Chapter 26
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
IDALLIA
Torridaig’s battle horn wakes me from a fitful sleep. I sit bolt upright, my pulse pounding wildly, then leap out of bed.
“Fyrestar!” Reaching for the clothes I dumped on a chair last night, I get dressed as fast as possible and brutally pin up my hair.
I add an extra layer, a thick, fur-lined, long-sleeved tunic to protect me from the night-cold air I know is about to bite me as hard as a weretiger. “Hurry! I want right wing!”
Fyrestar swoops down from the roosting wall. “It’s not even dawn.” His golden gaze shifts to the window.
“Good. Maybe Kellan will be slow to wake up.” If he’s even here. No one’s seen him in days.
I shove a foot into one boot and then hop, pulling on the other. Rim and Sol poke their heads out of the roosting wall. While Fyrestar flutters to the unlocked window and uses his talons to pull it open, I leap for my swords and strap them on. “Go!”
He takes off with a sharp caw. I’m about to run after him, then remember I want a dagger.
I sprint across the room, grab one off my dresser, and slip it into my boot, leaving just the hilt accessible.
Whirling, I race for the window, leap headfirst through the opening, somersault in the air, and open my arms and legs when I see the ground beneath me.
I fall like a star, my limbs splayed, the wind buffeting me.
Fyrestar’s big body partially replaces my view of a still-sleeping Drayke.
The city lamps are turned down low, and barely a wisp of smoke curls from a chimney.
I clutch Fyrestar’s feathers and settle myself onto his back. He angles up immediately.
“Are you sure you have everything you need?”
“Yes!” Then I remember my vampire-repelling torque from Stuart. A sudden ache hits my neck, my thigh, my breast. Fangs. Pain. Shock. I suck in a breath.
“Idallia?”
“All good.” We might not even be going toward vampire territory.
Except, nine times out of ten, it’s a Bloodwold problem.
We climb toward the war room, growing dread coating my mouth with the bitter tang of fear.
I try to swallow it down and can’t, my throat closing over.
The vampire bites that are just small marks now seem to scream at me with deafening voices.
I don’t know how they can throb like this when there’s barely anything there.
Maia joins the race, her leathery wings darker blotches against the granite cliffside.
“Hurry,” I urge. “We’ve got company.”
Fyrestar moves impossibly faster, and we blast into the war room first. He drops me at the right-wing pillar, and I leap onto it.
Maia soars across the room practically on Fyrestar’s flaming tail feathers and transforms in the air, dropping her booted feet onto the front-left pillar with a force that rattles the dais.
She looks over at me with a grin. “Kellan’s going to have a fit.”
I smile too. “Is he back?”
She shrugs. “Don’t know.”
Kellan barrels into the room next, answering the question for us. His wing nearly brushes my shoulder as he circles tightly and drops, settling behind me as he shifts into his common form to fit on the column.
I turn to gloat, cutting off my snide remark when I see how terrible he looks. “You’re back.”
“I guess you got right wing,” he says tonelessly.
“What’s wrong with you?” Frowning, I look him over. “Are you drunk?”
He shakes his head, his blue eyes the dullest I’ve ever seen them. “You should know me better than that,” he growls.
He sinks enough heat into his words to scald my face with regret. “I do know you, so what’s wrong?”
Arran flies in, taking the column behind Maia.
Kellan doesn’t answer even though I wait, watching him.
Danica and Wade arrive at the same time, and he gives her the right-side pillar without even going for it.
Now that’s friendship. Everyone’s wing guards circle the cavernous room.
Fyrestar circles with them. We wait for Bale.
He never watches our race to the pillars. He times his arrival to see the result.
Bale swoops in, wrapped in shadows. He’s a thundercloud, and my heart jolts as if struck by lightning.
It’s the first time I’ve seen him since that night in his lair, and my whole body ignites with awareness.
He shifts and strides toward us. His amber eyes burn into me first, then sweep over the others.
“Did you settle the Fae Queen into the quarters we talked about?” Bale directs the question at Kellan. I whip around again, seeing the end of Kellan’s nod.
My eyes narrow. That’s what he was doing?
“She’s here now and awaiting your formal welcome. The journey from Tanturriff took longer than I expected because she refused to fly,” Kellan rumbles.
He would have carried her? Dragon shifters don’t just carry anyone. They’re not horses or wagons. They only carry someone if there’s a connection.
