Warrior of the Drowned Empire (Drowned Empire #6)

CHAPTER TWO

RHYAN

Snow fell on the mountain’s top, coating the white seraphim. The flakes were so thick and heavy they were already blurring its form. I felt half-possessed with a need to clear the snow off, to keep the statue in pristine form. To honor it. To worship it. And yet I knew that the more snow that covered it, the safer it was. The more it would go unseen. Disappear. But then, so would she. Fuck.

I swore I wouldn’t do this. I wouldn’t fall apart. Not here. Not now. It wasn’t what she wanted. What she needed. I’d promised her I was strong enough. Promised that I’d be all right. But I wasn’t all right. I’d never be all right—not in this life, not in this body. Because she was … she was…

My cry was soundless. A violent hurricane inside my blood and bones, trapped with no release.

I couldn’t see through my tears. The tears that were freshly falling, and the tears that felt like they’d never stopped. Not since she … not since Asherah …

Asherah.

My chest was rising and falling, my breath coming in harsh, broken waves. I pressed my forehead against the tomb, the carving just like the seraphim birds she’d so loved. The cold moonstone was almost soothing as I breathed against it. Soothing, until again I remembered its purpose. Remembered she lay within. The grief started all over, as fresh and painful as it had been when it happened. As it had been when, only moments ago, I’d laid her to rest.

“ Mekara ,” I gasped. “My soul is yours.” I ran my fingers along the bird’s wing, along the place where I’d sealed the tomb. Her final resting place. The shard’s final resting place. I’d woven enough spells, and cast enough enchantments that I knew beyond a doubt that no one could ever disturb it. No one in this world or the next would ever have access to that level of power, or that level of destruction again.

“ Rakame .” There was a flash of heat from above.

I jumped back, my eyes widening, boots slipping in a bank of snow.

I could hear her, hear her in my head again. Hear her calling back to me. Hear her clear and beautiful voice. Gods. It was all I’d wanted. To listen to her one more time. To see her. To hold her. And by all the Gods, one day I would. In Heaven. Or another life. Or maybe even in hell. It didn’t matter where. Didn’t matter when. I’d wait as long as I had to. Go wherever she went to find her.

But first I had to finish what we started. First, I had to honor her sacrifice, honor the risk she took to save my life. To save everyone’s. Keep the shards separate. Keep them hidden. Keep them from ever coming together again, from ever falling into the wrong hands.

Especially this one. The most dangerous shard of all. The darkest. The indigo.

I pressed the red key into my belt, my eyes on the grooves where it locked into place. With a painful, ragged breath, I hugged the seraphim once more, my arms tight around its cold, lifeless form. This wasn’t her. This wasn’t life. She was gone. Even if I could still feel her in my arms, feel her body against mine.

None of this mattered. Because I knew one truth.

Goddesses never died.

Not truly.

There was a caress of wind against me in silent response, and something surged inside my heart. A feeling of familiarity. Of home.

Of her.

“Asherah, I still feel you.” I placed my hand over my heart, eyes squeezing shut. “I feel you everywhere.” My voice broke. “It should have been me. I should have gone first. Not you.”

She’d taken on so much power, so much light. She’d lit up, holding far more magic inside of her than any mortal ever had. More than any mortal could, even one as powerful as she was. Asherah had glowed so bright, I would have sworn she’d returned to her original form. To her full Goddess strength. It saved me. Saved everything. But it had been too much for the mortal form of her body on this plane.

More wind blew, another breeze bristled through my hair. I couldn’t say how, but I knew it was her. Not my imagination. Asherah had sent the wind from beyond. Even now I could feel her essence, her aura. Bright, warm, loving. Full of fire and life. She was still talking to me, still reaching out to be with me through any way she could find.

“ Mekara , stay with me as I am. Stay with me while I am Auriel. Until the end. Until I’m not. And I will find you in the next life. And the one after. I will do so again and again, until the end of time. There’s nowhere you can go where I won’t find you. No face you can wear that I won’t recognize. No form you can take that I won’t love. Because I know you. I knew what you were to me that first moment I saw you. I will always know you. I swear.” I pressed my fist to my heart. “ Me sha, me ka .”

I stepped back. It was time. Moriel’s indigo shard would be sealed for eternity. It would be kept away from him, protected by Asherah, who would remain a Guardian, and a warrior for eternity, even in death.

I just needed to close my affairs on her red shard, and on the orange shard of Ereshya. I didn’t know what had happened to the crystal which held the yellow ray Shiviel once guarded. He’d hidden it before we’d brought about his end—messy and painful as that had been. Nor did I know where the others were. I supposed they were all lost to the aftermath of the War of Light, lost to the Drowning. Lost to all of Moriel’s other machinations by now.

Asherah had destroyed him. But even in death, he was treacherous. He, or one of his servants, would try to find the shards, restore the Valalumir, and finish what they started.

But they would fail.

