Chapter 27
Lyra
Selena and Thorian were gone. From the trees, I’d seen them sobbing, yearned to run to them, to shield them.
I could not do any of it. They were innocent and fell to the gods because of their love for a shy girl and a mischievous boy.
The only relief that filled my heart now was knowing that Kael found me. I nearly sobbed at the contentment of his cheerful grin, like a downy bed after a long day. My brother called for me, ran toward me. His arms were open wide. Gods, he looked healthy, safe.
A fierce yank, as though a hook dug into my chest, urged me to run to him. It was a compulsion.
Somewhere in my mind, I thought I might’ve heard someone cry out my name. Even a burn in my chest; it was as though something yanked on the bonds of my heart. A warning, a plea.
Dread stacked in my chest when more Stav waited at a distance, merely watching me race for my brother. Why did they watch on like this was…expected?
Stop. A hiss, a command, a frigid snap of a voice in my soul.
Fear lanced through my veins. Why could I not stop?
The nearer I came to Kael, the crueler his smile became. His features shifted. No longer the handsome edges of a strong jaw and nose; now his chin weakened and a russet beard grew along freckled cheeks.
This was not Kael.
Panic, sharp and cruel, surged through my blood. I stumbled, desperate to stop, but like a lure to a hook, I was snared.
The Stav Guard who stood where Kael had been held a pouch in one palm. Even from ten paces away I could taste the potent herbs of spell casts and the tang of blood. Ingir sent one of her craft spells. I knew it like I knew my brother was not here.
“Lyra!” Now Emi’s frantic scream rattled in my skull.
I fell to the ground, scraping at the soil, clawing to get away. Soon, bright, hot agony tore at my flesh, as though whatever craft had summoned me was drawing the blood from my veins.
In the next instant, a wound formed over my palm, open and gushing, but no knife was nearby. All gods, the spell cast was truly pulling my blood toward the Stav. It was ripping it from my own flesh.
“Time to come home, Melder.” The Stav Guard laughed.
Shouts from the Dark Watch ordered for arrows, blades, every attention to halt the capture of the melder. No mistake, Roark would abandon the innocent lives in the palace to save mine. A little longer. Hold. Hold.
A snarl and rabid growl came from somewhere over my shoulder. A single heartbeat, and the sound of snapping jaws was overpowered by a shrill cry of a man’s horror.
The hook in my veins snapped. I fell forward, gasping. Free.
I spun around, desperate to scramble away, but stopped.
The large paws of the excitable fara pup slashed at the Stav Guard. The young wolf bit and scratched and tore at the man’s throat, face, and hands. In the distance, I took note of Stav archers aiming at the pup.
“Jorvan archers!” I screamed and pointed at the trees.
Fiery Draven arrows rained over the Jorvan forces, sending them back under the cover of the trees. I scrambled for the wolf. A dark, searing rage burned in my skull. They used Kael against me; they taunted me.
For that, this guard would pay too. They all would.
I would see to it that Ingir of House Oleg knew her mistake.
The pup snarled and snapped his jaws. Beneath the beast’s attack, the Stav Guard screamed and writhed, desperate to shield his face. Already open gashes marred his skin. I snatched the pouch from the Stav’s hand to avoid any further hooks from damn blood spells.
“Dammit!” The moment I touched the pouch, a barb of pain shot through the gaping wound in my palm.
I let it fall to the grass. Another gash opened and crossed with the split wound over my palm, and burning dripped down my wrist.
Teeth clenched, I shoved aside the pain, knelt by the screaming Stav Guard’s head, and rammed my fingertips into his open wounds.
He roared his agony.
Craft flooded my blood with such ferocity that I swayed.
Usually when I melded, the threads were golden, dainty, lovely. Be it from the rage, the hatred, or something else, I didn’t know, but the threads that burst from the Stav Guard’s flesh were boiling red.
I did not care what my craft did to him, I simply began to stitch. Bone split under my fingertips, shifting down his face, around his skull. New shards fastened on his jaw, below the socket of his eye.
The wolf bit down on the man’s shoulder, shaking his large head like he might be trying to rip the arm free. The Stav Guard let out a gurgled cry, already his mouth had grown misshapen beneath my touch.
Soon he made no sound at all. His teeth were melded shut, one gnarled, solid barrier to his mouth. I screamed at his manipulated face, ignoring the blood, the wounds. His eyes still had light left in them.
I reached deeper. Craft sought the threads of his bones, shifting and breaking, melding and remaking.
Until the small bones of his throat came to light.
Narrow threads, thin but strong, were there.
I pulled one through a wound in his neck, then wove it back in, searching for the upper bones of his spine.
