A Court of Smoke and Shadow

Chapter Twenty Three: Azriel

"It's gone quiet again," Nesta said.

"Get back in line. The soldiers need you there," Rhys ordered Cassian.

"What the hell can we do against that?" Cassian bared his teeth.

"I'm going in," I declared.

"No," Rhys snapped. But I spread my wings.

"Chain me to a tree, Rhys," I said, softly. "Go ahead." I began checking the buckles on my weapons. "I'll rip it out of the ground and fly with it on my damned back."

Selene looked at the decimated Illyrian forces and said, "Let him fight."

An armada of ships sailed towards the coast.

"We might have to run, Rhysand. Before they make landfall," Amren said.

Rhys and Feyre shared a wordless exchange through their mating bond.

She's scared this might be their last exchange, Selene said down our mating bond. This might be our last, too.

No one is going to die, I responded. Especially not you.

You don't know that, she said.

I won't let it happen.

I love you, Azriel.

I love you more, Moonbeam.

That armada sailed nearer. Hybern, sensing their reinforcements were soon to make landfall, cheered and pushed. Hard. So hard the Illyrian lines buckled. I sailed closer and closer to them, Siphons trailing tendrils of blue flame in my wake.

Rhys watched me for a moment, throat bobbing, before he said, "Cassian, you take the southern flank."

I heard Cassian say to Rhys, to Feyre, to Selene, to Nesta, "I'll see you on the other side."

Then I noticed the Seraphim, Drakon's legion of flying soldiers. And then came the Avian, the Grisha, and the Folk of the Air. Selene, it seemed, was even more sly than Lucien. She'd brought allies.

But then I heard the most guttural, heart-wrenching scream come from Selene as Ryoko fell out of the sky. Ryoko landed not far from them. Falkor and Ares both flew down next to Ryoko and I ran to them.

"Ryoko," she cried. "Please wake up."

But she wouldn't wake. She was too injured and an arrow had managed to pierce through her scales and into her heart.

Ryoko was dead.