Chapter 2
Aeson
“THEY’RE DEAD. THEY’RE ALL DEAD,” Commander Drazyn announces, and everyone in the ops room goes still.
Shock suffuses the already-tense assembly, and my mind whirs with the implications of what this means.
Each scenario I come up with is worse than the last. Commander Ventis leans forward, shaking her head like the movement will dispel what we all just heard.
Her blue eyes narrow on the holoscreen displaying Commander Drazyn, and not one strand of her salt-and-pepper hair dares to sway with the movement.
“That’s not?.?.?. how? What do you mean?” she falters, and that reaction from the normally unflappable leader has a few of the others sitting around the table fidgeting with discomfort.
“Are you sure they’re not just hiding?” Commander Zeir counters, disbelief etched across his face.
“No,” Drazyn answers, his bronze gaze unsettled but his tone firm. “We used the latest register to track every Relacour listed, but it might as well have been a hit list for all we found. Every single Relacour we located was dead. The entire line is gone.”
Several of the commanders and trusted advisors look around as though they’re hoping someone else will make sense of what’s happening. Even the dragons carved into the white stone walls of King’s Keep feel like they’re watching intently and holding their breath to hear what happens now.
“I don’t understand, Your Majesty, how could all the Relacours be dead? An attack on that scale is unfathomable,” Commander Zeir argues, and all eyes turn to my father.
King Noctis’s face is carefully blank, but I can tell by the way he’s tapping lightly on the table that he’s more disturbed than he’s letting on. Foreboding skitters down my back, and I sit up straighter in my chair.
Was Ever’s treachery worse than I thought?
We suspected there might be other Syphons, that she wasn’t as alone as she claimed. But to have the ability, the reach , to kill that many Arcs in one night is a different kind of threat altogether.
Instead of answering Zeir’s question, my father focuses his attention on the holoscreen floating in the middle of the table. “Thank you, Commander. Return to Four Tiers and await new orders,” he asserts calmly?.?.?. too calmly.
My stomach drops and I realize my father is not in the dark like the rest of us. We may not know how an entire bloodline of magic died in one night, but it’s clear that he does.
The holoscreen displaying Commander Drazyn blinks black and then disappears altogether. My father leans back in his chair and turns to Commander Zeir.
“I have my suspicions about what happened,” he confesses. “But I need to meet with the other Matrons before I can address anything. Until then, we won’t speak about this further.”
Unease swirls through the assembled advisors and commanders, but King Noctis’s word is final. Frustration ferments my insides, but outside, I show nothing but staunch support for my father and his orders.
“Any changes in the status of the gate?” my father asks after a beat, pivoting to the holoscreen framing my brother’s image.
Lorn has his obedient-scion mask in place, but I know my brother, and his gaze tells me he’s just as pissed and desperate to understand what the fuck is happening as I am.
His white hair is more disheveled than he normally allows, and his scale armor is dirty, I’m sure from digging through the rubble of the downed barracks in an effort to unearth answers we still don’t have.
“No,” Lorn replies. “All tests and systems checks have come back within normal ranges. Aside from the Matron’s death, Ever made no additional attempts on the security of the gate?.?.?. and she could have; the opportunity was certainly there.”
Several gazes flicker over to me when Lorn says her name.
I force myself to ignore it. I won’t let them see how affected I am by something so trivial.
It’s just a name. A collection of letters and syllables that meant nothing to me before I met the Syphon, and should mean nothing to me now.
Nobody needs to know that I’m clenching my jaw to the point of fracturing it in order to stifle the growl that wants to escape every time I hear her name.
“Have you been able to identify the weapon or magic she used to incapacitate the entire base camp for forty-two minutes?” Khalil, my father’s second-in-command, asks. His magenta scale armor is bright against his copper complexion, and his dark gaze misses nothing as he studies my brother.
“There’s no evidence of a weapon, which confirms what the feeds showed.
Magic, either the Matron’s or Ever’s—perhaps even some combination of both—is what knocked everyone unconscious,” Lorn replies.
