Chapter Nine #2
I keep going, gradually starting to slow my rhythm. I continue, even when I hear the first snores. Finally, after a few more minutes of work, I stop and watch him carefully. His helm hides his eyes, but his neck is lolling forward, motionless. He’s out.
I don’t know how much time I have, so I shuck off the protective apron quietly and head to the back of the forge. I pump my fist in triumph when I find the metal trapdoor in the floor—most bigger forges have an underground shaft in case of a fire—and I drop down as silently as I can.
Within minutes I’m out the other side and running toward the arena where Helena had told me to meet her friend. Come hell or high water, I’m leaving this place. It’s not quite dark yet, so I stay out of sight as much as I can, ducking into the hedge maze whenever I see a soldier on patrol.
By now, I know the grounds like the back of my hand and manage to make it to the second tower without being seen.
I hurry through the unlit passageways leading to the arena, surprised that I don’t see a single servant anywhere inside.
But maybe that’s all Helena’s doing. As I march onto the darkened sands, remembering the last time I was here, I swallow hard.
“Helena?” I call, hearing my voice echo. “Are you here?”
The steel doors clang shut ominously behind me, and I frown. The hairs on my arms rise, warning me of something that I can’t see, only sense. Beneath my skin, my magic roils, but it’s instantly dampened by the constricting runes on the cuffs.
“You made it,” Helena’s voice says from somewhere above me, and I try to place it, finally finding her in the royal box where Javed and Roshan had once stood what seems like an eternity ago.
“Where’s your friend?” I ask.
She holds the railing, jubilant laughter leaving her lips. “By the maker, you are so predictable.”
“Let me guess, you were lying?” I ask with a resigned chuckle of my own. “Just trying to entertain yourself at my expense?” I crouch and reach for my dagger. “Now who’s predictable?”
“Oh, I plan to be entertained,” she says.
“Alas, I shall be the only witness to a terrible accident. A rebellious little rat defied her king to see the forbidden beast, and tragically, it escaped from its handlers and killed everyone in the arena until it was finally subdued.” She sits on the seat meant for the queen.
“Time to finish what I started months ago and take the place meant to be mine.”
I have no time to respond before a vengeful screech pierces the silence.
Razulek. But he doesn’t sound like himself.
A commotion at the gates behind me lets me know that my four guards have arrived just as a cloud of dust kicks up on the far end of the arena. “Defend the Starkeeper!” I hear one of them shout, just as Helena releases another wild cackle.
Two of my guards take up positions in front of me as a bloodthirsty monster comes barreling toward us.
It’s a scene straight out of my memory, only without a slew of frightened women running for cover.
And the azdaha looks like a creature of nightmares, fresh blood pouring from deep wounds on its body, fueled by pain and rage.
Stars above, what have they done to him?
“Razulek!” I scream. “No!”
But either he can’t hear me, or he doesn’t listen, or he’s too far gone to understand.
To my horror, I realize that he’s not wearing a collar or bracers, which does not bode well for anyone in reach.
I catch sight of the runecaster—Helena’s friend, I presume—who had been tending to Razulek in the paddock many weeks ago.
He’s holding a jādū crossbow in his hand.
Three other men have similar weapons pointed at the azdaha.
So that’s their plan: watch a feral beast murder me and then subdue it.
“Razulek, stop!” I scream at the top of my lungs, trying and failing to open a magical connection between us.
These fucking cuffs! I feel nothing . . .
nothing but panic and impending death. My eyes flick up to Helena, who is watching the spectacle with twisted pleasure.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see one of my guards drop his weapon and run, but right as he reaches the gates, he’s felled by a bolt from a crossbow.
She’s going to get rid of anyone in here not loyal to her . . . and spin a fabricated version of events.
Think, Sura!
Screams punctuate Razulek’s rabid growls, along with the wet squelch of flesh and bone as another of my guards is devoured.
The remaining two guards’ weapons, forged with elemental magic, glimmer with air and ice, but they’re no match for the frenzied, pain-crazed azdaha.
One guard gets in a strike at Razulek’s leg that makes him hiss like a cavern of snakes, but then he is crushed beneath a taloned foot, the sound of his wail cutting off abruptly.
The creature is nearly on top of us as my last remaining guard swings his sword, wind whipping around him as the jādū runes on his blade ignite.
Without thinking, I dart forward, crashing into him with all my might.
