And then he was sprinting, tackling Cassius before he could react, crashing him down from the stone altar as his black griffin reared. It emitted a throaty caw as it leapt into the top of the aisle, skidding into the brawling men. I was running before they halted, aware the air was thickening with hissing threats. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled in recognition. They were the cries of the natural world, challenging the unnatural. I shot a look back and my unique, one-in-a-million twin was standing inside the old stone entranceway, flanked by the flock of ravenous cinereous vultures.
‘He brought the vultures,’ I whispered to myself wonderingly.
And then pandemonium enveloped us all.
Eli waved the flock forward, and there had to be at least twenty of them now. They were smaller than the griffins by half, but far more experienced at the hunt. They were also territorial. I could tell by the look on their ugly, ravined faces that they weren’t intending to leave hungry. The vultures took to the air with easy precision, creating a black tunnel of wind as they soared down towards the griffins.
The griffins responded immediately, rearing to the unexpected challenge, and shaking free their mounts.
‘Tal, move!’ Max yelled, approaching at a run with Unus lumbering behind him.
I scanned the guards. There was no order any more. Every inch of the stone floor was a writhing mess of giant birds and soldiers, Diasord meeting Diasord, beaks tearing flesh. Anguished screams and crows merging with the stench of blood, until it was impossible to tell who was who.
Come what may nature finds a way. The words were in my head and heart, as I bent low and ran right into the heart of the mayhem.
The encroaching dawn poured a mist over the chaos as I searched, as if to fade the violence. But at last I found what I was looking for: a small limp body right in the centre.
Aelia was white and unmoving, although there was a large wound at the base of her neck, where the griffin had buried its beak. She’d also lost a lot of blood, which was congealing around her head, and as I dropped to my knees beside her, I was vaguely aware of Max also skidding in beside me. I pushed the tips of my fingers into her neck, and could just feel her strength and fire, hanging on by a thread. I threw Max a terrified glance. He nodded and leaning forward, scooped her up as gently as though she were newborn.
He stood up, cradling her.
‘Run!’ I yelled furiously. ‘I’ve got your back!’
I lifted my slingshot and fired at a guard running directly towards Max’s broad shoulders. My small stone hit him square in the forehead, stunning him long enough for Max to start sprinting, through the frenzy, towards the tower. We both knew Aelia’s own meagre first-aid stores were probably her last chance. If there was one.
And he ran as though his tree-running pride depended on it, dodging griffins and laser fire, despite his unconscious load. I kept my slingshot trained, firing and reloading repetitively, and he was nearly there, nearly at the tower.
Then I saw it. A single lone arrow, flying straight down the aisle, as though caught up in a time warp. So, it was both slow enough to watch, and too fast to stop, all at once. It was following Max and Aelia. Too closely. Until everything fell into some sort of disordered, distorted motion.
Because it couldn’t happen. Not now. Not while I had his back. Not doing something I’d instigated. Unquestioningly. For me.
But it did.
It found him. Buried itself at the top of his spine. And he paused, as though he couldn’t quite believe it himself. Indignant. Before collapsing. First onto his knees, and then sideways into a heavy sprawl, his shoulder bearing the brunt of both their bodies. Being the hero. Always.
And my world slowly fragmented, like a jigsaw being pulled apart by a cyclone. All at once we were back at the waterfall, the only moment in our lives Max had ever been vulnerable. The only moment Eli and I had ever needed to rescue him.
My gaze swung back, fuelled by denial, towards the source of the attack. Cassius. Lowering a short bow he had picked up from a fallen guard, a triumphant grin infecting his face.
And although it was my hand that grabbed the Roman dagger on the floor, it didn’t feel like my legs that flew across the chaotic floor towards him. Towards the man who might as well have fired the arrow at me. Towards the man I loathed with more intensity I ever thought possible.
Towards my own black blood.
As a single word penetrated my fog.
‘Please!’
