Together, we sprint for the steps on the opposite side of the courtyard. I close my eyes as we leap over Alaric’s dead body, not wanting to see how his kind eyes stare blankly at the skies. Several guards give chase, their pounding boots in close pursuit. I send a blunt blast of air over my shoulder, knocking them off the steps and onto the ground. Finesse is a distant memory. My maegic is flagging, pushed beyond the pale.
We rush along the ramparts toward the grappling hooks still embedded in the stone. Below, there is no sign of the rocky beach. No place for a dinghy to put in. Waves throttle the base of the walls with the force of a battering ram.
“Fuck,” Penn clips, his jaw tense.
My eyes fly toward the horizon. I see the shadowy silhouetteof our brig with its black sails and, far closer, the much smaller shape of a dinghy moving toward us at immense speed, no doubt propelled by Soren’s maegic.
“That’s them,” I breathe.
“Should we jump for it?” Penn sounds grim. “Try to swim to them?”
I shake my head, eyeing the thrashing waves. They will break us like glass against the walls.
“I have a better idea.” I gulp nervously. “But you’ll have to trust me.”
Penn’s head turns my way. His eyes are very solemn, as is his voice. “Rhya. I would trust you with my life. I would trust you with anything.”
Our gazes hold for a long moment.
My maegic gathers in the air all around us, swelling from a gentle current to a solid stream as I wind it around his broad frame. I give him no warning as I lift him off his feet. His shout of surprise makes a laugh spill from my lips.
“Rhya! What are you—”
“Don’t worry,” I tell him, grinning. “I’m right behind you.”
With that, I sweep him higher into the air, then steer him out over the dark waves. My grin fades as the true weight of this task swamps me. I nearly bite through my lip in the effort not to drop him. I have never done this before—at least, not for so long a distance. And he is solid muscle. So very heavy.
Still, I cannot let him drop.
This is Penn.
I will not let him drop.
I watch the dinghy slow to a crawl as the men aboard spot my delivery sailing through the sky toward them. Black waves of exhaustion press in at my temples as I slowly lower his hulking form into the boat. As I release my hold, I collapse forwardagainst the stone railing, sucking huge gasps of air into my aching lungs.
I’m about to pass out.
“Clever.”Soren sounds slightly amused by my methods, even from afar.“Now get your ass off that island and into this boat.”
“I need a minute.”
“Rhya, you do not have a minute.”
He’s right. I can see, closing in, several foreign ships on the horizon. They are far larger than our brig and, if I had to guess, loaded with more than mere reinforcements. They surely have cannons, too, fully capable of blasting us out of the water.
“Deke is already underway, sailing north. It will take all our combined powers just to catch up.”
I push myself upright.
One last breath.
In through my nose, out through my mouth.
My mind is sluggish, my maegic drained. The poisonous ore has parched my inner reservoirs. The mark at my breast is icy with cold. I push through the fog of exhaustion as I step back from the rail.
Closing my eyes, I summon my frail wind. I don’t open them even as I lift up off the stone rampart into the sky. For I do not need to see where I’m going. I only need to follow the thread that connects me to that dinghy. To the two souls who bob there in the darkness, waiting for me.
The first bolt of iron pierces me in the right lung.