Chapter 44
Chapter Forty-Four
Nienna
Ididn’t sleep with Kallias.
It was childish. I knew that. Pride and hurt tangled inside me like briars, and even knowing how small of me it was, I couldn’t bring myself to seek his comfort after Hur’s death.
It was almost as if he blamed me for what happened, which he should.
It was my fault. Guilt gnawed at my insides, an acid that burned through bone and marrow alike.
He had every right to be angry, yet I hid from him.
I needed time away. Space to lick the wound no one could see. I could be the proud queen tomorrow, spine straight and chin lifted, voice steady as steel. Tonight I wanted something simpler. Warmth. Understanding. Silence that did not judge.
So I sought my dragons.
I managed to accumulate only two guards by the time I reached the plateau where Gyrak slept.
The wind cut across the stone, bitter from the chilled night.
Armor clanged behind me, metal striking metal in a rhythm that scraped along my nerves, but I kept walking.
I did not trust my voice not to break if I ordered them away.
Gyrak solved the matter for me.
The black dragon lifted his great head and huffed at my approach, smoke curling from his nostrils.
A low rumble rolled through his chest, a sound that vibrated through the soles of my boots.
I gathered my shawl tighter around my shoulders and stepped into the shadow of his vast body, craving the shelter of his dark scales.
When the soldiers edged closer, he snapped his jaws and spat a scatter of embers across the stone.
They stumbled back at once, retreating to a safer distance.
The scent of sulfur lingered as I curled against Gyrak’s side, pressing my cheek to the heated armor of his hide.
His warmth seeped through wool and linen, through skin and into bone.
He lowered his massive snout and sniffed at my clothes, breath gusting hot against my neck, a questioning croon rising from deep within his throat.
“I just missed you,” I muttered, shifting until the ridges of stone bit less sharply into my hip.
The ground was ruthless, cold and rough beneath my palm. Nothing like the carved bed Kallias slept in, sheets soft as clouds and perfumed faintly with lavender. Gyrak was a furnace at my back, scales radiating heat like banked coals in a hearth.
He adjusted one great wing, angling it to shield me from the wind. The leathery membrane brushed my shoulder as he settled, patient as any hound waiting for its master.
A rush of air stirred my hair.
Tsunami descended from the night sky, her vast shape blotting out the stars before her talons touched stone.
The landing was quiet for a creature her size, controlled and precise, though Gyrak answered with a warning growl that thrummed against my spine.
She folded her wings tight against her back and wrapped her long tail around her legs, sleek body coiling into stillness.
Her head dipped low. Nostrils flared. She searched the air.
“He’s not here,” I snapped, curling tighter against Gyrak’s side. He echoed my mood with a slow hiss, smoke drifting between his teeth.
Tsunami drew in a long breath and released it in a softer croon, almost an apology. Her steps sounded careful against the stone as she approached. She settled beside us, muscles taut beneath her blue-green scales, as if bracing for Gyrak to send her skyward again.
He only huffed and lowered his head onto his forepaws with a weary sigh.
Nestled between the two dragons, I stared up at the stars. They glittered like shards of glass scattered across velvet, cold and distant. The wind carried the faint tang of smoke from the fires below, mixed with the mineral scent of stone.
It struck me then how absurd it was that the people in the Heart of Sol did not sleep beneath that sky. Their comfort lay in the dark hush of the mountain, cradled by rock instead of air.
The thought made me shiver.
The Andeluith loomed above and below, a crushing weight of stone and shadow.
To sleep under that burden, with no stars overhead and no wind across my face, seemed suffocating.
I craved the sky, needed the sweep of constellations and the endless dark beyond them.
To be locked beneath the earth would be a living tomb. I wouldn’t survive it.
Hur’s body lay in the Heart.
The memory split me open. The wound in my chest cracked, scab torn free, pain seeping fresh and hot. It was wrong that it hurt me so fiercely. His family should carry that grief. It did not belong to me. I had no right to it. Yet it clung to me all the same.