Atticus. And there was just enough desperation in his voice for me to deflect the blade, and smash the butt-end of the dagger across Cassius’s temple instead. He staggered backwards, and sprawled to the floor as Atticus skidded to his side, grabbing his father’s fallen Diasord. He turned it back up towards me, his black eyes terrified and pleading, asking me to understand. But it didn’t touch me – nothing could.
‘He’s still my father,’ he said hoarsely, panting.
Cassius was muttering, dazed by my blow, and I had the satisfaction of watching a dark welt of skin split around his left eye socket. I gripped the dagger and held it high. I could let its own weight drive it downwards into his neck and, even if Atticus used the Diasord on me, it would all be over. A life for a murderous life. It was a good trade, wasn’t it?
‘Hunt to survive, Talia, nothing more.’
Grandpa’s voice. As strong and loudly as though he were standing next to me.
I resisted. I needed this. But he was there, staying my arm. Letting the death adder slither away. I inhaled painfully.
‘Talia, please?’ Atticus lowered his Diasord, pleading with me. To be humane. To choose life. Didn’t he know it was past that?
‘Hunt to survive, Talia, nothing more.’
I dropped the dagger with a clatter and backed away, letting the fog take my thoughts. Just as Unus lumbered up behind me, his pudgy face white with exertion. He struck out at two large griffins rearing in Cassius’s defence. They fell away, stunned.
‘Tal?’ he rumbled.
The room was awash only with blood and vulturic interest.
‘Tal …?’ he tried again, gently placing his huge boulder-hand on my shoulder.
I looked up at him and breathed out the only thought in my head.
‘… Max …’
And Unus understood, as he always did. Turning with a rumbling roar, he started batting a line directly through the chaos, knocking soldiers aside as though they were rotten tomatoes spoiling a harvest.
And we were halfway down the aisle when a riderless griffin struck out in a frenzied panic, the violence of its attack bringing a vulture to a tumbling crash in front of us. The griffin recovered first, driving its beak down through the vulture’s sparse tail feathers as Unus reached out and, lifting them as though they were river stones, scattered them down the middle pew. Clearing the aisle. Until finally there were only two inert bodies before us. Still and lifeless on the cold stone floor.
‘Max …’ my voice cracked as I sagged to my knees beside him, barely noticing as Unus deflected another looming guard.
I slid an arm under Max’s head and lifted, despite the eruption of pain the manoeuvre cost me.
‘Max!’ I whispered dully. ‘Please … you can say it …’
I was only dimly aware of the chaos around me, of Unus continuing to protect me as I cradled Max’s heavy head.
‘Talia?’ My name hung on the air, but it wasn’t Max’s teasing voice.
It was an altogether deeper, harder tone, although right now it was also unrecognizably gentle.
‘Max?’ was all I could whisper, conscious too of Aelia’s inert state.
If there had been a time we could help, surely that had passed. August dropped down beside his sister, and rolled her over. Her warm skin had taken on a pallid, waxen look, while creeping blue veins were reaching out beneath her glassy eyes. I looked away, not wanting to see her hold ebbing away.
‘We have to move, Sir … the Prolets, Sir!’ Grey interrupted, pointing beyond our hea
ds.
I glanced up and caught my breath. A stream of terrified Prolet children were emptying out of the tower, and into the waste ground outside the cathedral. And as if it heard, the air grew suddenly dark as the huge, dark creature circled back, closing the awakening sky with its oppressive shadow. I shot a look back into August’s drained face. The Prolets must have realized Unus was no longer protecting the stairwell, and made their escape before Cassius sent his guards inside. But out there they were even more exposed and vulnerable. I tried, really tried to think. But for once, the fire was out. What was the point any more? It was hopeless.
Cradling Max’s head, I reached around and snapped off the exposed arrow length. The wood felt tapered and smooth, and when I withdrew it, it lay in the palm of my hand as innocently as the day it grew. It was partially stained, which was a curious irony. It too had been green and full of life, and now it too lay in pieces, bloodied and still in my hands.
Then an iron-clamp grip beneath my arms dragged me to my feet.
‘No!’ I screamed hoarsely, writhing and kicking back hard. ‘I’m staying!’
