Chapter 13
AMAIA
When the thick shell cracked and split, my gaze felt hollow on it. Syris nudged me, and when I looked over at her, she gave me a hesitant smile. She’d known how excited I was to witness the birth of an Elthika.
But now?
All I could hear was Ryak’s threat in my mind.
I conjured a small smile just for her, so she wouldn’t think anything was amiss. But I thought she’d noticed my quiet once I returned to the hatchery, lugging the basket of oats, my arms trembling. My hands too, but that had had nothing to do with the weight and strain of the walk back.
Tarkosh was standing at the edge of the small, raised pen.
It had low sides enclosing the squared space—apparently because sometimes Elthika were jittery at birth.
Syris told me one Elthika a couple years prior had emerged from his egg in the middle of the night and taken a topple off his nesting place.
They’d found him limping the next morning.
And while he’d eventually healed, Tarkosh preferred the added assurances to keep the newborns safe.
One thing I’d learned in my week at the hatchery—and in Grymia, truthfully: Beyond all else, the Karag revered the Elthika.
Especially their Elthika, the bonded of Grym…
and their hatchlings. Tarkosh, I’d learned, was one of the most respected residents in the Arsadia because of her talent and expertise working in the hatchery.
I admired that. It reminded me of how the pyrokis had once been treated, centuries before, when the ancient hordes had known that their sacred and special way of life wouldn’t be possible without their revered creature companions.
Now?
At least in Dothik, pyroki were seen as a status symbol, if one could afford to purchase and keep one. But many owned creatures had still been relegated to our care. And it saddened me to know that the respect they deserved was long past, deadened with time.
I saw the edge of a long snout, pointed rather than rounded, poke from the egg.
And for a brief moment, I felt awe. For a brief moment, I felt reprieve from the fear that Ryak had installed within me and I could marvel at this wonderful little miracle, which was only possible in Karak.
I felt blessed by Kakkari that I was here.
Because in that moment, as I watched a hatchling—another Rythback—break through the egg with all the might and strength of a creature three times its size, I found that…
I was exactly where I was meant to be.
The feeling, the realization was startling. It stole my breath for a moment. The only thing that could distract me from looking away as the hatchling emerged in a tumble, a thin mucus covering its body, as it let out a rasping squawk, was the smile on Tarkosh’s face.
I figured she’d witnessed a hatchling birth more than a hundred, perhaps a thousand, times by now.
But that smile struck me. Because it was like she was seeing it for the first time. That same sense of awe lining her features, when I’d never seen an expression that wasn’t drawn and stoic on her face before.
A lump lodged in my throat.
Would I have to betray these people?
Tarkosh approached the small pen. “Never wipe away this lining, Amaia,” she told me, gesturing to the glistening mucus coating the hatchling. “Always let it dry naturally. We don’t handle the hatchlings until that happens. Unless they are born injured.”
“The lining gets reabsorbed into their scales,” Syris informed me. “Makes them stronger, until they have their first shed. It’s what makes hatchling scales so important. It’s used in clothing, armor. Nearly impenetrable. Everything that makes us strong…it’s because of them.”
Fascinating, I thought, watching the hatchling stretch its wings. Off balance and clumsy. I couldn’t help but grin.
“Kyr, get down,” Tarkosh ordered. “Faryn.”
I knew that word meant stop, and I watched the hatchling I was meant to monitor clinging to the stone walls of the incubation room, halfway up.
“Sorry,” I apologized, racing over to him. I plucked him off the wall, his sharp talons scratching against the stone as he tried to resist my pull. “Kyr.”
At my firm word, he nearly went limp. I almost laughed because it felt like he was pouting. Elthika, like newborn pyroki, had little personalities that usually involved seeking trouble.
I held him up, but my arms shook. He weighed as much as a small boulder, solid and thick. Even in the last week, he’d grown. I’d watched him devour the oat mixture, which Tarkosh merely called their “feed,” just moments before Syris had pulled me away for the birth.
“You little troublemaker,” I scolded softly, looking into his bright gold eyes, feeling a swell of affection, which I tried to tamp down.
“He’ll be ready to start flying soon,” Tarkosh told me when I returned to the ground, Kyr firmly tucked into my side. “All the hatchlings only stay here for a short time.”
“What happens then?” I asked, knowing she probably meant that as a warning for me. I didn’t want to get attached to the hatchling. Because I knew, like some pyroki, they wouldn’t stay in my care.
“If they have a known lineage, we present them to the mother or father,” Tarkosh told me, taking hold of Kyr’s snout and giving it a small little wiggle, which he huffed at.
Her lips quirked. “If not, like Kyr here, then we present them all the same. Another Elthika will usually step in and take them under their care and guidance. They are very protective over young, even if they’re not their own.
They have a higher consciousness in that regard, even more than we do. ”
I nodded, relieved.
“But don’t feel too sad,” Syris said. “Letting go of a hatchling is a happy thing. And you’ll always see them around the territory. Besides, we’ll have our hands full soon. You might even be relieved once they’re ready to fly.”
My eyes tracked around the incubation room. It was warm in here, a constant heat that made a trickle of sweat run down the back of my neck. Twelve more hatchlings to come. It was only the beginning.
“I think you might be right,” I said.
As if Kyr understood me, he gave a growl of displeasure.
