Page 33

CHAPTER 33

LYKOR

L ykor stalked away from the group, sweeping his gaze over the wreckage littering the beach as Serenna rushed to her brother’s side. A few elves-turned-wraith stirred weakly in the sand, but he ignored them. Not his concern.

The fleet lay in ruins, splintered hulls sinking beneath the surf. Blood soaked the shoreline, the air reeking of salt and death. His work here was done.

The metallic toll of alarm bells erupted from the castle, slicing through the bay’s stillness. Each clang reverberated through Lykor’s chest, a warning knell. Reinforcements—perhaps a horde of humans—would descend in a swarm. It was past time to depart.

A piercing screech shattered the night as Trella landed on the shore, the ground quaking. Prancing toward him, her talons gouged deep furrows into the sand, feathers streaked with blood that wasn’t her own. White irises locked onto his, a wordless question rippling through their telepathic link—an animalistic need for approval.

As he extinguished the glow from her feathers, Lykor relayed a pulse of appreciation. Her destruction had proven crucial. When she headbutted his shoulder in a demand of further acknowledgment, he indulged her by scratching under the plumes on her cheek.

Lykor cast a cold glance at the group huddled around Serenna’s brother, their hushed murmurs a grating irritation. A crack snapped in his spine as he rolled his neck, the tension in his body refusing to relent.

Now that the fire of battle had cooled, something felt off. Wrong.

His muscles spasmed in erratic jolts, every fiber stretched too taut. Essence thrashed beneath his skin, as if the power he’d claimed carried its own savage intent to rip him apart.

An insidious hiss scraped against the fringes of his mind. It wasn’t Aesar stirring. And that unsettling fact sent a prickle down every bone in his spine.

With a snarl, Lykor crushed the intrusive thought before it could take shape, refusing to entertain such notions. The Aelfyn’s whispers didn’t linger among the stars. That was madness reserved for the king. What he needed now was control—to bleed off the seething magic like draining a festering wound.

The air around Lykor shifted as he ripped open a portal to the jungle. Rather than offering reprieve, the effort deepened the fissures in an already cracked foundation.

He gestured for Trella to go through but she hesitated, ruffling her wings as concern rolled down their link. Sending a wordless reassurance that he wouldn’t be too far behind seemed to placate her well enough and she stepped into the void without further protest.

Lykor exhaled as the portal snapped shut, leaving him alone with the tightening noose of power. The edges of his vision distorted, the world pitching beneath his feet as the pressure under his ribs swelled to a breaking point.

He’d taken too much, too fast. His Well hadn’t had time to adjust. Essence blistered through his bones, heart hammering as if it might burst free from its cage.

He couldn’t contain it. Couldn’t control it. Wild magic clawed at him, a feral force unyielding in its hunger. If he didn’t act, Essence would devour him from the inside out.

The ground rushed up to meet him as he collapsed, hands sinking into the gritty shore. He retched, choking on air that refused to fill his lungs.

A flicker of rage surged, a stubborn defiance loathing the crumbling wreck of his body. This was pathetic. Brought low by his own strength, unraveled by the very power he relied on.

It wasn’t even for him. The wraith needed this advantage, this weapon he could become.

But there was another way.

Snarling at his own weakness, Lykor slammed a hand to his chest, fingers curling against his armor as he wrestled with his Well. Tremors wracked his body as magic erupted from him, spilling out in blinding waves of light.

Clenching his teeth, Lykor forced the chaotic flow into eight blazing globes—one for each talent. The orbs hovered in the air around him, crackling shards of energy that had nearly obliterated him.

He’d divide these talents among his people—the ones most ravenous for revenge. Perhaps the original wraith who’d endured life in the prisons or those from the academy who’d been transformed.

It wasn’t the advantage he wanted, but this power wouldn’t go to waste.

Hollowed out, Lykor’s breaths came in rapid bursts, each inhale raking down his throat. The world wavered and tilted, but the edges sharpened as his body settled back to a form that felt natural to him. Half-elf, half-wraith, his former five abilities condensed back into place.

