“King?”
“Rafe. King,” he repeated, more adamant.
Cassi exhaled softly, the realization somehow making her heart hurt for him more. No one, not even Malek, deserved to find his entire life a lie right at its very end. “Rafe is the king. He’s the King Born in Fire.”
“He. Lyana. Sphaira.”
The words were broken and cracked, but she understood. “He needs to go after Lyana. She went to Sphaira.”
He nodded, coughing as his body convulsed. “I—tried—”
“You did, Malek,” she urged, squeezing his fingers even if it caused him pain, because he had to understand. In the end, when it mattered most, he’d given up everything to save the world. “You held them. She got away. And Rafe will be here any moment. I’ll tell him what you said. He’ll protect her. He’ll keep her safe. And because of you, they’ll see the prophecy through.”
His hand went limp in her lap. The edges of his burned lips twitched into the ghost of a smile. When he opened his eyes to look at her, they were the same as she remembered, as tumultuous and deep as the sea, a vast pool she could lose herself within. But there was a difference too. They were open and honest, too aged to belong to the boy of her youth, more like a glance of the man she’d always hoped he might become.
“You,” he said, his voice losing vigor as his body grew slack. “Dreams. F— F—”
Your dreams have always been my favorites.
It wasn’t an apology, but she’d never expected one from him. In truth, she wouldn’t have believed it if he’d offered one. He wasn’t sorry. As long as the world was safe, even at his end, he would never be sorry for the things he’d done or the people he’d hurt. So maybe he didn’t deserve what she was about to do, or maybe he did, she wasn’t sure, but she knew she’d always regret it if she remained silent. Whether she felt this way or not, she hoped one day she would, and by then, it would be too late to tell him.
“I forgive you,” Cassi murmured, keeping hold of his hand as she said the words she so longed to hear from everyone she’d ever wronged, all the friends and lovers and even enemies she prayed would someday understand why she’d done the things she’d done—that, whether right or wrong, her actions had all been in the name of saving the world, same as her king’s. “I forgive you, Malek. For everything.”
He tensed and then relaxed against the floor.
Voices carried down the hall, then the heavy shuffling of boots. A group of mages stomped into the room, moving as one while flames simmered between them. It took a moment for her to recognize the body draped over their arms and the leathery wing dragging across the floor. Isaak stood at the front, drawing Rafe’s fire into his arms to keep it from burning the others.
“We found him unconscious on the rocks,” the fire mage hastened to explain. “We don’t know how or why—”
“Drop him here, now,” Cassi ordered, indicating the spot next to Malek. The king had known Rafe was injured. He’d known Rafe had fallen. And he’d held on with everything he had so, with these last few breaths, he could save him.
Cassi took Malek’s lifeless arm and placed it on Rafe’s chest.
For a moment, nothing happened.
She feared they’d been too late.
Then a golden wave burst from his palm and enveloped Rafe. The air prickled with the power, nearly pushing Cassi over with the force. The magic was as ferocious as it was brief, disappearing in a blink. Malek’s arm slid to the floor. His head lolled to the side. Next to him, Rafe jolted awake and jumped to his feet.
“Lyana!”
“She’s gone,” Cassi said, then swallowed the knot in her throat as she rushed to stand. “She went to Sphaira. I don’t know why, and the creatures went after her. Malek bought her some time, but I’m not sure how much. You have to go, Rafe. Now. You’re the King Born in Fire and she needs you.”
“I—” He broke off, his gaze dropping to the body at his feet, then shifting to the window before settling back on Cassi. A pained expression pulled at his features. “Xander’s in trouble. He was in the House of Wisdom when it fell, and I’m not sure if Lyana was able to settle the isle in time. Please, Cassi, go to him. Make sure he’s all right. Do this for me, and everything between us will be even. Save him, and nothing else matters.”
“I will.”