We roll across the sand, his disbelieving gaze meeting mine.
“Why the fuck did you do that?” he cries. “It’ll kill us!”
“I’m sorry,” I gasp as Razulek’s roar shakes the rafters right above us. “Run, if you can. I won’t blame you. I just can’t . . . let you hurt him.”
“That thing is going to—!”
The sour stench of urine permeates the air as a mouth filled with razor-sharp teeth descends, strips of flesh and the sickening flash of armor visible in his maw. The words cut off when Razulek swallows the man in one bite.
I can smell the coppery odor of blood and, from this vantage, see the white foam—poison?
—flecking the scales around his lips. His normally golden eyes are dull and covered with an opaque film.
Drugged? I can’t see if his wings have been hurt anew beyond the numerous slashes and lesions covering his body.
They are folded and tucked into his sides.
Blood is power, my simurgh screams. Blood is akasha.
Stars above, what does she mean? That I need to bleed akasha? That doesn’t make sense.
A deafening, maddened roar makes me cover my ears. Fuck, I have seconds, if that.
Throwing up a plea to any of the benevolent gods—Saru, Mithral, or Zora—or even Vena, if she’s listening, that I’m not about to make a fatal mistake, I run as fast as I can toward Razulek’s underbelly.
A feral eye latches on to my position and tracks me.
When I’m underneath, I slash my dagger across my palm, deep enough for my wound to not heal immediately, and press it to one of the open gashes on his hide. The cuffs don’t hinder my blood.
“Target the beast!” I hear Helena scream. “After it kills her!”
Razulek roars as our blood mixes and something transfers between us .
. . or maybe that’s just my very desperate imagination.
I feel no telltale drain of power, no akasha, nothing but a strange surge of heat.
Hysterical laughter bubbles and then dies as the hide beneath my oozing palm warms to impossible temperatures.
The dark green scales surrounding all the blood and torn flesh glow a molten chartreuse color, almost bright yellow, the color of fire.
Oh, maker above. The collar would have prevented him, but he’s rune-free, and . . . he lifts his head high and an inferno erupts from his mouth, running over the sands like a deadly tsunami of flame. I hear fearful shouts and then Helena’s scream as the blaze billows upward.
The entire arena is almost engulfed, but I’ve been around the forge my entire life, even before I was the Starkeeper. I’m not afraid of a little heat.
“Razulek! It’s me, Suraya!”
Moments or an eternity passes before the bulk that was inadvertently shielding me from the flames shifts, and I brace, shoving my bleeding hand against his wound and willing my akasha into him.
The azdaha’s body jerks as multiple arrows collide against his hide.
Pain explodes in my side and my leg, and I collapse in agony, my dagger curled to my chest. I’ve been shot, too. Gods . . . help me.
“Raz . . .”
Starkeeper.
Slowly, I part heavy eyelids to peer up, only to see the arrows sticking out of my torso and my thigh.
Both injuries look bad and feel worse because they burn like acid before melting into euphoria.
Fucking Jade. I can feel my magic valiantly trying to combat the wounds and the drug, but I must have given too much akasha to Razulek to clear through his fog.
Everything feels rapturously sluggish. My throat is dry, my body starting to convulse, as the glorious toxin scours my insides.
Stars, is this it? Is this the end?
Suddenly, the blazing arena is covered in a swatch of darkness as something—wings—expands wide above us. They’re the most amazing things I’ve ever seen. A pale green, and nearly translucent. I smile in shivering delight. They’re healthy and unmarred.
“Raz . . . your wings . . . so beautiful . . .”
Stay with me, little queen.
Dimly, I see huge bloodstained claws coming toward me.
Ever so gently, I feel those talons wrap around my body, and then a huge gust of wind whips around us as we are propelled upward.
I’m tucked into his belly, face pressed to his heated hide.
Razulek’s roar thunders right as his body collides with the roof.
Then there’s an unholy crash and the sound of splintering wood, but I only hear them dully as if my ears are failing along with the rest of my blissed-out senses.
But those wings spread wide on the wind, and we’re flying. Up and up and up.
My head lolls back as darkness dims the edges of my vision and a rhapsodic paralysis snakes through my veins. In the waning twilight, I catch a glimpse of the moon . . . and the first twinkling of my beautiful, precious stars.
Tears drip and blood bubbles from my lips, and I succumb to oblivion.