Chapter 32
T he wisps of cloud burn off as we coast closer to the sun, Rygun’s head stretched toward it like a hunter stalking his prey. I decide that’s not far from the truth, considering the Sabersythe spawning grounds sit directly beneath the gigantic ball of fire.
I tug the hood of Kaan’s cloak down, tucking deep into its shady hollow to avoid the sun’s harsh rays. Entombed in his molten musk, I find a smooth, grounding sort of comfort that … does things to me. Makes me picture sweaty, snarling warriors scorched beneath this overbearing blaze, a blood-heating smell that muddies my mind and makes me want to slap myself.
Hard.
He may have saved me from the coliseum and had my back mended, but he’s still a tyrant. Based on the way he stuffed his finger in my wound and made me scream, I’d say he has the same brutal streak as his kin. Probably worse, knowing my luck.
He wants me for something, I just have to work out what .
Bottom line: I can’t let him take me to Dhomm. Something low in my gut tells me it’ll swallow me whole.
The Fíur du Ath believe I’m dead. The Fade King and his Guild of Nobles believe I’m dead—presumably. I just have to find a way to escape Kaan so I’m free to hunt Rekk Zharos, then slice and dice him for murdering Essi and whipping my back to shreds.
Vengeance crackles through my veins, making the tips of my fingers itch. A shiver rakes up my spine, and I use the sharp of my thumbnail to scratch at the skin on the side of another—
Rygun coasts to the left, tipping me into Kaan’s arm, usurping me from my spot between his legs. I clear my throat, shuffling back into place, his powerful body a mountain stacked around me. Like I’m a fall of snow tucked between his crevices.
“There’s a sun-veil in the hood,” he rumbles, his accent so thick it’s like it was ripped from the Creators’ mouths, not tumbled by the tides of time like so many of those who live in Gore.
So unlike mine—forged in dark places where words were spat, hissed, and shrieked. Where the only softness belonged to the tight embrace of somebody who no longer exists.
“If you roll it down, you’ll be able to look around while we fly and better anticipate Rygun’s motions.”
The cut of his tone implies everything he’s not saying. That I won’t almost plummet to death every time Rygun banks or hits a current of air that forces him to dodge, dip, or sway.
Tentatively, I loosen my hold on the strap and reach up, frowning as I blindly pinch and pull at the hood’s hem, finding buttons I’m able to wedge free and release a roll of fabric that falls before my face.
Huh.
I lift my chin and dare a glance around, the material a fine sheen that casts me in a mask of shade and even allows me to look almost directly at the sun without fear of going blind.
I take in the vast expanse of our surroundings through widening eyes.
The rippling stretch of sand has given way to sun-scorched dirt torn through with a ribbon of bright-blue silk that I suspect is a large body of—
“There’s the River Ahgt,” Kaan announces as I marvel at its wide, interloping weaves. The way it sparkles in the light.
It threads as far as the eye can see, stretching for the sun, back toward the darkening sky in the south—something I confirm by peeking beneath Kaan’s arm. Tall, lanky trees cling to the rusty, sun-crusted banks, the tips of their numerous branches boasting blades of orange foliage that look sharp enough to slice. I even spot the odd golden wormlike creature slithering through the dirt, leaving a wiggly trail.
I look to the right, a few tendrils of the aurora still glinting over the horizon, though mostly it’s now out of sight.
Guess we’ll find somewhere to stop for slumber soon.
I’m just looking at the river again, fawning at the way the water appears to flow so freely between the chapped plains, when I notice Kaan put a little pressure on the left tug-rope.
Rygun’s right wing begins to rise.
Anticipating the canting motion, I grip the strap and lean into the sway, finding the movement almost … natural , this time managing to keep my seat between Kaan’s powerful thighs.
The sun now beats upon the right side of our bodies, warming my cloak as we’re carried toward a lofty band of auburn mountains stretched far and wide, north to south, emerging from the distant haze of dust torn up by the wind.
“Where are we going?”
“There,” Kaan says, pointing toward a distinct dip in the mammoth range, which expands a little more with each thud-ump of Rygun’s wings.
