53. Nyte
53
N yte
I’d left her. I’d let Drystan take me away from the wreckage of the temple when I couldn’t fight him in my state. Not even now did I have the strength to storm out of this tall wooden tower of a home somewhere surrounded by woodland to find Astraea. That’s all I knew about where he’d taken me as I sat on the edge of a bed staring out the long window.
It had only been hours since that hell we escaped but they dragged like agonizing days when Astraea was not with me. The sun was setting now, and I couldn’t be sure why it felt like my time was running out.
A healer had checked my bandages several times. Having my wings torn out was a pain incomparable to anything I’d felt before. The phantom claws of the initial resistance, the blunt force tear, seized me when I was touched anywhere near the raw scores of my flesh. It was the only reason I wasn’t tearing through Althenia right now to reach Astraea.
If Auster had her… I could hardly contain my utter outrage that Drystan had taken me and left her. All I could think about was how my blood spilled over the stone, and if they managed to gather enough, they could kill Astraea with it now.
The door creaked open and my fist tightened in the sheets. I hadn’t spoken to anyone in the few times I’d been conscious enough.
They’d all made it out. Zathrian, Rosalind, Davina, Lilith, Nadia, and Elliot were somewhere in this multi-story hut. Zath and Elliot were more incapacitated than me but I wondered if it was my sheer will and focus on Astraea that was pushing through the strong need for rest and recovery.
Drystan lingered behind me.
“Where the fuck did you get a dragon?” I asked, voice devoid of any emotion. I needed to gather shit so I knew where to start.
“Same place as you—an egg once upon a time.”
I was so fucking far from tolerating any humor. My teeth clenched in ire as Drystan wandered to the window in front of me. Astraea’s dragon wasn’t mine.
Drystan expanded. “In the diary I found all that time ago, I figured it out. The dragons were hunted nearly to extinction a thousand years ago, until a group of mages and fae found a way to hide them.”
He dipped into his pocket, unfolding a parchment. My lazy eyes dragged to the table he laid it on and I recognized the enchanted map immediately.
“They were cast into paintings,” Drystan told me, reaching for something else that stoked another familiarity. A new overlay. No—not new, he’d found that in the diary of the library too all that time ago. “Constellation Draco. These are the locations. Outside each temple is a giant dragon painting no one would think was anything more. They kept one dragon alive that delivered an egg. Fesarah. It was said the dragon hatched from it would be the catalyst to releasing the others through its tears.”
I might have found the story remarkable if I wasn’t in such dark despair; it was hard to find light in anything without Astraea.
He added, “Truthfully, I thought you would have figured it out, or at least had some suspicion, when the circle rune at the Guardian Temple was empty.”
“She knew all this time,” I muttered.
“Since just before she visited the guardians, yes.”
I had more questions about that, but my chest was aching so badly with the recollections of Astraea’s last words to me.
“She broke and scattered the key, just like it broke after her death, and I thought—” Fuck, I could hardly breathe. She was still alive, I could feel it in our bond. Though it was now a weapon to kill me, I was grateful for it. “She said you would know how to find the pieces. That the key is with the dragons.”
Drystan’s expression lit up with that knowledge. Then he gave an incredulous sound, shaking his head. He fixed the overlay over the map, studying it with a small smile.
“She’s so fucking brilliant,” he muttered.
“I only saw five pieces.”
“There’s seventeen named stars in Draco. Seventeen temples, and I hope that means dragons too. Hard to know which will have key pieces or… perhaps they all do. It seems there may be one last Libertatem after all. One that spans the continent.”
My fingers slipped through my hair as I held my head in my hands.
“That will take too long. I’m not leaving her there another moment past getting my strength back.”
“So we retrieve Astraea first.”
I wished it was that simple. Easy as he made it sound. I hoped it was.
Drystan sighed, heading back to the window and folding his arms.
“There was also another prophesy. I know you don’t believe in them, but we had to try. I asked Astraea to keep the dragon a secret because you would have only seen me as some kind of threat with it. I didn’t know if it would bond with me but it did. Her name is Athebyne, by the way. I’m sure Eltanin will be glad not to be alone anymore. But…”
Drystan paused, flicking his eyes to me with pained disturbance.
“What is it?”
“I think Auster might have Eltanin. We haven’t seen him since the battle.”
My eyes closed briefly. Shit. If Auster harmed the dragon, I didn’t want to think what it would do to Astraea.
“We have to go get them back,” I growled.
“Just wait, you impatient bastard. You’re not saving anyone like this and getting yourself captured again would just cause more hell for everyone.”
