Chapter 35
Chapter Thirty-Five
Dahes
MAGNOLIA
Ifelt him before I heard him. Dahes was at the sinking islands again. My mind tore open before pressure consumed every thought, and I knew the moment it didn’t belong to me. Pain seared through my skull like thousands of knives cutting through my bone.
“Did you miss me?” he purred inside my head.
No. No. No. It was too soon… It would always be too soon. I wasn’t ready for this to end.
I tried to steady my breathing, to will all my thoughts into neutrality. This past week was an idyllic reprieve. I hadn’t realized how much I missed having my emotions back, how much of my soul I lost, forcing myself to become an emotionless ghost just so Dahes couldn’t use my thoughts against me.
And last night—
I swallowed, forcing it out of my mind.
Numb. Emotionless. Don’t think.
“Time is up, little ghost.”
Where am I meeting you? I asked into my mind. I was still wrapped in Hael’s arm. My head was against his chest, listening to his breaths slowly rise and fall, before Dahes took over.
Last night, he admitted he barely slept anymore. That everything King Elion made him do since becoming their leader haunted him as soon as he closed his eyes.
He told me some stories, only small horrific glimpses where I knew he left out too many details.
I wanted to open up too. I wanted to tell him that I understood exactly how he felt. That I’d never related to anything more. That everything he said was exactly how I felt under Dahes.
But I swallowed it all down and now it was too late.
After I came on his tongue—twice—we talked for hours on his bed. We spent the night curled under the covers, talking until his eyes shut and his breaths slowed. I wanted to savor it.
I listened to his breathing shift, curled into his side, relishing the warmth, knowing I’d be freezing again soon. I knew this was coming, knew I was on borrowed time, knew Dahes was going to collect me.
I just hoped I had more of it.
I focused on the pain pounding inside my mind, narrowing in on it to zone everything else out, as I gently pried myself out of Hael’s arms. I was too far away from the original meeting spot. Hael had taken me to the Grigg, and walking by foot to the end of Soffikane would take too long.
“Step outside. Wherever you are, I’ll find you,” Dahes said, as I let my thoughts drift to the distance between the two Provinces, so Dahes would know I couldn’t meet the thatcher at the southern tip of Viven anymore.
I spent the week wearing Hael’s shirts. The first night I was here, I found a bunch in a cabinet by the bed, and he never questioned me on it, so I kept wearing them.
But today, I pulled out the black dress I stole from Viven.
I didn’t want to. I wanted to grab another shirt. But I couldn’t let Dahes see…
I sucked in a breath, turning back to Hael one last time.
He looked so peaceful sleeping. His dark hair was covering his face.
The blanket we shared had fallen over his hips.
The necklace he wore resting against his ribs, hiding a large part of the pendant from view.
My eyes trailed over his arms next, to his right forearm where the word drakin was burned into his flesh.
I hadn’t seen it on him until last night.
Even when he was tortured in the throne room, his hands were chained, forcing him to suspend his arms above his head, blocking the word from view.
The rest of the time, he always wore long sleeves, covering the burn, but now it was on full display.
I wanted to trace the letters, wanted to run back to bed and curl into his side…
“Goodbye,” I whispered.
Then, I snuck out the door, bracing myself for my cruel reality.
Daylight was rising. I could see the tops of the two suns starting to show across the horizon.
I walked along the coast of the beach before I broke free of Hael’s shield.
I glanced back, gasping when the cabin was no longer in view.
Then, I opened my thoughts to my location, letting Dahes know where to send the thatcher.
Each step I took felt too heavy.
It was somehow worse than crossing the Black Sands, worse than the heat burning my toes, worse than the miles of sinking dunes.
I didn’t want to leave.
Guilt wrecked me, threatening to swallow me whole, because if there was a way, I might have been tempted to take it. But he immediately came to my mind.
I had to leave…
It was all for him. I could do this again to save him. If I didn’t, Dahes would kill Masin, and he’d make sure to tell me every painstaking detail—how long he screamed, how much pain he suffered. I couldn’t go through that again. It would destroy me more than being his slave.
Breathe. One. Two. Three. Four. Exhale.
Keep walking. You can do this, Magnolia.
The stench of rot hit me before I saw it. The thatcher’s bone-crunching wings echoed around me a second before I was violently thrust into the air.
Blank. Blank. Blank. Blank.
Don’t think anymore.
You are nothing. Mindless.
Breathe. One. Two. Three. Four. Exhale.
Fog covered my view the moment we entered Moriann, dousing the kingdom in darkness. I didn’t see Dahes. I half assumed he’d be waiting for me as the thatcher dropped me onto the outside rotunda before the throne room, but I should have known better. He waited for no one.
“Bathe. You reek of Viven. I expect you to be ready to dine with me in an hour.”
I sucked in air. For a split second my thoughts lingered. Could he smell me? Would he be able to know what I did last night?
Don’t think. Don’t think. Don’t think.
I followed the ghost-laden halls, keeping my head down and avoiding everything I passed as I made the trek back to my room at a relentless pace.
I had shoes on so I couldn’t feel the coldness seep into the soles of my feet, but it didn’t matter.
It was all around me, wrapping me in numbing ice, making it harder and harder to breathe.
I kept moving, kept walking.
I forgot how fast I walked here. How fast I did everything.
As soon as I made it to my room, I scrubbed my body nearly the entire hour in fear that Dahes would know, hating how the smell of jasmine was slowly overpowering the smell of leather, vetiver, and salty brine.
When I ran out of time, I dressed in the sheer slip that was neatly folded and waiting for me on my bed.
Suns, I wanted to cry.
Everything was exactly as I left it. My bed was made to perfection, not a corner out of place with only a thin sheet tucked into the mattress.
