Chapter 27 Isi #2
“Congratulations. You survived,” Malcolm said, his voice rough. “This means you worked with each other. You cooperated rather than going out on your own. That is your first lesson. Those who made it this far learned when to lead, and when to follow.”
His gaze swept across the room and caught mine.
“Your training will be divided into three parts,” Malcolm said. “Combat in the morning. Strategy for two hours after lunch. Magical development after that.” He paused. “The third requires your bonded companion.”
He cast me another long look.
I met it head-on.
Someone snickered, and that same, isolated feeling swamped me all over again.
Maddox stood to my left, his arms crossed on this chest. “So you’re saying Jaxon died because he didn’t cooperate? My brother helped everyone.”
Malcolm’s head tilted. “Did he, or did he not leave his team for honey when he was supposed to be standing guard?”
Maddox flinched. “We were starving. It was our leader’s responsibility to keep us together.”
“Sometimes,” Malcolm said, “leaders don’t choose leadership. They rise because no one else will.”
My stomach twisted.
Bryson caught my eye and nodded.
“Who are we training to fight?” a woman asked.
“Yes, good question, Pyra. Who are we training to fight? Anyone want to answer her question?”
“Other courts?” I asked.
“Possibly. But there’s a worse threat.”
How could that be possible? My father was gathering an army for a war.
“The Skathe,” Kerralyn piped up, hugging her journal to her chest.
Who?
“They feed on magic and leave only empty husks behind,” she said, glancing my way. “They’re multiplying.”
“Yes, the Skathe,” he said. “What else do we know about them?”
We all looked toward Kerralyn.
Color flooded her cheeks. “I don’t know much. But from my readings in the library where I essentially grew up… My mother worked there. You may not know that. But I spent many summers there between—”
Maddox sighed, rolling his eyes.
Kerralyn’s cheeks darkened even further, but fury filled her face. “They came through the veil. They’re turning our villages into swampland. And they were invited.”
A few people gasped.
Goosebumps peppered my skin, and I rubbed my arms.
“Who let them in?” Malcolm asked, his mouth a grim line.
“We don’t know,” she said. “All we know is that they’re here, and they’re encroaching further into our territory every day.”
“And that’s where you all come in,” Malcolm said softly. “They’ll attack again, and we need to be ready.”
Maddox sent me a sneer. “Send Isi to stop them. She’s good at giving orders. Just don’t expect her to keep anyone alive while she does it.”
The words hit like a blade in the belly. I didn’t show the flinch, but inside, everything clenched. I hadn’t told Jaxon to leave his watch. I hadn’t told him to try to collect honey.
But I’d let myself sleep while he watched the dark alone. I’d trusted he’d be there when I opened my eyes.
And now he wasn’t anywhere.
Guilt churned inside me, tangled with fury. I wanted to scream at Maddox that I’d done the best I could. That he wasn’t the only one who’d lost someone. But my throat remained a locked box, my hands fisted at my sides.
I took the blow. Maybe I even believed I deserved it.
Bryson growled. “Enough, Maddox.”
“Yes,” Malcolm said. “That will be more than enough. We’re all in this together, all of us fighting not only to survive but to protect our people. If we bicker among each other, all of us will fall. I mean it, Maddox. Find a way to make this work or I’ll find it for you.”
He held Maddox’s gaze until it dropped to the floor.
“If we’re all needed so much,” a tall man about twenty asked. “Why kill even one recruit?”
“We don’t set the trials, the Beast Council does.
Bonding with magical creatures requires a specific type of person.
Not just anyone with magic can bond successfully.
The beasts choose their partners, but they’re drawn to those who demonstrate specific qualities during the trial.
” He nodded softly, sorrow shadowing his eyes.
They thrust us into the trial, but it must hurt them to watch us die.
“They look for restraint, wisdom, and yes, teamwork,” he added.
“Jaxon showed restraint,” Maddox grumbled. “Fara showed wisdom.”
Not when she went off alone. Guilt swamped me all over again. She’d only left because she wanted to find herbs to heal my arm.
“Power is amplified in those who survive extreme conditions,” Malcolm said.
