Chapter Forty-One
Whatever we want unfortunately has to give way to duty, which is what happens when two kingdoms and two kings are involved.
Not to mention paying our respects to those who died in battle as well as making sure that the rot from the corrupted remnant of Fero is completely eradicated in both Oryndhr and Everlea.
As Aran had explained to me, Fero isn’t gone—the gods exist in balance, after all, but his brothers and sisters have made sure that his ancient godly essence remains in exile until he realizes the errors of his ways.
For a power-hungry god, that could be another several millennia. I’m not holding my breath.
“Ziba?” I ask as I fasten the last of my leathers. “Do you know where my husband is?”
Her expression drops for a moment. “He’s in Princess Anahima’s quarters again.”
Needless to say, Darrius has taken the loss of his sister harder than expected, even with all her deception.
I find the king of Everlea in the next wing of the castle, standing at the entrance to Ani’s chambers.
They’ve been cleaned as if she were expected back from the library or her study at any moment. But she won’t be coming back.
I touch Darrius’s shoulder with my magic before I reach him. “Are you well, my love?” I ask him, slipping my arms around his middle.
His body relaxes slightly, though his big shoulders remain hunched when I rest my cheek against the middle of his back. “I just wish she had come to me. I could have helped. I could have done something to save her. I failed in my duty as king and as her brother.”
“She didn’t want help, Dare,” I say, stroking his stomach. “And you didn’t fail. Her actions are her own. She could have chosen a different path, but she did not.”
“I should have been there for her,” he says brokenly.
The truth is Ani was lost by the end. The remnant had corrupted her beyond redemption.
In fact, it was a mercy she was gone. While Roshan had hung on to the last of his humanity with everything inside of him, Ani had abandoned hers.
That’s the only reason he’d been able to come back from the very brink. Well, that and Saru’s grace.
But I think about that every day . . . What if he had embraced Fero fully?
Not even Saru’s light would have been enough.
Darrius nods. “I’ve been thinking of building a school for magical studies in her name. For budding magi.”
“That would be a lovely way to honor her memory,” I tell him, spreading my wings and wrapping my magic around him in a full-bodied hug.
“She was the smartest person I ever knew.” He laughs sadly. “Even as a child, that brain of hers had the power to change the world. She would have made a strong queen, if our laws of primogeniture had been different and she had been nurtured to the role.”
“So change them. That would be an even better way to honor her.”
He huffs another laugh. “Just like that?”
“Change is inevitable, Darrius, if we want to become better people,” I say quietly, spinning him to face me and studying his beautiful, somber face.
“But we have to make the effort when we see that old ways are not working. We have to leave the world a better place than we found it. Otherwise, what are we here for?”
My king cups my jaw and strokes my cheek with his thumb. “That’s true.”
“Ani wasn’t alone, you know, in the way she felt, that she was overlooked and undervalued.
I admit there were times in Coban when I felt the same, that my only value was in my dowry and my ability to bear children.
” I bite my lip with a shrug. “I suppose that’s why I rebelled and became a bladesmith.
But I was also lucky because my father never forced me into traditional roles. He let me do what I loved.”
“We need more men like him,” Darrius murmurs, gathering me into his arms.
“You are like him. You’ve never made me feel less than or that I needed saving.
” I loop my arms around his neck, feeling his shadows come alive to tangle with my ribbons of light.
“And if you truly intend to do something about it, then we should talk to the women of this realm. In a sense, the Aspa?anā have the right of it. They might have their problems, but their women’s voices hold the same weight as their men’s. ”
He lets out a heavy exhale as he detaches from my embrace to lead us to the door. “Do you think Ani hated me?”
“I think she hated who she became,” I say. “You were simply a convenient target.”
He shakes his head. “It feels wrong to be sad after everything she did.”
“It’s all right to grieve, Dare. She was your sister.
Your feelings will always be real, but you can’t blame yourself for the path she chose.
I’ve been where she was, so consumed by anger and pain that I couldn’t see anything else.
I had to make the choice between the truth and the lie, and sometimes the lie is easier because it’s what we want to believe.
Truth means looking inward at ourselves .
. . and sometimes acknowledging that we don’t like what we see.
That is never easy—it takes great courage. ”
“You’re very wise, my wife,” he says.