Scorched earth gives way to lush, russet jungle, the likes of which I’ve only seen in paintings on shop walls in Gore, the heavily vegetated mountains before us so large and vast they make Rygun feel like a pinprick in comparison.
The only ranges I’ve ever seen have been sheer and sharp, but these are the opposite. Like somebody ladled scoops of stone, then dumped them on each other in big mounded heaps, clouds beginning to gather around their heads like puffs of gray hair.
Rygun banks, aiming for a crevice, its soaring, jagged edges severed by the rushing river far below.
“Hold on,” Kaan growls, gathering both tug-ropes in one hand, threading the other arm around my waist. My spine stiffens as he tips his body forward, forcing me to do the same—wedging me between himself and the hard-packed saddle, pitching my pulse into a bellowing roar.
“ Why are you not steering ?”
“Because he knows where to go,” Kaan says upon the left side of my hood.
Huh?
A tightening of his dense body is the only warning I get before we pitch sideways, the motion so rapid my innards corkscrew the opposite direction. They finally manage to catch up, though just as they do, Rygun tips the other way. Back again, and again, and again, skimming past sheer, rust-colored cliffs the river appears to have worn its path between, like it’s reaching for something deep. Perhaps the other side.
Perhaps if it gets there, the world will split in two.
Another tip, Kaan’s inhale crushing his body so close to mine that I feel him everywhere . The way he flexes as he prepares for the next maneuver. The way his arm tightens around my waist, muscles bulging, clinging to me like I’m going to somehow slip free and plunge to my doom.
Rygun battles the gorge with such precision I realize he’s done this many times—tucking his wings when the pathway becomes narrow, dropping momentarily before throwing them out again.
We come to a dead end, water pouring down the rounded mountainscape above in wide, gushing steps, gathering in a large basin at its foot. The teal pool glimmers like a gemstone beneath diagonal beams of sun, the northern side cast in a deep pocket of eternal shade.
Rygun swoops almost low enough to drag his tail through the water, scooping skyward—Kaan’s tensing body and my firm grip on the strap the only things stopping me from ripping off the saddle, skimming down the length of the beast and plummeting into the pool.
A smattering of water pelts my cloak as we shoot up, then level so fast a yelp slips up my throat. Rygun thrashes his wings, lowering us gently … then all at once . We thud upon the ground so hard my canine pierces my bottom lip.
The taste of copper fills my mouth.
Kaan pulls back, ripping me with him. He flips the hood, tilting my head until I’m staring straight up at the underside of his scruff-covered chin.
He clicks his tongue, the rough pad of his thumb dragging across my bottom lip with such tenderness every muscle in my body poises for a few rigid moments before my brain has a chance to recalibrate.
Tyrant King.
My captor.
Shoved his finger in my wound.
Snarling, I bat his hand away and push to a wobbly stand, the insides of my thighs so chafed and achy I immediately buckle.
He catches me, making a deep rumbling sound as he flips me over with effortless ease and lumps me on his back, drawing a dense oomph from my tormented abdomen now folded over his stone-hard shoulder.
Being treated like a sack of grain is getting very old, very quickly.
“Your hips are sharp,” he grumbles, and I bash my fists against his back, knowing there’s next to no point.
Doing it anyway.
“I’ll show you something sharp .”
“Every word that comes out of your mouth is sharp, Moonbeam.” He one-handedly unbuckles one of his saddlebags and tosses it over his other shoulder. “I’m half dead already, bleeding out at your feet. Can’t you see?”
I scoff.
Please.
Kicking up his leg, he eases down Rygun’s ropes, my hood flopping so far over my head I can’t see anything but Kaan’s brown tunic stretched over his tensing back muscles. He leaps the last few feet to the ground, then he’s stalking away from the sound of Rygun’s deep, resonating breaths, his booted footsteps softened by something I’m unable to see because of this Creators-damn cloak .
He moves down some steps, dumps the bag, and flips me off his shoulder. My feet land on the ground, though I have barely a moment to gather myself before the cloak is unpinned from around my throat and whipped away.
“ What are you —”
He grips me around the waist, lifts me, and tosses me through the air.
For two tight moments, I picture myself plummeting down a crevice and straight into the den of a velvet trogg, about to be bound in slimy tendrils of excretion pulled from the gaping wounds in its palms. For two tight moments , until I dunk into a body of cool, crisp water.