A rough hand seized my face, forcing it up. It was August, and for a second I thought I detected empathy and real pain in the contours of his dust-stained face. He’d lost Aelia.
But what did he really know of either me or Max?
‘Grey is a medic. He can help … and Unus will stay, to protect them,’ he said in a low voice.
Unus nodded, and shuffled closer as if to convince me of his loyalty. As though I needed it.
August’s proud Equite insignia was masked with thick congealing blood, as Grey dropped beside Max and Aelia, two more guards standing by.
‘There are still the Prolets. Max would want you to help them. To live. For everyone’s sake,’ August urged, needing me to trust him.
I pulled back. I didn’t and I couldn’t leave Max; it was impossible.
This time August reached out and grabbed my shoulders.
‘I thought you understood!’ he seethed, as though he’d been suppressing the words for a long time. ‘Don’t you understand how important you are? The price on your own damned feral head?’
One of Cassius’s guards careered into our circle. There was a momentary clash as Unus reached forward, then a sickening crack before he dropped him to the floor, motionless. I looked up at the fury creasing his gentle face, and closed my eyes. This war wouldn’t be done until it had made monsters of us all.
An unnatural cry punctuated the sky. I gritted my teeth. It was closing in.
‘Now,’ August ground out, grabbing my hand, and somehow, my feet fell into step beside him, stumbling towards the stone archway that led outside.
We reached the ruined doorway and paused as mayhem rose to greet us. Prolets, scattered all over the grassy scrubland outside the cathedral, lost and vulnerable without Atticus to lead them. My body filled with an emotion, but I was too exhausted to identify it. Was it fear? Or denial? I only knew the ground was staining black, as the shadow approached like a brewing storm.
I’d lost Max. My chest felt like it was on fire, and I was struggling to take a full breath. But it still wasn’t over. I threw my gaze skywards. It was the same creature I’d seen when Lake had been taken. I was sure of it. Cassius’s mythical haga-phoenix.
The era of the black aquila.
Rajid’s traitorous words spun out of nowhere. I blinked and was back in the Flavium again, staring at Livia’s contemptuous profile as a huge, double-headed angel of death soared down to adorn her balcony, while the terrified Prolets awaited their fate.
I closed my gritty eyes. I could still help.
‘Find somewhere to hide!’ August growled. ‘I’ll round them up.’
I nodded, but he knew better of course. And as I stumbled instead towards the dispersed Prolets, I caught the faint echo of another sound. I exhaled harshly, aware my limbs felt detached and spent.
Cassius’s hounds below ground, and an angel of death above.
‘Molossers!’ I yelled, converting all my emotion into one last burst of adrenaline. ‘For the love of Arafel, move!’
Chapter 20
Chaos split the night. Terrified Prolets were scattering in every direction, and the nerve-shredding baying was getting louder every second. I wheezed as I ran, conscious the molossers’ powerful legs would make short work of the tunnels beneath the ruined cathedral. And suddenly, I was intensely aware that I hadn’t seen Eli since his release of the vultures.
A single-armed satyr ran in front of me, chasing the AWOL miniature griffin. I scooped both up, searching for a safe corner, and exhaled with relief as I caught sight of my twin, protecting a small group of Prolets beneath a broken stone lintel.
Surging across the waste ground, I deposited both with Eli before scanning the ground again, ignoring his entreaties. August had found Therry trying to follow the pig-dog down the tunnel steps behind the fallen gargoyle, while the rest of the young satyrs were still scattering in all directions. I ran out in the direction of a young satyr, acutely aware of fresh attention from the sky.
The black aquila was circling lower, its amber eyes in full hunting mode, as it suddenly power-dived, its coarse cry raking the air. I paused momentarily. It was a breathtaking sight. Its blood-red flight feathers gleaming in the encroaching dawn, its heads low and angled for the hunt. This creature wasn’t born out of scientific curiosity for a lost era, it was the signature of something different. Something experimental, savage and archaic all at once. And it had a nature of its own that felt brutal and uncompromising. My lip curled. Hadn’t it heard about the Minotaur?
