Crown of Stars (Crown of Stars 7)

She leaped toward Blessing. Lightning blinded her, striking so close that her skin seemed to rip off her body. She flew away from the strike, blasted sideways by its power, and smacked hard onto the earth. She blacked out.

Startled back into consciousness, her scalp buzzed.

Thunder roared. Without meaning to, she clapped her arms over her head, shut her eyes, and prayed. Even with her eyes shut, a second lightning strike flashed through her eyelids to leave streaks in her vision. The crack and boom that came after deafened her. When she wiped her running nose, she opened her eyes to see blood on her hand.

“Oh, God.” She pushed up to hands and knees and with a curse struggled to her feet because she had to find Blessing. She had no idea how long she had been unconscious.

The Ashioi camp had dissolved into chaos as mask warriors raced to capture tents and gear blown to pieces by the wind, as others staggered for help because they were injured. She blinked rapidly to clear her vision of the jagged streaks etched into her sight. Her gaze tracked aimlessly over hillside and distant wall and jumbled field until with an effort she focused on what lay immediately around her.

The golden wheel burned. Smoke poured heavenward. All around her, the ground was scorched. A dozen bodies—two score—more—sprawled on the ground. They were charred husks, twisted and gnarled in grotesque figures, so blackened that their clothing and even their features had been burned off. The stench made her retch.

“Bright One!” Sharp Edge called at her ear, her voice like a whisper although it seemed clear from the stretch of her lips and the tightening of her eyes that she was shouting.

A shadow approached out of the north. A cloudburst raced toward them across the open ground, hammering into the dirt.

The rain struck.

Her companions pressed up beside her and spoke words, but she could not hear them over the pounding rain and the echo of thunder in her ears. She pushed into the ranks of the stunned onlookers.

Amazingly, Zuangua had survived. He was kneeling. Rain streamed down his body. Leaning on a spear, he cradled his left hand against his chest. His fingers were curled into a claw; streaks of weeping skin scored that arm. His neck was red and raw.

Seeing her movement, he looked up. As calmly as if he were greeting a long-expected friend, he shouted in a strong voice that penetrated her deafness. “So it happened in ancient days, when the Horse witch called lightning and struck down her captors, the blood knives. I saw it happen that day, as it happened this day. Is this your work, Li’at’dano?”

o;She escaped,” said Hugh in a low voice.

“Impossible. No one can escape the Heart-of-the-World’s-Beginning. Who freed you?”

“I freed myself. Give me my daughter and safe passage, and I will tell you how I did it.”

“I won’t go,” said Blessing. “I don’t want to go. I’m training to be a warrior!”

“Hush!” said Zuangua.

She snapped her mouth shut.

Feather Cloak shrugged mockingly. “I cannot force the child to go with you. You have fallen into a trap of your own making, Bright One.” She glanced at Sharp Edge and the four mask warriors who accompanied Liath. “Those who aided you will be punished.”

“Liathano is mine,” said Hugh. “So you promised.”

“Mine to give you when I am ready,” retorted Feather Cloak, “and I am not ready.” She beckoned. Two-score mask warriors closed in to trap them within the ring made by their bodies. “Guard these.”

“This was not our agreement,” said Hugh in an even lower voice, almost a whisper. He had hidden his hands in the folds of his robe, and the cloth shifted and rippled over them.

“The sorcerer who raised the galla is dead.”

“So she is,” he agreed, glancing toward Novomo’s walls. Wind raced through the air and whipped his hair back. “She is no longer a threat.”

“You are right to say so,” said Feather Cloak. “I have been too cautious, too kind. No more. I will tolerate no more human sorcerers who can threaten me. Enough!” She raised both arms, tilted her palms to face the heavens. “Masks! Kill them!”

A shock passed through those mask warriors close enough to hear, like an intake of breath. Even Liath was too surprised to react immediately.

“Too late,” said Hugh into this pause. “My trap is already sprung.”

The storm front crashed down like waves breaking. The wind hit. Within the encampment, the gale uprooted stakes and sent the cloth of the shelters into a frenzy, blowing, curling, or torn loose to ripple away south. Thunder boomed, although Liath saw no flash of lightning. This was no natural storm.

“Get down!” she cried.

Her companions dropped flat.