Page 106 of House of the Iron Reaper

Chapter 63

Deyanara

The wind screams around us, howling through the gaps of Dragon’s Vale in a circle but leaving us untouched in the epicentre. I press back against the arena seats and feel the wind whistle past me.

Oh, Saints, what have I done?

I glance back and see the storm ripping through the city. My stomach clenches. The scar on my jaw itches. I’m doing it all over again—ruin, destruction, death. Is the sound of people screaming in my memories or is it now? My breath quickens.

I do not hear Aythora make her strike until a hammer of fire lands across my face. Pain explodes across my jaw, lava sizzling across my scales. A crackling roar claws up my throat in response.

Dragons screaming, my father going limp. I killed them, I killed them, I killed them.

The lightning dies at the back of my mouth.

I need to get away from here. I need to leave and take the storm with me. I cannot bring ruin upon anyone else, I cannot.

“Deyanara!”

Novalie. My eyes snap down to her, a small head poking out of the tunnel. The wind hasn’t reached her, not yet.

“Deyanara!” she calls again. “The city is fine! Do not worry about us-”

Aythora shifts her feet slightly, arm drawing back once more.

“We’re fine!” Novalie shouts, waving to get my attention back. She jabs a finger in my direction. “DO. NOT. HOLD. BACK!”

Aythora tries the same punch as before—I dodge my head to the side this time and her fist lands harmlessly against the arena seats, scattering lava. Novalie said they would be fine but…

Dragons screaming, my father going limp.

I inhale and expect to smell molten glass and death. I do not.

I smell… salt.

It is so thick, it feels like a physical weight in the air. I breathe it again. Cahir. Cahir is enchanting the city. My heart slows.

It is not as it was back then. Coalsburgh is safe from me.

I pull away from the walls of Dragon’s Vale and stand straight, tipping onto my back legs. Faeth pours through me. I draw it into my krata and open my maw.

A flicker of fear crosses Aythora’s face.

Lightning cracks out of my mouth like a whip, snapping Aythora in the chest. She roars and falls back with a crash. Distantly, I hear Novalie scream, “Yes!”

The volcanic scales at Aythora’s chest have split like she’s been hit with a ragged axe and molten lava pours from the wound. I suck in a breath. But I only have a second of hope before she pushes back off Dragon’s vale and onto her feet again, snarling. Her broken horn is still lodged in the space between her neck and shoulder. She should be broken. She should be finished.

But she is not, I realise with a dejected acceptance, because she is Aythora and nothing will stop her but death.

I gather my faeth again, feeling lightning nip at my chest, and ready myself. Aythora lunges forward quicker than I expect and closes her fist around my maw. Her scales are searing hot and pain screams in my mind.

I grab her broken horn and pull it free before slamming it back in the wound. Aythora roars but holds fast around my maw. Lightning licks at the back of my teeth.

“You should have stayed dead,” she growls, pulling me closer to her.

Novalie shrieks something incoherent and rage-filled from beneath us, and launches a rock into Aythora’s eye. Aythora howls, her head snapping back. Her grip does not loosen on me but it gives me the opening I need.

I grab the middle joint of her wing. Ignoring the scorching pain, I throw all my force into it and snap the bone in half.