I loathed this state of weakness so much I thought my rage of adrenaline could see me through killing Auster at least. But then there were his brothers… my father… FUCK.
“Astraea couldn’t yet explain to you why she trusted me—why I asked her to kill me,” Drystan said.
It was the wrong thing to admit. My blaze turned scorching and I targeted that lethal stare on him. Drystan winced at it.
I could hardly grapple sanity from what I was hearing.
“You asked her to what? ” I seethed through my teeth.
“Astraea had to become Lightsdeath—it’s the only way we stand a chance of winning this. Of both of you surviving it and of stopping the quakes once and for all. You never would have agreed to her trying and we needed you to summon the God of Death to do it. I won’t deny it was a risk; he could have refused, killed her, let me die, or asked for something else, but it’s been a long three centuries, brother. All I had was time and I don’t have your power but there is often more might in knowledge.
“I knew the gods had their own wars and Dusk and Dawn had long been regarded as superior. Death has tried before to meddle with their plans; creating you wreaked havoc in the world they’d set up to create so perfectly to their celestial order with their daughter. Your bond I think was unexpected and more to do with your heritage as star-gods. But then Astraea came back and they bargained her memories in the hopes their golden era could be restored and Death would lose. They told father how to kill you and also that he had to ally with Auster to do it. Auster has always had the favor of Dusk and Dawn, as do all the High Celestials divinely chosen by them. Death wants them gone. So we had to take a chance. In claiming Astraea it severed her ties as the Daughter of Dusk and Dawn and made her Death’s creation like you. He did exactly what we hoped he would. Legends speak of a Godkiller… and as you know a god can only be killed by something it’s made of.”
Astraea was made of Dusk and Dawn.
My hand massaged my forehead as I tried to comprehend this plan—this foolishly desperate plan—they’d conjured between themselves.
Godkiller. Shit, the fable was as incredible as it was fascinating. Remembering how Astraea had looked, the power she harnessed so bright and glorious as Lightsdeath, I couldn’t deny he might be right if such a legend was true.
“How is there a good end to any of this?” I snapped.
“Because your death is next.”
I huffed a bitter laugh. “You’re nicer to me when you’re dying.”
“Speaking of—that was a shit experience I hope to never revisit. Though my comeback was a one-trick act of desperation. I don’t know how you’ve died so many times like it was nothing.” He shuddered. “It took me a while to come around, and honestly I feared for a moment the little rogue might have changed her mind to make it permanent when I woke despite her bond to me being severed. She was in on it too. But if she’d have been the one to kill me you would have killed her without a thought. It had to be Astraea.”
Their plan was suicidal. Reckless. Dangerous. Stupid.
And brilliant.
Fucking brilliant.
Drystan said, “But if I’d just pulled myself together faster… got to you faster… your wings…”
“It’s not your fault,” I said.
It kept me weak right now more than anything. It was hard to explain the emptiness I felt with them gone. The wounds would take a while to heal, I’d been informed, but it was inside that felt fractured.
“Too many had guarded minds. I didn’t stand a chance of killing all I needed to and attempting to shatter the veil to reach Astraea and Auster had the key right. There. He could have killed her just to break me. If I hadn’t surrendered, he would have whipped Astraea every time I resisted.”
Losing my wings to spare her pain… it was worth it.
I leaned my forearms on my thighs, clamping my trembling fists from how explosive I became with every thought of him. I couldn’t believe I’d missed it. That I hadn’t considered Auster a culprit even once despite Astraea’s bond with me. She trusted him. They’d grown up together… yet I’d failed her by not seeing that ultimate betrayal. Instead, I’d fucking protected him and his brothers behind that veil.
“That bastard is going to pay,” Drystan said to himself in a dark promise I’d never heard from him before. “Both of them.”
“I don’t understand what Auster has to gain from father,” I said.
“Nothing. Not anymore. Auster got the answer to kill you and orchestrated the attack on his own people with what’s feebly left of father’s army—true vampire rogues that still thought he would grant them the world someday. Auster simply saw a way to further frame you as the villain and condemn Astraea as the enemy too when they found out she was with you. As far as the story will go—it was you who attacked, and Astraea was compliant with it. I imagine the lot of us will be fugitives with Auster taking over Solanis now. We’ll have to be vigilant.”
He took a deep inhale, turning to me with tired, pitying eyes. “Father has foolishly expired his use and I wouldn’t be surprised if Auster kills him before we can unless he manages to wrangle some alliance. He’s like a serpent with five heads that way.”
There was no better way to put it when it felt like we cut one head off and he was still fucking here.
