War Storm (Red Queen) - Victoria Aveyard Page 0,64
and with the raiders.
Shaky, I climb to my feet, using the hulking vehicle above me for support. The battle still rages before us, and the monstrous beasts snort and stamp, at odds with their own nature and their Silver masters.
A net of white lightning forms ahead of them, like a fence to hold them back. They toss their heads at the display, frightened beyond sense. I know the feeling.
“Poor things,” I hear Tyton mutter as he stops next to me. He stares at the beasts, strangely forlorn. When one tries to charge, he blinks, and it drops, its massive body crumpling.
The raiders return for another pass, their cycles snarling and leaping through the thinning trees. Evangeline and her cousins do battle with the other magnetrons, wrestling for dominance over the cycles.
One hand on my chest, nails clutching at my suit, I try to grab hold of a cycle as it leaps over the road. Glaring, I trace the lines of electricity into its engine. With a great push of resolve, I feel them die in quick succession, a sudden burst and then nothing.
The rider twists, startled, as his machine fails. Breathing hard, I do the same to the next. They fall one by one, either coasting to a stop or toppling in midair.
Our own soldiers descend on the raiders. They must have orders to capture, not kill. Davidson himself imprisons one in a cage of shields, letting the raider pound uselessly at his blue prison.
Evangeline pursues one of the small raider magnetrons, running him down over the dirt. He tries to duel her, swirling twin blades that bleed between sword and whip. She is faster and more deadly. His swords are no match for her knives as they pepper his skin, her ability too strong for him to overcome. Evangeline Samos owes no allegiance to Davidson, and she doesn’t have his mercy. She cuts the raider apart, letting him bleed silver beneath the starlight.
Between the blood and the ash, the low foothills smell and taste like death. I gulp down the wretched air anyway, trying to catch my breath.
The remaining raiders know the battle is lost, and their engines begin to ebb away, attempting to escape into the wilderness. As they disappear, so does their influence, and the herd of beasts calms. They turn, charging away into the forest, leaving only corpses and trampled underbrush behind.
“Was that what you call a bison?” I pant, glancing at Davidson.
He nods grimly and I swallow around the irony. I can still feel the bison steak in my stomach, heavy as a stone.
In the distance, some ways down the road, headlights flare out of the plain. I clench a fist, tensing for a second wave.
But Tyton puts a hand on my arm. He looks down at me with flashing eyes. “It’s the Goldengrove transports. Reinforcements.”
Relief floods me and I drop my shoulders, exhaling. The movement sends a twinge through the cut on my back. I hiss, wincing, and put up a hand to feel the damage. The gash is long, but not so deep.
A few yards away, Tiberias watches me take stock of my wounds. He jumps when I meet his gaze and spins on his heel. “I’ll get you a healer,” he mutters, stalking off.
“If you’re done crying over paper cuts, I could use some help.” Still on the ground, Farley gestures with one hand, her teeth clenched together tightly. Her gun lies in the dirt, surrounded by spent bullet casings. One of them saved my life.
She leans to one side, careful not to move her right leg.
Because her knee is . . . wrong.
My vision swims for a second. I’ve seen many forms of injury, but the way her knee twists, the lower half of her leg out of position, something about it turns my stomach. I immediately forget the ache in my own muscles, the blood on my shoulder, even the touch of Silence, and rush to her side.
“Don’t move,” I hear myself say.
“No shit,” she growls back, her hands tight on mine.
TEN
Iris
The mountains are steep and perilous, guarding the valley cities from siege or an army’s onslaught. The thick pines make for dangerous obstacles to any transport that dares to turn off their defended roadways. And the elevation alone is a deterrent, weakening any who might hope to climb their way up into the city’s jaws. They think themselves safe in their fortress of cliff and sky. They see no danger, for no army could hope to march to their