Page 25

Chapter 24

P reparing Ariadne for their journey across the Keonis Valley nearly drove Azriel past the brink of his withering sanity. Despite weeks of training on Oria’s back, thanks to Whelan, she had not yet mastered more advanced maneuvers. Therefore, prior to leaving Auhla , he ensured she could hold onto Razer without anyone else. To do so, he sent her into the sky time and time again just to watch her fall hundreds of feet before Razer caught her. And if watching his heart plummet to the ground hadn’t been enough to terrorize himself, listening to her scream shredded his soul.

But he had to know that she could stay on that overgrown lizard’s back if he wasn’t there. He had to know that if he gave Razer the command, she could hold her seat in the midst of a battle…or the midst of their vinculum breaking.

Because Azriel wasn’t going to risk Razer dying with him—or he with Razer. They’d agreed to sever the connection in the event of the worst.

“ You mean like your father did with Mhorn ?” Razer asked pointedly when they had discussed their next steps, given the opportunity for one of them to survive. The great brute had eyed Azriel with wicked mirth.

Azriel didn’t find the idea of it all very funny. The purpose had been to ensure Ariadne would have at least one of them to keep her safe if the worst happened. Despite himself, he couldn’t deny the similarities between his request and that of his father to Mhorn. In light of that, his only response had been, “ Yes .”

So again and again, Azriel helped Ariadne out of Razer’s foreclaw, held her tight to reassure himself and the monster within him that she was safe, and went back to the dragon’s shoulder, where he held out his hands to hoist her into position. Tears streaked her face, and she shook like a leaf in a storm, but Ariadne hauled herself back onto the dragon more times than they could count until they were all satisfied.

Until Razer could twist, turn, roll, and dive without leaving Ariadne behind.

It took a week of incessant training before she had strengthened her legs enough to remain seated during such complex moves. Seven nights of watching her fall. Seven nights of hurling in a bush after seeing Razer catch her mere feet from impact. Seven nights of Whelan and Kall flying with Oria and Bindhe nearby, shouting orders on how to adjust her grips.

Though Ariadne grew set and determined over the training to master the challenge, Azriel’s will chipped away more and more. Frightened though she was, after watching her fall so many times, he couldn’t help her onto Razer by the end. His feet refused to move, as though by preventing her from mounting, he could keep her from falling again. So, Ariadne taught herself how to climb Razer’s foreleg on her own.

By the time they prepared to leave Auhla , Azriel knew Ariadne was ready. The problem by that point, however, was whether or not he was ready.

This is what you deserve .

The words echoed in his head each time she screamed, accompanied by the image of her head falling apart in his hands—only now it was attached to her broken body from hitting the stone from thousands of feet in the air.

“You’re behind,” Kall said in the dhemon language, bumping Azriel’s shoulder with his own and jolting him from yet another mental trap of fear. The dhemon continued on, his ax strapped to his back and saddlebags of supplies over his shoulder. They’d developed the bags to hang over the dragons’ necks, pinched in place by their knees. Introducing them had required its own practice as it took away the grips they learned with their legs.

As Ariadne would be riding with Azriel, Kall agreed to carry enough for the three of them. Despite his cold exterior and the way he yelled throughout training—particularly since learning of Sasja’s disappearance—the dhemon’s warm heart was bigger than a dragon’s.

Following Kall out of the keep to where the four dragons stood waiting, Azriel almost had to detour to the bushes when he found Ariadne already sitting on Razer’s back. When would such feelings subside? Sooner rather than later, he hoped.

His resolve hardened when he reminded himself that the ritual would put that beast of a bond at ease. The sooner they found it…the sooner he could sleep without terrors waking him in the middle of the day.

Bindhe stood not far behind Razer, her beautiful scales gleaming in the moonlight. Not far off, Brutis lowered his gray belly to the ground so Madan could swing himself into position one-handed. Anthoria, with Whelan adjusting his seat on her back, knocked horns with Brutis in a playful gesture; the two had as close a partnership as Madan and Whelan—one of the few dragon pairs that could potentially breed for a new clutch.