Lykor shoved himself off of the ground, forcing his trembling legs to bear his weight, though his muscles screamed in protest. But more fragility wasn’t an option.

Someone moved toward him.

His gaze snapped to the one who dared to step closer, hand extended in a misguided offer of help.

Jassyn.

Lykor bared his fangs, the fires of resentment igniting. Jassyn wasn’t here out of concern. He was here to leash him, to fasten submission around his throat like a collar.

Lykor stalked past, dismissing him without a second glance.

Answers. He needed definitive ones. Now.

Vesryn stepped into his path, planting a palm against his chest. A mistake.

Lykor snarled and shouldered the prince aside, his attention slicing between Serenna and the boy. Both of them stared at him with those unsettling glacial eyes, twin mirrors of judgment.

“Does he know anything useful?” Lykor demanded. “Or is he under the capital’s influence?”

Serenna scowled, tilting her chin up in challenge. “Saundyl isn’t compelled,” she snapped, her grip tightening on her brother’s arm. “If that’s what you’re implying.”

Lykor’s eyes flicked over the golden rings at the tips of his pointed ears, then to the golden circlet resting on his brow. The symbol of submission. Obedience worn as a crown. “Why not?” he demanded.

Saundyl straightened and adjusted the tether perched on his mahogany waves, as if the motion restored some of the composure Lykor had stripped from him. “Because my sire,” Saundyl grated out, “took my wife and son weeks ago to ensure my compliance . Elashor has no need to…coerce me.” He glanced at Jassyn, who’d undoubtedly explained the magic’s nature, given his abhorrent proclivity for it.

Lykor grunted. “Riveting.” He tore open another portal and sneered. “Finish this touching reunion later. We’re leaving.”

Saundyl stumbled back, slipping from Serenna’s grasp. “I—I can’t leave. Elashor might be obsessed with my son’s bloodline, but he’s already promised to hurt my wife if I don’t oversee the ships—”

“What ships?” Lykor flung an arm toward the shattered bay, the wreckage drifting aimlessly in the dark.

“It’s not safe for you here,” Serenna urged. She shared a look with the prince before studying the castle above. “We could retrieve Mother too.”

Saundyl shook his head, voice trembling with quiet despair. “I’ve been ordered to depart with the next wave.”

The next wave.

The words landed like a blow, dread settling in Lykor’s gut like stones. Galaeryn’s forces were already advancing across the world. Every day brought them closer to the dragons, closer to seizing a power that would tip the scales irrevocably if they discovered a way to harness and control it.

Above them, the wind carried the harsh bark of orders. The humans were mobilizing, their ranks poised like an encroaching stormfront. Time wasn’t just trickling away from him—it was hemorrhaging out.

Lykor’s fingers curled into fists, his breath hissing through his teeth. “How many have sailed?” he demanded, needing to gauge the scale of what they faced.

“Ten from this harbor,” Saundyl answered. “But they’re building more in the lumberyards to the west and portaling the vessels directly to the water once they’re complete. We were expecting another score in a few days.”

“Do you know anything about the shipyard’s fortifications?” Vesryn questioned, stepping closer. “How many Essence-wielders might be present?” His gaze flicked to Lykor when Saundyl shook his head. “I could dispatch the rangers to…finish what you started here.”

Lykor’s jaw tightened as he stared at the whirling spheres of Essence talents. He didn’t have the luxury of fighting every battle himself. If he distributed this power with purpose, he could begin forging his own army. But perhaps the prince was right—the rangers and that self-important Zaeryn could surely manage razing the vessels before they ever touched water.

“Are there others like us?” Serenna asked quietly, folding her arms around herself. “With shaman power?”

Saundyl nodded stiffly. “Ten from Vaelyn’s court were already deployed across the sea. More arrive from the other realms by the day—and not just those with Essence. The elves are collecting humans who are manifesting their ancestral power.”

