Chapter 16 Kaelen
Kaelen
“Stop pacing.”
Something small and hard bounces off my chest. Twisting, I frown at Eres. He shrugs unrepentantly and tosses another sugar cluster at me. This one hits me in the forehead, dropping down to land on the crumpled parchment in my hands. “He’s coming.”
“I don’t care if he comes or not.” I glare at the door. “I’m not waiting for him.”
I need some damned sleep. Between our dwindling food stores, lack of resources, lack of everything, I feel as though I’m drowning. “Whatever he wants to discuss can’t be that important.”
Another crystal hits me. I stride over and snatch the bowl from Eres’s hands, setting it down on the table beside the bed. “You’re going to regret that when you run out. There isn’t anyone left to prune another batch.”
“And you’re telling me this now?” When I don’t respond, Eres sighs. He stretches out on the bed. “You need to get past this with Darian, Kae. Before it’s too late to change things.”
That doesn’t help. If anything, it threatens to crack open the panic I’m trying my fucking best to keep contained. I blurt the words out. “They’re moving into the Veilspire.”
It takes Eres a moment to follow my trail of thought.
He moves faster than I do. I’ve been trying to focus all day, ever since the on-duty sentry found me this morning to pass along the scribbled message from one of the scouts.
Eres sits up immediately, gesturing for the message.
“Why haven’t you called a Council meeting? ”
“Another fucking meeting.” I hand it to him, and turn, resuming pacing while trying not to stare at the door. “All we have are meetings, Eres. Hour after hour of sitting around that table, saying the same thing without any of us acknowledging the truth.”
And I couldn’t face it. “This is the end. There’s nothing left. We can’t hold them off.”
After close to two hundred years of fighting, the Lightbringers have finally succeeded in their mission to eradicate the Darkwielders from existence.
All they need to do is pick us off. “I’m ordering the evac tomorrow.
Anyone who wants to leave can. The rest will hold the line for as long as we can. ”
“Kaelen.” Eres is pale, his brow knotted as he scans the message. Turning it over, as if it might reveal some secret that will save us. “You can’t. Not yet. Just… just wait a little longer.”
My laughter is short, sharp, broken. I can’t remember the last time I smiled with anything resembling true happiness.
“If I wait any longer, there’s no chance at all.
We have days, weeks at most, before Vaelion launches a full assault.
They need to be away before then if they’re going to have even a chance—”
“There is no chance,” Eres breathes. “You know it, and I know it. They can’t survive out there.”
“Then they die here!”
Fuck. The pain in my chest expands with my roar, a deep, swelling agony. My knees hit the ground, my palms following.
I can’t breathe. Can’t take any air in, only a wheezing sound making its way out.
“Kaelen.” Eres is at my side. “Kaelen!”
Help me.
My right arm lights up with agony, a searing wall of flame sweeping over my skin as I double over.
Help me.
But it’s not me. And somehow my panic only grows as I grab for Eres’s hand, trying to make him understand.
Help him.
Gasping, I lift my head. “Darian.”
Eres steadies me as I pull myself to my feet, trying to breathe through the fire in my arm. “Is it the Binding? What’s wrong?”
I push myself free on unsteady feet, lurching toward the door with Eres on my heels, demanding answers. “I don’t know.”
But something is. Something is badly wrong, and every sense I have is screaming for me to hurry.
“His chambers—”
Shaking my head, I shove the door open and take off. My bare feet slap against the floor as I race down the hallway.
Right, and right again. Down the steps we used to race down.
Through the hall where my father’s office once stood, where we’d wait outside to be scolded for whatever prank we’d thought up that day.
A few moments later, Eres catches up, his belt in his hands as he follows. “You can sense him? Is he hurt?”
“I don’t know.” Sweat sticks to my back. “He’s in pain.”
He’s been in pain for months. Months, and I left him alone with it. I abandoned him to their derision and scorn, forever tied him to me with a Binding and cut him loose to drown under the weight of guilt he should never have had to carry.
“There was an incident today,” Eres breathes as we head toward the great hall. “In the medical bay. One of the soldiers called him a traitor, and I threw them out. If something happened—”
No.
He can defend himself. Better than anyone else beneath this roof.
But would he try?
The tall, thick entry doors crash open against the walls before we reach them, my erevas already pulling back into my palms as we race through and into the courtyard.
“Where?” Eres asks urgently.
It’s hard to breathe beneath the pain. Darian’s pain, and the panic that thought invokes makes it even worse. Slamming my palms into my eyes, I force myself to calm, to concentrate.
My head jerks up. “It’s her.”
My feet move without thought. The door that leads down to the cells rips from its hinges with the force of my anger, tossed aside as I race down the steps. “Darian!”
If she’s hurt him, I will kill her.
