Chapter 35
Jak
The wind howled between Jak’s feathers as he soared low over the streets.
Smoke curled, mingling with the night’s foggy air from Lephyrin’s fleet setting fire to anything in sight.
From this height, Anchorage Cove was barely recognizable.
Raucous laughter was replaced with the bellowing cries of maidens as they sought shelter from blades, and the smell of spilled liquor was now overpowered by blood as it filled the streets in its place.
Jak’s heart thundered in his chest. Esmyra was here and there was a chance they could all make it out alive. They had lost Cyrus and half of their crew since they sought out that damn cave that led to Maerinys, but the worst of all was that they’d lost her too.
Esmi was his best friend—his everything, really. She was all Jak had aside from the few other idiots they sailed with, but even then, his love for them was no comparison to what he felt for her.
Since the moment he met Esmyra, Jak had noticed the way everyone looked at her.
Their eyes were always filled with the same nonsense.
Curiosity, fear, and a hint of lust. Her beauty was undeniable, but whenever they got too close to her, sensing there was something different about her, that rush of terror took root.
He didn’t blame them, but he also knew that someone who cowered beneath her without knowing who or what she was would never be worthy to be in the presence of someone like her.
All of this was why he loathed Draevyn so much, especially in the beginning. The Phoenix never showed her fear, always meeting her fire with his own flames.
When Jak thought Draevyn had doomed her that day in the cave, he imagined carving the man’s heart from his chest, of torturing him in ways unimaginable and watching him bleed out at his feet.
But when that man, their enemy, came crawling out of the hellhole they’d been trapped in, covered in brutal scars and begging they turn around to get her back, it was then that Jak knew.
He knew that Draevyn had fallen in love with Esmyra. No man would ever act the way he was if there wasn’t something much deeper going on between them.
Jak didn’t know if Esmyra felt the same way, but he doubted the man would still be alive if she didn’t. Esmi always said she didn’t know how to love and didn’t want to waste her time entertaining any man or woman in her bed for centuries.
But Draevyn? The realm’s monster of the land while she was that of the seas?
A man who was used as his father’s weapon and tool for power, just as she had been?
He was her equal. Her mirror, even. And Jak knew his girl well enough to know that even her beautiful black heart wouldn’t be able to resist falling for a man like that. And he couldn’t blame her.
Wasn’t that all that any of them wanted? To be seen and loved.
It wouldn’t only be that someone saw her, but that they loved her anyway, knowing the weight and burden of all she’d been dealt. Someone who wouldn’t make her feel so godsdamn alone.
They had to find her and bring her to safety. All he wanted was for her to be happy, and the world had taken away every sliver of joy she’d ever felt over these last few weeks.
Jak needed to get his captain back. He needed to bring her to her family and to the fire-wielder who committed treason in her honor, knowing his neck was now just as much in the noose as theirs.
In his owl form, his vision was sharp, catching every flash of movement and face below. He’d been searching for her, keeping to the skies to cover more ground at once. He knew in every bit of his soul that she would never stay hidden in a building.
She was likely out fighting for their home port—and with magic at that. It shouldn’t take long for him to spot her from above.
Shouting caught his attention down the beach.
The mist rolled thick along the shoreline as Jak flew lower, his wings slicing through the fog as he tried to make sense of the shapes beneath him.
It was a line of dark figures trudging across the sand, their armored boots sinking with each step.
But no one else was near. Were they patrolling the beaches to be sure no one tried to escape into the sea?
The lower he hovered, the more confused he became. It looked like the soldiers were coming back from a fishing haul, and something heavy was caught tangled in their nets. But as the net moved beneath the moonlight, its silver veins cast a ghostly shimmer.
That’s no ordinary fishing net. And it certainly wasn’t any kind of fish being dragged away by them either, bumping and catching on rocks protruding from the sand.
But then a break came in the fog, and the light hit it just right.
His heart seized.
No, no. Fuck. It can’t be—
He angled downward, squinting through the gloom.
The net possessed a faint glow, the metallic threads glinting with that unnatural, vile shimmer he’d become all too familiar with in Lephyrin’s dungeons.