Before he could think on anything too much, Azriel pulled himself up behind Ariadne.

“Are you well?” Ariadne turned and tilted her head back to search his face.

Azriel swallowed hard. No, he wasn’t well. He was, in fact, very unwell. There was too much at stake, with all of them leaving at once. They’d be a massive moving target across the Valley, no matter what route they chose. Too far north, and they’d risk flying over Northecrosse or, worse, the Irem Tundra. That wasteland could kill a vampire if they weren’t careful. Too far south and the towns speckling the shores of Lake Cypher would certainly see them. As such, there was but a narrow alley in which they could fly. Their only hope for not being seen by the majority of vampires and reported back to Loren came from using the split Noct to travel during the day.

Most of all, he wasn’t well at the idea of putting Ariadne in such danger.

Despite the tumultuous well of fears, Azriel plastered a small smile on his face and said, “I’m well.”

Ariadne, to her credit, didn’t look convinced. She pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes, twisting further around for a better look at him. “Do not hide from me.”

Cupping her face, Azriel kissed her softly and admitted, “I’m terrified.”

“We will all be safe.” She brought her palm to his cheek, and he leaned into it. “And we will be back here together before you know it.”

This time, he didn’t try to hide his fear. “You promise?”

“Promise.”

A beat of silence, then Azriel wrapped his arm around her and pulled her back to his chest. She adjusted against him, pinning her knees to the blue scales, and found her grip on the nearest spike.

“ Easy , Vhaltrinin,” Razer said, his conscience curling through Azriel’s mind like a balm. “ She’s safe .”

The same words he’d said throughout the training. His gentle jab of calling him Little King was enough of a distraction to make Azriel’s shoulders ease down from his ears.

“ None of us are safe .”

“ Not with that attitude ,” Madan’s voice cut in as the dragons pushed off from the ground in a staggered formation.

Wind rushed past Azriel’s ears, reminding him just how useful the vinculums were in providing the telepathic link to those around him. If Ariadne tried to speak with him, it would be nearly impossible to hear her words.

“ Why do you say that ?” Whelan asked, Oria soaring above them.

Azriel hunched over Ariadne as they eased higher into the sky, his ears popping from the altitude change. “ We’re fortunate Ehrun hasn’t attacked Auhla since our occupation . It makes me nervous .”

“ Someone would have seen something by now ,” Kall said in the dhemon language. “ The skies have been clear .”

“ It’s unlike him .” Azriel brushed his lips over the top of Ariadne’s head, the constant reminder of her presence calming the beast inside.

Madan sent the silent feeling of agreement through the vinculum. Words were not always needed to depict thoughts. Merely opening one’s mind to the others was enough. Doing so, however, meant that every single thing would be sent to everyone. Most avoided that if at all possible.

“ And if he attacks while we’re gone ?” Azriel asked after silence stretched between them.

This time, it was Whelan who sent the sense of reassurance through the connection. “ Lhuka and Gavrhil have everything under control .”

“ If you think ,” Kall added, “ that Phulan will let anything happen to the residents, I’m certain she would be happy to demonstrate otherwise .”

The mage may be a healer and no good at offensive attacks, but she had the defensive skill and foresight to keep everyone safe. Had she had a vision of anything going awry prior to their departure, she would have said something. Her psychic abilities, however, were limited and sporadic.

They flew on without much more conversation. Madan and Whelan likely talked between them, and Azriel was happy not to be included. His brother, though loving and loyal, also would have no problem with paying him back for what he’d said a week prior. That none of them spoke of the vocal display he and Ariadne had put on meant one of two things: either they hadn’t been present, or they chose to let it go, as dhemons were wont to do about such things.

By the time they crossed the northern reaches of Eastwood Province and landed at the edge of the first expanse of trees, the sun had begun to rise behind them. The dragons slunk their way between the trees, doing their best to damage as little along the way as possible. Keeping out of sight was critical within the boundaries of Valenul.