I pelted towards the small satyr who was frozen to the spot, and pushed him as hard as I could. He went sprawling towards Eli, and I shot a twisted, satisfied smile to the sky. The creature wasted no time in proclaiming its fury, while adjusting its direction. And it was a most magnificent, arresting sight all at once: the creature diving directly at me, its four eyes gleaming and beaks open, displaying an ugly array of carnivorous teeth.
And I did feel the momentary impulse to run.
But then he was there, inside me, always when I needed him most. His voice guiding as clearly as though I was kneeling by his chair in his study.
‘There is no freedom without sacrifice, Talia.’
I yanked out my last poison-tipped dart and nodded to the heavens.
‘You always were right, Grandpa,’ I whispered.
Its shadow loomed large, enveloping the wasteland and pushing back the dawn. As I prepared myself for impact I was vaguely aware of the sound of running feet, of a rough voice yelling behind me.
‘Of all the most obstinate … stubborn … most frustrating feral … cats.’
Then the hurricane wind enveloped every other sound, just as a pair of strong arms pulled me forcibly to the ground. There was a deafening cry and, as I used what was left of my strength to dispatch the dart directly into the monster’s black breast, the iron clutch of a claw designed only to maim and kill closed around both of us.
The ground fell away as though we were falling, not rising, while the pressure around my chest felt as though it would shatter my ribcage at any second. But as I watched the cathedral ruin recede into the rest of the sprawled Dead City, I was engulfed by an odd sense of calm.
And it was only when the bird let out a drunken cry of euphoria, that I recalled I wasn’t the only one clutched in its macabre, sharp claws. And it felt oddly consistent. That it was the two of us. Again. Like consistent fractures in the same story. The feral and the fettered somehow winding an adrenaline-fuelled dance. Burning, always burning.
A hand closed over mine, and I gripped back. Even from my twisted position, I could feel his exposed flesh and a blood-soaked tunic. It was too late now. And in a way it was the most freeing knowledge. Then there was another cry. I managed a jubilant gasp as its violence reached right through me. It was a cry of defeat as the dart finally took control of the beast, and paralysis set in.
It c
ould have been worse. The talons holding us prisoner could have seized together as it plummeted towards the ground in a death spin. But instead the creature released its final prize, letting us fall like stones towards the unforgiving streets of the Dead City. Dust to dust. Somehow, through it all, we managed to stay entwined. And as I gazed across into the pink stain of a new day, I mumbled the words that had always felt like a prayer anyway.
‘Why run when you can fly?’
Then there was the hollow splash of deep water, the slow suffocation of bitter cold, and finally, black.
Chapter 21
The hands and harmonies soothed as I passed through biting cold into the vacuum that stole reality. For the first time in days, the violent pain in my chest eased. And I wasn’t furious or terrified or sad. I simply was.
If I could have stayed in that emotional and physical void, I’d have no hesitation. It felt like an intoxicating peace away from reality, and ignorant to its agony. So I let the hands take me to the darkness, and replace the suffering with dreams.
Until a choking breath split the still. Drawing me back to the cold air, and the silhouette of the Dead City, reaching up out of a glass river.
I sat up, disorientated, and looked around at my peaceful riverside surroundings, fumbling for my own wrist. There was the beat, regular and strong. Confused, I stared downwards at my fresh clean tunic. There was neat stitching up the front, just as though my mother had sewn it. I yanked it open, and the slim vertical scar snaking up my abdomen looked months old.
I inhaled audibly, willing the sweet spring air to help me remember.
Pale light was stealing up the river. I was seated on a grassy bank, and there was someone next to me. The contour of a tall, familiar gladiator reached through my semi-conscious delirium.
‘August?’ I spoke in wonder, his presence corroborating neither my life or death.
He rolled towards me, his olive skin glistening with fresh dew, and opened his eyes lazily, as though from a long, deep sleep. They fixed on me, softened by a light that had nothing to do with the honey blur of dawn.
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