55. Chapter 55
CHAPTER 55
Cassiel
T wilight had fallen. From his perch in a tree, Cassiel overlooked the camp. His Valkyrie were also on watch within the trees. The majority had stayed behind in Sellav to keep an eye on Nazar.
He would deal with Lord Gadriel and his sons at a later time. The only thing to have his attention was pretending he didn’t exist. Not that Cassiel could blame her. But when she ignored him it felt like dying.
Dyna sat by the stream with Raiden, smiling about something. The sight made his stomach churn. She had been the first one to smile at him in both lifetimes.
“I intend to court Lady Dynalya.”
The words had hit him like a hurricane. It took all of Cassiel’s will to keep his composure instead enacting all of the hundreds of ways he imagined killing the damn elf for even uttering the words.
Lucenna walked past his tree and quickly spotted him. Noticing what he was looking at, she grinned wickedly and mouthed, “Suffer.”
Cassiel ignored her.
He had faced impossible battles, rendered an entire Realm to ash, faced his enemies head on, and now commanded an entire legion of warriors, yet he hesitated to take that first step toward his mate.
“Dyna!”
The desperate shout for her name in the woods startled Cassiel out of his thoughts. Von came stumbling out of the bushes beneath him, holding his bleeding arm. Cassiel leaped to his feet and Dyna was already running toward them.
“He’s turned!” Von shouted. “Everyone, flee now!”
Before Cassiel could react, the Other tore through the camp, roaring. The clouds parted and Cassiel recoiled at the sight of the full moon. Silvery light filled the camp full of people like a waiting feast. Among them was family. It was Zev’s greatest fear realized. If he killed someone he loved it would destroy him.
The Guards immediately armed themselves and loaded their bows and Eldred’s staff flared with magic.
“No, stay back!” Dyna shouted, then to Raiden she said, “Take your mother away from here!”
Raiden hauled Lady Aerina onto a horse and rode away. Klyde grabbed Lucenna and Tavin, and they ran with those who fled.
The Other went after Von first.
Cassiel dove and intercepted, tackling the Other. They crashed on the ground. The beast snarled and snapped its teeth for the commander.
Cassiel wrapped his arms around his neck, holding him back. “You probably hate Von as much as you hate me, but he’s not for dinner tonight.”
The Other snarled and bit his shoulder.
Cassiel gritted his teeth, hot blood gushing down his back. “I probably deserved that, but you won’t bite anyone else. Do you hear me, Zev?”
The beast tossed him aside and he crashed into a tree. The force broke Cassiel’s arm but pushed himself up as his wounds instantly healed. He waved off Sowmya and the other Valkyrie.
“Stay out of this,” he ordered.
He spotted Dyna on the floor, grunting in pain and gripping her shoulder in the same spot he had been bitten. She glared at him, and Cassiel winced apologetically. Whatever pain he suffered she would feel it though the bond.
The Other leaped for Von. He was snatched away in a blaze of green light and dragged to Dyna’s side. “Go, now,” she told him.
Von scrambled to his feet and backed away. “Dyna, he mentioned not having his chains.”
She exchanged a startled look with him. “All right. Go.”
That left her in the Other’s sights.
“Eyes on me,” Cassiel shouted, hitting it with a small fireball. Enough to singe its fur.
Furious, the Other snarled viciously and stalked toward him.
“We have no chains to contain you this time,” Cassiel said as he kept it in his sights. “I know you don’t want any more innocent blood on your hands, Zev, so you can have mine.”
The Other charged at him. Cassiel flew out of the way and moved back, leading him away from the camp. The Other lunged and slashed at his chest. Claws tore through his flesh, and he stumbled back as hot blood seeped through his torn clothing. Dyna hissed in pain behind him.
He braced his legs, his heart racing as the massive creature prowled toward him. His bright yellow eyes glowed in the rage. No recognition in them. Only hunger. And pain.
“I know you’re angry with me,” Cassiel said the Other circled him. “I wasn’t there when I promised to be, but I am here now. I am right here, brother.” He filled his hands with fire. “So come on, then. Let’s finish our fight.”
The Other feigned a lunge. Cassiel mis stepped and those teeth caught his arm, and whipped his wings, hitting the Other hard enough to throw it across the clearing.
