22. Huntyr
Chapter 22
Huntyr
I crept through the dark halls of the wretched castle, making sure I didn’t run into a single soul as I made my way back to Wolf’s bedroom.
It took me hours to train until I was exhausted, hours to realize I was never going to be as strong as I needed to be.
A fucking queen. A leader. A vampyre. I couldn’t be those things. I couldn’t lead people to freedom, couldn’t raise a dead kingdom from the ashes.
That wasn’t me.
Those people—everyone who counted on me—they were wrong. They were wrong to put their faith in me.
My magic rattled my bones, clattered inside me, but I could never control it. Not in the way I wanted to.
I wanted to be better. I really fucking did. But I felt so weak. So powerless. So incompetent.
I was no queen. I was no savior.
The sooner everyone realized that, the better.
Wolf slept with his back to me as I entered the bedroom, and I was grateful for it. I didn’t need him inspecting every emotion on my face, didn’t need him questioning my sweaty body or my flushed skin.
I just wanted some peace.
I kicked my boots off and made my way to the bathroom door before Wolf said, “Jessiah is teaching you to fly tomorrow first thing. Don’t be late.”
“What?” I asked. “I thought you?—”
“I changed my mind,” he said. “You deserve to know how to fly. He’s the one who will teach you.” He didn’t turn around, didn’t face me, just let me walk to the bathroom without another word.
If I hadn’t felt so damn empty, I might have actually been excited.
J essiah and I stood awkwardly on the roof of an abandoned building on the edge of The Golden City. The sun had fully risen, but the place still felt grim and shadowed.
“This doesn’t feel safe,” I said.
A cool breeze tickled my skin.
“That’s because it isn’t, and that’s even more reason for you to learn how to fly.”
“Shouldn’t I be learning to fight? To protect myself and my people?”
Jessiah flapped his own wings. “If you’re in the middle of battle, sometimes it will be up to you to gauge the advantage point, to see things your weaker soldiers with no wings cannot see. Very few vampyres and fae possess magic strong enough for wings, Huntyr. You have a gift. You must learn to use it.”
My chest tightened. I hated that he was right. I also hated that I didn’t want these wings. I didn't want to bear this burden.
But that wasn’t going to fix the problem. These wings were mine, no matter how hard I wished them away, no matter how often I cried to the goddess about it.
“Fine,” I said. “So what’s next?”
“Well,” Jessiah smiled softly, “you can summon your wings now. That’s the hardest part. Now, we just do this.”
I should have seen it coming, but Jessiah catapulted himself forward and gripped me around the waist, flinging us both into the air.
This time, however, I had wings.
“Try!” he yelled through the air. His grip on me loosened but didn’t disappear entirely as I flapped the heavy leather now attached to my body.
It was much harder than it looked. My body felt too heavy, wings flapping at an uneven beat.
I didn’t make it a few seconds before we started to descend toward the city.
“Jessiah!” I yelled—shrieked, rather.
“I’ve got you.” His arms tightened around me, nearly cutting off my breath as they dug into my stomach. His own wings flapped up, sending us back toward the sky. “Do it with me. Act like you’re flying alone.”
“It doesn’t feel right!”
“It never will until you get used to it. Think of it like a child learning to walk.”
I choked down the wave of frustration and did what he asked, pumping my wings repeatedly to match his.
Soon, our wings were moving in unison. We soared through the sky, but I didn’t have time to worry about our height or how quickly I would die if I crashed toward the ground.
Hells, could I die by falling? Vampyres were much harder to kill than fae. Their bodies could handle more, could survive more than?—
“Focus, Huntyr! I’m going to let go now.”
“No!”
“I’ll be right here,” he said. His hands started to loosen, and panic crept into my chest. “Don’t change a thing. I won’t let you fall.”
It was now or never.
Jessiah’s hands slowly left my body.
And then, I was fucking flying.
I half-expected to plummet toward the ruins below us, but when my wings actually held my body in the air, I burst out laughing.
This. This was everything I could have dreamed of. This was freedom.
Jessiah cheered behind me, but I barely heard him over the sound of my own laughter. Joy bubbled in my chest—a feeling that had become foreign to me.
Did I want my wings? Did I want this burden? Did I want to be the most powerful vampyre, heir to the blood throne? Definitely not.
But this was making it worth it. This was finally giving me something to work with.
“You’re doing it!” Jessiah yelled from above me. I flapped my wings again and again, soaring higher into the sky. I could see the walls of The Golden City below us, heavily guarded with weapons I had never even seen before. I made sure to turn before we got too close. The last thing I needed was to be shot out of the sky on my first day of flying.
Still, it was hard to care when I was this ecstatic.
The rest of the day was more of the same. I flew until my back screamed at me, took small breaks to recover, and got right back out there. Learning the limits of my own wings and pushing my body harder and harder had me panting for breath and collapsing onto the roof by the time the sun began to lower on the horizon.
“Alright, alright,” Jessiah said, standing over my collapsed body as I lay on my back. “I think we can consider this a successful first day of flying lessons.”
I smiled, still too breathless to reply.
He approached and sat beside me, relaxing backward on his hands and extending his legs out in front of him. “Wolf will be thrilled for you,” he started.
Ugh. I really tried to avoid thinking about Wolf all day. It gave me fucking whiplash every time I did. Hells, I didn’t understand him or his reasoning. He wanted to help me save the vampyres, but now he wanted me to show his father my power?
When I didn’t respond, Jessiah continued. “He’s doing it all to help you, you know. Everything he does is to keep you safe.”
“It really doesn’t feel that way,” I spat.
“Our father threatened to torture you again if we didn’t show him something. Wolf would die before he let those men touch you again, Huntyr. Showing Asmodeus a small amount of your power was the compromise.”
Well, shit. Why hadn’t Wolf said that? He could have started with Hey, Huntress, my father’s going to hurt you if we don’t give him something, so let’s work together and figure out what we’re going to expose.
Instead, he let me believe he had ulterior motives for gaining his father’s trust.
Again.
“Your brother can be a huge asshole,” I replied. “It’s hard to trust him when he’s changing direction every five minutes.”
“He always has a plan. He’s always thinking of the greater good. I may not know the details of it all, but I can promise you that he is trustworthy. He’s doing his best to get you out of this, even if we don’t know the specifics.”
The guilt started to creep in again, but I shoved it aside. I had nothing to feel guilty for. Wolf shouldn’t be surprised I expected his betrayal again.
Even if, this time, he had his reasons.
We laid there on the roof for a few more minutes, watching the sun lower until darkness shadowed around us. I was beginning to see more and more of Jessiah, of what type of man he was. He was loyal to his brother, even when he had no clue what Wolf had planned for us.
And Jessiah was smart, calculated. He surely had his reasons.
“Come on,” Jessiah said after a few more minutes, wiping sweat on the back of his arm and reaching down to hoist me up to my feet. “We deserve a drink after that.”