Chapter 13 Rae
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
RAE
A pact. A compromise. Temporary and hard-won.
I understand that he might be worried about this delay, about making another sweep over the heaving sea.
Might. Yeah, funny. In this arena crawling with death where he died? Or almost died? Who wouldn’t be? And what really happened?
“What do you care about me anyway?”—“I don’t. But Jai does.”
I mean, what does Phaethon know? He brags and orders people about, but I don’t believe he can tell how Jai feels about me, or anyone else.
They share the same mind.
Not completely. They are two separate entities. They said as much.
And I need to stop thinking about this, stop focusing on these weird emotions and the sensation that I know Jai much better than I have any right to.
Time to move on to more pressing matters.
Like getting a drak for myself.
We’re standing on top of the platform where Jai crash-landed us.
The Goldfinch drak we got from the tunnel and rode here is sitting on its haunches like a dog, observing us.
It’s a shuddery feeling, having the huge reptile so close I can smell its fetid breath.
To my dismay, I have a good view of its yellow, serrated teeth and can easily imagine how they are used for tearing its prey apart before swallowing it down.
It’s not leashed. Not caged. It’s not supposed to be as intelligent as the Great Dara—but who’s to say it’s stupid? Those red eyes seem to follow our every move.
Shifting my bare feet on the pebbly, thorny ground, the sparkly stones the draks love so much tormenting my eyes, I watch as well. I watch Jai take a few limping steps toward the edge of the platform, looking up. The wind whips at his dark hair, slashing it across his pale, marked cheeks.
“Drak!” His voice doesn’t ring out, I realize after a shocked moment. “Come!”
I hear him. Inside my head. Like I hear Remi. I stagger back a step. How is this possible?
“Come,” his power booms, “come down and submit.”
I thought he said he doesn’t command draks, only talks to them. But he also said he commands them when necessary, didn’t he?
After a long moment, a Magpie drak, white with black markings and a black crest running down its back, approaches us, coasting on the air currents.
I’m still reeling from the fact that I can hear Jai in my thoughts—I can hear his voice of power, his magical commands—when the drak circles down.
Lower and lower it flies, and the sound of huge, leathery wings beating fills the air. Crest rippling, the drak flies over us once, twice. Then on the third pass, it attempts a landing, claws ripping up turf and dislodging stones.
The landing sticks with the drak crashing to the ground—Gods, do they always have to land so disastrously?—and skidding a few yards. I turn away, covering my head with my arms, to avoid getting blinded by the volley of sharp pebbles and sand.
The dragon comes to a stop close to me. Too damn close.
But in those crucial moments, Jai has managed to step in front of me, inserting himself between us, ready to die to prevent the drak from eating me, if necessary. One of his nightgold swords has materialized in his hand, though he has his other hand raised and calming words hum inside my mind.
Shaking myself, shaking the sand and pebbles out of my tangled hair, I straighten and let my arms fall to my sides.
There it is. Jai kept his promise. A drak for me to ride. Not a darakin but a huge, fully-grown winged lizard that breathes fire and snacks on humans in between meals.
Taking a step to the side, I peer around Jai and take in the drak.
The claws half-buried in the soil are black, black scales like socks covering the lower part of its legs, turning to gray and then white as I look up, and up, my gaze journeying up the long neck until I see the elongated head with the horn-like protrusions at the top and the black crest that continues down its back to its massive tail.
The drak has turned its head to the side, regarding me with a flat, blue eye. It’s uncanny. It’s empty of any feeling, any expression, a mirror, a window out of which the dragon can see.
Alien. Calculating and cold, like the Eosphors.
Like Phaethon.
Jai is still half-blocking the dragon’s access to me. “Rae, this drak has agreed to carry you on his back. His name is—”
“I am called Keres,” a deep voice rumbles in my mind.
I jerk. “Keres,” I whisper.
Jai’s gaze swings around to crash against mine, dark brows hitting his hairline. “You can hear him.”
I give a small shrug, all too aware of the drak still observing me, taking my measure. “Is it any different from hearing Remi?”
“No, but like with Remi… I had a hunch you could do it.” His shock gives way to pleasure, judging from the tilt of his lips, and a hint of an emotion I can’t name warms his dark eyes. Pride? It can’t be. “Though I still don’t know how you can.”
I debate telling him that I also heard his voice inside my head, but as he turns something catches the light on his neck. Scales? I reach out and touch them, follow them with my fingertip up to his jaw. “Scales… You’re finnfolk, too?”
