Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
Auraelia
Shooting up from where she was kneeling on the bed, Auraelia sprinted to her closet and grabbed whatever garments she could get her hands on.
While she slipped into her leather trousers, she could hear Daemon scrambling around her chambers, trying to ready himself as well—all while Piper explained her vision.
There wasn’t much to go on, and the details seemed to change or become fuzzy with each retelling. What remained the same was the flames rising into the pastel sky of dawn. The screams of citizens as they tried to save whomever and whatever they could, and then there was Davina.
Her eyes near the color of obsidian as she wreaked havoc on the unsuspecting citizens of Lyndaria, their bodies crumbling beneath her magic.
As Auraelia stepped out of her closet—her second boot haphazardly laced and the ties on her corset hanging open—Piper rushed to her side.
“Good goddess, Rae. Fix that.” She gestured to the laces across Auraelia’s bust. “I’ll fix your boots. Daemon, grab her dagger from the table and her emerald necklace from the top drawer of her vanity.” She tacked on without losing her focus. “I swear you would fall apart without me.”
When Daemon returned with the requested items, Piper had just finished fixing Auraelia’s boots.
Kneeling at her feet, Daemon strapped the dagger around her thigh, the emerald blade warming as soon as it came into contact with her leg, even through the thick leather of the sheath.
A mixture of emotions swirled in his eyes as he stood, and as much as she wanted to, she didn’t have time to dissect them. However, when she looked down to see the emerald necklace he’d given her when she was in Kalmeera, she could have easily guessed what they were.
Swallowing audibly, Auraelia turned and swept her hair from her neck. The chain was cool against her skin, but everywhere Daemon’s fingers touched was scorching.
Focus, Auraelia.
When she turned around, Daemon’s eyes bounced from the pendant to her face. Before she could say anything, could explain why she’d kept one and not the other, Piper’s sharp intake of breath pulled her attention.
Snapping her gaze to her friend, she watched as Piper’s eyes stared vacantly into the void of her vision. When clarity came back to her hazel orbs, Auraelia rushed to her side and grasped her hands. “What is it?”
Piper’s eyes were still wide, terror coursing through them as her head rotated from side to side as if she couldn’t believe what she’d just seen.
Dropping her friend’s hands in favor of cupping her face, she demanded, “Show me.”
Heaving a heavy sigh, Piper nodded, and Auraelia could feel it the moment her friend dropped the barrier between them. Piper’s magic flowed freely through Auraelia’s veins, filling her mind with images of death and destruction.
As the wall between them rose once more, lightning crackled between Auraelia’s fingers, and she spun around, piercing Daemon with a hard stare. “We’re leaving. Now.”
Every nerve ending stood on end as her magic coursed through her body. Not even the cool caress from Daemon’s shadows as they swirled around them, transporting them to the outskirts of the city, could lessen the fire that filled her veins.
Their feet had barely touched the ground before the sound of screams pierced the air, and the smell of smoke filled her nostrils. The sound of men, women, and children overpowering the flames that crackled as the fires burned through the wisteria and gardens that covered Lyndaria.
Launching into a sprint, Auraelia threw everything she could into her magic, pulling the water from the clouds in the sky until they turned from fluffy and pink to heavy and gray.
Thunder rolled as she reached the city line, the sound of her citizens in peril piercing her ears and stabbing her heart.
Daemon was right on her heels as they wove their way to the harbor.
It was where Piper’s visions continuously placed Davina, and where Xander had ridden out to intercept their cousin while Piper alerted Auraelia.
But with the chaos cluttering the streets, it was hard to determine where she was going.
Pausing for a moment, Auraelia looked around to try and get her bearings.
Nothing was as it should have been. Roads were blocked by debris.
Most of her people were crying and screaming in the streets, while others attempted to control the chaos—issuing orders and directions to keep the flames from spreading.
Panic began to surge in her chest, working its way up her throat and stealing the air from her lungs.
One. Two. Three—
She only made it to three before the familiar feel of Daemon’s arms wrapping around her pushed her anxiety back down.
“Breathe, Auraelia,” he whispered in her ear. “Focus on where you need to be, and let my magic take you there.”
