Chapter 22
Would she never wake up? Nik brushed a lock of hair from Kyrja’s cheek and let his fingers linger there.
Darkness had fallen as they’d been brought aboard, but beyond that, he had no idea how long he’d been in this strange room with her in the heart of the trireme.
Only that he’d been cradling her limp form so long his limbs were going numb, and still she didn’t open her eyes.
“Kyrja. My heart, please. Please, wake up.” He shifted her in his arms again but couldn’t bring himself to just set her on the down-filled, canopied bed in the corner of the crystal-lined room.
For the hundredth time, he checked her pulse. It still beat steadily against his fingertips.
Behind their lids, her eyes darted back and forth, and Nik relaxed into the plush divan on which he held her.
Sleeping. She was sleeping now, dreaming, and that seemed far healthier than just being unconscious from the blow to her head.
He knew she’d scarcely slept since she’d won the Challenges, but here?
In this room that he had to assume silenced her Blessing as surely as it did his fire?
There would be no noise to wake her mind.
Nothing to pull her constantly from rest.
She needed this. And so he rearranged them again so that they were both cradled by the back of the lounge, tucked her tight against him, and let his own eyes slide shut.
Prayed that the heat he felt building inside him, unable to disperse through the ground at his feet, unable to do anything but simmer in his own veins, wouldn’t burn them to cinders.
Helviti was in his dreams. The dark of the tunnels, the sting of the sulfur, the comforting glow of the lava streams. It felt an eternity away, forever out of reach, and his blood ached for it, for the relief of a dip in the pools.
Then a whiff of fresh-fallen snow, the kiss of cold air outside the dome, a sweet chill that swept his fever-hot brow. He sank deeper into the dream, let it run wild, let that coolness soothe his own internal heat.
He surfaced sometime later feeling more refreshed than he had any right to, the flames within him banked to manageable embers.
And blinked awake to find silver eyes looking down at him, dark curls hanging free and wild, framing the most beautiful face in the world, and fingertips on his face that weren’t cool anymore, having clearly taken his excess heat from him.
“Kyrja.” His hand lifted, found her cheek, slumber still tugging at him.
It made him tug back, pull her down, not quite intending to but not quite not.
Then definitely intending it when he heard the little catch of her breath, felt her hand splay over his heart, saw how close he’d drawn her. Her lips were the color of ripe berries and looked just as sweet. He couldn’t resist lifting his head an inch, closing the gap, tasting them.
Her lips moved over his. Welcomed. He knew there was a reason he shouldn’t kiss her, but at the moment, it didn’t matter what it was. Only that she was here, in his arms, cool and sweet as a fresh mountain stream, even as heat buzzed through him and his head swam with it.
She tasted like a thousand tomorrows. He couldn’t pull her close enough, couldn’t hold her tight enough, couldn’t break through the fog of her in his mind to remember why he needed to wake himself from this dream.
Then the world lurched, and she tumbled away with a little screech that turned into laughter and jolted him the rest of the way awake.
Nik sat up—he’d still been reclining against the chaise—and reached for her where she’d fallen on the floor. “Are you all right?”
She still wore the ice-and-flame gown from…
the night before? He had to assume it hadn’t been longer than a single night since then, based on nothing but the state of his stomach and ache in his muscles.
She looked a little worse for wear, with black smudges on the gown, tangles in her hair, and a bruise just peeking out from the hairline at her temple.
Seeing it heated his blood. Whatever idiot hoplite had dared to leave a mark on her ivory skin should have to pay for it.
“I’m fine.” She sat beside him again, angled toward his upper half, and framed his face in her hands.
Chill seeped into him. Brushed back the heat. Frost and flame, he needed to get a grip on himself or he’d set this very comfortable divan on fire, and then they’d be without a place to sit.
He reached up too, to feather the tips of his fingers over the edges of the angry bruise. “This isn’t fine.”
“Fine enough.” She leaned into his palm, eyes fluttering shut, and he had to admit it—she didn’t look in pain or even upset. Just content. For a moment, anyway, until she levered her eyes open again and drew in a breath. “Where are we? Do you know?”
And there was reality, elbowing its way in.
