Page 107 of A Kingdom of Sand and Ice (Kingdom of Gods #2)
We all have strengths and weaknesses.
Tabitha Wysteria
Kai had insisted they halt and rest after countless hours spent riding along shadowed, winding roads. The ash drifting from the sky had yet to cease, a constant, silken snowfall of soot that obscured the view ahead, rendering Fireheart little more than a name whispered on the wind.
Dawn had been behaving oddly for some time now. Tense, restless, urging him to press on, refusing any suggestion of pause. She had pleaded for side roads instead of main ones, offering feeble excuses each time he questioned her.
‘We should keep going, I’m not tired,’ she muttered.
‘It’s growing late. We’ve been riding all day.’
‘We’re sitting on a horse.’
‘And does your back not ache?’ he countered, watching her expression shift, betraying the weariness she stubbornly denied. She was bone-tired, he could see it in the set of her shoulders, in the hollow quiet beneath her words. And still she pushed. ‘What’s troubling you, witch?’
‘Nothing,’ she replied quickly, fingers twisting through her hair with forced nonchalance.
Kai opened his mouth, a low retort poised on his tongue when a thunderous boom shattered the air in the far-off distance.
His instincts surged. With swift precision, he seized his hook swords and slung them across his back, every sense alert and taut like a drawn bowstring.
He dismounted from his shadow steed in a single, fluid motion, as his boots met the ash-laced earth.
He strode out onto the dirt road, eyes scanning the darkened horizon, nostrils flaring as he scented the wind.
Dawn, having slipped down from the horse too, now held a handful of the horse’s mane, her grip gentle as she moved close behind.
There it was. The unmistakable tang of magic in the air, metallic and sharp, threading through the ash like a warning. It saturated the atmosphere, so potent it prickled along his skin.
He looked skyward. Flashes of unnatural light bloomed through the gloom like silent fireworks, bursting in spectral colours against the heavy veil of ash above.
‘We ought to rest.’ Dawn waved him back towards the patch of earth they had chosen for their camp, her gesture light but insistent.
Kai trailed behind her, his gaze sharp and narrowed, suspicion lingering like smoke in his eyes.
‘Stay here,’ he said, gathering a few essentials with practised ease. ‘I’ll investigate. I’ll return by morning.’
‘What?’ The horror in Dawn’s voice bled the colour from her face. ‘You can’t just leave me out here on my own!’
Kai rolled his eyes in theatrical disdain.
‘Insufferable,’ he muttered under his breath. ‘Then move quickly,’ he added aloud, striding past her. ‘We’re going back. The lights were near the wall.’
Dawn froze .
Only for a breath. But it was enough.
She masked it quickly, yet Kai caught the fear behind her eyes.
‘Perhaps we should stay,’ she said too lightly. ‘The plan was to head for Fireheart. We will lose days if we turn in the opposite direction now.’
‘Why does it matter if we lose days of travel?’ he asked, his tone laced with growing curiosity as he gestured at his shadow to retreat.
The inky figure slipped away into the dark, returning to whatever void such creatures dwelled in when not summoned.
‘My army is weeks away, we’d have to wait for them anyway. ’
Unlike Kage, Kai had never felt the need to keep his shadow tethered to him.
His younger brother, however, had always kept that damned crow close, its incessant cawing like an echo of his own thoughts.
Kai used to tease him, claiming it was because the creature had been Kage’s only friend as a child.
Kai exhaled a long breath, the weight of memory pressing against his chest like a stone. Thoughts of Kage drifted through the veil of ash, brittle and persistent. Was his brother still alive? Was Mal keeping herself out of the kind of trouble that always seemed drawn to her like a moth to flame?
‘It might be dangerous,’ murmured the witch behind him, her voice uncertain, breaking the hush of the road.
He offered no reply, only the quiet rustle of his movements as he gathered their sparse belongings and turned back towards the path they had strayed from.
Her footsteps followed moments later, light but dogged.
He refrained from calling upon his shadow just yet.
First, they would walk. Let the stillness speak, let the silence settle.
They would decide on safety once the air whispered its secrets.
A sudden cry pierced the quiet .
He stopped.
Turning, he found her on the ground, clutching her ankle, her features twisted in pain.
‘What is it now?’
‘I think I’ve twisted my ankle,’ she groaned.
‘Then heal it,’ he said dryly, unimpressed. ‘You’re a witch, aren’t you?’
She glared up at him, the frustration etched across her face almost laughable. ‘It doesn’t work like that! We can’t heal ourselves with magic. We’re never taught how.’
