himself shifting, like a Sabor or a Stregan, only this shift made him more of what he was, what he was supposed to be, what all Fae were meant to be.
Brilliant ruby light bathed him.
He heard the shouts below as he almost struck the ground—then swept upward into the waiting sky.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO
ARON
On the battlements of Triune, standing between the bodies of two Altar warbird soldiers he had just slain, Aron’s short sword slipped from his numbed, damaged fingers. The blade clattered off the battlements to the courtyard below, coming to rest beside more dead soldiers and the bloody carcass of a Great Roc, upon which Tek was happily feasting.
He couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
Nic, spreading a pair of massive wings and taking flight over the battlefield.
The wings seemed so fragile, like they might be made of gossamer and silken feathers, but they lifted him higher, higher, over soldiers who were shouting and pointing and throwing down their swords.
Sabor shifted back to human form.
So did Stregans.
In moments, it seemed all of Eyrie had focused its attention on the sky, on the first Fae with wings the land had known since the mixing disasters robbed them of their heritage and legacies.
Nic’s ruby glow was so powerful Aron knew that the colors could be seen on either side of the Veil, likely even by those who had no mind-talents at all. The magnitude of that power drew Aron’s senses through the Veil, and heightened his awareness of every detail of the tableau below him.
The Mab soldiers stopped fighting, dropped to one knee, and lowered their heads, placing one fist on their chest in a gesture of fealty to this, their new dynast lord and king. Cobb and Ross soldiers knelt with them, and many from Altar and Brailing as well.
With his Veil-enhanced sight, Aron picked out Bolthor Altar standing beside the body of a woman on the far hillside. The body’s burned features were beyond recognition, but not the ruby dragon head pendant still clinging to her ruined forehead.
This was Lady Mab, Nic’s mother, whom Aron believed had been struck down by some sort of giant snake, then finished off by Dari or Kate when they attacked the hillside in their Stregan forms.
Bolthor Altar threw his blade to the ground beside Lady Mab’s body, sank down beside the dead woman, put his face in his hands, and began to cry.
On the field stretching below him, his sons were being taken into custody by Mab and Cobb and Ross commanders, and none were resisting. Lord Brailing’s heirs were nowhere to be seen, and Aron figured all of them for dead.
Before his eyes, Eyrie had just changed, and changed forever, moving back to a better time, yet forward toward the future Nic was calling to them with the magnificence of his graal and the wondrous flapping of his wings.
Stormbreaker stirred, unable to come to consciousness until Aron lent him a bit of energy. When he opened his eyes and saw Nic floating above him, it seemed too much for the man, and he passed out cold even with Aron trying to help him stay awake.
Dari stood with her twin in a circle of Stregans, and Aron almost connected with her—but her twin caught his attention instead. Kate was gazing at him, her mind open and welcoming as he joined his essence with hers. So familiar, like Dari, but different as well. Warm and soft, without the prickly edges he had come to associate with Dari. Without thinking about it, Aron offered Kate a portion of his energy to help keep her mind settled, and she gratefully accepted it.
I’m glad you didn’t kill me, Kate said, and Aron felt very glad of that, too. More than ever, he understood Dari’s drive to save Kate, and why Lord Ross and even Platt, the king of the Stregans, would take such risks to protect her even though she had periods of madness. Perhaps he could help her with those difficult times, if she wished him to do so.
Yes, he was glad to know Kate, and to see Dari safe, and to see Nic so transformed. Aron was even happy, despite all the death wrought by this terrible battle. He felt happy for everything in the universe until a moment later, when Nic’s amazing red glow sparked and faltered, and a fit seized him in midair.
The storm in Nic’s mind moved so fast, so forcefully that Aron and Dari could do nothing to save him as he tumbled