Shey Thrudesh-Vo
SIXTEEN
Shey tightened his grip on Tyche’s hand as they ran through the main corridor.
He’d been loath to leave his mother behind, but they couldn’t fix this from a distance.
There was no one else besides him and Tyche who could reach Haru.
Especially if something had happened to Adrian.
If he wanted to save the people of Sirelis, he needed to find that dragon.
After a few more turns, they reached a set of wide doors that opened to a balcony, which presented a perfect view of the city.
But it was a vision of Sirelis Shey had never seen before.
The sky was pitch black, with faint lights from the buildings barely more than pinpoints piercing the gloom.
Yet to the far south, the sky was a blood red with swirling mists of black.
It was the neighborhood where he’d seen Adrian and Haru set down after taking out the ships in the harbor.
From that bleak region, piercing screams, moans, and dragon roars arose. Goose bumps formed on Shey’s arms, and something hard sank deep in his gut. While it was hard to tell from this distance, it looked as if buildings were missing, replaced by jagged rocks that shot up from the streets.
“This seems worse than anything we’ve seen yet. Tell me I’m wrong.” Shey tore his eyes from the scene.
Tyche shook his head, but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the city. His voice was soft, but his words sounded so haunted. “No, this is worse. Something happened to Adrian. It’s the only thing that could have caused this. He’s dead or wounded. Maybe…if we’re lucky…they got separated.”
Shey ripped his hand away from Tyche’s and took a step back. The heavy weight in his stomach turned into a ball of ice. “He’s not dead!”
The words tumbled out of him not just because they’d be damned in the worst way if Tyche was right.
He didn’t want Adrian to be dead. The Erya royal guard was a good man.
A funny, caring man who didn’t deserve to die so young.
Haru and Adrian had headed off on their own only an hour ago.
Maybe two. How could something have happened so quickly?
No, he refused to believe it.
“He’s not dead,” he repeated as much for himself as for Tyche. “Adrian is tied to the God of Hope. Even if it’s not a lot of power, he’s got some. It has to give him some protection.”
Tyche’s brow furrowed as he gazed at the city. A few seconds ticked by before the God of Luck nodded. “You’re probably right. It must mean they’ve been separated, and Haru is panicking. If Adrian had been injured, Haru would have scooped him up and carried him directly here. We need to find them.”
“Agreed, but…” Shey’s voice faded as he stared at his city.
Sirelis was over two thousand square miles, from the harbor to the wall, from the palace to the historic district, and everything else in between.
How the hell were they supposed to locate Adrian?
Finding Haru didn’t feel like a big problem.
The dragon had to be in the middle of the red and black swirling mist.
“Caelan!” Tyche shouted, startling Shey out of his wandering thoughts. His companion swung around and grabbed both of his arms. “Can you call Caelan? He could sense something from Adrian. Or maybe they can talk telepathically. Fuck! I don’t know. Something, right?”
Because of that magical link between them. It made sense. And by now, Caelan was likely to have returned to Stormbreak, making it possible for Shey to reach him.
Shey ripped his new cell phone from his pocket and nearly dropped it in his haste to pull up the phone number he had programmed into it.
The call rang.
And rang.
And rang.
Until it went to voice mail.
Shey paced and lowered the phone to end the call rather than leave a message. “Fuck!”
“What’s wrong?”
“He’s not answering. He might be in a meeting.”
Tyche waved his hands at Shey as if he were trying to chase away such thoughts.
“No, it’s more likely someone is trying to convince him not to hop on his boyfriend and fly here.
He would have felt it if Adrian had been hurt.
” Tyche huffed and made a face as he suggested, “Do you have Rayne’s number? ”
He did, actually, even though it didn’t feel safe to admit it. Rather than saying anything, he pulled up Rayne on his phone and called the number. Thankfully, it rang only twice before Rayne answered.
“What’s happened, Shey?” Rayne demanded.
“Caelan—”
The king’s name was barely out of his mouth when he heard Caelan in the background demanding the phone.
“What’s going on? What happened to Adrian?” Caelan barked.
“I don’t know. Haru and Adrian flew into the city while Tyche and I went to the palace to meet with the queen. There was a sound like an explosion, and then another nightmare swamped the city. We think Adrian and Haru have been separated. Can you feel Adrian?”
“Yes! He’s alive!”
Shey felt his knees go weak and his head spun.