“We saw you with Tarran and other Elder Vampires,” I said with careful suspicion.
“I know,” he smirked. “You two should probably delegate the sleuthing to someone else next time.”
“They’re allied with father still? Did they lead the attack?”
“No. They’re with us.”
My head was beginning to throb too painfully to absorb what the fuck he was trying to explain. Nothing made sense anymore. Everything I thought I knew.
I didn’t care.
About the war. The collapse of the stars.
I didn’t want to care about anything but Astraea yet I knew everything was tied together in a nightmarish path to get to her anyway.
“You should rest. There’s a lot you need to understand—”
“I need to get Astraea back, ” I snarled.
Pushing to my feet, my stability wavered so instantly that I reached clumsily for the desk, knocking things off. I hissed in frustration.
Drystan approached but I didn’t look up. He thumped something in front of me and I almost snatched it to snap it in two.
“It’s just until you get your strength back. Healer’s orders, since we knew you’d be adamantly against lying down.”
Everything in me despaired at the sight of the black wooden cane.
“How long?” I asked.
His hesitation of silence was enough to close my eyes, sinking my thoughts further.
“They don’t know for sure. At least a few weeks from what they know of celestials losing their wings in the past. Your balance will come back steadily, you’ll need to eat more, and your power… well only you can tell us if that’s been affected and when it’ll come back fully. You might find your mind blocks or limits access to it so your body can heal.”
I knew celestials losing their wings had a long road to recovery, but some how I thought I’d be different. That I could push through it faster, ignore the pain, and keep. Going.
“I know this is going to be hard for you, but we’re not all resting. You have to have a bit of faith in the rest of us to carry out the work for once.”
Drystan laid a hand on my shoulder and for a moment it stopped the pacing beast inside me. I never thought I’d feel his comfort again. Part of me was questioning if this was even real. He edged the cane closer and I had no choice but to accept it if I wanted to keep my balance when letting go of the dresser.
“I meant what I said,” he spoke quietly, like the remaining shadows of his resentment wanted to keep it secret. “I might have wanted to keep you two apart in fear of this tragic, vicious cycle. I wanted Astraea to choose me in friendship and if she didn’t fall for you again, you’d leave this realm and we’d restore this one. But I’ve come to realize I don’t care about the past, how dark and selfish you became, we need you. Not because of your power… we just need you. Both of us. We all have wrongs we’re not proud of and that lead us astray, but somehow, I think we’ll always find our way back.”
I nodded. Glad for once, through my cloud of misery, that I had my brother back at least. Though we had a long road of mending our broken relationship ahead of us.
“She’s resilient and powerful. If she doesn’t save herself first, we’ll get her out,” Drystan said.
All that anguished in me about it was how I couldn’t save Astraea. Not like this.
I shuffled with the cane to the window. My body was too heavy yet also hollow, my mind was foggy. Snow covered the trees and hills surrounding this tall cabin.
“Where are we?” I asked.
“We’re still in Vesitire. This place is the home of Nadir, the mage we visited. It’s cloaked so that no one should see it if they wandered past, no one can use the void to find us, and anyone who passes the veil around the protection perimeter triggers an alarm. It’s not over, Nyte. In fact, I think we’ve just entered the beginning of the end.”
Drystan left, and in the solitude my helplessness bore down fractions heavier. I had to put my trust in others and that was something I wasn’t sure how to do. Every tap of the cane against the wooden floor sank the reality of my situation in deeper.
The sun torched the trees with a golden hue and the snow sparkled beautifully. All I could think of was Astraea’s hair with a deep yearning in my chest.
I’m coming for you. I tried to communicate that to her through our bond but that link between us felt blocked.
Tiredness weighed on me with the slow descent of the sun and my pulse picked up. I didn’t know where the panic came from. Why I was desperate for once for the day to defy instead of the night to fall.
I leaned more on the cane as twilight descended. My mind chanted Astraea’s name, desperate for her to hear me. For her to know I wasn’t abandoning her, not by choice. Never.
My hand trembled on the cane with the weight I could hardly hold on my own anymore. My eyes struggled to stay open but I couldn’t miss a flicker of this last sunset.
I couldn’t stay here. She was out there. Closer than Althenia. I could feel it.
Our bond seemed so distant but she felt right within reach and I wondered if being in this house was dulling our connection from the protective shield I was within.
Astraea was Lightsdeath. Another creation of His.
Our existence before had been clashing. Now I feared it had reached its climax sooner than any of us predicted. Nothing given was without sacrifice, and with the rapidly descending sunlight, I finally understood.