“The trial itself strengthens your magic. The results are fewer magic-wielders than we’d like but ones who can not only survive the trials and the bonding, but the flow of magic your bonded will send you.
Undisciplined magic users are more susceptible to corruption and madness.
The magic requires a culling for balance. ”
A shiver wracked my frame. I’d survived for years in my home court with a trickle of magic warming my soul. Unnoticed. Not forced to drink poison. All that time, I could’ve truly gone mad. I wasn’t sure why I’d doubted it.
“What do you mean by our bonded sending us magic?” Lexie asked, Derren watching Malcolm with steel in his eyes.
“Your companions will enhance your inherent skills.”
My companion had left me, and I had very little magic to work with. Which meant I had no right to be here. But I wasn’t leaving. Not until I found out what happened to Addie. Not until I found those missing children and returned them to their families.
Malcolm scanned the room. “I’m going to divide you into groups, because some of your teams are sparse.” He nodded to two men, the only survivors of their team of eight. “Others larger. Original team members will remain together, of course.”
“With all due respect.” Stones grated through Maddox’s voice. “I’d like to be assigned to another team. Any team but hers.”
“With all due respect,” Malcolm snarled. “I’m asking you to give your team a chance. Make this work.”
“Not happening,” Maddox whispered, low enough for my ears alone.
Malcolm nudged my group into one corner of the room, then added two more members.
With his ferret still slumped around his neck, Malcolm paced to each group, introducing them to their specific trainer, himself taking the first group he named Vanguard.
Naveah Islad was assigned to the Sentinel group.
The head of the castle’s armory, she appeared to be about sixty years old.
I’d only interacted with her once, in the dining room, and I’d found her quiet.
But she spoke to everyone with respect, and as a recruit, I’d appreciated that.
Her fluffy gray cat companion lounged across her arm, its tail dangling, swishing.
The recruits in the Warden group nodded to Nia, who started in right away, crisply explaining the rules while Malcolm walked toward us.
Stopping in front of us, he rocked on his heels and waved to an older man waiting near the wall.
Before the man could reach us, a door behind our group groaned open on iron hinges.
A gust of cold air swept through the room, brushing the back of my neck like a lover’s warning.
I felt him before I saw him. The same as the pressure drop before lightning splits the sky.
When Trew stepped into the hall, he looked like sin forged into black leather armor, his cinderhawk a whisper of wings behind him.
Our eyes met, and it hit like a punch in the chest.
He didn’t smirk at first. He just looked at me. Like he was trying to solve a riddle he couldn’t name. Like I was the answer and the curse all at once. Something unreadable passed through his gaze. Want, maybe. Regret. I could see both.
Then the smirk came, a blade dressed as a smile, and I didn’t like how my belly clenched, how I couldn’t forget what it felt like to be in his arms.
He moved across the room like a shadow loosed from the edge of the world, his cinderhawk swooping above him. His black leathers molded his muscular frame, and the wind tousled his hair. I couldn’t even find fault with the dark stubble speckling his jaw. Power simmered around him.
He passed close enough for the heat of him to catch on my skin, the brief graze of his shoulder sending a jolt through me. A match struck too close to the heart. My thoughts scattered like startled birds.
He reached Malcolm’s side, and they spoke low together.
With a curt nod, Malcolm strode over to the man he’d intended to lead our group. I suspected there had been a change in assignment, and I ground my teeth together to hold back my protest.
Trew’s gaze locked on mine. “I’ll be leading the Striker group.” He fed me that damned sneer that both irked me and made me ache to run my fingers through his hair. Drag his head down to mine.
As if he knew exactly what I was thinking, his smirk widened.
I suspected he knew exactly how to ruin me, and he was only biding his time until he could do it.
Heat bloomed low in my spine.
He didn’t look away. Not once. Not when Malcolm handed him the reins. Not when the others shifted awkwardly under the weight of his presence.
And fates help me, I was watching him right back.
The memory of his mouth on mine throbbed like blood beneath my skin. I’d spent the entire morning building walls to hold it back, and he shattered them by walking into the room.
I wanted to be angry. I should be angry. But instead, I was unraveling again, quietly, completely.
And the worst part?
He looked like a man who regretted kissing me.
But also like one who was planning to do it again.