Kellan’s eyes flick to mine. His usual smirk infiltrates his weary expression when he sees me staring, and I snap my mouth shut, pivoting back around.
“What’s the battle horn about?” Wade asks from the back pillar on the left.
“Vampires,” Bale practically snarls. Anxiety grips my stomach so fast it’s like a fist grabbing and twisting my insides.
My palms start to sweat, and I shuffle on my pillar.
“They went all the way to Ruthinock for this batch of humans and are making their way back through our land.” He starts to pace, furious strides snapping against stone.
“They’re west of Fanghaven now, which means they’re stuck on our side of the border until they can find a usable pass through the Silver Moon Mountains. ”
My skin feels hot and cold at the same time. Numb on top. Feverish beneath. “How many?” I ask hoarsely.
“A good dozen,” Bale answers swiftly. “Nothing we can’t handle.”
A dozen vampires against the whole Elite Wing shouldn’t scare me. My pulse still races, and my body locks tight. I’ve fought vampires for nearly two centuries, and yet the thought of going back into battle with them now fills me with spine-icing dread.
“Rannigan Bloodthief must be on his way to the Ellonrift Council as we speak,” Maia snarls furiously. “He’ll walk in here with claims of Torridaig being the aggressor while he waits for his raiders to haul their spoils back to his blood markets.”
“What’s new?” Danica snorts her disgust. “It’s been that way for ages.”
“We could kill him. He’ll be right here,” I say softly.
Everyone still hears me, and all eyes turn to me. I do my best to hide that I’m shaking, my body still telling me to flee.
“You’re talking about murdering a starborn king,” Bale says with so little inflection that I don’t know if he likes the idea or thinks it’s utter madness.
I lift my chin. For all I know, Bloodwold could be my native home. My family could have been blood traffickers. “So? He murdered the Fanghaven royals in cold blood, then got everything he wanted and has been spreading his blood violence for two hundred years.”
“So we should do the same?” Bale asks warily. “And during a recognized moment of non-aggression between Ellonrift’s rulers?”
“We should if we want any hope of keeping diplomacy alive. We take his kingdom and his vote. Then we get Fanghaven’s too.”
Bale watches me from under lowered brows. “How do you figure?”
“She’s dead—the last of the Fanghaven line. Rannigan doesn’t have a wife, or else someone who doesn’t live under Rannigan’s thumb would’ve seen her by now. Fanghaven is without a true ruler, and we either take it or give it to Rexton Hale in return for an alliance.”
“Let’s put Idallia on the Council,” Wade jokes from behind. “We’ll control half of Ellonrift in no time and put an end to blood trafficking.”
A muscle jerks in Bale’s jaw. Smoky shadows darken the air around him. “Cealastra might impose consequences.”
“What consequences did she impose on Rannigan Bloodthief?” I shoot back. “None. Not a fucking one. And now she’s gone anyway.”
“We don’t know that,” Bale says sharply.
Somehow, I do. I know deep down in my heart that she’s gone.
Magic will keep waning. The fae will die out entirely unless they start intermarrying with other populations or organizing full-on people-thieving like Bloodwold.
Shifters will still be able to shift because that’s physical, not magical, but accelerated healing might disappear, and no one will be able to create healing spells or protective torques or everlife-infused firebirds.
Loss crushes my heart, and nothing has even happened yet. I will never let Rim or Sol back on the battlefield. And Fyrestar…If something happens to him, I’ll die of grief, so at least we’ll return to the stars together.
“So…what’s the plan right now?” Arran asks after a tense silence. “How much time until these vampires make it to safety?”
“They’re only a day out of Ruthinock now.
They couldn’t move up the mountains on the Fanghaven side because the passes were blocked by an early snowfall the night of their raid,” Bale answers.
“They had to veer into Torridaig, and it’ll be their fatal mistake.
It’s close to dawn now, and they’ll be forced to take cover.
They’ll be on the move and out of hiding again at sunset, which is just about when we should reach them if we leave now and fly fast. If they get in another full night of travel, they could reach a potential passageway into Fanghaven.
We can’t let that happen.” Bale turns and motions everyone toward the tall, wide windows. “Let’s go! Move!”
The others shift and take off, whooshing past me. Their wing guards follow. Fyrestar angles low and sweeps by next to me at pillar level. I tense to spring onto his back.
And don’t move.
Fyrestar flies on, but his head whips around, his golden eyes questioning. He circles the room and comes back the same way. Bale is watching, too, and I try to take the leap onto my warbird this time. I really do.