“The Orics are combing through our records as we speak to see if anything like this has ever been recorded before.”
“So the Syphon was only after the Matron,” Commander Galerus notes.
Ventis scoffs and all eyes turn to her. “For all we know, what happened with the Matron was self-defense. Yes, the Syphon delivered the final blow, but all of us watched the Matron set some kind of trap and bait the girl. We’ll never know for sure with the sound being corrupted on the feeds, but we shouldn’t jump to conclusions one way or the other. ”
I eye Ventis. I didn’t expect her of all people to speak in Ever’s defense. I have no idea what happened between them in the haptic simulator the other day, but something did. Whatever it was, it garnered Ever the support of one of The Horde’s fiercest commanders.
I blow out an aggravated breath, and a thin trail of smoke slips out with it. I shut it down before anyone notices. It seems my mate excelled at convincing others to let their guard down around her. She got to Ventis; how many others sitting around this table has she gotten to?
“We never should have trusted the Relacours. Not after the role they played in the rebellion,” Elio grumbles, and my father gives his third a censorious look.
It’s not the first time the two have gone back and forth about what to do with those linked to the rebellion. Of my father’s council, Elio is the least forgiving. I used to think the Burner was overly paranoid and bloodthirsty to a fault, but now I’m not so sure.
“We were facing attacks on all fronts after Merik died. I wasn’t going to gamble with the wards on the Fae Gate by altering the original seal,” my father asserts, his blue eyes glacial and his features hard.
Elio drops his gaze and offers a resolute nod.
“Now, it seems, we’ll have no choice,” Galerus points out, and once again the room goes silent as that reality settles in.
“Commander Zeir, I’m assigning you and your Flight to the Fae Gate,” my father orders resolutely.
“It isn’t a question of if something is going to happen, but when .
We need to be prepared. Lorn, once the commander is debriefed, I want you to return to the keep.
The Blood Rite is around the corner, and we need to be vigilant.
We have traitors in our midst and powers at play here that we didn’t anticipate.
I don’t have to remind all of you what happened last time we found ourselves in this kind of a situation. ”
His words send a wave of stubborn vehemence surging through the room. Everyone turns to my father with a singular vow burning in their eyes and radiating from their visages. What happened to King Tenebrae will not happen again.
The fury I’ve been doing a good job of stifling unfurls at the look on my father’s face. Worry and determination set his features, but it’s hardened by pain and loss. The fallout of what Ever’s done is taking an undeniable toll.
Kathal Noctis has a fortitude and vision that have helped The Horde recover, prosper, and thrive. His integrity is revered and something I strive to emulate, and yet I can see him questioning everything, wondering who to trust, and doubting which is the right path forward.
Ever Tenebrae’s mere existence has taken a wrecking ball to all of our foundations, and now she’s gone and done this .
Fury feels like acid in my veins as I think about how she stomped all over our bond right before shoving a blade into the Matron’s heart.
Then she ran and left the rest of us to clean up her mess.
Ventis can give the Syphon the benefit of the doubt, but I was there.
I begged Ever to listen, to trust me, to spare the Matron. She killed the Blood Crafter anyway.
“You all have your orders. You’re dismissed,” my father commands, the directive pulling me from my wandering thoughts and returning me to the ops room. “Lorn, Aeson, stay back, please.”
Khalil and Elio shoot my father a questioning look, but he doesn’t acknowledge their silent probing.
Instead, he waits patiently while the room empties and the doors close.
When it’s just me and my brother left, he exhales a long sigh and slouches in his chair at the head of the long onyx table.
Lorn’s holoscreen floats off to the side, and we study my father as he runs a hand down his weary face.
I fight the urge to drop my gaze and give my father’s vulnerability the privacy it deserves.
“Ever Tenebrae killed the Relacour Conduit,” he announces suddenly, offering nothing to soften the blow of his words. His statement is tipped with a razor-sharp fury my father doesn’t often let out of its cage, and warning crawls up my limbs and curls around my nape.