It was my fault.
I shouldn’t have listened to Ronan, shouldn’t have pressed Hur to guide us. Gods, I knew better. I should have waited for Kallias.
Tears blurred the stars into streaks of silver. I scrubbed at them with my sleeve, angry at their persistence. Would my life always be spent waiting for Kallias? Waiting for approval. For permission. Was that the price of marrying a man older, seasoned, and certain where I still faltered?
How could I be the queen he deserved if I hesitated at every turn? If doubt shadowed each choice?
But it was my decision that had gotten someone killed.
Everyone longed to be the princess. To be Queen.
Even Tallon craved the throne, hungry for its glory.
No one spoke of the weight that came with it.
The way responsibility pressed against the ribs and stole breath.
Tallon would not lose sleep over Hur. Reckless boys rarely did.
I’d been raised to understand that lives would thrive or perish from my words, yet knowing did not make bearing it easier.
Gyrak’s deep groan vibrated, warning of another presence before I heard footsteps on stone.
“Sea beneath.” Ronan cursed as he sank down beside me. His leathers creaked with the movement, cool against my cheek when he draped an arm along my shoulders. “I’m sorry.”
The words settled between us.
Why could he say them so easily, yet I could not offer them to Kallias? They seemed too small and insignificant. Too thin to bridge what I had broken.
“It’s my fault. I wanted to see it,” Ronan muttered into my hair. “Blame me.”
“Sometimes I feel so useless.” I tried to pull away, but his grip tightened. I surrendered and rested my cheek against the cold leather at his shoulder. It smelled of oil and smoke. “I’m a queen who can’t use a sword.”
He scoffed. “It would be silly if you did. Anyone would say a princess trained like a soldier would only come from an unstable nation.”
“So you agree? I should sit back at Reem?” I demanded. “Knitting. Painting. Waiting while the men return with tales of victory?”
“I won’t repeat that to Mother,” he said with a quiet laugh, gaze fixed on the sky. “No one expects you to fight. I doubt even Kallias expects you to know your way around a battlefield.”
“What good am I if I can’t fight?” I pressed the heels of my hands against my eyes until stars burst behind them, wishing it would force some sense into my skull.
Silence stretched. The wind hissed over stone, whispering through the trees that survived the siege.
“You’re a bright flicker of a spark for the next generation,” Ronan said at last. His voice lost its teasing edge.
“A promise of peace and comfort. These people have fought for so long that it’s nothing to them to take up the sword for a few more days.
But when you pass them, I see it in their eyes, in the way they stand a little straighter, hold their weapons a bit higher.
You remind them what they’re fighting for. You’re their hope, Nienna.”
“I feel like a curse,” I whispered. My hands fell to my lap. Everything I touched seemed to fracture.
“That’s you being a woman. Feeling too much.”
My palm struck his arm. The sound cracked in the quiet, and he laughed, pulling me closer until my head rested against his shoulder.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you today,” he said, softer now. “They move so storming fast—I’m not used to fighting them.”
A chill traced my spine despite Gyrak’s heat. “I don’t know how Kallias does it.” He fought them with ease, movements clean and efficient, as if he were sparring another man instead of something borne from nightmare. He made it look effortless, like child’s play.
“Years of practice, I’d say. He was probably fighting them before you were born.”
“Ronan!” I kicked his foot.
Gyrak released a low, displeased moan, eyes closed, tail twitching once against the stone.
“Hush,” Ronan murmured, patting the dragon’s foreleg. “My hard-working dragon is sleeping.”
Darkness hid my smile. Annoyance and affection lived side by side when it came to my brother. His insolence grated on me as often as it comforted. Yet moments like this were rare and fragile. One day he would be gone, swallowed by duty or distance, and I would ache for this simple understanding.
Between two dragons and beneath a sky full of stars, with Ronan’s arm heavy around my shoulders and Gyrak’s warmth at my back, the tightness in my chest eased.
At last, I let sleep claim me.