“It is no wonder,” Ariadne said as they set up camp in a clearing just large enough for the dragons to lie down, “that no survivors were left during raids.”

Azriel laid his bedroll out beside hers. “If we hadn’t, someone would’ve spoiled our secret.”

She nodded in understanding and thanked Kall as he handed her a sandwich. They wove around large, scaled limbs and ducked beneath membranous wings as they laid out blankets and stretched the soreness from their legs. No need for a fire—not when the dragons let off so much heat.

“Once this secret is out,” Madan said, a hand on Brutis, “we’ll need to redouble our efforts to keep the clutch safe. Everyone will want one of their own. Just like the clan leaders.”

“No good,” Kall added. “Think what happen if Loren have dragon.”

Beside him, Ariadne shuddered. “I do not want to imagine him with that much power. Ehrun is frightening enough.”

Azriel eyed the dagger she unbuckled from her thigh. How she stomached to carry that thing with her, he had no idea. If he got his hands on any weapon that had tortured him, he would destroy it immediately. But she almost seemed to revere it with the way she kept it clean, shining the names etched into the metal until they gleamed. Rhana. Thavii.

“I won’t let him near you,” Azriel promised, his blood thrumming with a sudden dump of adrenaline at the mere thought.

But she placed a hand on his arm, likely seeing the murder in his eyes. “I know.”

“We’ll be staying here through the day and night,” Madan cut in, changing the subject before anything more could come of such talk. Wise of him to keep a discussion like that at a minimum. He knew all too well what could become of him if left to dwell on those thoughts.

Ariadne turned to her half-brother with a frown. “Why so long?”

“We’ll attract less attention if we fly to our next camp during the day.” Madan handed Whelan a small sack from the saddlebags. Before Ariadne could ask a follow-up question, evident by the way she gaped at him, he continued, “Crossing the highway to Notten and flying over villages will require greater heights and more stealth. The dragons need to fly fast, so they must be rested.”

Snapping her mouth shut, Ariadne nodded.

“I thought you enjoyed traveling during the day,” Whelan said.

The words made Azriel’s skin crawl. He trusted the Noct, but tempting the sun with the altitude required for the crossing only made him worry.

“I do.” Ariadne glanced at him as though sensing his displeasure. “But it frightens me.”

Madan nodded, making Whelan’s face pale. The dhemon dropped his voice to speak with his partner. Though Azriel couldn’t make out the words, the tone matched how he felt at the notion of exposing either of the Caersans to sunlight.

Settled in on the far side of the clearing, Kall leaned back against Bindhe. He watched the exchanges, legs outstretched and crossed at the ankles, with mild amusement on his face. Upon noticing Azriel’s attention, he raised a brow. “I take first watch.”

The statement was all Azriel needed to hear, and before long, he and Ariadne were tucked beneath Razer’s wing together. He curled his body around hers, pulling her back taut to his chest, and kissed the top of her head. “Sleep well, my love.”

Her quiet hum of a reply, not unlike the way he grunted his affirmations, soothed him enough to close his own eyes to let sleep settle in.

Ariadne used the hours waiting for daylight to train. She braided her hair back and faced off with Kall as she so often did. Without Phulan around, they did not practice with blades and instead turned to grappling. The fight against Melia may have turned in Ariadne’s favor, but when she described what happened to Kall, he had been less than pleased with her panicked use of the techniques he so dotingly taught her. As such, he had spent the following weeks at the dhemon keep drilling the movements into her mind so they would hopefully not vanish the moment true adrenaline kicked in.

Before Kall initiated the training session in the middle of the forest, however, he held out a bare strip of cloth like what they would use to wrap injuries. “Put on.”

Though this was far from the first time they had trained blindfolded, Ariadne had never done well—and for that reason alone, they avoided it whenever Azriel watched. “Kall…”

“Eyes.” He mimed wrapping the cloth around his face as though she had forgotten what to do with it.

“I do not think this is a good time for it.” Ariadne forced herself to look the dhemon in the eye without glancing at her husband. The only time Azriel would have seen them grapple in such a way had been the night his grandmother forced him to look away.