Silence coiled around them, thick as the mist rolling in from the tide. Lykor stilled, his breath sharp through his nose. Humans. Their sheer numbers already made them an insurmountable threat—tens of thousands in the king’s army. But if they also had access to power…

Saundyl flinched as wraith began shambling to their feet along the shoreline, eyes veering away as though denying their existence could erase their presence. “I—I don’t understand how…”

Lykor muttered under his breath. He didn’t have the patience—or desire—to enlighten a blind fool about the grim realities of the world.

Catching a shift of motion, his gaze flicked upward. The cliff face blazed with torchlight, a fiery corona searing through the night. This little excursion was over.

Shadows stirred around Lykor’s feet as he summoned rending and faced the wraith scattered along the shore—a loose end he had no intention of leaving untied. Darkness writhed, tendrils swirling to his fingertips as he lifted his arm.

But before he could release the tide of shadows, fingers hooked around his wrist, firm and halting. The interruption snapped Lykor’s head to the side, a snarl ripping free.

Of course it was Jassyn standing there, wind whipping his curls into disarray, those amber eyes steady beneath the full weight of Lykor’s fury. But it was that scar—always the scar—that commanded Lykor’s attention. That defiant line slashed into his face. A reminder of what Jassyn had endured. An accusation of what Lykor had wrought.

And he hated that mark—hated how it stood as a glaring testament to what his strength hadn’t broken. What he was still too weak to destroy. Jassyn was as much a threat as the king, a fact that burned like acid in his veins. What did it say about his own power if—

With the barest shake of his head, Jassyn conveyed an unspoken appeal. It wasn’t a challenge, but it dared to ask for something Lykor wasn’t sure he could give.

“There’s no need to claim more lives,” he said softly.

And for an agonizing moment, Lykor hesitated, detesting how one person could unmake him so thoroughly with nothing more than a look. How Jassyn had the nerve to touch him, when that morning, Lykor had reached out and he’d recoiled.

Yet now, Jassyn was steady. Unflinching.

As if there was no longer anything to fear. As if he had already decided that Lykor wouldn’t hurt him. That he couldn’t .

Or was it because the undeniable truth was that Jassyn could reach into his mind, bludgeon that vile magic into his skull, and bring him to his knees with a single thought?

That he could coerce him now if he refused to stop.

Lykor’s shoulders twitched as he came back to himself. He yanked his arm out of Jassyn’s grip and growled, “And if their loyalties still lie with the capital?”

Saundyl’s bitter laugh broke the tension, cheeks tinged with anger. “You’ll find most of us don’t take kindly to being controlled—or our families being threatened. But what choice do we have when we don’t even know who is watching and reporting our every move?”

Lykor grunted dismissively, letting his shadows unravel in the wind. This wasn’t his problem. Yet his eyes lingered on Saundyl, catching the flicker of resolve buried beneath the fear. Those pushed to their limits would always choose a side. Whether this boy would emerge as an ally or a liability if they met again was a question that time would soon answer.

“We can take these wraith back with us,” Serenna offered. “They would at least be safe until we figure out where they stand.”

Vesryn shifted closer to her, eyes roving over the globes of stolen Essence drifting around them. “We’ll return their power and—”

“No,” Lykor interrupted, flat and final. “We’re not outfitted to shelter every stray in the realm.” He turned to the girl. “If your brother is delusional enough to stay, then be quick with your farewells.”

Whatever grand scheme the prince had brewing was of no concern to him—Lykor had his own designs for that power. His gaze slid to Saundyl. “And if we find ourselves standing on opposite sides across the sea,” he growled, “you’ll find out just how little patience I have for anyone who dares to put my people in danger.”

Without waiting for his response—or for the prince to spin another argument—Lykor stalked toward the waiting portal. He hurled the globes of Essence ahead of him, the orbs casting a final glow across the sand before they vanished into the void.

One more battle awaited him tonight—an irate captain to placate. Let Kal busy himself redistributing these talents.

At the threshold, Lykor threw his final words over his shoulder. “This changes nothing. We still leave at dawn.”