Page 11 of Zepharali: Lord of the East Winds (Lords of the Wind Book 3)
Zepharali
Tir Scáthanna ~ Peaks of Kipmis Mountain
Zepharali, Boraleashe, and Theodor landed together in a clearing outside the last place Zepharali’s waves had been deflected.
Boraleashe was the first to start in on his world—he hadn’t expected anything less.
“By all the hellhounds in Hades, Zeph! You should’ve warned me!”
Zepharali rolled his eyes. Boraleashe was always the most dramatic of his brothers.
“No one told you to wear a damn white fur cloak. You knew where we were going.”
The Scáthanna suns beat down relentlessly, heating Zepharali’s skin in the best way. The blazing winds were so powerful that the shimmering mirages distorted the views of the villages at the foot of the mountain.
“Calm down, my winter lover.” Theodor ran his long fingers through Boraleashe’s blizzard-white hair. “Try to ignore the warmth and take in the beauty of the summer lands. It’s as gorgeous as my father describ—”
“The gods be damned, Theo! This is not warmth. The Autumn world is warm. This place is scorching my skin and stifling me. I can barely take a breath.” Boraleashe frowned at his hands. “I’m already getting a fuckin tan.”
Zepharali and Theodor concealed their grins behind their fists.
He decided to let Boraleashe continue to grumble and shed a few layers as he led them toward the farthest corner of the mountain, near the only Golden Yucca tree.
He assumed his intruders were still hidden there.
Zepharali smelled the unique smokiness, and instead of voicing it, he waited for Boraleashe’s and Theodor’s reactions.
“What’s that smell?” Theodor paused, tightening the grip on his sword, Gold Reaper. “It’s demonic.”
“Do you smell the other scent?”
“What other scent?” Boraleashe took a deep inhale. “I only smell a sooty stench that’s making me wanna gag.”
Zepharali pressed his thumbs to his temples. He was more confused than ever.
The sweet fragrance was even more prominent than two days ago. Why couldn’t anyone else pick up on it?
Instead of confessing that peculiar truth, he focused on keeping his cock under control while they closed in.
“I can smell and see it, Zeph.” Boraleashe pulled Weeping Glass from behind his back.
“I’m able to identify any entity from any realm.” Theodor shook his head at Zepharali. “But I cannot detect a species of the dark worlds because they don’t belong outside of it.”
The Titan of the South confirmed his worst suspicions. He had to rid his world of this evil and return it where it belonged.
“This is close enough.”
Theodor put his arm out, stopping Boraleashe from getting too close to the mysterious fog that rolled over itself, creating a spectral silhouette.
The smooth base of the yucca tree was concealed behind the ghostly mist, its mighty branches reaching toward it like eerie arms.
The air was different here. It was damp and heavy, tinging this part of the forest in an enigmatic gray hue that shouldn’t be able to survive under his suns.
“I am the titan and ruler of this land,” he said as forcefully as possible. “I am Zepharali Cavalerie, Lord of the East Wind and commander of the Three Suns.”
He waited a couple of minutes to see if anything happened, and when nothing did, he announced his allies.
“I stand here with the Titans of the North and South. Together, their combined winds can create a force of nature that can challenge a god.”
Zepharali didn’t like issuing this threat. The words rolling off his tongue tasted sour.
He swallowed, then lowered his voice, using the tone he did when he was in bed with a lover.
“I won’t hurt you if you just show yourself to me.”
Boraleashe glared at him as if he’d lost his mind.
“You dare disturb my pledging to my king and have us come all this way…to negotiate.”
Boraleashe scoffed and shed his white overcoat, leaving only his crisp linen tunic and cotton breeches. His husband stood close behind him with his broad chest pressed against his back.
“I stand with my king.” Boraleashe’s voice was as cold as his realm, making a dreadful cold creep inside Zepharali’s core. “Do not make me pull on his element lest there will be no surviving it.”
Theodor’s sword glistened with his Autumn heat as he placed his palm over Boraleashe’s shoulder.
Boraleashe unsheathed Weeping Glass—the white-gold blade gleaming in the sunlight—and gripped the pearl handle with both hands.
Zepharali’s loving heart dropped to his stomach as the mist thickened to a black fog, the enticing sweetness becoming even more pronounced.
There had to be a reason why only he could smell it.
“Boraleashe, just send a light dusting of your frost first. As a small warning,” Zepharali suggested.
His brother scoffed and stabbed half his blade into the soft earth. “You asked for my frost, and that’s what you will get.”
Zepharali whipped his head toward Theodor, pleading with his eyes to help him. Boraleashe would obey no one but his king.
He was relieved when Theodor reached around his husband and placed his palm over his chest, against his core.
“Do not cover his mountain under miles of ice, my love.”
Boraleashe’s stern features softened at Theodor’s voice in his ear, making Weeping Glass shimmer like a diamond as he pulled lightly on his element.
Tension continued to build in Zepharali’s heart. He wished this person would just surrender. He hated showing this kind of lethal force toward a stranger.
Boraleashe’s hands paled until they appeared frozen, and small shards of ice formed on his fingertips.
Gods.
The frost traveled down the blade to the point where it disappeared into the ground. Boraleashe released the handle, cupped his polar-white hands around his mouth, and blew a gust of air that came out like translucent snow.
The ground became a thick blanket of ice beneath Zepharali’s feet. Frost clung to the nearby shrubs before the chill spread through every nook and cranny of the forest.
Once Weeping Glass pulsed with winter energy, Boraleashe flicked one hand forward—thank the heavens it wasn’t both—sending another dusting of frost across the mountaintop, cold enough to cause instant hypothermia.
