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“This is what we’ve been trying to avoid,” Rhedros snarled.

I tried to move my head, tried to sit up, but my body didn’t respond. I was completely numb. I’d hit the dirt and looked down to see a dagger protruding from my chest, but after that…nothing.

“We knew this was going to happen.”

Rhedros grunted in frustration. “I just thought we had more time.”

I pulled on the tether that held my consciousness to this bodiless nothing as I tried to form words.

“We need her,” Rhedros murmured. “We can’t do this without her.”

“Can’t do what?” I managed to whisper, my voice scratchy.

“Iknewit was her,” Katia answered suddenly, her voice hollow with disbelief. The droning noise continued. It almost had the cadence of someone speaking.

I tried to pick my head up but was once again greeted with the feeling of numbness. “It’s me.”

“How is she hearing us, Rhedros? How is she speaking to us?” Katia asked, her voice frantic.

“I don’t…” Rhedros replied, trailing off.

“Where are we?”

The darkness faded away as a dusty, wood paneled room materialized around me, my eyes opening involuntarily upon the waking world.

“During Katia’s time as the Keeper of the Blood Saints, she conjured up an army of beasts controlled solely by her.” It was the same low noise that I’d heard in the darkness, much clearer now. “Kelpies guarded the sea and soulhags guarded the land. Most notable, however, were her five drivas, the earliest ancestors of dragons and fearsome guardians of the skies.”

I let my head drop to the side to see half a ram’s head mask peeking out from behindThe Complete Lore of the Saints, its leather glowing orange in the firelight that burned in the hearth.

It was Miles’ voice that had somehow echoed its way into the in-between. “Like dragons, Katia’s drivas were winged and scaled with rows of razor-sharp teeth and the ability to breathe fire. That is, however, where their similarities end.”

I blinked as I watched him, the way the book was propped up in his lap, his nicked and scarred hands wrapped tenderly around its covers. Warmth rushed through me and a weak smile crossed my face at the sight of the formidable Lieutenant perched in a rickety wooden chair.

“The average driva was three times the size of the average dragon, with a wingspan the width of two warships placed end to end, and teeth the length of a man’s arm. Her largest driva, Adorex, was–”

“Reading me a bedtime story?”

“Shit,” he spat when he lowered the book to see me staring back at him. “You’re awake.”

“How long this time?” I asked quietly, still disoriented.

“Just a few hours. It’s past midnight now.”

I propped myself up on my elbows, realizing I was in a small cot, body covered with a coarse blanket. As I pulled it back, I looked down to see my entire torso wound in bandages, a bloom of dried, crusted blood in the middle. I should have been in agony, but there was no pain beyond the soreness of sleeping in a bed that was unfamiliar to me. “Someone stabbed me?”

He gently closed the book and placed it in his lap. “Yes. Well, someone threw a blade.”

I let myself fall back into the pillow. “Kauvras’ men?”

“Kauvras’ men,” he confirmed. I took a deep breath. “Apparentlythey weren’t actually trying to kill you. Just maim you enough to immobilize you.”

“How considerate of them,” I muttered, scrubbing my face with my hands, not a blister to be seen. “So how did we get…here? And where is here?”

“Eat first,” he said, leaning to the small bedside table to pick up a tray of stew and bread before placing it gingerly in front of me.

“Just answer the Saints damned question.”

“Eat your Saints damned food,” he quipped back, his voice playful but still edged with authority.