“Daemon, I don’t have time—”
He kept her back to his front but tightened his arms around her. “You have time to take a second and breathe. You’re not going to be any good to your people if you’re running around like a crazed person. They need you focused. Let me help you.”
Taking a deep breath, Auraelia closed her eyes and let her mind go to where she needed to be. She pictured the ships rocking gently in their ports, the waves lapping against their hulls and the docks.
When she opened her eyes again, Daemon’s shadows faded away to reveal not only the harbor but also her cousin's back.
“Davina!” Auraelia yelled as she pulled out of Daemon’s embrace, using the wind in her control to project her voice over the crackle and pop of the fire.
With all the grace of a feline, Davina turned. There was a menacing smile on her face as her head slowly tilted to the side. “Hello, cousin. Come to play?”
Auraelia stiffened, and thunder clapped in the sky, drowning out the sizzle and hiss of water droplets falling onto the flames as the clouds released their heavy burdens.
The sound made Davina jolt where she stood, but that shock was short-lived.
“I’ve come to send you back where you belong,” Auraelia shouted.
Bands of lightning wrapped around her extremities, cocooning her in incandescent light, while wind swirled around her in a protective barrier.
It wasn’t until Daemon’s shadows joined the mix that Davina seemed to even notice his presence.
Tsking as she shook her head from side to side, her gaze narrowed in on where he stood behind Auraelia. “Daemon, Daemon, Daemon. Did you really think that you could come here and I wouldn’t know? That even here in Lyndaria, I wouldn’t have little birds relaying your every move?”
Auraelia felt—more than saw—him step up to her side.
His body was poised for battle as his magic spilled from his fingers, pooling into swirls of shadows at their feet.
She could sense the rigidity in his muscles as if they were her own, as if they had become so attuned to each other that they had become one.
The deep tenor of Daemon’s voice cut through the chaos around them as he answered Davina. “I am not yours to keep tabs on.”
“Our engagement would say otherwise, my love.”
Auraelia knew that she called him that to get under her skin. Knew that Davina was doing it to see how she would react. Despite the rational side of her mind telling her not to, she couldn’t help the possessive rage that overpowered her rational thought.
The cresting glow of morning faded away as light, brighter than the sun itself, filled her vision.
She could feel the static crackling in the air, the way her hair floated around her like she was suspended in water, as her magic spilled out of her.
And as she spoke, the words more of a growl than anything else, the ground began to rumble beneath her feet.
“Get the fuck out of my court.”
The heat from her lightning was a warm embrace as it flared and coalesced in her hands, glowing like the evening star as it swirled into an orb of fiery light. But as she took aim at Davina, her cousin’s feline smile shifted into something much more sinister.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, dear cousin,” Davina chided. “You see, if you did, poor Xander here wouldn’t live to see tomorrow.”
Auraelia’s blood ran cold as Davina stepped to the side.
There, on his hands and knees, with blood gushing from his nose, mouth, and ears, was Xander. How she’d gotten past his shield, she didn’t know. But seeing her brother crumpled on the ground sent flashes of her mother’s death to the forefront of her mind.
“You’ll find, cousin, that I have many talents.
Ones that not even your dear Prince Daemon has knowledge of.
Did you really think that you could beat me?
” Davina began slowly walking toward Auraelia as she spoke.
“That you could sneak around trying to get information about me without my knowledge? Seems I gave you more credit than you were due.”
Auraelia’s thoughts began to race. She needed to get Xander out of there. Needed to get him to Ser Aeron so that he could be healed. But how?
With Davina steadily approaching, there was no way for her to communicate with Daemon. No way to ask him to save her brother, or beg him to leave her there and save the last remaining member of her family.
A familiar cool caress slithered along her spine as if he had heard her thoughts. A simple acknowledgment that he knew what she needed without her having to say a single word.
When Davina was far enough away from Xander, Auraelia sucked in as much air as she could into her lungs, and as she exhaled, she whispered, “Now.”
Before she could even blink, Daemon was gone, his shadows devouring his form only to release him next to her brother.
Then, within the next second, they had both vanished.
She wasn’t sure how far Daemon could shadow-walk or how far away Xander needed to be before the effects of Davina’s magic subsided, but at that moment, all she cared about was that they were both away from the bitch standing before her.