Without another word, Rafe took off. A heavy silence followed his departure, the mages at her back and the king at her feet now looming in the quiet. Cassi turned, meeting the eyes of Malek’s closest advisors. Jacinta. Isaak. Nyomi. Kal. Viktor. The people she had spent most of her life studying, envying, sometimes hating, because they got to see him in the light. To them, she was little more than a name he sometimes spoke, just another dormi’kine, one of many, yet they watched her expectantly now, as though she might hold the answers.
She didn’t, not even close.
But she did have a lifetime’s worth of knowledge of pretending.
“The king is dead,” she told them, not harshly but honestly, because it was the sort of thing one needed to hear to believe. “And with his dying breaths, he proclaimed Rafe the King Born in Fire. The world might end tomorrow for all I know, but until it does, we need to do everything we can to continue the fight. There’s no time to mourn. He wouldn’t want that. Instead, go out into the city and do what you can to help. Rebuild. Regroup. Send a team to the Salty Clam Inn. The skryr is in a room on the top floor, at the end of the hall on your left. Protect him at all costs, and make sure he doesn’t try to run. As soon as I get back, I need to speak with him.”
“Where are you going?” Nyomi asked, stepping forward.
“To keep my promise,” she said, already arching for the sky. Xander’s name whispered through her thoughts, louder and louder with each passing second. He was in danger, and she would go to him. Not for Rafe, but for herself. “There’s a raven out there who needs me.”
52
Lyana
The crystal city was just as she remembered, gleaming beneath a sun-drenched sky, a symbol of hope and peace and light. Soon it would be bathed in fire. Fur-clad doves soared across the glittering rooftops, not a care in the world. Before long, they would cower in fear.
Lyana swallowed the tightness in her throat, unable to imagine her childhood home surrounded by fog and flames. But she knew what she’d brought by coming here. She knew what followed her on the wind. Time was the only thing on her side. The quicker she acted, the quicker it would all be over and the quicker the people of both worlds would be safe.
With that in mind, she dove for the nondescript dome on the northern edge of the city, fighting a chill as the cool air rushed over her body. Her clothes had been made for humidity and heat, and the cold was already nipping at her bones. When she landed on packed snow, her toes immediately prickled with the sting.
I miss my boots.
The thought was so silly it almost made her laugh. But she did. She missed her boots, and her furs, and all the other things that reminded her of home. Never in a million years would she have thought she’d be returning like this—sneaking into her own house to bring about its ruin.
Lyana threw open the door.
“What—” The guard stationed inside immediately jumped to his feet. Upon seeing her, he froze, confusion twisting his features. “Princess Lyana. I mean, Your Majesty.”
He sank into a deep bow, his tawny wings spreading wide as a sign of respect.
“Please, don’t,” she said and stepped forward, her heart jerking wildly. She was about to end the only world he’d ever known. She didn’t deserve his admiration.
The guard stood. “What are you doing here? The king and queen will—”
“No,” Lyana interrupted. Invisible to him, her golden magic took hold of the spirit glittering inside his chest. Though he didn’t move, fear flashed in his russet eyes. Swallowing back her disgust, she pushed on, aware that with every wasted moment her head start was disappearing. “I know you don’t understand, and I’m sorry for
that, but no one can know I’m here. So I need you to go out that door and fly until you reach the very end of the House of Peace, until there is nothing but open skies beneath you, and only then can you even think about coming back. Go, now.”
He left, heeding her orders.
The command would wear off, probably by the time he reached the sky bridge, but by then the fighting would have already started.
Lyana shut the door behind him and ran down the tunnel, keeping her wings tight to her back in the cramped corridor. She knew every inch of the secret passage. Even in the dark, her steps didn’t falter. The last time she’d been there was on the dawn of the courtship trials, when she and Cassi had snuck out of the palace to spy on the arriving houses. Little had she known then what fate had in store for them. That morning had changed her life. But here, now, racing toward her destiny, Lyana had the sense that everything had happened exactly as it was supposed to, as though guided by the gods’ own hands.
