Page 149 of The Primal of Blood and Bone (Blood and Ash #6)

“I know. But this? It doesn’t belong to me, Delano.

If you don’t want it, I understand. But I won’t use it again.

” I drew in a ragged breath as an image of him flashed in my mind, his snow-white fur stained with blood.

“To be honest, even if it had nothing to do with your sister, I don’t think I would ever be able to use it again after it—” My voice cracked, and I had to take another breath.

“After it was used to hurt you. So, whether you take it or not, it won’t be used by me or anyone else ever again. ”

“Poppy.” He repeated my name, this time roughly.

Neither of us spoke for several moments, and then he placed his hand over mine. A fine shudder went through him as he closed his eyes.

“I’ll take it,” he whispered.

Unfurling my fingers, I felt a throb of awareness signaling that Casteel was near. I pressed my lips together as Delano lifted the dagger from my hands.

“Thank you.”

“You don’t need to thank me,” I said.

“I know.” Holding the bundle to his chest, he looped his arm around my shoulders and tugged me to him. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with it,” he said, his breath stirring the top of my head, “but I’m so damn grateful I have a choice.”

I blinked damp lashes as Delano leaned in to press a kiss to my forehead.

When he stepped back, a lopsided, sweet and boyish smile tugged at his lips. He didn’t say anything as he left—I imagined to be alone. I needed that, too.

I inhaled deeply, grateful I had a few moments to myself. I took several deep breaths, hoping to ease the stinging in my throat as I wiped under my eyes. Lowering my arms, I shook out my hands, my gaze creeping over the chamber before settling on the glass wall and the gray Cliffs beyond.

Where I had died.

That felt so…wrong yet right to think. I took a small step toward the glass—

Awareness skittered through me, drawing my attention from the Cliffs. I felt both Casteel and Kieran, but only the latter appeared in the doorway. My eyes locked with winter-blue ones.

Kieran stepped into the chamber and then stopped. His chest rose with a deep breath. “Cas told me.”

I smiled. Or at least I thought I did. “Bet you weren’t expecting that.”

“Were you?”

What he asked was such a simple question, but the answer halted in my throat.

Swallowing, I turned back to the window and the Cliffs.

Had I been expecting to learn that I’d been reborn more times than one could count?

No. But had I suspected something from the moment I woke—maybe even before then? Yes.

“I don’t know,” I said finally. “It doesn’t matter, though.”

“You’re right.”

His response drew my gaze back to him.

Kieran crossed the space between us and grasped my upper arms. He didn’t look away as he lowered his chin. “Poppy,” he said, his normally flat tone rough and low. “ That’s who you are. That’s who you will always be. And that is all that matters.”

The tension in my chest loosened—not by a lot, but a little. And at that moment, it was enough. “Thank you,” I said, my voice shaky.

Kieran didn’t respond. It was almost as if he sensed there was nothing more to say.

The breath I let out was stilted as a mixture of…

wariness and bone-deep sorrow pressed on me.

No, not just sorrow. I felt anguish . The bitterly cold kind that pelted my skin.

It was quick and vanished as fast as it arrived.

Lifting my head, I met Kieran’s gaze. He gave me a small smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes as I opened my senses.

Kieran’s shields were up, but I picked up faint traces of sadness and threads of almost bitter wariness.

But what I’d felt was stronger. More intense.

Familiar . What I’d felt wasn’t from Kieran.

I stepped back and looked toward the doorway.

Casteel stood there, his features smooth except for the tension bracketing his mouth.

That anguish was coming from him. And the reason it felt familiar was because I’d felt it before when we first met in Masadonia. It was that same anguish that had always been there under the surface of every teasing word and smile. It was the near-constant anguish for his brother.

But Malik wasn’t the source of what I’d briefly picked up from Casteel a bit ago. It couldn’t be.

I stepped toward him.

The tension left his mouth. Before I could speak, he did. “Malik is waiting for us.”

The air was cool despite the time of year in Carsodonia as we traveled along a wide street deep within the Luxe.

I’d asked Casteel if he was okay before we reached the stables. He assured me he was. When it was clear I didn’t believe him, I got a smile without a dimple and a soft, sweet kiss.

He had done what I did when asked that question. He’d told a white lie. Considering how often I’d done it, I couldn’t hold it against him, but the reason behind his anguish haunted my thoughts.

