the front of her coat, and then Remy’s hand, because if she didn’t hold on to him, she would rush across the courtyard, all reason abandoned, for the chance to look even once into Simon’s eyes, innocent and not yet full of hurt.
A few moments later, the man patted the woman’s shoulder. Simon’s father, Eliana assumed, her head spinning wildly. Garver Randell. She watched Simon help the woman to her feet. His father fastened a cloth wrap around her torso, gingerly placed a fussing baby inside it. The woman nodded weakly, then pressed a kiss to Simon’s head and limped away through one of the narrow courtyard passages.
Simon’s father hurried through another passage at once, and Simon followed close behind, their bag of supplies strapped to his back.
Once, before he disappeared into the shadows, Simon paused and looked back over his shoulder. Such a frown on his face, such a fearsome little glare. There were echoes of the man she loved, the man she had left to die at the hands of his tormentor. Thinking of it, the air left her lungs; she gripped Remy’s hand hard and tried to push from her mind the image of Simon, alone at Corien’s mercy.
Then the young Simon was gone, hurrying after his father, and the courtyard was empty—except for one shape, long and dark and lithe, like the one she had seen only moments ago slithering down a building.
And now it was here, darting into the passage Simon and his father had taken.
Eliana launched into a fevered run across the cobbled stonework and into the shadows, and when she emerged into another larger courtyard, she saw the beast crouched to jump—scaled and bulbous, yet feline in its grace. Dragon-shaped, but a mutilated, vicious version. Charred castings had fused with its body, but it seemed not to care. It stared at the people gathered nearby. Simon was there, and his father, and several others, huddled around a man lying prone on the ground. They didn’t see the beast, nor the three others approaching through the courtyard’s garden. Tails lashing the air, long snouts glistening with blood.
Eliana did not think once of her sword or the knives at her hip and in her coat. She snapped her wrists to awaken her castings and threw herself at the beast she had followed. She tackled it, rolled, then slammed her palms against its hide and sent it flying through the courtyard. It hit a wall with a startled yelp, then fell and did not rise again.
The small group of people cried out and scattered.
Eliana turned away from them, Simon’s presence a hook in her heart. The three other beasts converged on her, mouths open wide, their broad malformed paws pounding the ground. A child rode one, pressed flat against the back of its beast. Gray-eyed and silent, the child sent spinning discs of light flying at her like arrows.
Eliana dodged them, then flung back at the child raw waves of power, furious and blazing. In mere seconds, her attackers were ashes. Shards of the blown-apart castings skittered across the ground like sparks, then went dark.
Eliana stood, breathing hard. She saw Remy watching from the shadows, ready to come to her aid. He shook his head at her, his mouth thin. Eliana flexed her hands, wrangled her wild thoughts, commanded her castings to dim.
But was it too late? The people in the courtyard had seen her. Had Corien? Had Rielle?
She held still, feeling for a change in the air, but none came. A moment passed, then two.
She dared to glance back. Simon was gone, as was his father, and Eliana bit back a wild cry. An ache seized her, so hard it felt like a punch to the chest.
A man stepped forward, tall and shadowed. He gestured the others away, sent them scurrying off through a narrow passage between buildings of pale stone. Saints stood at every corner, watching with blank white eyes.
Soon, the man stood with only two others—soldiers, hands on their swords and shoulders square with tension. The man approached Eliana slowly. One of the soldiers hissed, “Odo!”
The man waved them back, and as he came out of the shadows, Eliana saw his face. He had brown skin, smooth and taut, oiled black hair in neat waves, a neat black beard. He stopped a few paces away, narrowed his dark eyes, and said, “Who are you?”
Eliana did not answer, unwilling to trust him yet. Was it Simon the empirium had been leading her to, or