Total pages in book: 247
Estimated words: 235897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1179(@200wpm)___ 944(@250wpm)___ 786(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 235897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1179(@200wpm)___ 944(@250wpm)___ 786(@300wpm)
“Vi, watch out! Aura’s going to—” Xaden starts.
“Don’t!” I pivot and throw myself at Aura, but the damage has been done.
Fire sparks and spews from her hand like dragon flame and engulfs the doorway.
We land in a tangle of limbs, and I narrowly keep from smacking my head on the stone of the stoop as a wave of heat blasts the side of my face, lighting up the night. Dread seizes my heartbeat, but I cut it off before it can take hold or, worse, freeze me with fear.
“Get off me!” Aura bellows, shoving me aside as the figure stumbles forward into the moonlight and screams.
I gasp, and for a millisecond, fear wins.
Captain Grady is on fire.
“No!” Aura scrambles across the stone as he kneels in the center of the street. Every inch of the leathers that should help protect him is covered in foot-high flames.
And we don’t have a water or ice wielder on the ground.
“Xaden!” I yell, gaining my feet and running toward the captain. “Aura! Take off your flight jacket!” We can smother the flames. We have to.
His shriek etches itself into my memory as he collapses, and I wrench Aura’s flight jacket from her hands and throw it over him, hoping to put out the fire. The scent of charred flesh turns my stomach, but it’s quickly overpowered by thick, cloying smoke coming from the building behind him.
Xaden gets to me first, yanking me back from the captain, and shadows stream from our feet to smother the flames as the screams cease, but the fire in the building ahead of us roars. “Fuck.”
All three of us look up as the wind gusts.
My heart drops to the ground as house after house catches fire, spreading down the street. The land, the buildings, the very wood they’re built with may be drained of magic, but they go up like kindling.
“Riorson!” Mira shouts, barreling out of the house behind us, Henson close on her heels. “Do it! We’re as good as dead already!”
I wrench out of Xaden’s arms and stumble toward Grady as shadows rush up the sides of the buildings, but the flames have already licked their way across the bridges. We’re in the middle of a fucking tinderbox.
“Sir!” I drop in front of Grady, but he doesn’t move.
“He’s dead,” Xaden announces like it’s the weather forecast. “And I can’t…”
I look over my shoulder to see sweat beading on his skin as he shakes his head, lifting his hand again and again, directing shadows over one building and then the next, but there’s no earthly way to keep up with what the wind is spreading. Every cinder, every gust sends another structure up in flames.
Captain Henson battles what she can, but even the best wind wielder can’t control the drift of ash and ember.
The sky cracks, and my eyes jerk upward. The bridge connecting both halves of the house comes crashing down, engulfed in flames. I move to push Xaden out of the way, but Mira’s standing between us, her arms raised and fingers splayed.
A pulse of blue emits like a mage light, and the bridge cracks overhead, splitting in two and falling on either side of us.
“We have to get out of here.” Mira hauls me to my feet, then yanks a stunned Aura up by her collar. The senior wingleader just stares wide-eyed at the spreading destruction.
“I can do it!” Xaden shouts, raising shadow after shadow.
“Let it go,” Henson orders. “The best we can hope for is a clear path to the village square for evac.”
Xaden’s arms tremble, and fear stabs deep within my chest, chilling me to the bone. If the land he stands on hadn’t already been drained…
I put myself in his face, uncaring that everyone can see, and grasp his cheeks in my hands. “Let it go,” I beg. “Xaden, you have to let it go. We need to get out of here.”
His tortured eyes lower to mine, reflecting the flames in their onyx depths.
“Please.” I keep my gaze on his. “There’s no stopping this. There’s only surviving it.”
He nods and lowers his hands.
Relief fills my next breath, but that’s all the time we’re allowed.
“Run!” Mira shoves at us both, and we break into a sprint down the narrow street.
Pain shoots from my ankles up to my knees, but it doesn’t matter, not when both sides of the street are catching fire slightly slower than we’re running.
“Focus and get to the town square,” Tairn orders, and I do just that—focus.
Dragons can’t fit down these streets. We have to make it to the square or we’re dead.
Every ounce of my energy goes into the placement of my feet so I don’t roll my ankles on the stone, the movement of my breath, the space between us as Xaden keeps pace beside me.
Mira hurries ahead, turning corner after corner with a certainty I could never possess in this maze of a village, and we follow, running for our very lives.