Chapter 22
Ever
A SHOCKED INHALE GETS TRAPPED in my lungs as Aeson’s mouth crashes against mine.
His hands cradle my face while his lips conquer my objections.
I crush my body to his, hands searching, and then I’m climbing him.
I was running and now I’m climbing, and my bond-addled brain wouldn’t have it any other way.
Large hands palm my ass and lift me so I can wrap my legs around his thick waist. I fist my hands in his silken hair, and he groans when I slip my tongue into his mouth and grind down against the bulge in his armor.
His lips are searing as his mouth claims mine, the heat warming all my dark, desolate fissures.
He devours a needy whimper while his tongue feeds me his fervor, and I open for him like a lock to a key.
His scent overwhelms me, his touch brands my skin, and all I know is I need more.
More rough and then soft hands. More scale armor teasing my nipples as I writhe against his length. More titillating gasps and panty-melting groans. I kiss him like he’s the only thing I need to breathe, the only thing I need to exist, because here and now?.?.?. he is.
With a growl, Aeson tears his mouth from mine, and before I can object or question why, he sets me down on wobbly feet and runs his fingers down my throat.
He studies my dragon mark, his bright blue eyes swirling with need and conviction, and then those emotions congeal into a detached resolve that makes my stomach drop so hard and so fast it kills the butterflies that were just fluttering around inside of it.
“Take her,” he snaps coldly to someone behind me, someone who crept up on us while we were?.?.?. Reality slaps me hard across the face and whispers you dumb bitch in my ear.
Hands grab my arms roughly, and I try to pull away, but I’m given no room to maneuver.
“What the fuck is this?” I demand, but Aeson’s already turning away, like his work here is done and he has more pressing matters to attend to.
My chest aches, but it’s not for him; it’s for thinking he’d behave any differently than he is now.
I should have known he’d rather wallow in his anger than hear me out.
He feels entitled to things he hasn’t earned, and I was stupid to think he might credit me for all of my actions instead of condemning me for the one.
“Remember this the next time you wonder why I don’t trust you,” I fume at Aeson’s retreating back.
He pauses, and for half a breath, I wait to see if he’ll prove me wrong, if he’ll see the mistake he’s making and turn around to correct it. He takes a step and then another, and the next thing I know, he rounds a corner and disappears from sight.
“Get the fuck off me,” I snap at Karis and Ogdan. Each has an arm locked in a viselike grip, but of course they don’t listen. Once again, I’m some nobody they picked up off the street and don’t see as an equal.
Ogdan and Karis force my arms behind my back, and all at once, my mind snaps to a different place where I was bound against my will and transported with a bag over my head.
I fight the flashback, focusing on my breathing and trying to see the crystals all around me to prove to my panic that I’m not there.
That I’m safe despite the manhandling and mistreatment, but I can’t seem to banish the weeks of sensory deprivation and torment.
Out of nowhere, my dragon slips smoothly into my veins and then stretches languidly through my thoughts.
Without warning, a growl, the likes of which I’ve never been capable of before, quakes through me, and Ogdan and Karis go completely still.
A ripple of power settles in my limbs, like my dragon might actually do something, and I wait with bated breath to see what that might be. The force settling through me begins to fizzle out as quickly as it manifested, and it takes everything in me not to sag in defeat and cry.
I inhale and exhale measured breaths as I wrap anger around my anguish and remind myself that this is what I’m here for.
This is why I flew into this cave and didn’t take one of the nine exits right back out.
The Horde will know how to fix whatever is wrong with my dragon, and if I have to deal with a scion’s temper and his Wing’s disrespect, then so be it.
“Now, now, lass,” Ogdan censures warily, “why choose the hard way when the easy way’s working so well between us? This cave isn’t big enough to reveal in. You’ll end up hurting yourself.”
I scoff and aim a glare over my shoulder at the Burner.
“We wouldn’t want that, now would we?” I answer flatly and then shake my head.
“And don’t start with that ‘easy way, hard way’ bullshit.
The easy way would have been you treating me with a modicum of respect and asking me if I’ll cooperate before you start shoving me around. ”
Ogdan’s gray eyes flick back and forth between mine, but I can’t get a read on what he’s thinking.
Battle braids pull his burgundy hair away from his face, and a part of me wishes he wasn’t wearing the style.
He dons it only when he’s anticipating danger, and with a pang of regret, I realize I don’t like being the source of that precaution.
Before, it felt like a strange sort of accomplishment to see the seasoned warrior with his hair down around me.
Now I wonder if I’ll ever see it again. I shove that reflection aside and ignore the sliver of sorrow wedging itself between my ribs and turn to Karis.
His dark hair is pulled into a knot, and his deep-brown scale armor is pristine. He doesn’t look any worse for wear from his showdown with the wards yesterday, which is good. I look up into his cinnamon-brown eyes and let disappointment harden my features.
“Is this how you treat someone who kept you from becoming a crispy critter?” I query, and Karis’s gaze drops from mine.
“Don’t try to manipulate him,” Tove snaps from somewhere behind me.
I twist to try to see her, but Ogdan’s and Karis’s big frames block everything behind them.
“That you, Tove?” I ask, like I’m surprised to find her here.
“My bad, I totally mistook you for a bitter little troll. The resemblance is truly uncanny,” I taunt.
She doesn’t answer, so I reload and fire off a few more shots.
