Page 35 of The Storm of the Empire (Flyers Of The First Kingdom #3)

THIRTY-FOUR

LUKA

I felt on top of the world when we stepped foot back on the landing platform at the palace, but it all came crashing down. We tried to go right to Nyx with what we’d seen but were stopped by armed guards.

Either the King was with him in Kol’s room, or something else had developed.

“Where have you two been?!” Jaxus confronted us, waving the guard to stand down.

“We went to inspect Damona Island ourselves,” I informed him, unsure why it was an issue.

“Why?” he demanded.

Hazel side-eyed me.

“Are we required to ask now before we leave the kingdom?” I dropped my voice, holding his gaze. “Because last we spoke, I was to do whatever was needed to see this through and get to the bottom of why herbs the priests had made your mate sick.” I didn’t care what they’d found or hadn’t. I wasn’t about to let him give me attitude.

Jaxus glanced at the guards and moved us further down the hall to give our conversation more privacy. “With the way the king reacted when we sent flights to Damona Island and it proved fruitless, we are under extra scrutiny,” he growled.

“Well, we have more intel.” Hazel stepped forward.

“What are you talking about?” Jaxus glanced between us, frowning and stepping closer. His nostrils flared, and I realized he was scenting us. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. Really? You two?”

Ohhhh.

“Yes. I’m her ryder,” I said with a measure of pride. It was still sinking in, but I would not deny it to anyone.

Jaxus raised his brows at Hazel. “And the rest? You haven’t told him?”

“I hadn’t gotten around to it yet, no.”

I looked between them, but they both avoided my gaze. “Umm, will one of you tell me what he’s going on about please? I’ve already had quite the last twenty-four hours. I’ve got magic now, then learned I’m a ryder, and we flew through a fucking storm summoned by my flyer because apparently we can do that now, too. I did not think I would survive.” I count things off on my fingers. “I’ve been captured and escaped. Discovered Octavian is still alive, kind of—that one is going to haunt me.” I shuddered. “The way his face moved was really not cool.”

Jaxus’ eyes grew wider with every point, but when I got to Octavian, he held up a hand. “What?”

“We did try to tell those guards we needed to speak to Nyx. As Hazel said, we have a lot of new intel.”

Jaxus scrubbed a hand over his face. “Let me go see if he and the King are done. Don’t tell another soul, and please don’t mention this to the King if he stops you on his way out.”

“Do you think they are going to believe us?” I asked in mind speech while we waited for Jaxus to return.

She lifted her shoulders. “A week ago, I would have told you Nyx would believe anything I said. Today, I’m not so sure.”

“I can’t believe they’d doubt us, but maybe I would too had I not seen it with my own eyes.” I hesitated. “We saw it, right?”

“We did. They were real. I felt them under my sword. They can’t make us hallucinate that.”

“How is Octavian still alive?” I was just running through the stream of my own thoughts.

“I don’t know. He only looked half alive if you ask me. Maybe it’s a ruse?”

“Do you think they’d keep him alive, or the figure of him at least, to keep the momentum for their cause?” I needed some of this to make sense. The last few weeks had felt like a fever dream.

“It could be anything with him. The bastard wouldn’t go easily. If I know anything about him, it’s that.”

Jaxus returned, putting a finger to his lips, then gestured us towards Kiera’s office. He had us wait there and said he’d be back.

“Why are we being treated like spies?” Hazel almost laughed in her mind voice.

“Because we are. Like it or not, we are operating outside of the official channels.” We were going to be viewed with some level of suspicion by some, but at least she trusted me now.

“I heard that. And I do.”

I narrowed my eyes. “ You can hear everything? How? I’m not thinking it at you.”

“Until you learn how to shield your thoughts, I will be able to.”

I pulled a face because that meant she was going to be able to hear all my very obscene thoughts about her.

“Yes, I can. And I rather like how naughty your mind is so don’t stop on my account.”

My skin heated. “If I didn’t think Jaxus would be back any second, I’d have you over this desk right now.”

“Tease! Later.”

I lifted my brows. “Really?”

“Promise.” She paired her words with the sexiest smile, and I knew she was going to drive me crazy before the end of all of this.

“Are you going to tell me about what Jaxus meant when he said you hadn’t told me something?”

“Later for that, too. I don’t think we have time now.”

I nodded, pretty sure I had an idea but wanting to at least talk about it. This was a lot of change. Then something occurred to me. “So wait, are we in the flying legion now?”

But she didn’t reply because Nyx stalked into the office, looking undead himself. “I had to tell the King I needed the bathroom to get a minute to breathe. What’s all this about?”

“You might want to sit down,” Hazel said.

“I’m fine.”

“We saw Octavian.”

Nyx’s face twisted into a look of incredulity. “No, you didn’t. He’s dead. We burned his body.” Nyx sat on the edge of Kiera’s desk, rubbing his temples.

“I’m aware.”

“So you saw ash?” Nyx said through his teeth, clearly not wanting to hear any of this.

“No, we saw a pretty creepy version of him somewhere between alive and undead, and I didn’t think he could get creepier.”

Hazel put a hand over her mouth, holding back a laugh I could hear mentally. It was kinda nice to be connected with her that way.

“The King is never going to believe any of this.” Nyx sighed. “I can’t deal with this right now.”

I glanced at Jaxus. “Do you want us to keep it to ourselves?”

“Yes, but first, I want you to walk us through what happened step by step and then let me decide how I’m handling it.” Nyx gestured for us to carry on.

