“We tried your way,” my father said, turning and walking toward me. “Now we will try mine.” He looked to Devon, gesturing at the human. “Restrain him.”
Devon went to the man, grabbing him at the shoulders in his giant fists. The man hissed in pain.
“Hey, now, easy,” he said. “We can work something out. I’ll cut my price—”
My father picked me back up by my throat again and lifted me until I was fully in the air again.
“What do you mean when you say you will try things ‘your way’ now?” I asked.
Kejetan’s dark sockets stared into my eyes.“I spared those people of yours,” he said, “because I thought that I was not only getting my son back but that I would get the arcane knowledge I had gathered back. I put my faith in family and a trust in your word, but you have broken with that. You disappoint, Stanis. You have made a mockery of me, and for that, I will make sure your humans suffer when I march against them and reclaim the secrets that are rightfully mine.”
“You speak of family and trust as if those words mean something to you,” I said.
“I have only ever thought of our legacy,” he said. “Our desire to live forever!”
“Your desire,” I corrected. “Not mine. And certainly not at the expense of the people you have and would kill in your mad pursuit of that power. Including me.”
Kejetan shook his head, but there was no sadness in it for what he had done to me, only bitter resolve.
“Your death pained me, for centuries,” he said. “Do you think I meant to strike down my only son? I had just cast off my human form, this stone one new to me. I had not mastered its strength yet.”
“Your desire for longevity has blinded you,” I said, “and that is what pains me most.”
Kejetan shook his head, his words filled with bitterness when he spoke. “What pains me more is the man, the creature that you have become. Full of weakness, invested in these equally weak creatures.”
“I see no weakness in them,” I said. “Only strength.”
“I will show you their weakness,” he said, still holding me there. “Starting with the one you seem to favor most.”
I struggled, a small amount of my strength returning to me at the very thought of harm coming to Alexandra, her family, or her friends. I raised my claws against my father, but he held me farther away from him so that all I could do was claw at his arms.
“Control him,” he shouted out to the human.
“Can’t right now,” the man replied. “Kind of restrained over here by your second-in-command.”
“Release him,” my father said.
Devon did so, and the human stepped quickly away from him, rolling his shoulders as he went.
“Much better,” he said, moving closer to me. “Now, then . . . relax.”
My body went slack at the command, but part of my mind was still my own.
“You will leave Alexandra alone,” I said.
“I think not,” my father said, pulling me closer as he peered into my soul with those dark, dead sockets of his. “First, I will take from her that which her family has stolen from us. Then my people can be awakened from these hideous forms we now possess. Then . . . I will break her, as I did you. So fragile a thing like her must be. So many bones to crush . . .”
Although the dominant voice in my mind left me unable to react, the thought of Alexandra’s going through the painful death I had gone through at my father’s hand was too much to bear. The voice at the back of my head—my true voice—could not live with it and shot forward.
“You will leave Alexandra alone,” I repeated, my own will rising and forcing itself into action.
“So much flesh to rip from her bones,” my father continued, but I barely heard his words.
My entire focus became making sure that never happened. I raised my arms high overhead and brought them down against my father’s. Bits of stone crumbled off the jagged rocks of his skin, and he screamed in shock, letting go.
I dropped to my feet, my knees buckling, but I remained standing. I rammed both my hands straight forward at my father, slamming into his chest and sending him flying back. Still tangled in chains, I pulled my wings close in around me, shaking loose what I could before sorting through the rest.
Devon was closing with me, but, with a flick of my wings, the attached chains spun out from me toward his legs, and he toppled forward in a tangle of his own.
I dug my clawed feet into the metal floor and stayed standing, Devon’s struggles pulling the chains taut. Bringing my wings in around me with as much strength as I could muster, I placed my mouth over the chains still hanging from me and let my heavy stone fangs clamp down hard over them until they snapped off, leaving only a small amount still attached to the spikes.
I needed to leave this place. Now. The cargo-bay doors high overhead were the only barrier between me and what I hoped was the night sky, and I spread my wings, daring to fly for the first time in months.
The act itself was an excruciating burn through both wings, but it was also filled with the pleasure of liberation. My feet left the ground, and I soared in small circles as I forced myself slowly upward like a bird learning to fly.
“Stop him,” my father shouted, the words ringing over and over in my ear.
Down below, the stranger was quickly sorting through the inside folds of his jacket, pulling a vial of this and a vial of that free before placing them to his lips and drinking. I turned my attention back to my flight, circling ever higher to the doors above. With each bit of lift, my wings stayed spread longer, soaring higher, and, in seconds, my clawed hands dug into the seam of the cargo-bay doors.
There was nothing left except forcing them apart, which I set to. The metal did not want to give way, but slowly I forced the tips of my claws in between them and felt them begin to yield.
Chain wrapped around one of my feet, the surprise of it causing my grip to slip out of the small gap I had opened in the doors. Needing my wings once more to stay airborne, I dropped lower for a moment as I righted myself, but all that did was allow the chain around my foot to slacken, and, with a flick of the human’s wrists, it looped around me again. It caught my other foot this time, binding them together as he pulled, but other than inconveniencing me, it was not really a problem. With my superior strength, I could easily lift the man into the air, chain and all. Once I got the doors back open, I’d be skyward-bound and able to fly. Then it would simply be a matter of time and puny human strength until his arms gave out and he fell into the water surrounding the freighter.
Except I never got a chance for that to happen. The man pulled at the chain, but instead of the weak human effort I expected, there was a powerful tug that sent me crashing into the floor. I landed on my side, dazed from the display of strength. The man stood over me, rolled me onto my back with a superhuman strength, and lowered himself until he was sitting on my chest. I raised my free arm to stop him, catching him on the side of his head, which should have ended him, but it did not. My hand connected with the flesh, but the flesh felt as solid as stone.
“Fall in line,” he said, grabbing my arm, forcing it down under his leg, then raised his fists, bringing them down again and again on my head. Again, this would have been laughable under other circumstances, but the blows of his flesh hands felt just as heavy as those of my father or Devon. I fought to buck him off me, but it was no use.
“Fall in line!” he shouted with each shot he took at me.
With each passing blow, more and more of the fight went out of me until there was nothing left to do but take the abuse. My true voice subsided until I had no desire left in me.