I scramble, kicking and thrashing, certain I’m about to be consumed by some waterborne creature that no doubt likes the taste of fae flesh, until I stretch my legs down and plant them on a … pebbled ground.
Oh.
Shoving up, I push my head above the water and gasp for breath, just in time to see a bar of soap spearing at my head. I dodge it, then scramble to scoop it out of the water and throw it back the way it came—the bar thudding against Kaan’s chest, leaving a soapy smear on his tunic.
“You smell bad. Soap fixes that,” he says, picking it up and tossing it back at me.
Splashing me in the face.
I snatch it, pelting it at his crotch. “You need it more than I do!”
“I’ve got my own fucking soap,” he growls, catching it just before it can make obliterating contact with his cock.
Oh.
Failing to muster any more words to wield, I poke my tongue out at him instead. He returns the gesture, and the corner of my mouth threatens to lift.
The King just stuck his tongue out at me.
Muttering beneath his breath, he tosses the soap again and spins, kicks off his boots, then uses one arm to reach down and pull his tunic up over his head.
My heart skips a beat, mouth popping open.
The scars on his arms extend across every visible inch of his broad, muscular back, covered in so many small sable dots of ink that it appears almost entirely blacked out. And upon the dusky expanse … a constellation of white stars and beautiful bouldered moons. Almost two dozen of them—both near and far. Most the size of an eye, though a few are the size of my fist.
But they’re not just any moons.
My breath hitches as I take in the small wonky one I love so much, sketched so exquisitely I can make out its misshapen wing.
Something inside me stills as the backs of my eyes prickle, certain I’m staring out my window back at home, looking upon the glorious sight.
One I never thought I’d see again.
I almost reach out and touch it. Almost trace the dips and peaks of its visible wing, the delicate swoop of its long neck, and the silken tendrils that hang off its jowls and around the back of its head.
I’m so caught up in the trance that it takes me too long to notice the other moons upon the darkened expanse—ones I also recognize. Ones that crowd my favorite little moon in real life, like Kaan sat beneath that patch of sky while somebody mimicked the view with an inked etching stick.
Almost perfectly.
There’s one moon that’s out of place. The biggest—a silver moon I’ve never seen before, perched just beneath his right shoulder blade beside my little wonky one.
I frown.
That one doesn’t exist. Not anymore.
That’s the one that fell .
“Not to shock you into strangling me with your hair,” he says dryly, injecting the perfectly viable thought into my head, “but as you so dutifully pointed out, I need to bathe.” He tips his head. “Feel free to evacuate the west side of the plunge pool so I can use the waterfall to rinse myself to your standards.”
“You’ll be at it a while,” I say, scooping up my soap and edging to the right, nipping another glance at the little moon on his back. “Hope you have refreshments in those saddlebags. You’re gonna need them.”
“You really do say the sweetest things, Moonbeam.”
“Thanks. I try my hardest.”
“Hate to see you not trying,” he drones, yanking at what I realize are his pant fastenings when they’re pushed past his muscular ass, revealing his dusky undergarments. “I don’t think my poor heart could handle it. Now, unless you want an eyeful, I suggest turning your attention elsewhere.”
“I’m not giving you my back,” I growl, my words chased by his airy sigh.
“Suit yourself. But if I wanted to hurt you in any way, I had plenty of chances in the cell I rescued you from.”
He spins.
My eyes widen, the organ in my chest thumping to a halt.
He’s stacked together like boulders, his abdominals so defined they hardly look real. And though all that’s impressive, it’s far from the reason my lungs have suddenly stopped working.
More pale scars mar almost every inch of skin on the front of him, too—both big and small.
Long and short.
Some are fine-cut lines that are perfectly predictable, like they’ve come from the slash of a blade. Some are thick and messy, healed in such an angry manner that I can almost feel whatever it was that sawed through his flesh. There’s distinct stab wounds and other marks that look like something toothy lunged for a bite and carved off curls of flesh.
My gaze narrows on the round, flat, black and silver carving that hangs from a braided strap of leather bound around his neck, absorbing the intricate design—a Sabersythe and a Moonplume locked in an embrace.