None of the mountainous thick, fluffy comforters that spread across the beds in Viven, and not the hand-sewn quilt that was on Hael’s bed in the cabin.
I didn’t even get the chance to ask him who made it…
Stop thinking about it, Magnolia.
It took me ten cycles of breathing before I found the courage to walk the halls again to meet Dahes in the dining room.
He was already there, sitting at the table and drumming his fingers while he waited for me.
The contrast between the meals with King Elion to King Dahes was jarring. Elion’s meals were lively, with different people dining with him as frequently as the waves shifted in the Adrian. But with Dahes, it was only ever me. No one else joined us. Ever.
He didn’t say anything to me. Didn’t even stand or shift in his chair. The only acknowledgment I got was his gaze raking down my body. It was the longest I’d been apart from him in the past seven years, and the shock of seeing him now was paralyzing.
I hated that he was attractive, that his outward appearance didn’t match the inside.
That his features were defined, his body lean.
He was a monster. A pale devil with a pretty face.
The white eyes with the blue rim to match mine.
His bone-white hair, his even paler skin—everything so devoid of life.
Death. He looked like death wrapped in a forbidden color like the berries by the river, luring starving souls in only to poison them before they realized it was too late. His glamour faded and the realization that it was lethal—that he was lethal—couldn’t be taken back.
“Sit.” He commanded in my mind, his eyes the only indication that he was happy to see me. He didn’t stop staring, didn’t stop raking my body from the moment I walked through the door.
There was a plate in front of my seat. My stomach revolted as I looked down at the textured meat. No fruits. No bread. No nuts. No desserts or pastries. No wine or mead—only the goblet filled with red liquid that Dahes had placed in front of him.
I sank into the chair, slowly picking up the fork and knife set on either side. Dinner with him was the only time I moved slowly.
The meat was tough, or maybe I was just too used to soft cheeses and pastries. I forced myself to chew, forced myself to not look up at him, even as I felt his gaze lingering.
I finished three bites before Dahes finally spoke. “I hope for your sake you were successful.”
The knife scraped across the plate as I cut into the next bite of meat. I’d never failed a hunt, had no idea what would happen if I did. Would he punish me? Torture me? Lock me up in the dungeon? Would he finally kill me? Or would he go to Masin, would he go back on our deal?
I nodded even though it destroyed something in me.
“Tell me.”
“I found out that drakins have magic through their dragons—”
Dahes held out his hand, cutting me off. “Tell me more than spitting facts, little ghost.”
I stilled. Dahes wasn’t surprised by that, but Hael said no one knew besides drakins and Elion.
“I want his weaknesses, his desires. I want to know who and what he loves.”
“He doesn’t have any,” I said, forcing myself to not think too much. “He loves no one, but his duty. He isn’t allowed to.”
“What do you mean he’s not allowed to?” His pale gaze narrowed as his fingers stilled around his goblet.
I hated this, hated betraying Hael, hated exposing his darkest secrets.
But I had to. If I told Dahes nothing, I had no idea what he’d do.
But maybe I could make him seem untouchable.
Maybe I could stop this before it started, make him not want to attack.
Maybe Dahes would give up once he realized it was futile.
“King Elion made him his personal assassin when he became the Drakin Leader. Any task that’s too dangerous for the Drakin Army, goes to him alone.” It was one of the things Hael admitted to me last night.
“You said he isn’t allowed to love.”
“King Elion sterilized him. He forbade him from ever finding a lover. He’s the only drakin that doesn’t care about anything.
He doesn’t even have a family.” I swallowed, leaving out the part about it being uncommon.
Hael told me last night it made him an outcast. Since breeding was calculated, everyone knew exactly where they came from.
“The only thing he cares about is his dragon.”
“Hmmm.” Dahes grunted, and I tried to breath slowly, to calm my heart rate that was beating out of rhythm. “We can work with that.”
“We can?” I looked up and my heart plummeted.
“If his dragon is the only thing he cares about, then that’s how we’ll draw him out.”
“How?” My mouth gaped as I tried and failed to compose myself.
“I’ll send a threat to the Perinth Islands. The land is too close to Ryaranthia that King Elion will be forced to respond quickly. If Hael is King Elion’s assassin, he’ll only send him to cover it up.”
My lips parted. My food completely forgotten on my plate.
“It should be easy enough to defeat Hael.” He took a sip from his goblet.
“I thought… the triplets… they said you couldn’t kill him.”
He studied me for a moment. “I won’t kill him, only his dragon if he doesn’t cooperate.”
Aura…
“How do you know it won’t kill him too?” My voice was rising to a dangerous octave, but I couldn’t help it.
I couldn’t numb myself, couldn’t calm my racing heart.
“They have this thing called the Vinculum. It bonds the rider to the dragon, what if it accidentally kills Hael in the process? We know nothing about their bonds.”
“No. You know nothing of a dragon’s bond. The beasts once belonged to me. I know everything. Hael won’t die, even if he wants to, and if he wants to keep his precious dragon alive, then he’ll agree to my terms.”
His goblet echoed across the room as he set it back down.
“But how do you know King Elion will send Hael? How do you know he won’t send all the drakins—”
Dahes rose. “Relax, Magnolia. You did well.” He walked toward me, and my transparency flickered the moment he was a breath away.
He grinned as he reached his hand out, even though he couldn’t touch me.
“I know he’ll only send Hael because he doesn’t want Viven to know that the dragons were once mine, or that I still have one. ”
My mouth gaped open as realization dawned on me. “You’re a drakin?”
He nodded. “You did your task perfectly, little ghost.” His hand ran over my now-transparent mouth, and even though I couldn’t feel it, it felt like being burned. “To reward you for your good work, I’ll let you watch.”
It took everything in me not to vomit.