Page 129 of I Dream of Dragons

Neere is grinning, leaning far out of a window. Other fae women point and cover their mouths. Not everyone is happy with Jai’s punishment. Many—both women and men, both fae and human—look sad and scared.

I think I see Mera and Amaryll—but then I also think I see Axwick, which can’t be real, since he died in the second trial.

I think I see my brother’s face.

My mind is playing tricks on me. Too much panic and fear, too many revelations crammed in the space of a day and a night.

Then I see Tru and I flinch, remembering his face as he pushed me off that balcony. Dizziness hits me, a sense ofdisorientation. My body aches in a million places, burning where the poison of the sea serpent got me, just above where the snakes bit me in the first trial.

He was trying to protect Jai, I remind myself. Wouldn’t I have done the same? Sometimes you tell yourself you’d never go for blood, but when the time comes, you’d do anything to protect those you love.

And still I can’t help the pounding of my heart and the trickle of fear in my veins, though it pales in the face of my worry for Jai.

“Let’s start with twenty-four lashes.” The king gestures and a burly man enters the yard, the whip coiled in his hand. A human.

He bows and snaps the whip, but all my attention is on Jai.

“Rae,” he says. Just my name, but the sound holds so much emotion my eyes prickle.

“I’m here.”

“You should run away. Please, run away from here and save yourself.”

“I can’t do that.”

He sighs. “Then close your eyes,makhair, and close your mind to me. I don’t want you to see or feel this.”

But I do. I want to feel everything he does. I don’t want to be spared.

“I’m here,” I repeat. “Right here. I’m not going anywhere.”

“I know,” he says softly.

His dark eyes flash with those streaks of gray I’ve seen in them before. Now I know he’s Mars, I wonder if the true color of his eyes is showing through the shadows. Velvet black or pale gray, they are arrows through my soul every time he looks at me.

When the first lash falls, his body jerks and I gasp.

“If you won’t close your mind,” he says, “you will be hurt. Please.”

“No.”

“Phaethon may surface and drive you craz—” His body jerks again.

Another lash has fallen.

And another follows it.

My back stings. It reminds me of the burn of poison. Pain is poison. As more lashes fall, whispers fill my head. I know I’m getting echoes of Phaethon’s voice speaking to Jai. I don’t understand the words. They slither inside my mind.

How many lashes?

Twenty-four, the number of humans collected and brought here to be fodder for the fish and the Gods.

Twenty-four humans whom Jai rounded up and accompanied to the palace.

The symbolism can’t be lost on anyone watching. The king’s goal is achieved. It screams,This man only works for me. He isn’t my equal or a good person. This is your reminder of that fact.

“Stop!” I scream, my power rising, my voice warping. “Stopnow!”