Stitch after stitch, bones turned molten and joined with others until there was no opening left for him to breathe through. Shards and fragments of his throat were melded across his airway, joined front to back.
The Stav Guard jolted and his chest puffed, desperate for air.
I pulled back my hands, the lust for his death fading the longer I watched his soul flee to the gods.
Bile burned in my throat. The Stav Guard thrashed and trembled, clawing weakly at his neck. Even the pup stepped away, his bloody lips locked in a snarl.
I retched.
Arms encircled me and pulled me against a hard chest. Inside was the beat of a heart I knew so well. Steady. Strong. Mine. Roark was covered in blood, but still he held my cheek to his heart until the body beside me stopped moving at long last.
I tilted my head to see what I had done.
The Stav Guard was destroyed. By the wolf and his melded bones, the man had been slaughtered.
Down the hillside, Jorvan warriors fled toward the distant ravines. Left in their wake, the fallen were sprawled across the lower township, blood staining the stone paths and meadows around the gates. I did not know how many Dravens fell.
Look at me. Roark’s gentle words brushed over my cheek.
Blood and gore soaked his skin, but I doubted he minded. Roark brushed damp hair from my face, inspecting my face for wounds.
“I thought he was Kael,” I whispered. “It was a blood spell. I couldn’t stop.”
Roark scanned the pouch beside the dead Stav. He nodded and pressed a kiss to my brow.
I clung to his tunic, desperate to slow the race of my pulse. “I’ve never…never hated so fiercely. I wanted him to s-s-suffer, Roark. I wanted him to hurt. I am as cruel as Fadey.”
Roark’s arms tightened around my shoulders. He held me for a long moment before tilting my chin. The calming brush of his fingers would always be an anchor in the storm.
We never truly know a heart.
I grinned. “Until we see the darkness inside.”
I might like to see yours. Roark tugged on my bottom lip before gesturing against my skin. Never feel guilt for keeping yourself alive. Never.
I was not so certain that keeping myself alive was what I had done.
“Lyra.” Emi skidded at my side and flung her arms around what little was left to embrace beyond Roark’s hold. “By the gods, what was that?”
“Blood craft,” I mumbled against Roark’s tunic.
“Shit.” Emi crept over to the bloodied pouch and sniffed. “That’s horrid. Yrsa always told me the more rancid the smell, the darker the spell cast.”
Footsteps drew closer. òlmr’s snout sniffed my face, then moved to the black wolf pup, licking away the blood on his head. The smaller fara swished his tail and nipped at the elder wolf. Brynn and Auki lowered to a crouch, a look of horror written on their similar features at the sight of the Stav.
I turned away, all at once unwilling to watch what tentative bonds of friendship we’d fashioned snap once they realized the truth of what melding craft could do.
“Now, this is more like it.” Gunter’s voice broke through my fears. He laughed mercilessly and nudged the dead Stav with his boot. He beamed and waved a finger between me and Roark. “I’m not certain which of the two of you have stolen my breath more.”
“Pardon?” Auki sniffed. “Did you not see how my three best wolves tore a captain apart?”
“Damn.” Gunter huffed. “I do love when you sic the wolves.”
“What’s with the look, Lyra?” Brynn tilted her head. “You truly should see how Auki calls to the wolves. I’ve only been able to speak to òlmr and at times one elder fara together. Three is quite impressive.”
She thought I was not impressed with them?
I blinked, confused. “I would like to see it…sometime.”
“Were you harmed? The head, perhaps? You look as though you do not know where you are.”
“I just thought, well, you all were raised to despise melders, so I thought if you saw what I’d done…”
Gunter snorted and nudged the corpse again. “Lyra, we’ve been waiting for something as fearsome as this since you arrived. In truth, I’d heard such ruthless tales of melders, I thought you’d be slaughtering the lot of us by the day.”
“Auki saw one of our warriors after Melder Fadey got to him during the raids.” Brynn swallowed and looked down at the Stav. “He no longer had a face, and his chest was turned inside out, like his ribs had grown backward. Gunter’s not wrong. We know what melders can do.”
“Simply glad you did it on our side this time.” Gunter gripped Brynn’s shoulder. “Any losses?”
“Two wolves, three keepers. Another took an arrow but still lives.” Brynn looked toward the palace. “Time will tell how she fares.”
“My father said the count of ground warriors is near a dozen. Village folk, we don’t know yet. I hear they killed old Aldr on his farm when they crossed the border. But his grandchildren made it to the palace,” said Gunter. “Pyres will light the courtyards.”
Battles were beginning.
How many more funeral pyres would we face before they were done?