Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Torin
“They should be back by now,” I growled to an empty room. Empty, except for a still unconscious Ellowyn lying in my bed. While a bit of the beast inside me settled at seeing her here in my space—in my bed—a larger part prickled with justified rage.
At the gods.
At my commanders for ignoring my orders before the Battle of Vespera.
At the fact Ellowyn was still fucking asleep.
I paced just in front of my door, the gaudy red wallpaper and matching rugs only serving to exacerbate my pounding headache.
With a low, frustrated growl, I shoved my hands through my hair, causing the ends to stick up haphazardly. The leather soles of my boots slapped against stone as I stomped across the floor before my steps were muffled by the high-pile rug.
I’d abandoned my previous monastic space in the servants’ quarters in favor of the larger room Lord d’Leocopus offered when the rebellion first landed on Lishahl’s shores nearly a year previous.
His responding serpentine smile when I demanded the room upon our arrival today should have set me on edge, but my need for Ellowyn’s comfort and safety far eclipsed any reservations I had regarding the Lord of Lishahl.
If his demands were too ostentatious or if he grew too troublesome, I’d simply kill him.
Where I once feared retribution from an allied Lishahl and Vespera—a threat d’Leocopus made on numerous occasions to force my compliance—the death of the Warlord negated that possibility.
At some point, the new Lord of Vespera would come asking us for support, which we would eagerly give—it was always supposed to end with our factions united.
Until that day, or until the Lord of Lishahl’s usefulness ran dry, we were stuck in Imena.
“You’re going to wear a hole in that gods-awful carpet,” a feminine voice remarked dryly from behind me as I strode away from the wall and back toward the bed.
I quickly glanced at Ellowyn, assuring myself for the thousandth time that her chest rose and fell, before turning to face the Bondsmith on a deep sigh.
“Bondsmith,” I greeted drolly.
Her lips quirked at the corners before flattening again as she emerged from the shadows, a small tumbler of caramel-colored whiskey held loosely in her fingers.
“Drinking already?” I asked with a quirk of my eyebrow.
“Looks like you could use one, too.” She gestured lazily with her occupied hand.
I hesitated for a moment before cautiously approaching and grasping the glass.
When the Bondsmith made no move to remove the tumbler from my hand, I quickly pulled it free and shot it back in one swallow.
The alcohol burned my throat before fire exploded in my belly.
“Fuck,” I rasped, eyes watering. “I will never get used to that shit.”
“Still more of a vodka man, hmm?”
“You and I both know I am no man,” I scoffed before setting the glass on an offensively gold side table next to the arm of an equally ghastly blood-red sofa.
The Bondsmith gave me a true smile before sinking onto a cushion and curling her bare feet beneath her body. The movement was fluid and oddly catlike, reminding me both of her daughter and her daughter’s feline companion.
“I spoke to Faylinn,” I stated, eyes never leaving the half-goddess.
“Oh?” Her eyebrows rose a fraction of an inch as her head came to rest on her hand, curls falling around her propped arm. “I figured that would be the case, considering you are here and not dead.”
She laughed at my obvious look of surprise. “That’s the punishment for breaking a bargain with Fate.”
“Could have warned me beforehand,” I muttered as I flopped onto the couch opposite her.
“And where would the fun be in that?”
I grunted, much to the amusement of Faylinn’s mother.
“Are you all this insane?”
“You tell me, godling. You’ve had more contact with my siblings, father, and offspring than I have in the last three centuries combined,” the Bondsmith admitted dryly.
The answer to that question, then, was undoubtedly yes.
“And before you ask, yes, you are also a touch less than sane,” she said with a nod toward Ellowyn. “Does she know?”
I shook my head once and averted my eyes from her disapproving stare.
“You had months to tell her, godling. Months. Now she is going to wake here, weak and afraid, and have to come to terms with who and what she is without the support system she established in Vespera.”
“There was no support system,” I muttered petulantly, but winced when I thought of who she’d unwittingly left behind. Faylinn, most obviously, but also her task force—Leal, Talamh, and Tine. Though the latter was dead.
The Bondsmith hummed softly, judgement etched in every line.
“Did my daughter figure it out?”
My lips twitched slightly at the fact that even a goddess couldn’t help but ask about her child when the opportunity presented.
“Yes.”
“She’s a smart woman.”
“She’s the Rune Master to the deceased King of Elyria, the Bondsmith’s daughter, and Fate’s granddaughter. Yes, I’d think it’s safe to assume that she’s smart,” I deadpanned as the Bondsmith rolled her eyes.
“What are you doing here, anyway? Shouldn’t you be watching over Itanya, especially with Peytor and Folami still gone?”
The Bondsmith huffed as she pulled at the sleeves of her tunic, exposing a spattering of runes that rivaled the number of Faylinn’s. Some were newer than others, and I recognized one that was also etched on Itanya’s skin.