We walked him through the events of the last twenty-four hours and helped each other fill in the details.

“So they know you escaped?” Nyx asked, exasperated.

“Yes. We had to fight our way out of the temple.”

“Oh, I almost forgot. They said they were going to give the temple the same treatment as the one on Damona Island,” Hazel said in a rush. “I know it’s far-fetched, but they obviously have a way to do it. Clear out and leave no sign behind.”

“I believe you. You wouldn’t lie to me,” Nyx tells her. “And Zaria trusts Luka with her life, so that’s enough for me.”

“I trust him, too.” Hazel slipped her hand in mine. “I can see his whole mind now.”

Nyx glanced between us, only just realizing what Jaxus had picked up on right away. That was how clouded his mind was with all he had to deal with. “You two?”

Jaxus shrugged. “Those pendants worked well, I guess.”

“Are we just going to have mates keep sprouting up all over the place now? What happened to this being a rare occurrence?” Nyx said, but it was evident he wasn’t really asking.

“I don’t know anything about that stuff.” I shrugged. “I’m new to your crap.”

“Do you think Kerani has something to do with this?” Hazel asked, bringing up a point they clearly hadn’t considered.

“It would make sense. Their shielding is quite good,” Jaxus mused.

“And they have the storms to disturb magic as well, giving their land even more protection,” Hazel added.

“And if they are taking our eggs?” I added, and everyone looked at me. “Someone had to say it. Those eggs are going somewhere.”

“Surely, those are going to wherever the Dragon’s Bane is going?” Nyx said.

“Octavian didn’t seem to know about the eggs, though,” Hazel said, looking to me for confirmation.

I lifted my hands. “I don’t know. It could be either. But they are going somewhere.”

“And no lead on Alora’s egg?” Nyx asked, glancing between us. “Or is that a dead end? Losing a future storm dragon would be terrible. Who knows if Alora can even have another?”

Hazel clutched her heart. “We didn’t find a trace of it at the temple in Runerth, but the trail was long cold by then.”

“I’m having Faolan look into it to see if he can figure anything out with his contacts about where it might have gone after leaving Storm. He believes it was on his ship,” Jaxus added. “It’s a long shot, but it’s something.”

“Keep on it. How long until Alora’s egg was due to hatch?” Nyx asked.

“Six months,” Hazel said.

“So we have a little bit of time.”

“A little, yes,” Hazel spoke, but I couldn’t focus on her.

Flickers ate at my vision, almost making it seem frosted, like ice crept from the corners of my sight, threatening to engulf it all. I blinked, trying to follow the direction of the conversation but unable to. The room grew cold.

“Luka?” Hazel put her hand on my shoulder.

“Sorry, what?” I asked, blinking a few times until my vision cleared.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Over-tired, I think. We didn’t sleep much.” I offered her a smile.

“I need to wrap my brain around all of this,” Nyx cut in, shaking his head while lacing his fingers behind his neck. “We know we have priests smuggling Dragon’s Bane and eggs, and Octavian was definitely involved in the Dragon’s Bane but doesn’t seem to know about the eggs. I killed him myself, but now, he’s somehow alive and hiding out with the priests in their temple. Magic has been declining for years, as have dragon numbers, but if eggs are being stolen and moved to Kerani, that would explain the decline. And now we know two pendants were keeping mates apart?”

“In a nutshell,” Jaxus said, sounding almost defeated.

“There’s something we’re missing here, and we have to figure out what. Somehow, it’s all tied together.” He pushed to his feet. “Don’t go spreading this mate thing around until we figure out what to say about it, and I’ve got to explain that to the King as well.”

Jaxus stared at him like he was losing his mind. “Dragons are going to know. Can’t you smell it?”

“Sure, but most dragons are out on patrols right now. The King is extra twitchy about this Damona Island situation, so I’m pretty sure we can keep it on the down low until I figure it all out.” Nyx crossed his arms over his chest. “So where am I going to say you two disappeared to?”

“Just say our bond suddenly kicked in, so we melded and then fucked our way through the last twenty-four hours. You know dragons—we can’t really help ourselves,” Hazel said casually. I shot her a glance, shocked she would be so flippant about telling the King something like that.

Jaxus clapped a hand over his mouth, but his bellowing laugh was too much to hold back. “Can’t deny them that.”

“Thankfully, that’s something the King will believe.” Nyx shook his head, and I was sure he wasn’t looking forward to telling the King we’d been fucking all this time. “Jaxus, you fill in Kiera and see if she has any insight. I’m going to tell Zaria. No one else. This circle is already too big for my liking. Not because I don’t trust any of you, but because the more people who know, the more dangerous this gets. I don’t like any of it.”

Nyx left, and Jaxus excused himself to find Kiera, leaving us to our own devices.

“What now?” Hazel asked when we left the healer’s wing.

“I’m starved. Want to nick some food and take it back to your suite?” The fog lingered in the back of my brain, and I really didn’t want to deal with anyone else until I’d had some rest.

We barely made it back to Hazel’s room before the ice was creeping back in.

“What’s wrong?” Hazel turned towards me.

“I don’t know.”

She crossed the room and put her hands on my face. “Are you feeling ill?”

“Do you think I could have caught something?” But it wasn’t exactly feeling ill. “I think I’m just tired.”

We sat, leaning into each other and sharing our meal, and I felt better. Then we fell into bed, exhausted, and sleep took me quickly.

But the deeper I sank into sleep, the further I fell into the ice.