He must have wobbled because Tyche was right there, grabbing his arm and supporting him as he got his legs under him.
He flashed Tyche a weak smile and mouthed that Caelan had confirmed that Adrian was alive.
Tyche released him to sit down hard in the middle of the balcony.
Apparently, the god’s confidence had been just for show a few minutes ago, and his relief now was very real.
“He’s in pain, but seems to be managing. He lost consciousness for a while, but I can sense him moving now.”
“Okay. Good. Is there any way you can see what he’s seeing? Do you have any sense of where he is in the city?”
A growl escaped Caelan. “A bit. It’s garbled. What I’m getting from him makes little sense, plus I don’t know Sirelis that well. We didn’t spend a lot of time walking all of it. If I fly there with Drayce, I’ll be able to pinpoint him.”
Shey’s stomach twisted. He could understand Caelan’s need to be on hand to help Adrian.
“But it will still take you hours to reach here by dragon. I don’t know if Adrian, Haru, or Sirelis have that long to wait.
Tell Rayne and me what you see. There isn’t a single place in the city that we haven’t visited. ”
There was a long silence in which Shey’s hopes sank. It wasn’t as if he could order King Caelan, the God of Hope, to do as he asked. He couldn’t wait for Caelan’s arrival. They needed to do something now.
“The streets are smooth. Asphalt. Not cobblestone.”
Shey almost choked on his sigh of relief as the first slow words came from Caelan. He shoved aside his rising joy to focus on what he said.
“The most prominent spots in the city without cobblestone are the warehouse district and the poor quarter.” Rayne’s voice came through loud and clear. Caelan had put the phone on speaker so his advisor could hear everything they discussed.
“There was also a section of the harbor that was resurfaced from cobblestone to asphalt a couple of years ago,” Shey chimed in.
“The buildings are brick. Tall, but not too tall. Four, five stories. Close together. No, now it’s all trees. A forest. How did he get into a forest?”
Shey scowled at the phone. “A forest?” This didn’t make any sense.
“The nightmare.” Tyche’s words jerked Shey’s attention to him. He was standing near the railing of the balcony, looking toward the city, but he was listening to what he could hear of the conversation.
Shey lowered the phone and tapped the button to put it on speaker so Tyche could hear everything. He walked over to him and held the phone between them. Tyche offered a weak smile before turning his gaze to the city.
“No, the forest is gone. Buildings. Narrow streets.” Each time Caelan spoke, it sounded as if each word had to be pulled painfully from his throat.
“Can you see cars? Are they all pointed in the same direction?” Rayne demanded.
“Yes.”
“Poor Quarter!” Rayne and Shey said at the same time.
Officially known as Ash Row, it was one of the older parts of Sirelis that had never seen great renovations like many other districts.
All the buildings were narrow and built close together.
In addition, most of the streets were also slender, designed for horses and carriages rather than cars.
Because of its older, faded appearance, the housing was much cheaper there than anywhere else in the capital, making it the unofficial Poor Quarter.
“The nightmares seem to get worse as he travels,” Caelan cut in.
Tyche grunted. “He’s trying to get to Haru.”
“Cael, work with Rayne. See if you can work out a specific location, whether it is by the name of a shop or a street. Text me what you learn. Tyche and I are going to cut through the city to pick up Adrian so we can take him to Haru.”
“Okay. Report back when you can.” Caelan ended the call, and Shey shoved the phone into his pocket. He reached for Tyche to pull him along, but the God of Luck stepped away, frowning.
“What?” Shey almost choked on the question. There was something in his expression that chilled Shey to the bone. The god was about to say something he didn’t want to hear.
“You locate Adrian. Bring him to Haru. I’m going to find Haru first.”
“What? No! That’s insane. You have no idea what kind of state you’re going to find him in.
He could kill you.” He wasn’t listening to this.
Gritting his teeth together, Shey reached for Tyche’s arm, prepared to pull him to the motor pool.
They could find a fast way across town together and search for Adrian.
But his hand never touched Tyche. He missed him somehow.
“Shey.” Infinite patience and compassion wrapped around his name. The gentleness of Tyche’s tone almost broke him.
“No,” he repeated, forcing the word out past the growing lump in his throat. “You can’t…”
Adrian was wounded and possibly being pursued by whoever had grabbed him. Haru was lost in a world of nightmares of pain. If something happened to Tyche next…