“I’ve warded her room—all exit and entry points as well as the walls themselves.
In the unlikely event someone knew how to break my runes, then she’s sleeping in a rune circle.
If they break through that, then I’ve etched a Protection Rune on her skin as well as twin runes on her and me that will alert me if she leaves the room.
She’s safe. Do you really think I’d fuck around with that child’s life, Torin? ”
I opened my mouth to say something about Faylinn, but bit my tongue when her eyes flashed.
“Don’t you dare bring my daughter into this as an example, Torin d’Eshu. You will not like the repercussions,” she hissed, eyes flashing with something dangerous and otherworldly.
I quickly nodded in acquiescence.
“Not to mention our rooms are connected by a hidden passageway. I’m your neighbor,” the Bondsmith said, all earlier notes of danger bleeding from her tone completely.
Unhinged bat.
My feelings about my new ‘neighbor’ must have been written across my face because she cackled loudly before sobering once more.
“Tell me of the battle,” she said, eyes unnervingly boring into mine.
“What of it?” I asked.
“Everything.”
I sighed and cracked my neck.
“What, you have something better to be doing?” the Bondsmith asked, annoyance lacing her question.
My eyes unintentionally flicked back to Ellowyn at her words.
“She will be gone from us for some time more. She’ll return when she’s ready.”
I combed my hand through my hair once more before settling back against the couch to recount the Battle of Vespera.
What felt like hours later, my voice was hoarse and my emotions fried from reliving every moment where I thought Ellowyn would be ripped from this world to a place I couldn’t follow.
The Bondsmith was an attentive listener, asking questions where she needed clarification and grumbling in outrage at the appropriate parts. Once I reached the end of my tale, however, she was silent, seemingly lost in thought.
“Say that last part again,” she asked, pushing herself off the couch to pace as I had earlier.
“Where Ellowyn collapsed?”
She waved her hand at me. “No, that part I understand. She overused her magic, created something so powerful in emotion and desperation that Meru pulled her home.”
She’s in the Dreamscape.
“Which part, then?”
“Kaos saved Ellowyn.” It was a statement rather than a question, but I answered anyway.
“Yes. Before Solace’s magic could reach her, he grabbed her from behind and portaled to a different part of the battlefield.”
“Why the ever-loving fuck would he do that?” she pondered, shaking her head in exasperation. “It doesn’t make sense.”
I shrugged, not really caring why an immortal god decided to intervene on Ellowyn’s behalf.
Ultimately, his newly developed savior complex meant little; he would die just the same as his despotic sister.
The gods had to be eliminated to ensure Ellowyn’s safety.
I would not sacrifice her for anything, Fate and Elyria be damned.
Silence stretched between us for moments before the Bondsmith sank back onto the couch, brows still drawn in concentration.
“What happened in Lishahl while I was away?” I changed the subject, desperate for information from the Bondsmith while I had her as a captive audience.
“You need to be wary of Razia, Torin,” she stated, surprising me with her opening statement.
I waved off her concern. “He’s harmless, Bondsmith.
Came easily to heel last time he stepped out of line and will again if needed.
He’s replaceable, at the end of the day, and I no longer fear the repercussions from Lord d’Leocopus.
With the death of Lord d’Refan, there is nothing he can hold over my head or that of my generals any longer. ”
The Bondsmith’s mouth flattened into an unimpressed stare. “Careful, Prince Who Was Promised, your hubris will be the death of you. Sometimes it’s what you least expect that topples the king.”
Those ominous words, uttered so purposefully and laced with a chord of danger, should have iced the blood in my veins. But the door to my suite swung open, distracting me completely from our conversation.
I jumped to my feet, calling forth my Fire Magic so it pooled aggressively in my hands, the heat licking at my arms, up to my neck.
“Sir!” A guard burst into the room, chest heaving with exertion. “They’ve returned. General d’Aelius and General Folami are back. They have two Academy soldiers with them.”
Just as quickly as I pulled my magic to the surface, I banished it back beneath my skin.
“Who?” I asked, readying myself to go to them.
“Lex d’Talionis and his Vessel, sir.”
Lex? Lex and Ilyas were here?
My eyes flicked to Ellowyn again as I cracked my neck, torn between staying with my beloved and going to fulfill my duties as the leader of the rebellion.
“Go,” the Bondsmith said firmly. “I will watch over her.”
I nodded my thanks before following the guard from my rooms.
“Heed my warning, godling,” she called, and I paused, fingers flexing against the doorknob. “There are much more dangerous beings in Elyria than the Warlord. His actions? They look like child’s play in comparison to the potential the others hold.”
With that, I swept from the room, my mind pulled into a thousand directions, no clear answers in sight.