There was a second caw as the weapons were flung, and the smack as the other bird hit the roof. It was a pained sound, the one-gun was twisted, warped and embedded deep into its breast. The avian lay in a heap on the ground. Bran mustered the strength, albeit healing slowly on its own, to hop to the fallen bird. To comfort it as it lay dying. Bran didn't want it to die alone.
Eric looked down at himself. Everything else around him had evaporated into sound. There was blood on his fingers. It seeped out of already closing wounds though the tears in the cloth of his shirt from the spray of lead would be the reminder.
Finally he managed to offer a glance to the pair of wounded birds, and then to where Macklyn stood. A body lay at his mate's feet. Headless with blood pooling around it. It was a nightmare. The phantom's words burned him. They seared his heart and it was worse than the pain from the shots. He was in shock. Frozen.