I frown, smothering the strange urge to ask if I can take a closer look.
He kicks off his pants, grabs a small satchel from his saddlebag, then begins striding toward the west side of the pool. My gaze drops to his undergarments, material that does nothing to hide the outline of his manhood hanging thick and heavy between muscular thighs lashed in the welted remnants of old—
My breath hitches.
I whirl around, my cheeks attacked with a flush of heat.
Burns.
He has burns .
I hear him dump something on the shore, the water disturbed by a wave of ripples. I cast a glance over my shoulder to where Kaan is now wading toward a trickling waterfall that feeds into this small plunge pool, cushioned from all angles by fluffy foliage the color of copper.
The squiggly lines of melted flesh look as though a fiery serpent lashed around his thigh. More than once.
The lump in my chest feels heavier than usual.
I wonder how he got them? They look almost … strained. Like they happened when he was small, and the scar tissue stretched as he grew—
I shake my head, jerking away from the thought.
Tyrant King.
Dangerous.
Has a very hungry dragon.
Again, I peruse his many other scars while he lathers himself with his own bar of soap, frothing the thick black hair under his arms …
He’s a warrior, and the biggest male I’ve ever seen in every way, shape and form. He’s probably looked death in the eye more times than I have.
Damn.
Getting away might be harder than I originally anticipated. I’m not opposed to challenges, but I prefer them when I’m not already on the back foot—bound and with an iron pin lodged in my fucking shoulder.
He works the bubbles through his beard and hair, stepping under the fall of water to rinse off while I fail to manhandle the bar of soap beneath my heavy tunic so I can wash myself. Hard with my hands tied together in such an awkward position.
“Bet you’re wishing you lied about your murderous intentions when I offered to free your hands earlier,” Kaan drones.
“You have no idea,” I mutter, also wishing I had a spare change of clothes so I could rip this tunic off my body. Finally be done with this scratchy cell garb.
The soap slips from my hands just as I was about to wedge it up beneath the fabric, and I groan, settling instead for scrubbing my face and hair, working the bind from my thick, matted locks for the first time in … a while.
So focused on the task of trying to untangle my sodden tendrils, it takes me too long to register the off sensation tickling my skin, making it pebble.
I frown. “This water tingles.”
“Dunk lower,” Kaan says, tipping back, allowing the waterfall to wash over his head again before easing free. With a dash of both hands, he pushes his shoulder-length hair back off his face, next running them through his beard. “It has healing properties.”
Well, that’s handy.
He stalks through the pool, making for the shore, beads of water peppered across his beautiful body. I do as he said, needing my strength if I’m going to make a swift escape when the opportunity strikes, dunking low enough that the ripples he makes fold over my shoulders.
He reaches for the small satchel he left on the bank, loosening the leather drawstring. Cradling the pouch, he digs through the contents until he reveals a pair of prongs, yanking my heart into my throat.
Fuck—I forgot about them.
I dunk so low the water’s lapping at my chin as I scurry backward, keeping my narrowed eyes firmly locked on his—that flinty stare now puncturing me like a couple of arrowheads. “If you stick those in me, I’m going to knee you in the cock.”
“That’s an improvement on being slaughtered,” he says, charging through the water.
“You’ll certainly wish you were dead,” I warn through clenched teeth, though all my confidence dissolves the moment my back collides with the stone wall that cups this side of the pool.
Shit.
“There is only one thing that could take me back to that dark place,” he mutters, such a hard punch of honesty in his words that my heart stills, some innate part to me pausing.
Listening.
Wondering.
“And I will never let that happen again,” he finishes, drawing closer, eyeing me like I’m getting in the way of that very prerogative. Of this strange promise he seems to have made to himself.
“What’s that got to do with the pin in my shoulder?”
“ Everything ,” he growls, snatching me by the collar and yanking me into his atmosphere. In the same motion, I thrust my bound hands down, fist his undergarments, and hold him exactly where I need—my knee poised to spear forward and charge straight into his cock. Considering the size of my target, I’m more than confident in my chances to land a crippling blow.
We both freeze, energy prickling between us that has every cell in my body standing on edge.