He sighed. “Short answer—on one of the triremes. As for where that is by now? I have no idea.” He motioned around them with the hand not still happily caressing her cheek.
“Apparently Stefanos was inspired by the crystal channels in the cathedrals of the Awakened, the ones insulated from magic. And thought, ‘I wonder if putting an Awakened in a whole room of crystal, perfectly sealed, would cut them off from their magic?’ Answer: yes.”
“And no.” Her gaze distant, she tilted her head.
“Cut off, but it doesn’t deaden it like his touch did.
It’s more like the crystal web we have in the prison.
I can’t sense the sea or clouds, but I can sense and manipulate what’s in this room with us.
The water in the pitchers, what’s in the bathroom connected to this one, our blood.
And it can’t be perfectly sealed, can it?
We’re breathing. Air has to be fed into it somehow. ”
“Presumably.” He sat up a little straighter. “Can you sense it? Follow it back? Does that help us break out?”
“I don’t know.” She frowned in concentration for a moment, then shook her head. “The air’s too dry. And though there are water lines in the bathroom, they seem to be sealed. Perhaps when the fixtures are in use, though. I’ll try it.”
He nodded, even as he suspected that Stefanos had already thought of that.
He wouldn’t leave such an obvious connection in a suite he’d clearly intended to be a prison to the magic of his bride.
“I can’t believe they’ve kept this nullifying thing a secret all these years.
How did we not sense it that first night? He prodded at me, kissed your hand.”
“He was wearing gloves.” She caught Nik’s hands in hers and squeezed them. “And the knuckle kiss was so light, so quick…and I was distracted. Too furious to note a split-second interruption, I guess.”
Nik let it swirl through his mind. “I imagine the secrecy was helped along, too, by the Awakened lands being so careful not to send anyone magical to Ellas, when it became clear they were hungry for what they don’t have. Obviously they’ve had contact, if they knew the effect they’d have, but…”
“But our fear of them didn’t just protect us, it protected their secret.
” She craned her head to look around the room.
“I always found it so strange, though, that they hadn’t lured some Awakened or Blessed to come and settle down there.
Offer them money or power or their pick of beautiful partners. ”
“We have.” Stefanos’s voice filled the room, making both of them jump.
Kyrja jumped all the way to her feet, spinning around to try to identify where the voice had come from.
Light flickered on the wall across from them, a crystal-projected image appearing. Stefanos smiled. “Many times. All of the above. To no avail though. No offspring were ever Awakened. It seems whatever is in our blood cancels out whatever’s in yours.”
Could he see them, as they could him? Nik stood too, and walked to the far side of the chamber, where a tray was bolted to the table, a sealed water pitcher strapped in. He freed it, poured two cups.
Stefanos’s gaze tracked his movements.
Brimstone. Was he watching them constantly?
Had he seen that kiss? Would he punish Kyrja for it?
They were technically, legally betrothed—though to Nik’s mind, and in the eyes of the kyrka, consent was a rather vital part of any such arrangement.
One could not force a covenant relationship onto someone against their will.
Contracts, however, were something else entirely. Matter of law, not faith. And law said Stefanos was still somehow within his rights, through all of this nonsense.
Kyrja crossed her arms. “Then what’s the point of this? If you already know your unmagic will nullify my magic—”
“Strength matters, we think.” The king leaned a little closer to the recorder.
“I readily admit that we lack the volume of data your own biologists must have had to create the device for your Test. But our best hypothesis is that strength of magic could correlate with number of nanites in one’s blood. ”
Nik handed Kyrja one of the glasses of water, catching her gaze as he did so. To his silent question, she gave the slightest shrug.
He didn’t know if that theory was sound either. The kyrka’s library hadn’t had many medical texts—the secrets of biology, especially concerning the Blessing, were closely guarded.
Stefanos took a sip from a thick mug, steam clouding the air before him momentarily.
“The only Awakened we’ve managed to lure into our society have not been paragons of magical ability, to put it mildly.
Few nanites, if our theory is right. Easily overwhelmed by whatever it is we pass on, generation after generation.
But a stronger specimen? From a royal family, perhaps?
” He leaned back again, the image of ease. “The chances surely improve.”