Raze the Night (Nightstar Book 2)

Fennrin groaned, shaking his head as he tried to pull himself together. He needed to capture or kill Ainreth. But instead he was the one being captured, given the clamp on his right hand.

But…wait. His left hand was still free. And no one was holding him down anymore. He got up, trying to wrestle the clamp off his hand, only to find it locked.

But he could still fight, even with just one hand. He could….

His thoughts came to an immediate halt when he heard a horn coming from the other side than it should. He turned to look, blinking in horror when he saw a massive army dressed in blue coming in from the border.

His heart seized. He wanted to yell to warn his people, but the words died on his tongue when he saw Ainreth running toward the Orinovan army.

Fennrin wasn’t sure why, but he was running after him immediately, the hand clamps clinking against either other. And he had absolutely no idea what he would do once he caught up. Capture him? Kill him? Tell him to run the other way?

Fennrin didn’t know, but he couldn’t let him march to his death like this.

“What are you doing?!” he yelled after Ainreth, making him stop and look at him. Fennrin could barely see his face from this far away.

“What I’ve always done,” Ainreth called back. “Protecting Lys-Akkaria.”

Fennrin stopped dead in his tracks. Did the fool think he could fight the entire Orinovan army on his own? He would just get killed. He couldn’t….

Not unless he repeated what he’d done all those years ago. But Ainreth himself had been so adamant that he wasn’t sure how he’d even done it.

Fennrin started sprinting again, gasping for air as he tried to catch up with Ainreth.

“You can’t!” Fennrin gasped out as he reached him. Ainreth had stopped, standing in the middle of the field. And the Orinovan army was getting closer and closer.

Ainreth said nothing, reaching his arms up to the sun and taking a deep breath. Fennrin was still panting but he tried to catch his breath as he gripped his shoulder.

“Ainreth! We need to go. You can’t fight them,” Fennrin tried, his heart hurting. He shouldn’t care anymore. He shouldn’t. But he couldn’t help it.

“I’m not leaving. I can stop them. So I will,” Ainreth said, firm and decided.

“Then I’ll help you. Together we can—”

“No!” Ainreth opened his eyes, looking horrified. “I’m not killing anyone else I love. Not again. Go back. Tell everyone to get out of the way.”

Fennrin stared back, his eyes filling with tears. Ain still…loved him. After all that. And he cared about this country so much that he was willing to die for it, to protect everyone.

This was happening only because Lys-Akkaria was fighting with itself. And Fennrin was the catalyst.

Oh sun, what had he done?

He watched as Ainreth turned his attention back to the sun.

“You don’t know how you did it the first time,” Fennrin reminded him, growing desperate. He couldn’t let Ainreth die here. “Please, you can’t—”

“I have to,” Ainreth said, gritting his teeth as he clenched his hands into fists. “And I will. Come on, you sundering sun!”

Fennrin wanted to once again tell Ainreth that this was hopeless when the world around them started to dim. At first he thought his eyes were playing tricks on him, but when he took off his light protector glasses, he gasped.

The sun was getting dimmer. Dim enough to look at it. And next to him, Ainreth was glowing so brightly Fennrin could barely stand to look at him.

“Ain.”

Ainreth looked at him, and Fennrin had to cover his eyes. The other man’s gaze was too bright to look into. “Go. Now. Warn everyone. If anyone gets too close, they will die.”

Fennrin nodded mutely, tears running down his face. He didn’t want Ainreth to die. He didn’t want any of this. But this was the only way. The Orinovan army was too numerous. They couldn’t possibly defeat them, even with their combined forces.

Fennrin wanted to say so many things, but he couldn’t force out a single one. So he just nodded and turned into a shadow. It was so dark now that he could manage that, sliding along the grass as fast as he possibly could. The rebels and the soldiers had gathered, both watching with horror, some far too close to Ainreth.

“Get back!” yelled Fennrin as he reached them, pointing at the fields beyond. “We will all burn if we don’t get far away enough!”

No one needed to be told twice, most of the them immediately running off farther to safe distance. A few people lingered, looking worried and confused, but they too moved away. Until there were only two people left—Petre and their friend Enlin.

“We have to go,” Enlin told them quietly, but Petre shook their head.

“I’m not letting him do this again!” they yelled, running off toward the glowing Ainreth in the distance. He was too bright to look at in the sunless dimness, even from this far away.

Fennrin could see the shadow of the Orinovan army approaching, though. They were reaching Ainreth.

“Petre!” yelled Enlin, running after them. Fennrin gritted his teeth. He couldn’t let either of them do this. Reaching out with his free hand, he grabbed Enlin’s shadow, and then Petre’s, just in time to see an explosion of light.

Fennrin tried to pull both of them as far away as possible by their shadows, ignoring their protests as the air became uncomfortably warm, heated up by the sun’s unforgiving light.

Fennrin kept pulling as the light spread, running from it as he watched the Orinovan army burn. It was nearly impossible to see, but he could hear the yelling and screaming, the horn ordering a retreat, and the light mercilessly burning everything in its way in a massive circle.

He finally collapsed to his knees as he finished dragging Petre and Enlin to safety, gasping for breath as kept watching Ainreth. His light was dimming slightly, but the circle of destruction around him was no longer getting wider.

Unable to fight with himself anymore, Fennrin turned into a shadow, using the temporary darkness to get to him. Get close enough to see Ainreth collapse in the middle of the burned grass and bodies. Ash was floating all around, and Fennrin could feel the heat of the air even as a shadow.

And just as he was seconds away from reaching him, someone descended from the sky, grabbed him and then flew away again.

Fennrin rushed after the windwalker, but in the ash-filled darkness, he lost sight of them nearly immediately. All he knew was that they were going west. To Orinovo.

Panic was squeezing his heart. He needed to go after Ain. Save him. He couldn’t be a prisoner of Orinovo. But was he even alive still when he’d been taken? That thought ripped his heart asunder.

Fennrin flinched when he heard the retreat horn of the Lys-Akkarian army. He yearned to go to Orinovo, fight his way through to save Ainreth, or at the very least bring his body back home.

But that was a foolish thought. He couldn’t track a windwalker, and he had no equipment. And he was absolutely terrified of disobeying Daryan who wouldn’t want him to strike out on his own and leave Lys-Akkaria vulnerable to another attack.

Fennrin turned into his physical form, falling to his knees right where Ainreth had just fallen, running his hand over the scorched earth. His tears hissed as they hit it.

He couldn’t go try to save Ainreth on his own. He knew that he’d end up dead or captured as well if he tried with no backup. But that didn’t stop him from desperately wishing he could.

Because no matter what, he still loved Ainreth. He couldn’t pretend or lie to himself, not after this.

He still loved him. And now Ainreth was in the hands of their enemies. Because of Fennrin.