Lorn and I know better than to say anything. Our father will explain what he wants, when he wants, and nothing we do or say will speed it along or coax more out of him than what he’s already decided to share. So we wait.
“There’s an extensive history lesson in what I’m about to tell you, my sons. One that we don’t have time to get into, but know the information I’m sharing isn’t common knowledge and it needs to be kept that way.”
He looks to Lorn and then me, waiting for us both to nod our understanding before he goes on.
“Like the vampires, the sorcai have a progenitor fail-safe built into each bloodline of magic. It’s had different names throughout history, but in this day and age, it’s referred to as a Conduit. Kill the Conduit, and you kill the line of magic.”
A high-pitched ringing starts in my ears and my vision tunnels.
Kill the Conduit, and you kill the line of magic.
An angry drum sets the pace of my pounding heart, and my scale armor ripples with the urge to shift, fly, and burn . The true magnitude of what Ever has done and how she’s fucked us over settles through me, and I don’t know if my fury is aimed at her betrayal or at myself for not stopping it.
“This is why Drazyn can’t find a Relacour Blood Crafter that’s still alive,” my father continues gravely. “Their Conduit has died?.?.?. and the rest have fallen like dominoes.”
“How the fuck—” Lorn starts.
But I tune him out and shove away from the table, needing to move so I don’t lose my shit entirely.
“Let me get this straight,” I growl, interrupting whatever my brother is saying and leveling my father with a thunderous glare.
“You made a deal with my mate, behind my back, which gave her access to the one person who could take out the entire bloodline needed to keep the wards intact on the Fae Gate?”
“Not exactly,” he corrects with an annoying amount of composure. “When I became king and was entrusted with this information, it was recorded that the Relacour Conduit was someone else. I did not know the Matron was the fail-safe. I would have done things very differently if I had.”
“So the sorcai lied to us?.?.?. again,” Lorn points out, and my father nods. Rage sweeps across my brother’s face while also igniting like a backdraft through me.
“That kind of purposeful misdirection is an act of war,” I growl.
“Yes.” My father nods again. “It is.”
“What are the odds that this deception stops with the Relacours?” Lorn asks warily.
“We’re going to find out,” my father declares, and the scope of what we’re facing becomes crystal clear.
My father looks resigned, but there’s a vicious indignation simmering just below the surface that calls to my own.
“We need to tread carefully,” my father warns. “Not only with the sorcai but within The Horde as well. Our circles of trust need to remain small and our movements circumspect.”
Lorn nods and I blow out a deep breath.
“That won’t be a problem,” I accede. “But we’re headed for a disaster with Liberation Day and the Blood Rite exactly six weeks away. There’s going to be far too many opportunities to come at us, and we don’t even know who, or what, we’re up against yet.”
“What I don’t understand is how Ever knew about the Relacour Conduit. If it’s such a closely held secret, one we didn’t even know about, how did she find out?” Lorn challenges, his gaze contemplative and fixed somewhere off-screen.
I run my fingers angrily through my hair and start pacing again. “I knew she was up to something. I fucking felt it, but I let the bond blind me.”
A loud knock stops me in my tracks, and everyone’s attention snaps to the door.
“Enter,” my father booms, and the door slides open to reveal Ogdan.
My gaze lands on my Wing Leader, and he gives me a pointed nod that sparks every cell in my body to life.
“We’ve got her,” Ogdan announces, and adrenaline explodes through me, reigniting my desperate need to fly?.?.?. hunt?.?.?. avenge.
I don’t offer so much as a goodbye to Lorn or my father as I storm out of the ops room. Ever slipped through my fingers once; I won’t let it happen again. Farrow, Karis, and Gatlin are waiting for me in the hall, and I sprint past them, unwilling to wait for anyone to fall into step.
“I want a plan of attack, coordinates, and Span Crafters ready to go in five,” I bark over my shoulder as they rush to catch up.
“Already on it,” Ogdan confirms. Not wasting any time, he opens the passway between my rookery and my father’s and then starts to recount the rest of the intel needed to corner my mate.
I’m coming for you, Ever.
And then you’ll answer for everything you’ve done.