She reached the end of the passage and pressed her palms to the trapdoor, searching for the latch. At this time of the day, the palace should be quiet, not much activity except for servants shuffling between the rooms. Still, she cringed when the click reverberated through the silence and slowly eased the door open a crack. Wielding her magic, she stretched out with her senses, feeling for all the souls currently fluttering across the crystal dome.
Leave the main atrium.
Don’t turn back.
Get inside a room, lock the door, and stay there until the danger has passed.
The order was subtle enough that it would seem innate to most, only appearing strange as it started to wear off and they wondered why they’d locked themselves away. By then, the dragons would be here, and they’d have far more to worry about.
She waited a few moments for the gentle rustling of feathers to fade, then strode into the main atrium. A deep breath filled her lungs at the sight of her home, overwhelming in its midafternoon glory. The sun cast a dazzling glow upon the mosaic floor, so from floor to ceiling the might of Aethios shone through. Lyana drew on that strength as she soared to the entrance of the sacred nest. Normally, the door, towering thirty feet high, would be too heavy for a single person to move, but with her magic she gripped the spirit of the wood and it glided silently open, just far enough for a single dove to slip through. A resounding thud echoed across the stones as it slid closed, loud despite the chirping of birds and the rustling of leaves. At the end of the hall, just behind the ornate gilded gate, a priestess waited in flowing ivory robes, almost as though she’d known Lyana would come. The trees beyond were backlit by the golden glow of the god stone hiding within.
“Open the gate,” Lyana commanded, her magic giving the words weight.
The priestess complied, slipping a key from around her neck and inserting it into the lock. The bars swung open, and Lyana stepped inside.
“Now close it,” she ordered, guilt coiling inside her at treating one of Aethios’s chosen with such little respect. But there was no time. The power of the stone thrummed from the center of the nest, urging her closer, calling out to her the way it always had. “Find the other priests and priestesses, and lock yourselves in your sleeping quarters. Don’t return to the sacred grove until I say you can. It’s not safe.”
As the priestess disappeared around the perimeter of the large room, Lyana stepped between the trees. Leaves crunched under her feet as doves cooed overhead, their gentle calls almost like a blessing. Warm light streamed through the branches, a mix of the sun and the stone, sparkling with the hint of magic. The pulsing in the air drew her in, luring her closer as her heartbeat shifted to the same rhythm.
There, in the very center of the sacred nest, waited the brilliant golden egg she’d been looking for. It hung suspended in the air, oozing power. Deep in her spirit vision, she no longer viewed the stone as an emblem of her god. Now it was the center of the rift spell. Threads unspooled from the orb in a spectrum of rainbow weaves, some dim, some blinding, all burning with power. Letting her hands hover above the smooth metallic surface, Lyana felt connected to it all. The rift waiting thirty thousand feet below, drowning beneath the sea. The remaining stones keeping the House of Song and House of Prey afloat. Even the creatures, no longer connected to the spell but still connected to the beings housed within the eggs, just waiting to hatch. She could feel them racing closer. She could feel the aethi’kine creature pulling them in. They were a part of this, just as much as she was. Everything was connected. The isles. The rift. Their souls. It was a vast puzzle she was on the verge of solving.
Yet she hesitated.
What if I’m wrong?
Blood pounded in her ears as her fingers twitched a mere inch above the egg. The aethi’kine power seeping from inside wrapped around her, telling her not to stop, to keep down this path, to give in. Was it Aethios? Was it the creature? Was it her own intuition? There was no way to be sure. It was a leap of faith, a belief in the prophecy and in herself, a trust that despite all her faults, she knew what she was doing. Love had always guided her—a love for adventure, a love for the world, a love for its people—and that love had led her here.
People were dying. Their souls called out to her for aid.
The world was suffering. Even now, the black abyss at the center of the rift claimed more and more of its beautiful spirit.
The unknown was calling, and she had no choice but to answer.
Aethios, be with me.
