Chapter 21
Chapter
Twenty-One
Kaelith touched down with a shudder of her wings, gravel and dust swirling in her wake. I was out of the saddle before she’d fully stilled, sprinting across the grounds toward Hein as Jax and Ferrula closed in from the opposite side.
Zander hung loose in the saddle, and my heart lodged in my throat. Hein lowered himself to make it easier, his great head swinging toward me with something close to worry in his eyes.
We eased Zander down, his boots scraping against Hein’s flank before his legs buckled. His eyelids fluttered, and he blinked up at me with that familiar half-smile. “I think I need a nap.”
“You need more than a nap, Your Highness,” Jax drawled, hooking an arm under Zander’s shoulders and taking most of his weight.
I moved to his other side, slipping my arm around his waist. “Stop calling me your highness,” Zander slurred, his head lolling toward Jax.
“I’ll call you princess if you’ll just get to your bed and get some rest,” Jax shot back, smirking.
“Asshole,” Zander muttered, but there was no heat in it.
Jax winked at me over his head, and a thread of tension eased in my chest. He was going to be okay.
We navigated the castle’s wide corridors, the echo of our boots chasing us toward his chambers. Guards straightened as we passed, eyes following the three of us, but no one dared speak.
Inside his room, the heavy curtains were drawn, and the air was warm from the fire. I guided him to the bed, and by the time Jax lowered him onto the mattress, Zander was already halfway asleep.
Carefully, I pulled off his boots and set them aside, then drew a thick coverlet over him. His breathing was slow, steady, the harsh pallor of exhaustion still clinging to his skin—but his chest rose and fell, and that was enough for now.
I brushed a lock of hair from his forehead and let out the breath I’d been holding since the battle.
Jax shifted his weight toward the door, glancing once at Zander before looking back at me.
“I’ll head back to the Ascension Grounds. I need to unsaddle Koddos. Will Kaelith let me take hers off? That way, you can stay here for a bit. You could use a nap yourself.”
I reached for Kaelith’s mind, the familiar hum of her presence sliding into mine. Jax wants to remove your saddle. Is that acceptable?
Her answer was warm and smug. Kass’ rider already did. He was suitably reverent… and told me my scales remind him of night violets.
Despite everything, I smiled. “She says Cordelle already took care of it, and complimented her in the process.”
Jax snorted but tipped me a two-fingered salute. “Good. Stay with him. Get some rest, Ashe.”
When the door shut behind him, the quiet pressed in. I sat on the edge of Zander’s bed, watching the steady rise and fall of his chest. The battle exhaustion tugged at me, a slow, heavy pull. I was about to lay down beside him when Kaelith’s sudden hiss split through my mind.
The world tilted.
I didn’t just hear her. I was yanked forward, dragged into her consciousness as if I’d stepped off a cliff. My vision went black, then flooded with light—her light—and the sensation of her massive wings curling around me.
But it wasn’t a memory.
It was more.
Colors bled into impossible shapes. The air vibrated like a thousand heartbeats pounding in unison. I threw my hands over my eyes, but it didn’t matter—the images seared through my lids, through my bones.
And Kaelith’s voice whispered, low and ancient.
I can’t stop it.
The world solidified around me in a wash of heat and smoke.
Kaelith’s memory—no, her inheritance—poured through me, and I stood on a battlefield that existed long before my birth. The air reeked of scorched scale and burning sea salt, the cries of dragons tearing across the sky like war drums.
The king rode astride Siergen’s back, his armor gleaming like molten sun under a war-streaked sky.
But Siergen… he was not the weathered red Courier I knew now.
He was massive, radiant—a gold Striker in his prime, his wings catching the light in blazing arcs.
His scythe-tipped tail gleamed wet with enemy blood as it whipped and struck with deadly precision.
Only a dozen riders flew with him—scattered amid the chaos, their mounts fighting desperately to survive. I had forgotten that in the first war, there had been so few of them. Fewer still by the end. Victory had never been inevitable… they had won only because of the Unifier.
