The Rising Read online Kristen Ashley (The Rising #4)

Categories Genre: Dragons, Erotic, Fantasy/Sci-fi, Magic, Paranormal, Romance Tags Authors: Series: The Rising Series by Kristen Ashley
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Total pages in book: 161
Estimated words: 162269 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 811(@200wpm)___ 649(@250wpm)___ 541(@300wpm)
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Only then did Chu take heart.

Until a new wave of the enemy came racing up the coast.

They were chasing fairies, pixies, sprites and gnomes.

But they were being chased by Zees carrying broad, curved shields, and they were accompanied by…

Bloody hell.

Highwaymen.

King Cassius

Just Above the Abyss

MAR-EL

The Beasts had engaged.

It was bedlam, he had no idea who was winning, or who was losing, or when they came into the fight.

First, they spat their venom.

But Elena and Serena had prepared for that, doing this finding high ground, and casting magical shields for those who didn’t have them (for the Zees, always smart, had shown and played it just that way).

So, then the Beasts fought.

And as the bloody fucking fates would have it, Mac was the closest to one.

Emotion roared through Cass as he saw Mac’s body fly through the air.

He landed on the stone and skidded on his leathers, his limbs uncontrolled, his friend obviously unconscious (or gods forbid, dead), toward the end of a cliff.

“No!” Cass roared as Hera chased after him with such intent, when he rolled over the edge…

She went with him.

Of a sudden, Cassius stood stock still.

He raised his face to the heavens.

“NO!” he thundered.

And the day was banished.

And all about them there was night.

Teddy

Just Outside the Abyss

MAR-EL

“They’re losing,” Saturn whispered, watching a battlefield that was now impossibly being fought in the night, a battle that was lit coral by Nadirii magic.

A sprite came flying their way, and they all ducked, then they all flinched when they heard the moist noise of it hitting a rock behind them.

“Teddy, take her and go,” Saturn ordered. “Get her to safety. Just go.”

Teddy looked to his friend.

He was warrior.

He could no longer hide behind a rock in a time like this than he could fly.

“Go,” Teddy forced out, his voice thick.

“No,” Moira whimpered.

Saturn took her mouth in a fierce kiss.

Then he rose, leapt the rock, and raced to the fray.

Teddy put his arm about his friend and pulled her closer.

“I’m not running,” she stated.

Teddy stared at what was happening before them.

All the rulers were there. Their lieutenants. Rulers from across an ocean. Gnomes. Fairies. Pixies. Sprites. Zees. Soldiers. Dragons were raining fire on the outskirts, incinerating men and stone. People were falling into the hole in the middle that they were all fighting around.

And day had become night.

But there was more.

Vines were breaking up from the rocks, snaking swiftly across the stone, wrapping around the legs of the enemy and pulling them back, dragging bodies across the grit and hurling them into the distance or over the edge of the cliff.

Great waves were crashing against the rocks, rising high, the water falling what seemed like with aim, washing away members of the army with blank faces, taking them over the side into the sea.

And still, that mindless army, hacking and hewing, killing or falling in droves…

And those Beasts, with their slashing claws and ridiculous speed…

This is what hell looks like, Teddy thought.

“I’m not running either,” he whispered to Moira, tightening his hold on her.

They both jumped when, suddenly, they heard a boom from a cannon.

The earth shook and a great mass of the side of the cliff fell away, taking down enemy, as well as some gnomes, who fairies and pixies dashed to grab and heft back up to land, all this because a cannonball had slammed into it.

Another boom.

And that cannonball tore through some of the enemy, and into the belly of one of the Beasts, who took it then zoomed across the stone.

Yet another boom that hit the side of the cliff and made the earth shake.

“Good aim,” Moira whispered.

“The gods are with us,” Teddy said by rote.

“I disagree,” she retorted furiously.

With what was happening, he could not argue that.

“What…?” Moira asked, her question having more words, but she could not utter them.

But Teddy knew what it was.

For the dark sky shafted with coral light had now filled with waves of green light, and every swing True took, the earth exploded under his enemy, at the least taking the enemy combatant off balance, but for some, these detonations blasted away legs.

And then the sky took on surges of red.

And the blade of Mars’s sword struck fire with each blow, thus every enemy it touched caught alight and toppled away, racing about meanderingly to burn to death unconsciously.

And then shafts of blue could be seen through the dark, and every swathe of Aramus’s sickle sent a great sluice, a miniature tidal, the powerful gusts of water driving his enemy back to topple into the hole.

Last, beams of white slithered through the sky, and Cassius’s sword struck… actual… lightning.

“Their eyes, Teddy, look at their eyes,” Moira breathed.

Teddy did.

Cassius Laird’s.

Pure black.

True Axelsson’s.

Pure green.

Mars Laches’s.

Pure fire.

Aramus Nereus’s.

Sea blue.

“Maybe the gods are with us,” Moira whispered.

Teddy searched for and found Faunus and then Saturn.

They both were up, uninjured, and they remained fighting.


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