I close the distance between us to kiss him soundly. “Don’t you forget it.”
Taking his hand, I lead him out of the castle and to the courtyard, where Maxur and his kingsguard are waiting near a portal that opens to the plains.
But I stop Darrius as he heads toward it.
The Aspa?anā have their own traditions to honor their dead as well as rituals and feasting to celebrate them in their next lives.
The king and queen of Everlea are expected to attend.
“We’re taking a small detour,” I say to Maxur. “The king and I will meet you at the burial grounds shortly.”
Darrius frowns. “Where are we going?”
“It’s a surprise.”
I form a portal of my own and drag him through. Within seconds, we emerge on a plateau overlooking Deadman’s Canyon, where a dozen azdahas are soaring the clear blue skies above us. I’m grateful that so many of them survived the azhi, including Razulek, Indira, and their two hatchlings.
As if my thoughts have summoned them, we are suddenly accosted by two gamboling baby azdahas that are the cutest things I’ve ever seen.
One, a female, is a luminous silver, and the other, a male, is a vibrant green, just like his sire, though he has beautiful crimson markings over the nubs of his horns.
I’ve never seen a prouder father than Razulek, who is perched a few feet away on a rocky outcropping.
I glance at my king. “You needed some adorable baby therapy, and Raz said they needed some playtime.”
“When did they hatch?” Darrius asks, a tender expression taking over his face, one that makes me feel distinctly warm on the inside.
A fortnight ago, Razulek says.
“How’s Indira?” I ask.
My mate is taking a well-deserved rest.
I giggle when the two babies crash into each other, their tiny wings flapping hard as they go tumbling over the ground, snapping their fang-filled mouths at each other. “They’re already so big.”
Azdahas mature at a faster rate as hatchlings. Our growth slows as adolescents.
“Can they fly?”
They will soon. For now, they can hover and glide very short distances.
I grin at Darrius, who has a look of utter astonishment when the naughtier of the two mischievous hatchlings hops into the air and blows a stream of frosty mist right at his head. The king conjures a blast of fire that snuffs out the ice before it can get anywhere near him.
“Cease that at once,” he says in a tone that demands obedience, and the tiny silver azdaha falters in her tracks.
Big icy blue eyes widen, but a defiant plume of smoke curls from her nostrils as she sizes up her much bigger opponent.
After a beat of tension, she thinks twice of it before belching up a puff of frost and hopping away with obvious disdain.
The smile on Darrius’s face is worth everything.
I burst into laughter. “She’s going to be a handful, I see.”
Razulek sighs. You have no idea, little queen. Already causing trouble in the roost. There are a few older hatchlings, and she has already established herself as alpha.
“Like mother, like daughter. What are their names?”
The green is called Tiri, and she is Niloo.
“They’re beautiful. What do they mean?”
Tiri means “swift one,” and Niloo means “lotus flower.”
I crouch down, putting a hand out for the smaller male.
After a moment of consideration, cocking his little red-nubbed head to the side, he hops over to me and nuzzles his snout against my palm.
A spark of akasha flows between us, and for a second, I can feel his emotions crowding mine.
No words yet, just a wild stream of thoughts and consciousness, mostly love for his sibling and his parents, curiosity over the newcomers, and that he might be hungry.
“What’s his ability?” I ask, scooping him up as he cuddles into my side.
Razulek leaps upright, huge wings flaring wide, and I go still, wondering what I’ve done wrong, which I realize the moment I look down.
My hands, my arms, and the middle of my body have disappeared, including the tiny azdaha I’m holding.
I can still feel Tiri in my hands, but I can’t see him. He chuffs as if pleased with himself.
Tiri hasn’t quite gotten used to wielding it yet, Razulek says.
“Invisibility is a rare power,” Darrius says, grinning at me and trying to contain his amusement. “Useful for both him and any rider.”
We play with the babies for a little while, and then we take our leave to go to the plains, as we don’t want to delay too much longer. I can already tell that Darrius feels much lighter of spirit, which was my intent.
Loss is hard, but time has a way of healing all wounds.
Time . . . and baby azdahas.
***
“HOW WERE THE burial services?” Roshan asks me the next day as I meet him in the private antechamber beside the Kaldarian throne room.