Siergen…
I saw it in his eyes even as his body moved like an unstoppable force—rage tempered by grief so deep it hollowed him out.
These events were after the loss of his mate.
Every strike of his talons, every slash of those wicked golden scythes carried the weight of a creature who no longer cared whether he lived or died, only that he took as many enemies as possible with him.
He tore through a black dragon mid-flight, rending wing from body in one savage twist. The creature’s rider screamed as they plummeted into the frothing waves below.
Another Blood Fae came at him; taller than most, armored in jagged obsidian plates.
His dragon shrieked a challenge, but Siergen answered with a roar that split the air.
His claws caught the black’s throat, his tail hooking in a lethal arc.
One strike. Two. And the enemy rider was airborne—flung from the saddle, his body spinning helplessly before it vanished into the churning sea.
It wasn’t Severeth. This was a fae male; a powerful one. Or had been.
The instant he disappeared beneath the waves, the tide of battle shifted.
The black dragons faltered. Their formation broke.
And then… they fled. One after another peeling away, retreating into the horizon until the skies were empty save for the king, his battered riders, and the bloodied sentinel at their head.
Siergen hovered there, chest heaving, golden wings dripping scarlet into the sea.
And then the vision unraveled, fading into shadow and silence until I was once more in Zander’s chamber, my own breath ragged, my hands shaking.
What was that? I asked, breathless.
Kaelith’s voice slid into my mind, silk over steel. That was the past, she said, the echo of war still lingering in her tone. But history will repeat itself unless the Blood King falls.
I swallowed hard, still tasting the salt and smoke from her vision. You mean Veralin.
You cannot focus on Severeth, Kaelith pressed. That was Siergen’s mistake. Veralin works from the shadows, but he holds the true power. Siergen killed the first fae commander, and all it did was postpone the war. Killing Severeth will do the same unless you kill Veralin as well.
I paced the room, my gaze drifting back to Zander, sleeping deeply, his face pale against the pillows. Severeth has manipulated this entire kingdom. She’s infiltrated every layer of power.
She does nothing without Veralin’s consent.
The thought sat heavy in my chest. She wants to take his throne.
Good, Kaelith said, her mental voice sharpening. That could work to your advantage, but don’t lose sight of the true goal.
And what’s that? I asked, though the answer was already coiling in my gut.
Win the war, Kaelith murmured, her presence like the steady beat of wings in my mind. Not the battle.
The restlessness wouldn’t leave me, not even with Zander’s steady breathing in the background. Kaelith’s vision churned in my thoughts like a storm that refused to break.
I need to go for a walk, I told her; the words resolute in my mind.
Good, she replied, and I could almost hear the purr in her tone. Hein and I wish to have some alone time.
I rolled my eyes but didn’t argue. Her presence withdrew abruptly, the mental link snapping quiet, leaving my head strangely hollow.
The air in the corridors felt heavy, suffocating.
I moved quickly through the castle, past guards who bowed or simply glanced away, and let the cool evening wind meet me at the gates.
My steps carried me toward the healers’ quadrant without conscious thought—my body remembering how the Yarrow gardens always calmed me, even when my nerves were frayed to breaking.
The scent reached me first—crisp, green, and slightly sweet. For a moment, I could almost forget the war would soon be at our gates.
I never made it to the garden.
Something slammed into my back with the force of a charging bull, and I hit the ground hard enough to knock the breath from my lungs. Grit scraped my palms as I rolled, instincts screaming at me to get to my feet before the second blow came.
I pushed up just in time to meet a pair of furious eyes, their color dark and glinting with something evil. Perin stood braced, shoulders tight, with a sword glinting in his hand. His grip was white-knuckled; his expression was one of pure, burning rage.
And it was aimed at me.
We moved in a slow, taut circle, blades flashing dully in the dim light. My chest rose and fell with measured breaths, my eyes locked on his.
“All those attempts on my life,” I said, my voice low, my pulse thundering in my ears. “They were all you.”