“Use your compulsion,” Dyna said, coming up beside him as it rolled its feet.
Cassiel dithered. “I thought you said…”
“We can argue about the morality of it tomorrow.” A flare of vivid green light filled her hands. The force of her power pressed against him like the heat from a forge. Dyna had been a candlelight he tried to shield against his chest, but unknowingly, that flame had grown to an incandescent flame befitting a queen.
He smiled at the confident power shining in her eyes, and the possibility that they would speak again. “What’s your plan?”
“Keep him still for me.”
Wind whipped Dyna’s hair as she strode toward the Other. It charged for her with a bellowing roar. Calling on his compulsion, Cassiel’s wove the steel threads of his power through the Other’s mind and body. The creature came to a half a foot away from her, frozen in place. It growled and twitched, lips bearing angrily over its sharp teeth.
Lifting her glowing palm, Dyna gently laid it on his forehead. “Sleep, Zev.” Its glowing eyes rolled closed and the Other fell unconscious. “No more chains for you.”
The containment dome glowed a soft gold over the sleeping creature inside.
Lady Aerina had retreated into her tent with her son, while the Ranger Regiment stood on watch. Their steady stares were locked on the enchanted dome. The dome’s light shone over Zev’s black fur. He had the shape of a man, though clawed hands, and feet with the face of a wolf. Cassiel sat with him, keeping guard.
The camp was quiet save for the soft crackle of burning firewood from the braziers placed throughout the perimeter, and the croak of toads from the nearby stream. Lucenna and Keena had already gone to bed. Only Klyde remained awake as he and Tavin ate at their own campfire by their tent.
Cassiel glanced over at where Dyna kneeled beside Von, her hands glowing with magic as she healed the gash in his shoulder. The commander watched in awe as his skin slowly reformed itself, going through the stages of healing until fresh pink scars formed.
“It will be sore for a few days, but you will recover the full use of your arm,” Dyna said as she finished.
Von smiled at her tiredly and he slipped on his jacket. “Thank you.”
“Go on and rest.”
Nodding, Von got to his feet and strode away for a tent on the edge of camp.
Dyna then took a seat by the dome. Not exactly beside him, but close enough that it stirred the frail bond in Cassiel’s chest. Her emerald eyes stayed fixed on her cousin, clearly ignoring his presence. He had found himself in her eyes once, which made it all the more unbearable that she wouldn’t look at him now.
“I didn’t expect to see Von here.” Cassiel commented tentatively. “Last I knew, he served Tarn.”
“He serves me now. And I will hear no word against it. From anyone.”
The sharp response silenced him on the matter, and he left it at that. He was in no position to argue otherwise. But nothing good could come of having that man here.
A breeze rustled the trees, blowing in the fresh scent of spring, but tension hovered over them like a weighted blanket. Cassiel tried to start another conversation, but no words would come. It was as though he had forgotten how to speak to her, or he had simply lost that right as well.
He returned to watching Zev and counted each breath. The scars had returned. They were visible through his fur, red and horrid at his wrists. Only three months and they were so many burns. It doubled the weight over his shoulders.
I’m sorry…
He owed many apologies, but they were always difficult to say.
“You called him brother,” Dyna murmured.
The unexpected statement made his pulse quicken. She was speaking to him. On her own. Unprompted.
Taking a breath, Cassiel rubbed the back of his neck, ignoring his blush. He hadn’t known she’d heard him. “We have faced a lot together since we began this journey. I care more for Zev than those I share blood with.”
Though, whatever kinship they once had was likely gone now. He was good at that. Ruining relationships.
“Including Lord Jophiel?” Dyna asked.
The question made something in his chest tighten.
Sighing, Cassiel rested an arm on his propped-up knee. He couldn’t answer her yet. He still hadn’t fully processed the possibility if his uncle had told the truth about the bangles. Perhaps he was afraid to find out that he was wrong and the immense guilt it would leave him with. But he was also afraid to be right.
When Cassiel had confronted his uncle, he had been too angry and wracked with several other emotions to even hear what Lord Jophiel had to say. So sickened by all the deception, it was easier to believe his uncle had stuck another knife in his back, too.
