Behind My Shadow - Book Three

27. Darling, Everything's on Fire

The animal soul spirit is the size of a semitruck and trailer and it's currently bearing down on me with the speed of a runaway train.

There's nowhere to run! This is it!

Just before it can run over us though, an enormous serval flies out of the forest and crash lands on top of the raging crocodile. The force of the impact has both monster-sized creatures violently rolling over the ground rippling beneath them.

I know that serval! I suddenly realize with disbelief.

It's Adisonia's! She saved me?!

The Serval roars with fury as it rears back on its hind legs, viciously boxing both paws over the Crocodile's head. The Crocodile hisses with outrage and whips to the side with lightning-fast reflexes, its tail crashes into the Serval hard enough to send the cat flying through the air.

"Run!" I whip around and frantically shove Lyna in front of me. I suddenly hear the Crocodile behind us start to charge again. "Don't look back! Just run! Run!" I keep urging her, desperately seizing her arm to keep her balanced as we both leap over a fallen tree and race through the slippery swamp. We suddenly break free from the forest and run across the slick, muddy soil of an open clearing.

Lyna screams as she abruptly slips and we're both thrown off balance. We crash to mud and slide wildly away from each other.

"Lyna! No!" I cry as I see the enormous Crocodile barreling towards her. It's going to run her over to get to me!

A massive white Ox abruptly lunges out of the trees and crashes into the side of the Crocodile, hurling the reptile spirit through the air.

"Eastyn!" Lyna cries with relief as the other Queen of Diamonds rushes out of the forest, a sword in hand. Blood drenches her clothes and there's a cut across her forehead but honestly she's never looked more like a hero to me.

"Lyna! Adara!" Eastyn swiftly helps her wife now and now they both run over to me as I struggle to stand in the mud. "My gods!" Eastyn's eyes widen with horror at the sight of the dagger still in my arm.

"It...looks worse than...it feels," I lie with a dry smile.

Adisonia's Serval erupts from the forest again with a roar and lands on the back of the Crocodile still battling the mighty Ox.

"Who is that?!" I breathlessly, pointing at the Crocodile.

"Doesn't...doesn't Duke Kolfer have some kind of reptile?" Eastyn glances at Lyna.

Before she can answer, the Crocodile abruptly dives into a deathroll and crushes the Serval beneath it before it crashes into the Ox, leaving both animal soul spirits buried in the mud before the Crocodile barrels towards us.

"Get out of the way!" Eastyn suddenly shoves Lyna into me and we're both knocked off our feet and land out of the way just as the Crocodile thunders over the ground we were just standing on.

But Queen Eastyn doesn't move fast enough to miss the onslaught.

"NO!" Lyna screams with horror as her wife is suddenly crushed beneath the clawed feet of the animal soul spirit. "No!" She screeches with agony and shakily crawls through the mud to where Queen Eastyn lays drenched in blood and mud. "Gods, no!" Lyna cradles Eastyn's head on her lap and rocks back and forth with torment. Now she just wordlessly screams with pain.

"No," I breathe with horror and disbelief as I slowly sit up. My eyes are enormous with fear and pain as I stare at Queen Eastyn's lifeless, crippled body. "No..." Tears stream down my face as Lyna's cries hauntingly echo in my ears.

I numbly look around.

Black Hearts morph out of the shadows all around me, steadily closing in on me and the broken Royals.

The assassins all swiftly drawl their bows, poising their arrows to kill me, to kill Lyna as she weeps in hysterics over the body of her wife.

No, I shake my head with quiet rage and agony. No. I'm not going to sit here and be executed after so many people have died for me, have been tortured for me. I'm not a victim anymore, I think with tears streaming down my face as I watch the assassins pull the strings on their bows back. I'm a fighter now.

I scream with scorching pain and fury as I summon fire and abruptly all of the Black Heart assassins go up in flames. They all start screaming and drop their weapons as they desperately take off running, each one slowly being cooked alive in their suffocating armor. The Crocodile releases a roar of fury before it swiftly dissolves into a burst of golden glitter as its master summons it back.

I keep screaming as I feel all of my magic bleed out of me, my skin begins to turn purple and my hair blackens as I suffer from yet another powerdrop. My veins feel like they've been caught on fire but I don't care. The aching pain my body is subjected to by using up all of my magic doesn't nearly compare to the guilt and anguish I feel over this ambush.

Burn, I think darkly as I slump to the ground. One of the last things I see are the assassins running through the forest, their bodies still blazing under my command. I hope they all burn...

I blackout.