As such, a shuffle and grunt of restraint from behind her drew her attention. Looking back, she found Azriel glaring over her head to where the dhemon stood. While it had sounded as though Whelan held her husband back, the noise seemed to have been drawn from his own internal discipline. “Don’t.”

Unperturbed, Kall pointed at his foggy eye. “No see. Now you. You do before.”

Madan and Whelan moved in unison around the perimeter of the makeshift training circle to stand beside Azriel. They said nothing but knew as well as Ariadne that their intervention may just be required. Azriel’s self-control only lasted for so long.

Again Azriel spoke, this time in the dhemon tongue. The few curse words that Ariadne knew from the number of times she had accidentally stabbed Kall made their way through the language barrier. Threats, perhaps.

“I am fine,” Ariadne said with as much reassurance as she could muster, going so far as to plaster a warm smile on her face. “He is right. This is not my first time.”

“I don’t care if this is the hundredth time.” Azriel’s voice cut like cold steel. “There is no reason to train for this.”

Kall tilted his head in thought, then said in the common tongue, “Dark caves.”

“She can see in the dark!” Now Azriel stepped forward, an unrecognizable glint in his eyes—one that almost frightened Ariadne had she not known it was for her own protection.

“No light, no see.”

Stepping forward so he and his brother were shoulder to shoulder, Madan said, “He has a point. We need at least some light. If there’s none…we’ll be blind. That said, let her decide how much is too much. She’s done it before. Let her show you what she knows.”

For a long moment, Azriel ground his teeth. His attention flickered from Ariadne, still holding the strip of cloth, to Kall. The internal battle danced in his red eyes as he mentally grappled with the bond that was so desperate to keep her safe. The bond that thought her dead anytime she left his sight.

He did not speak again. Instead, he grunted and nodded once before stalking to his satchel and digging through it. From its depths, he pulled a small vial—one of a handful Phulan had sent with them. Without looking back, he popped the cork and threw back the entire potion, more than he typically drank.

Guilt squirmed in Ariadne’s gut. She did not want to be the cause of his need for the drink. The more he took it, the more she feared he grew dependent upon its illusory magic. Such an addiction would not bode well for the man meant to lead an army into war.

“ Yvhaltrinja .” Kall’s voice cut through her thoughts, dragging her back to the task at hand.

So Ariadne tied the cloth around her eyes, accepting the familiar darkness with a grimace. Vampires were not meant to be blind. Their sight was one of the few gifts provided by the curse of night. The absence of sight, though now not uncommon thanks to Kall’s incessant training, still made her hands shake.

But she had other heightened senses. The dhemon stepped forward, his boots crunching in the leaf litter, and in response, she lifted her hands to protect her face.

Just in time.

Kall’s strike connected with her arm, feeling harder than she was accustomed to without the blindfold. Without her sight, she could not prepare for the impact. It always felt different. She hissed through her teeth, heart pounding as she readied for the next punch. Though he often pulled his punches, he never did her the disservice of going easy—not when he knew she could dodge and block as well as any other. Not when she needed to know how it felt.

A jab down the center had Ariadne reeling back, nose stinging. Warmth ran over her lips, leaking a copper taste into her mouth. Brushing it aside, she winced at the lingering pain. Despite reining in his full strength, the damage was still done.

Somewhere behind her, the sound of sudden movement had her turning her head, breaking her concentration. A low, soothing voice spoke in the dhemon tongue. Whelan. The only one of the group who could hold Azriel back without resorting to the long, sharp teeth of the dragons.

And Kall took advantage of her distraction to hit again, this time in the gut. The air choked from her lungs, sending her to her knees.

Another shuffle, a barked curse, and Madan hissing, “You’re distracting her and only making it worse!”

Focus. Focus.

Ariadne ignored the way her head spun, listened for Kall’s next step, and pushed off her toes in his direction. She connected, back straight and head high, with her hands around the back of his knees. Grunting from the strain, she drove forward, then angled to the side as she lifted his leg.