His gaze softens, and he releases an exhale that’s tangible against my skin. “It’s been a long ride. I’m not untying your wrists because I’m in no mood to suture myself together this slumber, and you can’t pick that pin from your own shoulder. It’s wedged too deep in the bone.”
I open my mouth to speak, but he cuts me off.
“Your lips are already a shade paler than they usually are, your heart pumping at a faster rate. By this time next rise, you’ll have a fever, you’ll feel lethargic, heavy. By the following rise, you’ll be dead.”
I frown.
I can’t smell the infection he boasts carnal knowledge of. And unfortunately for both of us, trust is not a word I readily wield.
“So what’s it to be? The easy way or the hard? I’d prefer not to brace you against the wall if I can avoid it, but I certainly will if you give me no other choice.”
Holding his fiery gaze, I cling on with clenched fists and stony pride.
It’s not that I don’t want the pin out. I do. I’d just prefer to do it myself. The moment you let your captors weave their weapons between the cracks in your armor, you’re already slit, guts spilling.
Heart weakening.
Dying.
“You can’t be strong if you’re dead,” he murmurs, quiet enough that even Clode would struggle to catch it.
I sigh, his firm logic a blow to my spine.
I hate the sensation of my vertebrae crumbling as I loosen my hold on his undergarments and turn, resting my cheek against the mossy stone, watching the burbling waterfall pour down the jutting clefts. “How do you know about the pool’s healing properties?” I ask, trying to distract from the fact that I just yielded to this male and accepted his help.
Again.
It chafes.
I’m sure he’s collecting these favors owed, preparing to shove them down my throat at his convenience. Like when he needs somebody suffocated from the inside out or disembodied. Or something else I haven’t yet considered.
The possibilities are endless.
Kaan clears his throat, easing my collar off my wounded shoulder. “I spent most of my adolescence and a number of my later phases as a warrior of the Johkull Clan. They have always nested close to these mountains and recently claimed the crater formed by the fallen Sabersythe moon, Orvah.”
I frown, his scars suddenly making a lot more sense …
“I used to sneak here during the slumber, soak until I no longer bled, then ride back before the aurora rose.”
“You’re the King,” I murmur as he threads his prongs into my wound, making all the nerves beneath my tongue tingle. My next words are wrangled past clenched teeth. “ Why did … you spend most of … your adolescence in … a warrior clan ?”
“Because my pah sent me there when I was nine after it was discovered I could only hear Ignos and Bulder,” he mutters, pincers digging through my flesh while a warm leak of blood dribbles down my shoulder, leaching into the water. “Said that if I survived their harsh and grueling training methods, I might earn his respect.”
My heart squeezes painfully.
Creators …
If that male were still alive, I’d slit him from chin to navel, then braid his fucking entrails while he was still conscious.
“ What … h-haaappened to … him ?”
“I cut off his head, then fed him to Rygun.”
The words land like a kick to the ribs, almost winding me.
Deserved, but—
“ Wh-why ?”
“Because I was mourning someone I loved very much. I discovered my pah had done something unforgivable, and I took her revenge because I thought she no longer could. Now I have regrets.”
“ What was … h-her name ?”
“Elluin,” he murmurs, and pulls —yanking the pin free. I open my mouth in a silent scream, certain he just siphoned half my skeleton through the tiny hole.
Fucking. Ouch.
I spin, gaze dropping to the bloody thing pinched between us, Kaan studying the length, perhaps checking to make sure it didn’t snap on its way out—that name echoing in my mind with the blaring throbs of pain still rioting through me.
Elluin …
I swish some water into my wound while he dunks the pin, running his finger up and down the length.
My gaze narrows on his amulet, absorbing the intricate design—the two dragons embracing in such an intimate way that I wonder if it’s a symbol of their lost love.
A wave of … something sloshes through me.
Sadness?
Envy?
No, of course not.
“What happened to her?”
His eyes flick to mine. “She died,” he mutters with such finality the words feel like a shiv to the gut.
He storms from the water, pulls on fresh clothes from his pack, and tucks the others away. He stuffs his feet into his boots, grabs his cloak, then charges up the stone stairway toward Rygun—leaving me to marinate in a blossom of blood and unease.