle, a sword strapped to her back.
I turned to Raidyn to see his eyelids fluttering and then opening, his eyes as bright as I’d ever seen them. I dropped to my knees beside him as he struggled to sit up, his gaze roaming wildly over the room, until they landed on me, and then he exhaled and stilled.
“You’re alive,” I managed to choke out, through the emotion that rose up as he lifted one arm to wrap around me, pulling me into him with a fierceness that warmed every remaining inch of ice that Barloc’s attack had—
I stiffened so suddenly, he jerked back.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” His gaze roamed over me.
“My parents … Sharmaine … they were out there, with him—”
“We have to go help,” Loukas said,
standing.
Raidyn startled at the sound of his voice. “Loukas?” he said in disbelief. Then he noticed my sister, who had also risen to her feet, moving to stand by Loukas. “Inara! You’re both alive!”
“Thanks to Inara, yes, we are,” Loukas said, shooting her another one of those meaningful looks that almost brought heat to my cheeks.
Raidyn’s eyebrows furrowed, but with a slight shake of his head, he climbed to his feet. Naiki stepped forward, butting her beak into his back, with a low hoot.
“Zuhra? Inara!”
The tiny cry came from the doorway behind us, across the large hall.
I spun to see Sami, white-faced and trembling, staring at us.
“Sami!”
She hurried as quickly as she could across the wide expanse, tears streaking down her face. “I thought for sure you were all lost,” she said and pulled me into a hug.
“Where have you been? I thought you went back to Gateskeep!”
“I hid in the library,” she said into my hair as she squeezed me tight. “Why would I go back there when my family is here? I was waiting for you to come home. Praying that you would.”
Another explosion outside rattled the citadel, and my heart lurched up into my throat. Sami released me, and I turned to see Grandmother flying back through the shattered window, the blood drained from her face. She waved her arms with a shout. “Make room! Hurry—they’re bringing the wounded up!”
We rushed to obey, clearing the center of the room, just as a handful of Paladin soared through the broken window, carrying broken, bloodied bodies with them.
Everyone was covered in soot and grime and blood, so it took me a moment to realize one of the wounded was Sharmaine, being carried by a Paladin I didn’t recognize.
“Shar!” Loukas’s eyes widened. He ran to the gryphon carrying her, Inara right behind him. Raidyn sucked in a gasp when they gently laid her body down, exposing the extent of her wounds.
The other Paladin who stood by the gateway dashed forward and began helping to pull the other wounded down. Healers, I realized. Waiting here for this very moment, rather than joining the fight.
But there were too many for them, with more continuing to come through the window. Another Paladin I didn’t know even brought Sachiel and laid her body down near Shar’s.
I stood beside Raidyn, Naiki behind us, and stared at the carnage in horror. There had to have been at least a hundred Paladin that had come through the gateway—against sixteen. How were we losing this battle?
FORTY-THREE
INARA
I made myself focus on Sharmaine, too afraid to look at Loukas, to see what his face—what his eyes—would reveal as he stared down at her battered body. She was alive, but not for long. I’d thought myself prepared for this, for when we returned to the ones we had believed ourselves to love before the light, before the stream. But it turned out I wasn’t.
So I did what I knew I had been given this amazing gift to do.
I healed her.
As quickly and completely as I’d healed Raidyn. And even though her wounds were horrific, when I finished, pulling my hands away from her newly mended skin, I was a little tired, but not even remotely close to drained.
What had the Mother of all Paladin given me? What had I ever done to deserve a gift of such magnitude?
When Sharmaine’s eyes fluttered and opened, her chest expanding with a life-sustaining gasp of air, Loukas visibly sagged beside me, even on the periphery of my vision. I stood and turned away, unable to bear witnessing whatever reunion was about to take place.
“Thank you,” I heard him murmur as I walked away as quickly as I dared without making it too obvious that I was being a coward and fleeing.
My sister watched me, her eyes searching, mouth twisted with concern.
“What is happening out there?” I heard another healer question one of the Paladin who had brought a wounded comrade up.
“They’re all jaklas,” she responded, winded. “They’ve formed a circle around him. We can’t get close enough to do anything. Every time a battalion tries, we lose four times as many of ours as they do. We’ve only managed to slay five of them.”
“How many dead?”
I paused, afraid to know, but also unable to move away, to block the unknown Paladin’s answer.
“At least twenty,” she said, soft and defeated.
Grandmother, who had just walked over, made a noise that took a moment for me to realize was a strangled sob. “Call them back. All of them. We have to try something else.”
“What else can we do? We can’t use our power. The only hope we have of stopping them is to keep trying to get within range of using our knives and swords.”
“I will not allow our people to be slaughtered by them. Call them back. That’s an order!”