Velsinyte swallowed and absorbed magic, and whoever was inside the net, falling victim to the substance, was nothing but dead weight.
Pearlescent skin. Blood-matted midnight hair. Rune-marked limbs.
Esmyra.
She was unconscious, bound, and being dragged like an animal across the sand.
Jak’s wings faltered mid-beat, his body nearly dropping from the sky and crashing down to where they were.
They caught her. They fucking had her in a net as if she was any other sea creature that got too close to their ship.
He could hardly breathe, the air rushing out of his lungs as the guards hauled her farther down the beach toward a shadowed longboat. Their voices were low, making it difficult for him to hear even in his woodland form.
The net snagged on a rock, and one of the guards kicked Esmyra in the stomach while trying to get it to move again.
Blinding rage had Jak diving without a second thought.
Faster than an arrow loosed from a bow, he tucked his wings and plummeted straight down at the heads of the nearest guards.
His form rippled midair, feathers twisting into flesh, talons receding and becoming booted feet.
His hands shot out before him, summoning wind to slow his fall as he let out a battle cry that resembled a furious bellow entangled with an owl’s screech.
As they gazed up, he crashed down into them, bringing them to the sand.
One of the soldiers cried out in alarm, but Jak didn’t give them time to recover as his hand shot to his boot and withdrew a curved dagger.
They all swarmed him then. Steel met flesh as he slashed the man across the thigh, elbowed another in the throat, and drove his shoulder into a third, sending him sprawling into the surf.
The net jolted and twisted as Esmyra stirred weakly while a low groan escaped her lips. Their attention immediately returned to her, one of them taking a step closer to her limp body.
“Get the fuck away from her!” Jak roared, eyes blazing with magic and bloodlust.
One of them turned to him and raised his musket. The soldier never had time to pull the trigger as Jak hurled his knife toward him, the blade twirling and gleaming in the dim light right before its blade embedded itself in the man’s throat.
Another tried to tackle him but got a mouthful of sand and blood for it. A third drew a short sword, wildly swiping it through the air. Jak caught the blade on his forearm, biting back a snarl before ripping a pistol from his hip and ramming the handle into the man’s temple.
He fought like a man possessed, his stare drifting down to Esmi’s lifeless body as it lay in the sand, entangled in their web.
Fists pummeled faces. His knife slashed and spun.
But then came the click.
A gun cocked, and suddenly he was staring down the barrel of a pistol.
He froze, chest heaving, blood dripping down his cheek and knuckles. His wild gaze snapped to the soldier, eyes narrowing into slits, and he caught the moment the finger on the trigger moved to pull.
Jak shoved away, and the wind he summoned pushed the gun off kilter just enough for the bullet to barely miss his cheek as the gun went off.
They have velsinyte bullets, Draevyn had warned. What if that was one? If he had been hit anywhere, he would have been killed.
One of the guards, face bruised and bloodied, rose shakily to his feet. The man’s hands trembled, but the musket he held was steady, aimed directly at Esmyra’s unconscious form lying motionless in the net.
Her hair clung to her face, tangled with sand and blood, and her chest rose shallowly with each breath. He had never seen her so vulnerable, so exposed.
Jak’s heart stopped.
“Don’t—”
The guard’s finger twitched on the trigger.
He was torn, and every instinct was screaming to rip the weapon from the man’s hands. But there were too many now, more soldiers running down the beach toward them, racing out of the fog.
If he attacked again, they’d fire at her.
Esmi would die.
Jak realized then he couldn’t save her alone. He didn’t give a shit what happened to him, but her? He wouldn’t risk it.
Horrified, his body contorted, his feathers bursting from his back as he shifted mid lunge. The air screamed around him as he shot into the sky, his heart racing.
“Kill the shifter!” The order erupted from beneath him, and gunshots followed.
Jak was forced to zig-zag through the sky, narrowly missing being shot down. With a guttural, screeching cry, he spun sharply in the air, talons curling tightly as he barely evaded death.
He had to get help. Now.
Jak’s wings cut through the soot-laced sky as his sharp gaze swept the streets below. His gut twisted as he noticed most of Lephyrin’s fleet were retreating back to their ships.
He couldn’t let them leave with her. They had to get to her before it was too late.