“It’s not scales, it’s just marks.” A stillness comes over him. He moves subtly away. “What do you mean by ‘too’?”
I swallow hard. “You know what I am.”
“Do I? I have a pattern of scales on my skin because I’m Athdara, the dragon speaker, because I carry Phaethon inside me, but you… You’re human. You were under a spell, but you are yourself, you’re human, and—”
“I’m not mortal,” I whisper.
“I know that,” he snaps. He was pale before but now his skin is a stark white under the black swirls on his cheekbones. “I know. Fuck… What was I thinking? Of course you’re not mortal.”
Movement out of the corner of my eye distracts me, and I turn toward the drak only to find him slowly, painstakingly lowering himself to the ground. Like an oversized dog preparing for a long wait. Even the way he lowers his head between his front legs reminds me of the palace dogs back home.
But Jai puts a heavy hand on my arm, strong fingers gripping painfully. “Don’t toy with me, don’t… Rae, please. Don’t lie about this. Tell me the truth. Are you finnfolk?”
“How do you think I pulled you up from the deep?”
He flinches. “White hair,” he whispers, barely audible. “Like something old and dead.”
The horror in his dark eyes chills me. I never thought my true nature would disgust him so much. I never thought he’d flinch from me.
I also never thought I’d care how he feels about me, yet here we are.
Regretfully, I shrug his hand off me. “You’re not the only one who died and came back, it’s not your privilege, you—”
“You’re not…” His shadows writhe around him, slamming into the drak who lets out a screech, shoving more loose earth and rocks over the edge of the platform. A whirlwind is forming around him, lifting his hair. “Not her.”
I recoil. “Calm down. Jai…”
His fists clench and unclench at his sides, a low growl rumbling out of his chest. He looks like a feral beast straining at the leash. The shadows still whip around him, still send pebbles crashing.
After long moments, he grimaces and lets out a long breath. “My mistake.” The wind drops, the shadows dissipate. “Since I saw you I thought time can turn back. But that’s not possible.”
I shake my head. I still don’t know why he’s so upset. “No, it’s not.”
His fists clench and unclench at his sides.
“The key,” he says after a while. His voice is as curt as it is hoarse. “It will help you ride the drak. I never use one.”
“But you’re a dragon summoner.”
He inclines his head in a slight nod, face still hard. “I am, though as you know that’s Phaethon’s power, seeping into me. Use the key to lock the harness, and don’t let go of the reins. Keep your knees tucked in and your head low.”
“I’ve ridden horses,” I say, pulling the key out of my belt.
He gives a dry, incredulous laugh. “I bet you have. But if it escaped your Godsdamned attention, draks aren’t horses. The wind factor matters, as does the speed. Trust me on this.”
I would. He’s not only a dragon speaker, but also a dragon rider. He knows what he’s talking about.
I’m still confused and angry about his previous reaction, though, so I lift my chin and look away without replying.
Stop it, I chide myself. You thought he’d guessed already what you are, but he hadn’t. That’s hardly grounds for a dispute. After all, you wanted to keep your nature a secret.
Do I trust him not to go tell the king about me? About his help, about the drak he called down for me?
No choice but to put my faith in him now, right?
I take a step toward the pale drak—pale like Remi—and I have to wonder if it was chosen on purpose.
“Your coloring fits,” he’d told me about the darakin.
And then, “White hair, like something old and dead…”
Regaining my anger, the only spark of warmth inside me, my only anchor in the shifting sands of this regained world, I prepare to climb the drak and get into the saddle, fear be damned.
A rumble comes from the drak and it takes me a moment to realize it’s an actual sound, that it’s not inside my head.
Taking it as permission, or agreement, I suck in a breath and step right up to the giant reptile. I place a hand against its scaly hide, my pale hand almost blending with the white scales.
The scales are warm, uncomfortably so, reminding me that draks are fire creatures, unlike the Great Daras that are reputed to be cold and warped, made of animal parts and metal, alien chimeras, strangely beautiful and utterly powerful.
“Climb onto his leg first,” Jai instructs, and that hardness is still present in his deep voice, “from there to the shoulder. Use that as a stepping stone to climb onto the back and click the key in as quickly as possible so you can grab the reins as you get into the saddle.”
“Got it,” I grumble. “I saw you do it, remember?”
“And talk to him, for fuck’s sake,” he grouses, ignoring my answer, anger pulsing in his voice. He approaches my drak. “Tell him where to go. Use that advantage.”
I nod. “I will.”