Perin’s lip curled, his gaze fixed on me like I was something foul crawling across his path. “You will bring about the destruction of Warriath.”
“I am trying to save Warriath and its people,” I shot back, tightening my grip on my dagger. “Killing me will ensure the Blood Fae win this war.”
“They are misunderstood,” he sneered, taking a slow step toward me. “Severeth is the true queen. She will lead the dragons into a new era, one without the Blood King.”
“I believe she’d kill Veralin if she had the chance,” I countered, “but she’ll be no better than him. You’re just a pawn in her game.”
“I was Inderia’s one true love,” he spat, the words vibrating with an ugly pride. “I would have been king.”
The realization hit me like a kick to the ribs. “Inderia’s gift was persuading men she loved them,” I said, my voice firm. “Severeth used her, and ultimately got her killed.”
“You got her killed,” he snarled, his knuckles whitening on his hilt, “and I will repay the favor.”
He lunged, sword arcing toward my ribs. I barely twisted out of the way, boots skidding over gravel as the shock traveled up my weakened limbs. My body screamed in protest, muscles still half-raw from battle and magic drain. Jax had been right; I needed rest.
Kaelith! I shouted in my mind, my voice frayed with urgency as I scrambled back from the next strike.
Her answering roar shook the air, but it was distant. She and Hein were on the Dragon Isle.
Perin came at me again, his sword flashing in a vicious arc. My legs didn’t move fast enough; my heel caught on the edge of the garden path, and I staggered.
The tip of his blade sliced the air where my ribs had been a breath ago. I could feel the pull of it, the inevitable truth—he was about to run me through.
Kaelith… I’m sorry. The words were a raw whisper in my mind, shame tightening my throat.
But instead of the killing blow, Perin screamed, a sound that was equal parts fury and pain. His eyes went wide, his stance faltering as if the ground had vanished beneath him.
What is happening? I demanded.
Kaelith’s voice was steady and cold. Coldrath has cut his bond.
The truth struck like a hammer blow. Without his dragon, without that soul-deep magic, Perin’s power bled out of him in an instant.
His gaze snapped to me, wild. “I don’t need him to kill you!” He charged, rage replacing magic, and steel met steel in a furious flurry.
I tried to keep pace, but he still had brute strength, and his blade caught my arm, hot blood sliding down to my palm. I gasped, stumbling back, the earth coming up fast as I fell.
A shadow peeled itself from behind a stone column.
“How about you try me on, Rider?” Solei said, stepping into the moonlight with her twin daggers glinting in her hands.
“He is no longer a rider,” I rasped, pushing myself up with one arm.
Perin’s jaw clenched, fury and disbelief flashing in his eyes. “Coldrath will take me back once I explain everything to him.”
Solei smiled, slow, dangerous, and almost pitying. “I don’t think you’ll get the chance.”
Perin snarled and lunged, his blade flashing toward Solei’s midsection, but she wasn’t there. She moved like smoke, slipping around his strike with the ease of someone who’d been killing men longer than he’d been holding a sword.
Steel clashed as she parried, letting him overextend before she danced back, her daggers glinting in the garden’s muted light. Her movements were precise, almost lazy—like she was cataloging his weaknesses one by one, savoring the fight.
“You’re slow,” she said flatly, deflecting another strike and twisting away before his blade could bite.
He gritted his teeth and came at her harder, but every attack left him more unbalanced. She sidestepped, ducked, and when his frustration finally made him sloppy, she stepped into his guard.
Her right dagger came up under his chin, forcing his head back. The left drove cleanly into his chest, straight through his heart. His eyes went wide, the breath leaving him in a shocked gasp.
“Nobody touches my sister,” she said, her voice cold enough to freeze the air between them.
She shoved him back, letting him crumple lifeless onto the garden path. Blood still warm and slick coated her fingers as she turned to me, holding her hand out.
I took it without hesitation, her grip steady as she pulled me to my feet.