“What did you think of my Scream Eater out there? Does she look peckish to you? She’s due a good meal. ”
Taking the bait, Tove snarls at me, and I can feel the breeze across my back as she quickly closes the distance between us. Karis drops my arm to intercept her, and I’m finally able to turn and take in the full scene.
Tove’s green armor looks black in the light of the cave, and she’s recently buzzed her head again. Her brown eyes promise pain, and I ensure mine mirror the sentiment.
“You think this is funny, Syphon? He could have gotten really hurt. What kind of evil bitch does that to their mate?” she shouts, beyond livid.
Indignation fires through me, and I aim an incensed glare her way. “I didn’t do shit to him. I certainly didn’t tell him to shove his hand into a carnivorous plant. I don’t know what the fuck he was thinking.”
“He didn’t know what it was, you fucking dimwit!” she shrieks. “But you did, and you just left him there, where anything could have happened!”
I reel back, her accusation like a razor-tipped claw across the face.
When Aeson tried to grab me in the ravine, I thought he was taking a calculated risk because Tove was nearby and he knew she’d free him from the Scream Eater.
It never dawned on me that he didn’t know what was growing in the ravine, let alone what he’d reached his hand into.
White-hot rage overcomes me and I leap for the Seeder. Ogdan yanks me back and clamps a massive arm around me, keeping me from getting to her, but it doesn’t stop me from trying.
“Why the fuck didn’t he know what it was, Tove?
” I roar. “It’s your job, Seeder , to know what kind of flora exists here.
You’re the one who’s supposed to warn your Heart and your wing what they’re up against in any given terrain.
Why didn’t they know?” I demand. “What kind of evil, dimwitted bitch does that to her Heart?”
The cave goes silent, and Tove stares at me aghast, like it hadn’t dawned on her for even a second that there was anyone else to blame for what happened. Or that the picture she’d painted in her head about me might be wrong.
I stop fighting Ogdan and watch Tove as reality sinks in. Will she be like Amadi and build an existence of blaming everyone else for her problems? Or will she own her actions and do better, showing that she’s someone worth caring about, someone with integrity?
“Tove, go check on Chastain,” Ogdan orders, the resonant command breaching the mounting silence. He drops his hold from around me and puts space between us. Not so much that I could make a run for it, but enough to show a minuscule amount of deference.
Tove’s gaze is distressed when it snaps to Ogdan. Something is silently exchanged between the two, and then Tove turns and strides off without another word. Ogdan turns back to me, and I can feel his stare on the side of my face.
“While we’re on the subject,” I say, my eyes fixed on the path Tove just disappeared down, “I flew next to Jori for ages and he didn’t notice.
I had to hit him with a helmet to finally get his attention.
He’s going to get himself or someone else killed if he doesn’t sort out his situational awareness. ”
“Any other gratuitous assessments of my Wing?” Ogdan inquires wryly.
“Well, since you asked?” I quip, turning toward him.
He sighs and gives me a look that asks, What am I going to do with you? If he wants an answer though, he’ll need to look elsewhere, because these days I have no fucking clue what I’m doing with myself.
“Ever, are you going to cooperate while we escort you back to Four Tiers?” Ogdan asks. “That means no revealing and trying to fly away. No escape attempts or running. No antagonizing the commander or the rest of the Wing.”
I fight the urge to roll my eyes at the last part, and exhale an exasperated breath instead. “Cross my heart and hope to fly,” I say and draw an X over my heart.
“Pretty sure it’s hope to die,” Karis points out, as though he just remembered he could speak.
“You’d think so,” I mutter to myself.
“I need to hear you say it, Scioness,” Ogdan declares, and this time I do roll my eyes.
“I won’t reveal, I won’t try to escape in any form, I’ll keep my hands and words to myself, unless provoked otherwise.”
Ogdan surveys my face once more and then allows an easy smile to slip across his. “Good enough, lass.”
With that, he starts down the path Tove just took, gesturing for me to follow.
Karis looms behind me as I go, and I say a quiet goodbye to the caves I spent so many years laughing and playing in.
I can almost hear our shouts and chortles as we played hide-and-seek and argued about how to install the pulley system and get the crystals just right.
I squint against the bright sun when Ogdan guides me out onto the ledge where Tove, Chastain, and Jori are all waiting with?.?.?. a Span Crafter from the smell of him. I don’t see any focus stones, so we must be magically rawdogging it back to their camp.
“Frills!” Chastain cheers, and the jovial greeting surprisingly takes some of the edge off the anger and apprehension churning through me. “I ate a beetle because of you,” the Channeler admonishes playfully with a wag of his finger.
I wince and give him an understanding look of sympathy. “Yeah, they’re not too good when they’re raw. If you smoke ’em and get a good char though, it improves the texture a ton.”
The Span Crafter stops doing whatever he’s doing with his hands and looks over at me, horrified. I glance around and see similar shock and revulsion painted across the faces of everyone else. I shrug awkwardly and ignore it, choosing to take in the canyon beyond.
“Ready,” Jori calls out not too much later, and I turn and get my first glance at where we’re headed.
Only it’s not their camp that’s magically coalescing in front of me, it’s Four Tiers.
I inhale a deep breath and promise myself, whatever happens on the other side of this portal, I will do whatever it takes to find my Flight, reveal my dragon, and protect the other Syphons.
I’ll do it on my own terms this time, with new rules of engagement, and I won’t be taking any prisoners.