Alexander’s son, the babe she had once held, looked at her without flinching. “I am Rohan, proud son of the greatest archangel ever to live, and you are an abomination who will never break my will.”
“Insolent fool!” Crushing his neck until his head lolled forward, she dropped him to the floor. He’d live—he was a strong angel of enough age to heal those injuries.
“My men have sacked the palace but there is no sign of Alexander,” Xi told her. “If he is like Caliane and able to hide deep in the earth, we may not find him in time.”
Alexander loved his people. He loved his only son even more.
Lijuan’s eyes went to Rohan’s already healing form. Her lips curved. “Then we make Alexander come to us,” she whispered, and waited the minutes it took for Rohan to heal enough to open his eyes. “Your father will wake at reckless speed to avenge you.”
Her words made Rohan’s jaw go tight, but Alexander’s son didn’t beg, didn’t scream as her black knives plunged into him. He went to his death with the stoic and defiant pride of a true warrior.
Part of Lijuan could admire that, and had it been possible, she’d have ordered that Rohan be given a warrior’s burial. But it wasn’t possible—her black death had caused his body to disintegrate into ash of the same shade.
Rohan was gone.
The world screamed, lurching under Xi’s feet.
41
Naasir and Andromeda were out of bed and about to head out to speak to Tarek when the land bucked with violent fury. Struggling out of the small house, they went to their knees outside. The shaking seemed to go on forever.
“Naasir!”
Following her pointing finger, Naasir looked to the horizon.
Sand spouts burst out of the ground to spiral to the sky, burning a destructive path through the landscape, the lightning so electric and bright that it hurt the eye as it hit over and over and over again.
The shaking stopped with a spine-wrenching jolt, but the clouds above had turned a silvery black that boiled across the sky, turning morning once more into midnight. In the distance, the land cracked, the lava that poured out of it a molten and angry red that crawled across the ground at impossible speed.
Andromeda felt her heart slam into her ribs, but her fear wasn’t enough to make her miss a simple fact. “The village!” she yelled to Naasir over the sounds of the violence. “No lightning strikes within! No sand spouts!” Even the earthquake hadn’t collapsed any buildings.
“Inside!” he yelled and they both retreated.
Shutting the window to cut down the noise, he shoved a hand through his hair. “Something has angered Alexander, but even in his rage, he hasn’t forgotten the wing brothers who protected him these many centuries.”
“Alexander was meant to love his people.” Andromeda’s fingers trembled as she fixed her braid. “Do you think he’s killing them?”
“We’ll have to wait until after this is all over to find out.” Naasir suddenly hissed out a breath. “In protecting this village, he’s put a beacon right over it. Lijuan will know to head for the eye of the storm, will be aware Alexander must be nearby.”
Andromeda picked up her sword. “We should go, see how we can help the wing brothers.”
Nodding, Naasir opened the door again and they walked out into the fierce dust-swirled wind. It didn’t take them long to find the Brotherhood—they were gathered in the large central meeting hall. Since they’d spotted no one else on their way here, not even a face at a window, it appeared the noncombatants had already been moved to safety.
“These are the portents for which we were told to watch,” Tarek informed them. “But it was meant to begin far more gently and be a process that took a year.”
Andromeda considered if she should take another weapon from the wing brothers’ stockpile, decided on a relatively light crossbow. “The enforced speed of the Ancient’s waking means he’s going to be far weaker than he should be when he rises.”
Tarek’s hand fisted.
“If we can distract Lijuan’s troops,” Naasir began, right as the wind and the lightning dropped without warning, the ensuing stillness eerie.
Shaking his head, Naasir started again. “If we can distract Lijuan’s troops, it’ll give him a little more time at least.”
Andromeda didn’t say anything, but they both knew Alexander would still be at a catastrophic disadvantage. From what Andromeda had read in the Archives, when an archangel rose this quickly, he or she was at less than half