Lyana swallowed and took a deep breath as she lowered her fingers to the stone. Aethi’kine power rushed through her like a windstorm unleashed. Her body snapped back even as her palms remained stuck to the surface, connected to the power in a way she couldn’t control. Her magic fled from her spirit, draining into the egg. The trees disappeared. The doves vanished. The grove fell away. Her vision ran gold as the glittering power pulled her under. There was no way to fight, no way to stop. All she could do was spread her spirit wings and fly as the torrent carried her forward.
53
Brighty
“Put ’er there, Sparky,” Brighty said as she lifted her hand toward the young photo’kine sitting across from her on the floor. The perfectly controlled white orb hovering between them vanished in a blink as the girl leaned forward and slapped her palm into Brighty’s, a self-conscious smile on her lips.
Oh, for magic’s sake, Brighty internally cursed as her chest warmed at the contact. Not this again.
She’d told herself she was done taking in strays. Ever since Rafe had abandoned them to fly directly into the path of constant danger, she’d been in a state of emotional upheaval, oscillating between worrying over his safety and ruing the day he’d been born. It was exhausting. Honestly, fighting dragons was less draining than this constant gnawing fear that came with caring about people. Brighty was over it.
And yet, when a girl with deep mocha feathers speckled with copper highlights walked into their guest cottage, her eagle wings too large for her gangly little frame, Brighty had taken one look into her pearlescent eyes and caved. The mark of a photo’kine was too obvious to ignore. Under Captain’s sharp, scrutinizing gaze, she’d mumbled a begrudging, “Fine,” and stomped across the room to welcome their newest recruit. That had been about a week and a half ago, and already the girl had needled her way into her heart.
What in magic’s name is happening to me?
She was hiding in the middle of a city full of powerful avians who loathed magic. She was living on an isle hovering fifteen thousand feet above the sea and ready to drop. She was pretty certain the world was in the process of ending. Now was not the time to turn soft.
“All right, all right,” she grumbled, her grouchy tone wiping the girl’s smile right off. That’s more like it. “It’s a start, but don’t get too cocky. You’re a long way from lighting a dragon’s ass on—”
“Language!” Captain interrupted.
Brighty jolted and glanced over her shoulder. The woman missed nothing. “Sorry, Cap.”
>
Honestly, she’d heard worse by the time she was five. Then again, not everyone grew up running wild along the docks of Da’Kin.
“How’s the training going?”
“Great!” Sparky chirped. Oh, the enthusiasm of youth.
Brighty frowned. “It’s going.”
“Let me see.”
“All right…” Brighty trailed off as she scanned the room. They’d painted the crystals black in this central atrium of the building to keep out any peeping eyes, so the magic glowed vividly despite the midday hour. Sparks of every color danced about the shadows as Pyro worked with her group of fire mages, and Leech his trio of earth mages, and Archer his two ferro’kines. Spout was no longer allowed in here with her buckets of water after she’d sprayed the entire room during a sneezing fit—twice! Her set of hydro’kines was relegated to their own space down the hall. No electro’kines had stepped forward, so Jolt was usually the one surveying the progress, though Captain must have taken over. Her air mages were huddled in the corner following Patch’s lead, just Brighty’s luck.
“There.”
She pointed to a glass lantern on the floor by Pyro and her fire mages. The wick wasn’t lit, and the container was a perfect test of control. Too much light and it would shatter. Too little and the glow would die out. Just enough and a wonderfully self-sustaining ball of energy should be able to live inside there for a few hours.
“Let’s see if you can set some mage light from a distance.”
The girl nodded and scrunched her face in concentration, every ounce of her tiny body straining with the effort. Brighty snorted softly because, magic help her, it was endearing. Captain caught her eye, a subtle questioning arch to her brow. Brighty wrinkled her nose and turned her focus to the beam of light racing across the room.
Too much.
Too much!
She winced before the glass even cracked, anticipating the explosion. When the lantern shattered, a blast of power cut through the air, so forceful it stole Brighty’s breath, and every mage in the room froze.
The Dragon and the Queen (The Raven and the Dove Book 3) Page 38