He shrugged, unmoved. ‘Then sit there and wait.’
Something struck the back of his head, sharp enough to sting but small enough not to harm. Kai froze, muscles tensing as a surge of irritation curled like fire through his chest and rose hot against his throat.
‘I am not a dog,’ she hissed.
‘Did you just throw a rock at me?’
‘It was a pebble,’ she replied, utterly unrepentant.
‘Must we have this conversation again?’ he muttered, moving to her side. Without ceremony, he scooped her up into his arms and began walking.
‘You can’t carry me the whole way,’ she huffed, folding her arms across her chest like a child denied her sweets. ‘You’re not that strong.’
He said nothing, choosing silence over the obvious rebuttal. His strides remained steady and sure.
After a while, faint sounds stirred in the distance.
Voices, followed by the soft crunch of steps.
Instinct prickled down Kai’s spine. He veered off the road, slipping into the shelter of the trees, letting the shadows swallow them whole.
There, amidst the hush of the forest, he lowered Dawn gently to the ground .
‘Don’t leave me,’ she whispered, her voice trembling, fragile as gossamer. There was a nervous edge to it, too sharp to be sincere.
Kai’s brows pulled together. Her fear didn’t ring true. A lie, he realised. But why?
Before he could ask, before she could spin more excuses, he turned and vanished between the trees, moving like smoke towards the road once more. He crouched low, hidden from view, and waited.
The voices grew clearer.
Dawn appeared at his side like a wisp of smoke, silent and sudden. It startled him, her uncanny ability to move without sound, and more so the fact that she had reached him so swiftly despite the twisted ankle she had earlier claimed.
‘Kai, perhaps—’ she began, but he stiffened at the sound of his name on her tongue.
It wasn’t just her voice that set him on edge.
In that very instant, the road came alive with movement.
Hundreds of witches and warlocks drifted past like a procession of ghosts.
Kai held his breath and stilled his muscles, fingers coiled around the hilts of his hook swords, poised to strike should they be discovered.
Dawn didn’t move. She hardly even breathed. Her eyes tracked the march of her people, their numbers too great, too close for comfort.
When the last figure had disappeared into the shadows ahead and silence once again blanketed the path, Kai turned on her. Swift as lightning, he seized her by the arm and slammed her against the rough bark of a tree, one of his hook swords pressed to the soft skin beneath her jaw.
‘What in the gods’ names are you doing?’ Dawn gasped, genuine fear flaring in her eyes as she struggled in his grip .
‘What are you scheming?’ he hissed, his breath warm and sharp against her cheek. ‘You’ve been twitching all day, desperate to keep us moving, and now I find an army of your kin heading towards Fireheart? Explain that.’
‘I don’t know. I swear it!’ Her voice cracked under the weight of his fury.
‘I don’t believe a word of it.’
The blade kissed her neck, a sliver of crimson blooming against her skin and trickling downward like a single thread of silk. Kai watched it with a cold, unwavering gaze, the contrast of blood against her skin striking.
‘I will cut you, witch,’ he said, voice low and dangerous.
She cried out, lashing and flailing with all the fury she could muster—kicking, biting, spitting into his face with unrestrained rage.
And yet, through the flurry of violence, Kai found himself wondering why she didn’t use her magic.
She was far stronger than him, infinitely so.
With a single flick of her fingers, she could have flung him into the wind and vanished.
And yet, she hadn’t.
Kai released his grip, his chest heaving not from exertion, but from a quiet understanding. No matter how fiercely she fought, she would not truly harm him. Not when Ash still lingered in her heart like a wound yet to scar. She would suffer anything if it meant helping the man she loved.
‘It’s always easier, isn’t it?’ he said quietly, stepping back. ‘To let our happiness depend on others. That way, when it shatters, we’ve someone else to blame.’
Dawn wiped the blood from her throat, her fingers trembling with fury. Her face twisted into something fierce, hurt, defiant.
‘You know why the witches were on that road,’ he said, not as a question, but as fact. She hesitated, then nodded slowly, her shoulders taut with the weight of guilt. ‘Tell me.’
‘I can’t,’ she whispered, her voice barely audible. ‘If I do…’
‘If you do what?’ he snapped.
Her eyes glistened. ‘You’ll hate me.’
Kai looked away, jaw clenched. When he spoke, it was cold and cruel.
‘I already do, witch. Nothing you say will change that.’
Dawn’s purple eyes darkened, resolve replacing fear. ‘The witches attacked the wall,’ she said at last. ‘Your army, and the wolverian one, they were there. Fighting for their lives.’