Kall hit the ground on his back, and Ariadne followed head-first. His arm wrapped around her neck, shoulder tight to the back of her head.

Panic flooded her veins. She had not kept her head high enough—had not protected herself from the potential choke. A mistake she made all too often, and Kall exploited it every single time.

Grabbing his thumb under her jaw, Ariadne tilted her head back in a desperate attempt to remember how to free herself. In doing so, her face pressed into the ground, filling her nose with the scent of damp soil that now clung to the blood there.

“ Sabharni , ydhom ,” Kall grunted—the words he always used to remind her that he would not hurt her. Not really. Easy , princess .

She freed her leg from his tangle of long lower limbs and tried to breathe through the dump of adrenaline. Beneath her, Kall twisted in an attempt to regain control of her body. So, keeping one hand on his to prevent the choke from sinking deeper, she ran the other down his side and planted it on the ground. Then she pivoted her torso towards his head, using his horns as a gauge of where she was.

With her head swimming, Ariadne stretched her neck and pointed her nose up. His hold on her broke. Before she knew what to do next, though, he shifted and plowed his horns into her gut from his knees.

For the second time, air punched from her lungs. Time slid by as she lay on the forest floor, gasping for breath. Kall grabbed her leg and dragged her closer. In a real fight, she would be dead.

“Fuck—watch out!” Whelan’s voice rang out just before another shuffle of movement, and Kall’s hand released her leg.

A loud crack rang out just before a heavy impact shuddered through the ground. Ariadne sat up and ripped off the blindfold. The sudden low light of the night flooded her vision like a flash of white before focusing.

Azriel sat on Kall’s chest, raining down punch after punch. Beneath him, Kall curled up, covering his face to block the strikes. He did not hit back, not even as his face split open and the tang of blood spilled into the air. Not a word was spoken to defend himself—to reason with the incensed man.

Her incensed husband.

“Stop!” She scrambled to her feet and launched over to them, where she wrapped an arm around Azriel’s as he pulled it back to deliver another blow. “Azriel, stop!”

At first, he shook her off. The sudden momentum had her stumbling back in alarm. Not once did he look up from his adversary. His friend—the one he trusted to take care of her when he could not.

So much for that potion keeping him calm.

“Ari, leave them,” Madan said and grabbed her wrist. “He’ll stop in a moment.”

But she did not want to give him that moment. Could not. Not when it was her fault that Azriel had snapped. He had tried to warn them, but they did not heed his words. This was as much her fault as it was Kall’s.

She yanked herself free of her brother’s hold and rounded to face her husband. What she saw was not what she expected. Anger, perhaps. Hatred, fueled by a force he could not control.

No. What she saw was the face of a man who had succumbed to his inner monster. His face, sprayed with Kall’s blood, twisted. Sharp teeth bared and red eyes blazing like hellfire, he gripped one of Kall’s horns and slammed his friend’s head into the ground.

If this was what happened when he took Phulan’s potions, Ariadne did not want to see what would happen when he did not.

Before Azriel could do something he would regret forever—such as killing his best friend—Ariadne braced herself and shoved into him, wrapping her arms around his body as she pushed him backwards off of Kall. He grunted at the impact, his attention turning to her just long enough to hear her say, “Azriel, stop .”

It was not the first time Ariadne had witnessed the way the bond responded to her commands. Her plea for him to stand and fight in the Pits had kept him alive when she was certain he would have let the fae kill him.

This time, his body locked up, so when she wrestled him to the ground, he went down in a near-lifeless heap. His chest heaved for air, and slowly—oh, so slowly—his gaze shifted to focus on her face. Within a few rapid heartbeats, his expression softened…then pure terror widened his eyes as he pushed his back off the ground and looked over her shoulder.

Turning, Ariadne watched as Whelan hauled Kall to a sitting position and crouched before him to inspect the damage. The former murmured to the beaten dhemon, brushing his fingers over the scarred face. The latter raised his eyes and stared at her and Azriel with what she could only describe as sorrow.