Erevan, please, let him be alright—
His breathing fills the corridor. Harsh, and noisy, wetness rasping deep within his chest as I collapse down beside him, my hands tilting up his face. “Dare. Look at me.”
He doesn’t respond. Black eyes, void of light and life and everything that makes up him, stare out sightlessly. “Fuck—fuck, he’s walking. Eres!”
“I’m here.” He drops down on Darian’s other side, his hands already digging. “What was he thinking, walking without anyone with him?”
“Come on.” I shake him roughly. “Wake up.”
But his back arches, and my hands shift in panic, moving over him. “What’s happening?”
Oh, gods. He chokes once, and then again, and I stare down in horror at the foam that spills from his lips. The veins in his neck bulge as he arches once more, and then he stills.
“No.” It’s a moan. A plea. “Darian. Don’t you fucking dare. You keep breathing.”
Hands shove at me. “You need to wake Lyra up. Now. He can’t get out until she wakes. Wake her up, and quickly!”
Numbness steals over me as I stumble back. “He’s not breathing—”
“And he won’t unless you wake her up, right fucking now!” Eres tears Darian’s shirt open, placing his palms down over his heart and pumping. “Kae, move!”
For one long, tortuous moment, I stare at his hands in horror. At the brutal way he pushes them down into Darian’s heart, at the way he doesn’t move.
And then I force myself to step away. My feet almost slip as I turn the corner, yanking at the keys and rifling for the right one. My bellow is enough to call back the dead from Erevan’s hold. “Wake up.”
The witch doesn’t move. Shoving the door open with a clang, I dart across the room and yank the coverlet over her away. Gripping her shoulders, I shake her roughly before I notice.
She’s crying. Her eyelids are closed, her body still—but liquid leaks from both eyes, her hair damp beneath her. Sweat dots her forehead, soaking the gold strands around her head. And yet she still doesn’t wake.
What trickery is this?
“Wake up.” I snarl the words into her face. “Now, witch.”
Her breathing shifts, and I shake her again. “Lyra!”
The witch’s chest sucks in, a retching gasp on her lips as she bolts upright, eyes flying open.
There’s no flame in her eyes at all. Only darkness, edged with the smallest hint of gold. And her fucking hand slams straight into my damned throat, the low noise escaping her one of pure fear as she cuts off my air in a single, swift movement.
I choke, shoving her back and twisting back to escape her fist as it swings again. Catching it in mid-air, I squeeze it, ignoring the pained cry that falls from her lips. “What did you do to him?”
Her chest quickens, awareness returning to her gaze in a blaze of flame. “What in Aedryn—”
“What did you do?” I roar into her stunned face.
“I was asleep—”
“He’s waking up!”
At Eres’s shout, I let go of her wrist. The witch stares up at me, her mouth open and those tear tracks still visible on her face.
My finger shakes when I point at her, my voice hoarse. “You had better pray to your god that he makes it through this.”
She curls her hand toward her chest. Her shout follows me as I turn away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
His name is written between every heartbeat in the steps between her cell and his slumped form.
Darian. Darian. Darian.
As if I’m making up for every time I refused to think of him, refused to speak of him. My legs buckle. “Is he—”
Clouded, confused, deep amethyst eyes look back at me, brows drawn tight. Eres leans over him, and I grab his shoulder to haul him back so I can get closer. “What the fuck did you think you were doing?”
“Kaelen.” Ignoring Eres’s snappish tone, I lean closer. Darian shakes his head. Once, and then again.
Twisting, he heaves. Liquid spatters the floor.
“You’re fine.” Eres shoves me aside, gripping his shoulder. “Get it out.”
Not just once, but again and again, and fear grips my throat once more. “Is he sick?”
But he’s running his hands over himself, as if feeling for injury. The words are barely a croak. “I… she—”
I knew she’d done something.
The hoarse whisper makes all three of us fall silent. “What’s wrong with him?”
I left the door to her cell open.
And Darian flinches.
My erevas breaks free without effort. They slam into the witch, forcing her back against the wall as I turn. “Tell me what you did.”
“Don’t hurt her!” Eres tries to rise, his hands still holding on to Darian.
Ignoring him, I push my face into hers. I know she did something. “Tell me, or I will snap your neck right now.”
That fire glints in her eyes, and she begins to struggle. I add more erevas, pinning her in place. Her wrists, her legs, her poisonous fucking neck. “Talk.”
I’m so focused on her that the shift in the air doesn’t register fast enough. The body slams into me from the side, knocking me aside. The cold stone floor smashes into my face. Twisting with barely a second’s pause, I lift my hands—
Darian has the witch caged. His arms bracket either side of her head, his face buried in her neck and his shoulders curved inward.
It takes me a moment to understand. Longer. I stare at him until the words register.
“Don’t touch her.”