Chapter 20 Kaelen
Kaelen
This is a mistake.
Raising a hand in response to Eldritch’s shouted greeting, I stop myself from looking back for the dozenth time. Lyra’s footsteps are heavier now than they were this morning, and I find myself slowing my pace without voicing her delay.
I’ve seen fear so many times. I’ve seen wielders filled with it as they faced their end and the unknown to follow, seen it in the faces of families waiting for news, and I’ve seen it in the fucking mirror too many times to count. So much so that I’ve stopped looking.
I know what pretending it isn’t there looks like.
Damn it all, but I don’t want to soften to her.
She’s Vaelion’s daughter—and though it doesn’t surprise me that she was mistreated under his care, I still feel the stirring of anger low in my stomach.
More than that, I find myself wanting to know…
more. My fingers rub against each other to stop myself reaching for her again.
Eres has already lost his mind over her. Darian, too.
Darian knows.
Her thoughts made him ill, and her dreams nearly killed him. The nightmares that wait inside her mind were dark enough to petrify even a dreamwalker, and yet the witch keeps her face so expressionless that you’d think she thought of nothing at all.
Lyra. Her name blooms again in my head, and I try to bat it away. But it lingers.
I don’t want to think of her as a person. As a Lyra. Easier to place her into the box in my mind, to name her an enemy and not think of her at all.
Except that’s proving surprisingly difficult, and extremely inconvenient.
I can’t afford another person to care about, and particularly not a witch.
Not even when that witch walks quietly at my side, her chin lifted and fists clenched as if she waits for the next blow.
She believes herself to be broken. Worthless, if her words last night were any indication.
Vaelion let her believe that. And did far worse.
He tortured her.
Touch her skin. It’s new.
Even the thought of what that means raises bile at the back of my throat. I’m starting to suspect she is neither broken nor worthless. That perhaps her own pain outweighs even ours, hidden beneath haunting eyes of flame and ember that I can’t banish from my mind.
Lyra.
Jumping the rickety fence easily, I’m halfway through turning to offer her assistance when her feet land with a thump on the ground beside me.
“Be careful.” I don’t mean to snap at her, but I’m not sure I have anything other than anger inside me anymore.
Perhaps she and I are more alike than we realize, because she snarls right back at me. “I’m perfectly capable of climbing a ridiculously small fence.”
Fuck, but she has a temper. Maybe one to match mine, and I suddenly feel a prang of sympathy for Eres for putting up with me for so long. And for Darian, too. Erevan knows he’s faced the worst of me more than once, and my stomach turns over once more. Another conversation we need to have.
Eldritch slows as he approaches, looking between us. “Am I interrupting?”
“No.” Our voices echo in unison.
I’ve known Eldritch since the day I first drew breath.
The broad, older, gruff male has been my tutor, my instructor, my valued confidant and an advisor when my father died and my mother withdrew from life rather than face it without him.
Now, he acts as a military commander, overseeing day to day operations to keep his unending mind busy.
Familiarity is what we’re both used to, and I sense Lyra’s surprise when he rolls his eyes. “You’re late, lad. Get your sword.”
Lyra bristles when he turns to her, but I recognize the look with a mounting dread climbing up my chest. His words only confirm it. “You’ll be joining us in the ring, I assume?”
I stiffen. “Absolutely not.”
“Do I have a choice?” she says icily. “Or are you making it for me?”
Eldritch raises an eyebrow.
Ignoring him, I point at the fence we just climbed over. “You will wait for me here.”
Her eyes heat, but they threaten to burn through me when I open my palms. “We’re back to that?”
“I don’t need to worry about a knife in my back while I’m training.”
Her face flushes a deep, crimson shade of red, and I smirk at her. “Although that little lump of metal won’t do much. Keep it.”
“You are intolerable.” She glares at the creeping shadow from my palms. I find myself whistling as it wraps around her wrist and secures it to the fence panel, following up with her ankle for good measure. “Worried about a little embarrassment, Duskbane?”
Worried she might injure herself further. “You don’t need to be worried. You’re not taking part.”
The woman snarls at me. A lip-curling, irritated sound, deep and throaty and gods fucking help me, but I almost smile.
I need to speak to Eres. There’s clearly something deeply wrong inside my mind, because even as I approach the ring and nod at the soldiers already working under Eldritch’s discerning eye, my only focus is on her.