As Zepharali predicted, Boraleashe’s primary weapon put a considerable hole in the dense black fog, and he wasn’t finished.
The Titan of Winter’s long white hair fanned around him. His hands conjured a blur of swirling ivory and sapphire as he pulled more power from his sword and shot another devastating blow into the heart of the mist.
Zepharali squinted, inching closer while still giving Boraleashe a wide berth.
He could make out two men, one taller than the other in front. He could tell the man in back was young and frightened by the way he clutched the older man.
He couldn’t be all that evil or dangerous if he was cowering and afraid.
The berry-sweet scent turned ill-tasting, creating unease and indecision that twisted Zepharali’s stomach.
He leapt toward Boraleashe to stop him from delivering the final blast that would obliterate anything left of the fog and what was shielded behind it, but he wasn’t fast enough.
Boraleashe’s frost was below any temperature Zepharali thought possible.
Before the deadly ice reached the remaining shreds of mist, a blazing inferno erupted through the clouds and hit the ground so hard it shook the mountain.
A massive, winged creature appeared from a jet-black billowing mass of smoke.
Boraleashe reared back and shielded his eyes before Theodor threw up his magic-infused cloak to protect his husband from the searing heat.
The animal’s long, curved talons dug deep into the dusty snow that quickly melted and vanished.
The birdlike beast extended his long black wings, shielding whoever stood behind it.
The creature screamed a shattering “Keeearr” that none of them mistook as their one and only warning.
It spread its large wings and flapped them, sending embers into the sky.
Their three war stallions bolted to their sides and reared up before landing and shaking their wild manes and stomping their hooves in response to the threat against their masters.
Boraleashe struggled for words, shock and rage evident on his face as he yanked Weeping Glass out of the earth. The blade transformed into a sharp spike of unbreakable glass, ready for battle.
Theodor clutched Boraleashe, halting his attack. “Wait, don’t!”
“If it comes toward us, it dies.”
“No one move,” Theodor warned in a hushed voice. “It’s a phoenix.”
Zepharali inched backward. “Will it try to kill us?”
“Only if you continue to threaten who it was born to protect.”
Boraleashe kept his sword raised, remaining skeptical and cautious.
Theodor pointed at the almost twelve feet of blazing wings. “His flames are hotter than in the Underworld…but…he can’t withstand your frost for too long.”
“Good,” Boraleashe growled.
“But he’d be a worthy adversary and give you one helluva a fight, my love.” Theodor touched his husband. “Stand down.”
“I’ve never seen one of these. Are they from the dark world?”
“No, Zepharali. They are not of any world or realm.” Theodor extended his hands in a gesture of peace. “It’s of the Phoenix Vale, created by the ancient guardian angels to protect the greatest beings created. Entities or species that have the capacity to reshape entire worlds…or conquer them.”
Zepharali had lived long enough to assume he’d seen all the many worlds and realms had to offer.
But he was wrong.
“No one has seen the magnificent—ferociously loyal—Ribiccaww Raptor in thousands of years. The more brilliant the sun, the more powerful and deadly their flames.” Theodor nodded to Boraleashe to shield his weapon. “Just wait a moment. His fire will recede when he calms and his charge is no longer in danger.”
“She.” The nonthreatening voice behind the phoenix slid down Zepharali’s spine like a forbidden caress. “My Myst is a female.”
The older of the two men emerged through the remaining fog first, standing silent and alert as he scanned each of them with keen black eyes.
He was a few heads shorter than them. Zepharali guessed he was a fragile human of the Earth Realm. His skin was wrinkled but not sun-weathered. His long slate-gray hair had perhaps once been beautiful brown or black locks.
His dirty, battered tunic and overcoat looked like they’d seen better days before he decided to camp at the top of Kipmis Mountain.
The oversized phoenix calmed enough to extinguish its flames—the dense feathers continuing to release enough steam to melt any lingering frost—but her midnight-black wings stayed extended, concealing the man behind it.
Zepharali craned his neck to catch a clearer glimpse of the one who’d spoken with a voice that dripped like berry sap—smooth and tempting.
“Renowned Lords of the Winds. King Cavalerie, our gods’ Treasure of the Realms.” The slight man gave a deep, respectable bow. “I am Oleksandr Osmund, the Silent Sentinel of the Ancient Angel Continent. My lord and I were sent to this world by Mother Earth and the Titan of the West Wind.”
Boraleashe scoffed. “Leave it to Orestes to send trouble but no warning.”
“My charge, the dark lord, has been bathed in love and humility, my lords, not trouble. He is kind and unsullied. A being so dynamic and grand in stature that the universe sent its mightiest guardians to protect him.”
Zepharali didn’t realize he’d inched forward until he was a couple of feet from the sentinel.
“Lord of the East Wind, I present my master, the Lord of Fire and Warrior of the Flame. He is the Defiant of the Gods of Light and Master of the Shadows.” The old man extended his hand behind him. “Lords, you have the honor of standing in the presence of the world’s one and only firstborn tribrid, Prince Lazaaras Nyateagor.”
“Impossible.” Theodor blinked, his mouth falling open. “What have the lords of the dark worlds done?”
Boraleashe stood frozen for several moments before he snapped out of his shock and rushed to Zepharali’s side.
“A tribrid is forbidden, brother. It should’ve been stricken down by the gods at birth.”
Zepharali jerked away from Boraleashe’s clutch.
“Zeph,” his brother growled, “you send that Paleolithic scavenger and his prince of too many fuckin’ titles back to where they came from, lest your people suffer a fate even greater than mine.”
The only word ringing in Zepharali’s head was unsullied. Meaning never been touched or tarnished. Pure and impeccable.
“Let me see you.” He softly sent the request on his heated wind.