“Fuck…” Azriel scrubbed his face with his hands, the skin on his knuckles split wide and bleeding. He pulled his knees to his chest and clung to his horns, hiding his face behind his legs.

Satisfied that her husband had found himself again, Ariadne stood, dragging her sleeve across her face again before walking back to Kall. There she crouched, grimacing as she took in his battered face. Black bruises stretched out around his blind eye. Crimson dripped from his nose and mouth. “I am so sorry.”

But Kall shook his head. “I never listen.”

“You were helping me.” Taking a cloth from Madan to dab the blood from his face, she tried a half-hearted smile and said, “I almost had you.”

When he did not return the smile, choosing instead to divert his attention to the forest floor, she sighed. This had not been something they anticipated when leaving the safety and comfort of the dhemon keep—or the healing provided by Phulan. An outside attack, perhaps. Never two friends fighting and injuring one another.

“The sun is rising,” Madan said as she continued cleaning up Kall’s face. “We need to leave soon.”

Kall nodded and grabbed her hand, stopping her from tending to him. Some life returned to his eyes, and he dragged a finger over her chin where her own blood had dried. “I am fine. Go.”

A lump rose in Ariadne’s throat. She had never seen him look quite so defeated. “Kall, I—”

“We go.” Kall pulled his face away from her and stood. After a moment of hesitation, he tilted his horns at her in a silent apology, then turned and stalked towards Bindhe without another word.

Returning to Azriel, Ariadne took her husband’s face in her hands. His red eyes were as hollow as Kall’s as she used the strip of cloth to clean his friend’s blood from his face.

“Are you hurt?” His words were soft and cracked. When she shook her head, he swallowed hard and followed up with, “Is Kall hurt?”

Ariadne’s eyes flickered up to the dhemon, now shoving his meager belongings into his bags. Though he moved with practiced ease, he paused every so often to mop up the blood still leaking from fresh splits in his deep blue skin.

“Yes,” she admitted. “But it is deeper than the blood spilled, I think.”

A quiet curse, and Azriel hung his head again. “I didn’t know what I was doing.”

Her heart ached for them both. “I know. He knows.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I do not think I am the one to whom you should apologize.”

Azriel grunted in confirmation, yet he said nothing as he got to his feet. Whether the silence was driven by shame or sorrow, Ariadne did not know. Yet no one spoke again as they cleaned up the clearing, and one by one, the dragons took flight into the lightening sky. Ariadne pulled a hood up over her head as an added precaution against the rising sun, the Noct’s strange weight against her sternum.

If the others communicated through their telepathic links, she had no way of knowing. All she could feel was Azriel’s arm around her waist—looser than normal. As though he were trying to touch her as little as possible. The thought of him distancing himself from her after what happened in the clearing made her heart ache.

All she wanted was to turn around and tell him everything. That she loved him. That she understood why it happened. That she was angry with the way he reacted. That he and Kall needed to talk now more than ever.

But between the wind and thin air at such a high altitude, Ariadne did none of that. She merely looked down to the wash of golden land far below her, lit by the sun that warmed her through the cloak. Towns and farmland spread out in great swaths of checkered roads and massive fields.

When they crossed over the highway that led to Northecrosse, Ariadne tensed. Specks moved below them—merchants, Rusan soldiers, and other day-dwelling beings moved steadily. Most headed south, away from Notten Province. All it would take was one person looking up and realizing they were not meant to be there, flying through the sky, for rumors to begin.

There would be no knowing if anyone saw them. So they moved on, landing only when they arrived at the forest on the western border of the province.

Setting up camp required little talking, and when Kall handed them another meal he had prepared at the dhemon keep, Ariadne accepted with a smile and thanks. Azriel, on the other hand, mumbled his gratitude and avoided all eye contact.

The tension did not ease that night or the following day as they waited for dusk to leave again. Any conversation that arose held little weight and did not last long, no matter how hard any of them tried. The silence that lingered between each burst of discourse pressed down on them.

No one suggested training.