I don’t get distracted. Ever. And yet all I’m aware of are those fucking eyes burning into the space between my shoulder blades. My hands move in motions so familiar that I could enact them with my eyes closed, the practice sword hitting exactly where I need it to.
Most of the soldiers here are well-trained. They have to be, since they’re the last of us. My attention finally slips from Lyra to their faces. There’s plenty of fear to be seen here, too, hidden behind jibes and petty rivalries, jokes that fall a little flat and forced smiles.
A few of them are too young to have seen any of the war at all.
Our last large-scale battle was five years ago, hundreds of losses sustained when the Lightbringers sent several heavily-armed units through the Veilspire to test our defenses.
Eldritch refuses to send them on patrol, his sentimentality showing.
And I let him hold them here, too aware of how few would make it back.
All of them will fight at the end, to hold Umbraxis for as long as we can before it falls.
And none have ever fought a Lightbringer. Have ever even seen one.
Frowning, I hold up my hand and look over my shoulder. She’s watching a group spar to my right, brows furrowed as she silently assesses their footwork.
Stealing two pouches from Eldritch’s stores, I walk over and toss one at her. “Water.”
She almost drains it.
“You were thirsty.” And I haven’t offered her any water since this morning.
When she shrugs, I turn to watch the sessions with her, leaning back against the fence. “Did you want to spar?”
A shoulder lifts again. “I would have liked to stretch my legs. I’m used to more exercise than this. My muscles have a tendency to seize up if I don’t work them regularly.”
My eyes travel over the small amounts of golden-brown skin exposed by her armor. “Old injuries?”
“Something like that.”
“I thought the Lightbringer healers could fix anything.” I keep my voice low. “At least, that’s what I’ve heard from Eres.”
I don’t think she’ll answer. She seems inclined to give me as little information as possible. But Lyra takes another sip of water before she responds without looking my way. “They heal the wounds. But the body doesn’t forget.”
“Are you in pain now?” I focus my full attention on her, turning from the training.
A small smile touches her lips, a twisted sort of amusement. “Exercise helps.”
I… don’t like that. My jaw tightens. “Some of the younger ones have never seen a Lightbringer fight. Would you be willing to offer them a demonstration?”
Her eyes slide to me. “So you do have manners in there somewhere.”
“Don’t test me.” I open my palm to pull back the shadow keeping her in place, and she watches my erevas retreat with her lips pressed together. If I had to guess, I’d call it envy, and more unwelcome sympathy strikes. “And toss that damn knife away.”
Her hand slips to her lower back. She tugs it free from the waistband of her trousers, making a show of holding it between two frost-darkened fingers before dropping it. “I had no plans of attacking you, unless you attacked first.”
“Good to know you have some sense of self-preservation, since the Binding would strike before you could.” Suddenly, I have a greater understanding of Eres’s motivations in offering it. I nod to the ring of dirt we use to train. “After you.”
When we walk into the middle, silence spreads across the pockets of small groups. Swords drop, faces turning to us. Eldritch claps his hands together. “Good. They’re due a break, so they can watch. Together?”
The thought of her sparring with someone else makes my gut twist, so I nod. He tosses me two swords, and I hand one to Lyra as she grimaces, testing her grip and rotating her wrist. “Wood? Really?”
“What do you usually fight with?”
She holds up her bandaged palms in silent answer. “We don’t use practice weapons. I have a preference for daggers.”
A murmur runs through the soldiers. They take up positions against the wall, some dropping to sit and massage out whatever aches they’ve gathered so far, others leaning forward and bracing their backs against the wood as waterskins are passed down the shoddy line. But all of them are paying attention.
Eldritch hands her two slim wooden daggers from the weapons table instead, each the length of her forearm, and Lyra murmurs her thanks before looking at me. Her posture shifts as she rolls her shoulders.
I wait for her nod. “Ready when you are, wielder.”
“Tell me if you need to stop.”
“You’ll know when I need to stop.”
Eldritch is talking behind me. “Focus on her feet. Lightbringers receive the same basic training. They have tells.”
Her gaze flicks to him, and I move.
Lunging forward, I attempt to take advantage of her distraction and tap her guard lightly, barely touching it. Her arm raises, deflecting the blow without giving ground. Without even looking at me. “How very obvious of you.”
Falling back, I study her stance. Her center of gravity sits lower than expected, feet angled slightly.