CHAPTER 64

The ground exploded near my feet, sending plumes of white dust billowing up into my face and I stumbled, alarmed as a fissure appeared in the dry, white earth, wide enough to swallow my feet.

'Casey, watch out,' Ethan shouted, grabbing me around the waist and pulling me away, just in time.

A tall, lithe Dominion, no doubt the one to fire the explosive shot that had made the ground open up, came hurtling through the melee, its moves surprisingly graceful, its hair flying around its shoulders like a cascade of silver silk. With a cry that contorted its beautiful face into something quite repulsive, it released a hail of hard, focused bolts of energy that came at us with such speed that I felt the first ones rip through the air by my face as I pulled out of their way, the fierce velocity burning at my skin. I heard Ethan cry out and judder against me, and I knew he'd not been so lucky. He'd been hit, not badly, but a small trickle of blood was snaking from his temple where th