Children of Fallen Gods (The War of Lost Hearts Book 2) Carissa Broadbent (best book recommendations txt) 📖

we could have resolved this peacefully. But with a single movement, Eslyn shattered that hope.

She leapt forward, her spear poised at Elias’s throat, magic crackling at the edge of its blade.

“Do not threaten us,” she growled.

And just like that, Elias’s stare turned to steel. “Drop your weapons,” he repeated.

All of his soldiers raised their swords.

“Do not lift a hand against us,” Nura hissed.

Time slowed. My eyes flicked to the guards behind him, all ready. I knew the way they were looking at us. Targets that had already been marked. They had never intended to let us walk out of here alive.

“I don’t ask anything three times,” Elias said.

It was the truth. By the time the words were out of his mouth, I saw his men already beginning to move. And I didn’t need to think before magic tore through my veins, through my staff, the blades raised.

A split second, and I was leaping forward, blocking one strike and then another. A sword crashed against the steel of my weapon, and I found myself locked face to face with Elias, trembling as I held him back.

“Stand down,” he commanded, through gritted teeth.

“You were never going to let us go.”

His mouth twisted into a set grimace. I heard the blows coming before I felt them. I blocked one, but the other landed. My knees were on the ground.

I whirled to see another soldier raising his blade over me—

Only for him to falter, letting out a wordless grunt of pain. He clutched his abdomen. Between his fingers, I could see black rot. And as he staggered back, Tisaanah was behind him, Il'Sahaj bloodied.

“Do not touch him,” she ground out, as I was finding my feet again.

No time to thank her. No time to question. No time to breathe.

Any words I could have said disappeared beneath the clash of steel.

Chapter Three

Tisaanah

The violence cracked through the air like lightning. The thread of tension tightened, snapped, and then, all at once, it surrounded us.

I held onto control, but only barely. Reshaye thrashed at my muscles, feeding me power, getting me drunk on it. And the anger that had surged in me when I saw those men go after Max… it was all too easy to turn myself over to it.

My magic roared into my veins and my fingertips, flowing into Il’Sahaj.

{This is the welcome they offer us,} Reshaye snarled. {Such traitors. Let us show them who they are betraying. Let us show them what we are capable of.}

Pain slithered along my arm. A sword nicked me, just as I rolled out of its path. Too quickly, another soldier lunged for me, his sword raised — only to lurch to a stop, rigidly. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Sammerin, blade in one hand and the other raised, then closed into a fist as the man crumpled into a heap.

Thank you, I tried to say, but I had no breath for words. Split seconds, and I whirled to block another attack, then another, and then Il’Sahaj was opening ribbons of rot on the flesh of our attackers. I fought my way to Max and pressed my back to his, guarding his weak spots while he guarded mine. He was a beautiful fighter, his movements skilled and graceful. But at the end of each strike he lurched a little, tilting his blade away from throats and towards limbs, striking to hobble but not to kill.

Reshaye’s disapproving hiss slithered through me. {He is a coward.}

I clamped down on its reaching fingers as it begged for more and more control, and paid for that distraction with another breathless gasp as a sword struck my thigh.

I stumbled. In that moment of vulnerability, a flash of white leapt in front of me — Nura, slipping into the gap left by my ruined strike, her blades sliding between the ribs of my attacker. Her magic clustered around her like wisps of shadow. Even this brief brush of her presence, so close, sent unnatural fear tearing up my spine.

I blinked, and saw Esmaris’s blood-flecked face.

Saw golden hair and bloody fingernails and a room of white and white and—

Reshaye’s terror almost overwhelmed me. It took all of my mental strength to force it to the back of my mind. I managed to dodge another strike. Land a blow, one more vicious than I had intended, rot blooming over the chest of a soldier. He staggered close, and I saw that his facial hair was patchy, eyes wide and afraid above acne scarred cheeks. It was a young face.

No time to doubt. No time to question. More soldiers were on me in seconds. With Reshaye’s rage in my veins I cut through them one by one, my dark magic mingling with the flames of Max’s.

I whirled around, looking through the fighting to the sea, where the ship waited — still carrying all of our innocent passengers. Two of the sleek warships were leaving the docks. Panic spiked through me.

Leave, I wanted to shout, as if my voice could reach across the sea. Leave as fast as you can!

A force tackled me, knocking the breath from my lungs. My back slammed against the ground. Elias leaned over me, gripping my wrists, his armored weight too heavy for me to push off. His eyes searched my face, narrowed with curiosity.

“Who are you?”

I answered him by calling more magic to me, focused around my wrists. He let out a grunt, jerking away palms that were now black with decay.

I staggered to my feet, taking in the battle. Max was handling four of them at once, and barely succeeding. Nura was overrun. Sammerin had seven in his magic’s grip, each slowly breaking free of his control. And Eslyn was surrounded by bodies, prying her spear from a corpse, barely avoiding a strike at her back.

There were too many. Too many.

My fingers curled.

{We can end it,} Reshaye whispered.

I didn’t want to.

{We have enough power to end it all.}

No.

{Why?}

No.

And yet, I was still lingering