“I don’t know…” Cassiel replied faintly.
Another beat passed before Dyna asked, “Would you like to speak to him?”
He would need to muster up his wits for that first. “I will when all of this is over…”
“I meant to say, would you like to speak to him now?”
Cassiel blinked at her, confused by her meaning.
Dyna reached into her leather satchel and pulled out a scalloped silver plate that glinted with an iridescent pearl finish. Lord Jophiel’s water mirror. “I found it … after.”
After he left.
So, this was how she had confirmed his uncle’s release. The mirror must have been left behind unnoticed somehow. Though Cassiel was sure he had checked the rooms when he had erased all traces of himself. Clearly, he failed.
He had to turn his head away so she wouldn’t see the look on his face. Tentatively, Cassiel asked. “Have you … spoken with him?”
“Yes.”
It took a few minutes to get ahold of himself to speak. “How was he?”
After a pause she said, “Do you want the truth?”
There was something in her voice that made Cassiel look at her.
Dyna remained watching her cousin, but the expression on her face made his stomach drop. “He looked thin. Weary. He is resting in Hilos with Asiel there to care for him.”
Cassiel lowered his gaze to the ground. A lump formed in his throat, drying the words in on his tongue. I am despicable, aren’t I?
It was a raw question he couldn’t bring himself to ask aloud. Even if Dyna had heard him, she would have told him the truth.
He was a sorry excuse for a person.
Dyna plucked a blade of grass and rolled it between her fingers. “Despite what he endured; Lord Jophiel does not hold you at fault. His first words to me were, ‘Is he well?’”
Cassiel feebly laughed and pressed on his burning eyelids. That sounded exactly like his uncle. He never felt more worthless and undeserving than in that moment.
It reminded him of the day he had arrived in Hermon.
The mountains were capped in snow, so enormous, he had felt so small and insignificant as a child. He stood in the courtyard coated in ice as he took in the soaring castle before him. The frosty wind whipped painfully against his tender wings.
“Why did my father leave me here?” Cassiel asked. The wind stole the faint words from the air and his vision blurred. He didn’t understand anything, except that he had been abandoned again. “Why?”
Lord Jophiel crouched down so that they were at eye level and draped a blanket over his shoulders. “I would like you to live with me, Cassiel.”
“Why?”
Smiling, Lord Jophiel wiped away the tears that spilled down his cold cheeks. It had been the first genuine smile he received since his mother left. “We all need someone on our side. Elyōn as my witness, I vow to always be on yours.”
Somehow, he had forgotten about that.
Cassiel knew then, how wrong he had been.
About many things.
“Thank you…” he murmured. “For pulling my head out of my arse. And for knocking me onto it, too.”
Dyna’s gaze at last met his. He stilled beneath the stare of those green eyes, flickering with light of her magic. After three long months, he was able to inhale his first full breath beneath her gaze. Even if she had not forgiven him yet, the fact that she was finally looking at him, was enough.
Dyna scoffed softly. “Someone had to.”
Cassiel smiled, he couldn’t help himself, and that earned her glare. This may be the only leniency she allowed him tonight, but he would take that morsel, for she had no idea how much he starved for them.
Clearing his throat, he nodded at the scalloped plate. “I take it the water mirror has come of some use?”
“I don’t intend to relinquish it,” she replied tersely. “It’s mine.”
“It is,” he agreed. “The Element Mirrors belong to whomever finds them. They tend to be special in that way. Lord Jophiel found the water mirror several centuries ago, and now it has found its way to you.” Cassiel frowned at it. “But you must be careful. While you can communicate with others through it and spy on them as well, so can others.”
Dyna slipped it back into her satchel. “Your warning is unnecessary. I have been careful.”
“As careful as you were when to speaking to Tarn?” Cassiel wasn’t sure why he said that. He hadn’t even been thinking of the man, but it slipped out and he couldn’t pretend otherwise.
A tense silence hovered between them as they studied each other.
Dyna’s eyes narrowed. “You had Sowmya follow me.”
“Her purpose was to only keep watch over you and to notify me if you were under threat again,” Cassiel said, straightening his shoulders. “However, she overheard and saw many things while shadowing you, Dyna. Such as your deal with the Druid.”