The younger Paladin finally nodded. “Yes, madam.” She wheeled her gryphon back toward the window and began shouting in Paladin as they soared out to the carnage below.
Grandmother’s eyes met mine, and I swallowed at the bleakness in her face.
Within a minute, dozens and dozens of Paladin and gryphons surged back into the Hall of Miracles, until there wasn’t room for any more. The last one to make it in, before the others had to hover outside the window and wait, was a familiar gryphon with two riders. They were both filthy, bloody and battered, but alive.
She saw me first, her eyes widening and then filling with tears. “Inara!” she screamed, struggling to dismount before Taavi had even landed. At her shout, Father’s head whipped to the direction she looked, and when he saw me, his face crumpled, his shoulders sagging forward. Taavi quickly landed and they both clambered off his back, running to where I stood, their arms coming round me in a hug so tight, I could barely breathe.
“You’re alive,” Father said, his voice thick with tears. Mother couldn’t speak at all, her whole body shook with sobs. “And your eyes,” he added, pulling back enough to look into my face. “How is this possible? What happened?”
I smiled through my own tears. “It’s a story for another time. Right now, we have to end this.”
“Right. Right,” he repeated, more forcefully, letting his arms drop with a sharp nod. He turned and I could see the general in him assessing the situation, his gaze traveling over those in the Hall of Miracles. When he noticed Loukas standing beside Sharmaine, he paused, his eyes widening. “Loukas!” he shouted.
Louk looked up to where we stood. I quickly glanced away, to the floor.
Outside the window, a gryphon screeched, a horrific sound, followed by more shouts and screams.
“They’re coming closer!”
“What do we do?”
There was no way to fit any more of the gryphons and Riders in the hall, but the ones left outside were sitting targets.
“Fly over the hedge—get out of range!” someone shouted back from within the hall.
An explosion boomed below us and the citadel trembled from the impact. It was only a matter of time before Barloc began to attack us as well—either storming the citadel or bringing it down over our heads.
For the first time, I realized I wasn’t having any blackouts—I wasn’t seeing anything when Barloc used his power. Either he was letting all of the other jaklas do the fighting for him, or we were no longer connected now that I had been healed in the light.
“What do we do, Ederra?” someone shouted, and all eyes turned to my grandmother.
My father stiffened and spun. “Mother? You’re alive!” And then he was running to her, weaving through the small spaces between all those smashed together in the hall.
“General Adelric!”
“It’s the general!”
The murmur grew louder, spreading across the hall … voices rising and rising, a swell of something that sounded like hope.
“General! What do we do?” The cries turned to focus on him as he grabbed his mother into a swift, bone-crushing hug.
He quickly released her and turned to
face his battalion and the others who had been willing to come, knowing they were risking their lives—as so many had already lost.
“We have to make them separate,” he said, in the language of Vamala for the benefit of my mother and sister. I hadn’t even realized everything else had been spoken in the Paladin language until that moment—another reminder that I somehow understood both languages now. “We can’t reach them when they’re huddled in a circle like this. But if we can get them to split into groups, then we would have a chance to take more of them out.”
“How do we do that?”
While my father and the others traded ideas, I felt him walking over to where I still stood, resolutely staring forward. I sensed Sharmaine behind him, the sanaulus from healing her now allowing me to recognize her emotions. I’d seen flashes of her life, as I always did when healing someone, had recognized how truly kind and good she was … and it had made me realize, if he truly did love her, I shouldn’t interfere. No matter what I felt for him.
“I can’t believe we’re all here together again. I really didn’t think it would happen,” Raidyn said from the other side of where I stood.
That’s when it hit me. I turned to face Raidyn and Zuhra, suddenly hardly able to draw breath. “Wait … where’s Halvor?”
Zuhra stared at me, stricken, and I knew, even before Raidyn spoke, hesitant and low, his words buzzing through my brain, barely decipherable through the roar of blood in my ears. Something about a Chimera and sacrificing himself … but all that mattered were the words he couldn’t bring himself to speak.
Halvor was gone.
I’d never even had the chance to say goodbye.
I’d healed two potentially fatal wounds in less than ten minutes without getting drained, but I’d been too late to save Halvor. The realization that I would never again see him, never again look into his eyes, or have the chance to speak with him, stole the strength from my legs. I staggered forward, my hand going to my chest, clutching my shirt over my sternum. I knew the peace that awaited us all when we crossed into the next life—I’d wanted to go there myself after feeling a mere moment of it; I knew the joy of reunion he was experiencing with his parents, whose deaths had been the source of so much anguish in his life … but in that moment, it didn’t matter. The only thing I could think was that the sweet, kind boy who had cared for me when nearly no one else had, was gone.
Warriors of Wing and Flame Page 32