Later that night, I was tucked into my room, sitting by the window, which looked out to the courtyard and the mountain behind the hatchery. I’d been watching the Elthika come and go. There must’ve been a cave entrance where they nested on the western face.
I’d put Kyr back into the nesting room for the night, where he could climb the walls to his heart’s content. Had the evening meal in the kitchens with Syris, Moak making a brief appearance, which had only made my friend blush. And then I’d locked myself in my room for the night.
In my palm, I held a gift my father had given me.
A beautiful piece of metalwork, smooth around the edges, with a gleaming red jewel imbedded in the face.
The symbol of our family line—Rath Savenal, which had once been the horde of my grandparents—was etched above it, a looping line that resembled an ocean wave.
The dips and edges had developed a patina over time from my touch. It was one of the only things, besides clothing, that I’d stuffed into my travel sack when I’d left home.
My father had spent a lot of time making it. A gift on the eve of my coming of age. And I knew that my parents had saved and scrounged for the gold needed to buy the jewel—a fire gem.
I rubbed my thumb over it. Like it had a light within, it glowed from my touch before fading, responding to heat.
It was one of my most cherished possession…
and I felt a desperate ache for home. To walk into the home I’d grown up in, on the top floor that had a beautiful view of Bekkar’s Shield, to smell a stew cooking in the hearth and my mother’s laughter as she hosted whatever friend that night.
To hear the sound of my father’s heavy footsteps ascending the rickety staircase after a day in the forges, and to see my mother’s warm gaze land on the door, just as it opened to reveal him.
She’d always chide him for being late—though he never was—an old joke between them that Kiron and I had never quite understood, but I always watched the way they looked at each other.
I’d always hoped to find a love like theirs. Warm. Familiar. Rooted.
I wiped away the stray tear that fell down my cheek, the silence of the hatchery filling my room.
Just then, my door opened, and I gasped, turning in the stone window seat with a quickened heartbeat.
And when I saw who filled the doorway, it did nothing to calm my racing heart.
“What are you doing here? Gods, did someone see you come in here?” I asked, rising from my seat with parted lips, already fearing the gossip that would get fed back to Ryak.
“Embarrassed to have a Karath enter your dwelling late at night?” Alaryk asked, raising his brow, his voice nothing more than an annoyed grumble.
“Shut the door,” I hissed, wiping at my cheeks again, just in case there was evidence I’d been crying. My thumb was moving over the fire gem nervously, and I only felt a small relief when the door finally shut.
Alaryk’s booted feet treaded heavy on the stone, making a crisp sound, before it was dulled by the rug. He looked around the small room, his eyes hovering over the empty bed on the other side of the wall, not that there was much to see.
“Do I really need to clarify why I’m here?” he asked, his voice low. “When I left that night, I had meant for you to stay in my dwelling. Not sneak back to the hatchery before I could return.”
My brow furrowed.
“I wasn’t going to stay there,” I said.
“I want you close and safe, where I can—”
I cut him off, which made his jaw tighten. “Where’s the danger within the borders of your own village, Karath? Am I in danger of a vicious attack from the seamstress? Or maybe one of the acolytes might bludgeon and rob me blind as they’re limping home from training? Is that what you’re afraid of?”
“I’m afraid you might change your mind,” he growled, his blue eyes glowing in the dark, even brighter than my fire gem ever could. “So yes, I’d like to keep you close.”
A thread of realization shot through me. “So you can…twist if necessary.”
That was one of the words he’d used when he’d mentioned his own heartstone magic. That he could “change”…and “twist.”
I remembered our first meeting. The slither of his magic within me, getting into my head. His voice, deep and velvety smooth, almost like he’d enjoyed making me fear him.
Shall I turn your mind inside out and see all your secrets spill?
I thought of Samryn. The deep aching pain. I thought of the hatchling just born. I thought of Ryak, my new fear that there was much more going on here than Kiron had led me to believe.
Secrets. I had a lot of them these days. And if Alaryk uncovered them…
Even still, I wouldn’t turn my back on Samryn, on a creature that I thought was within my power to help and heal.
“I know what I want from you,” I told him quickly. “I know what my price is.”
“I’m listening,” he said quietly, stepping forward.
“I want you to promise to never use your heartstone magic on me. Ever again.”
His expression was watchful, carefully cataloging my reply in his mind, as if he was already looking for loopholes.
My eyes narrowed into a glare. “I mean it,” I bit out. “If you use it on me, if I feel it even once…I’m done. And Samryn will battle his curse alone.”
Now his expression looked thunderous. Perhaps my words had been a touch too rough…but after my encounter with Ryak, I was shaken. And until I knew exactly my purpose here, I couldn’t let Alaryk get inside my head again.
“I agree to your single term,” he finally said. “An easy enough thing.”
I almost snorted. I knew it was a lie.
“For a moment, I thought you might ask for riches. For jewels. Perhaps even to become my wife.”
I jerked. Shock spun in my veins. Now my expression was thunderous. “How could you think that?”
He said nothing at first. Finally, he said, “A relief that you ask for so little. Because I would’ve done any and all of that.”
I swallowed hard. “You’re out of your mind if you thought I’d want that.”
His sardonic brow raise told me he noticed the way my cheeks were flushed. He ignored the slightly barbed words. “Have you recovered?”
“Yes,” I sniffed.
“Good,” he bit out. “Let’s go.”