Breath heavy, my soul weighed down with grief, I took another step back. I wasn’t ready. I would never be ready—not for this. But it was time for me to take my leave. The sooner this ended, the sooner we’d be reunited.

I brushed the snowflakes from my hair, watching as the seraphim’s wings began to vanish. I took another step, and I froze, my aura tingling with a sudden awareness.

I wasn’t alone.

There was a flash of blue skin in the darkness, and cat-like eyes that peered through the shadows. Though feline, the eyes were peeking out from the head of a falcon—one attached to a tall Lumerian’s muscular body.

I glared.

Mercurial held up his hand, revealing a star of gold and red light, shimmering and spinning against his palm.

Just as quickly as he’d appeared, he was gone, the light vanishing.

The ground shook suddenly, and a clap of thunder and lightning exploded with enough force, it felt as if it had broken the sky in half.

Not the sky … My eyes widened. It had broken the tomb.

The seraphim statue was opening.

No. No!

“What have you done?” I yelled, searching for Mercurial. “You traitor!”

But the only response he gave was a bell-like laugh, muffled by the sound of stone grinding against stone as the tomb continued to come apart.

“I curse you!” I screamed.

But he only continued laughing as Asherah’s tomb opened. “You already have.”

“No! Stop!” I held up my hands, but they were strange to me now, lighter in color than I’d ever seen. Unblemished, roughened only by calluses. My hands, but … not. There were no burn scars, no sign of the fall I’d taken, of the light burning through my skin. I tried to push my power out, to use what remained of my energy stores, but no magic came from me. It was stagnant. Still. Trapped within my body.

Every muscle straining, I tried to close the tomb, to reseal my spell. “No. No! Seal! Seal!”

The white seraphim came to life, stone no longer. It rose up on its hind legs, its wings spread out, sharp and ready to attack. Blood dripped from the pointed feathers. This wasn’t possible. This wasn’t happening. Then she stirred.

Asherah rose from the tomb. New, and different. Her body glowing with a light this world could no longer sustain.

I blinked.

No.

Not Asherah.

She was Asherah no longer.

And I was no longer Auriel.

My name was Rhyan. Lord Rhyan Hart.

No, that wasn’t right … Not lord. Just Rhyan.

And she was … She was …

“LYR!” I yelled. “LYRIANA!”

Her hazel eyes widened, her hair, which had been fiery red a second ago, was now almost black in the dark of the night. “Rhyan!” she cried in anguish.

I rushed forward, my arms outstretched and ready to hold her. “What happened to you? Gods, Lyr! Are you hurt?”

Snow had coated the ground as I worked, the mountain top covered by pure ice. But now, though the air remained frigid, the ice was melting into thick streams. The water was rising above my boots and knees, flowing down the mountain like the tides of an ocean. Rising and rising, higher and higher. Until our bodies were almost completely submerged, practically drowning.

“I’m sorry!” Lyr sputtered. “It was my fault. Mine. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. I thought I was stronger.” She held my gaze. “I thought I could stop it. But I couldn’t. They’ve returned. All of them.” Lightning flashed, and she closed her eyes. Her body was sinking beneath the water.

“Lyr!” I reached for her, but she was gone.

A wave rose from behind and crashed over me, drowning me, too. I couldn’t breathe. I was submerged, my body was somehow rising and sinking all at once, floating in the icy waters, being taken by the tide, even as I swam against it. The waves were rushing and rushing until I was going over the edge of Gryphon’s Mount. I flailed, reaching for something to hold onto, reaching for her. For Lyr. For my love.

But the waterfall took me. The ground below was rushing toward me, and I was falling. Falling. Dying. My hands thrashed, trying to stop it, to climb back up. To find her again. To do anything but fall. Anything but drowning.

And even as the end came, I couldn’t stop fighting, couldn’t stop searching for—

“LYR!” I yelled as my eyes opened in the darkness. “Lyr!” My chest heaved, my breath coming in short, painful bursts against the cold air. “Lyr?” I reached blindly across the folds of the cloak beside me, but they were cold. She was gone.

I threw off my cloak. It had been wrapped around me like a blanket, my entire body shivering from the icy chill of the damp cave. Cold, even for me who’d been raised in winter. My heart was pounding too hard, and I clutched at my chest, seeing Lyr drown in my mind’s eye again and again. I could see the waves take her. See them take me. My heart felt like it was splitting in two. It wasn’t real. It was just a dream. Like the others I’d had, the ones that had tortured me when we’d been apart. When I’d missed her. When I needed her.

But that was a lie. Because this? This wasn’t a dream. It had been a memory—at least, it started as one. My soul remembered what had happened, how we’d ended. My soul could never forget. She’d died. Asherah had died. To heal me. To save me.

But it didn’t matter.

Losing her had still destroyed me in the end. There wasn’t a world I could survive in that she wasn’t part of.

And now, every fiber of my being remembered.