I feared I knew what it had to do with. Or whom.

Kieran.

It was telling that he hadn’t traveled with us and instead opted to stay back and discuss setting up a public address with the generals. Off the top of my head, I couldn’t think of a time that had happened before I awakened.

Whatever was going on between them—between the three of us—had briefly fallen to the wayside with Seraphena’s arrival.

But Casteel had agreed to talk. And that would happen as soon as we were done with whatever this was.

As we crested the circular driveway of a stately home at the end of a quiet street, I told myself I wouldn’t allow myself or him to distract me.

Because I needed to know what had happened between him and Kieran that could have caused such pain—the deep kind of heartache.

Setti slowed, causing me to focus on my surroundings. Several horses were already tethered to a hitching post beneath the shelter of a carriage house—one bearing the gold-and-white saddle of either a general or a commander.

“Nice house.” Delano, who’d joined us, eyed the home’s ivory stone facade and ornate pillars framing wide steps leading up to a veranda. Other than a slight redness to his eyes when we joined him outside the stables and the lingering hum of sadness, he seemed okay.

“All the homes here are nice,” Casteel replied, drawing Setti to a halt. “Unlike Croft’s Cross.”

“Only the wealthiest mortals live in this section of the Garden District. Most of the homes are occupied by the Ascended. No Ascended live in the other districts,” I said. “At least from what I can remember.”

“That hasn’t changed.” Malik dismounted.

“Yet,” I murmured, my gaze flickering over the homes across the street as Casteel swung off Setti.

Many houses would soon be empty, which would go a long way toward alleviating the cramped confines of Croft’s Cross. That thought made me feel a little better—a tiny bit.

Making sure the hood of my cloak remained in place, I jumped off Setti’s back, landing on my feet as Casteel turned to assist.

“I could’ve helped you.”

“I know.” Stretching up, I kissed his cheek. Or tried. I ended up kissing his hood.

I stepped back and made my way toward the stairs.

Malik was already at the door. As I passed two large urns on either side of the steps, my gaze flicked to the wilted flowers within and then lifted to the baskets hanging from the veranda ceiling.

The stems draped limply over the sides, and the plants were clearly starved of water.

“So, what are you showing us?” Casteel asked his brother.

Malik opened the doors. “Follow me.”

Delano and Casteel exchanged a look as we walked inside. A pleasant scent reached me.

“That smell.” Delano sniffed as he closed the door behind us. “Apples and cinnamon?”

“That’s surprisingly…homey for a house occupied by the Ascended,” I remarked.

Malik crossed beneath a chandelier, heading for a door tucked into a shadowy corner of the stairwell. He opened it, and I tensed, knowing why we were headed downstairs. He hadn’t wanted to show us something but rather someone .

My hand reflexively went to my thigh and the shadowstone dagger I’d grabbed and hidden there before leaving the Solar. Not that I really needed it if push came to shove. I could level this house if I had to.

“The Ascended Kolis drained,” I said, entering the lamplit stairway behind Casteel and trying to shake the unease I felt at entering the home of an Ascended. “Were those homes near here?”

“Several avenues back,” Casteel answered.

The stairs emptied into a foyer of sorts, and I saw hats hung next to closed, colorful parasols and delicate, drawstring reticules. The sight of something so…normal was unsettling.

Malik opened the doors ahead, revealing a wide hall with golden vines molded into the walls and ceiling. The female Descenter from earlier waited at the end before an open archway. Seeing her surprised me.

I glanced at Casteel. He frowned and remained silent, though I knew he was thinking the same as I was.

This was the very last place I’d expected to find a Descenter.

Taking a deep breath, I cleared my thoughts and walked ahead. I needed to focus on whatever this was about.

Helenea bowed her head as Casteel and I neared, her nervous gaze bouncing to Malik and then behind us as if she were looking for someone.

“I was told you met Helenea earlier,” Malik said.

“Yes.” Casteel drawled the single word with a raised brow.

Before I could chime in, I was immediately distracted—and confused—by what I saw within the large chamber. And I wasn’t the only one as Helenea quietly closed the door behind us.

The space appeared as if it was bathed in sunlight, an illusion created by the windows painted along the walls and the soft blue skies and heavy-limbed oaks rendered inside the painted frames. The bright, overhead lights made it feel like we weren’t underground, but in a chamber above.