32 What doesn’t kill you…
Look.
Fi had seen some weird shit: reincarnated daeyari shaped like panthers with horse skulls, the depths of the Void between realities, bird immortals claiming to be gods.
Relatively speaking, this ceremony was far from the strangest thing she’d experienced.
Still, it felt within her purview to project modest bewilderment as Avroz recited his lines like a dutiful sermon.
As the daeyari knelt to drink the aedari’s blood.
Humans had their odd habits, but immortals took it to another level.
“Who landed the killing blow?” Avroz asked.
Fi sat up straight, when both Antal and Ixli looked to her.
First reaction? Bafflement, obviously. She was still adjusting, overall, to the sheer quantity of daeyari looking at her at any given time. Adjusting, also, to a not insignificant number of burns stinging her arms, too close of quarters with that aedari’s wings.
And she’d been the one to kill him.
Heat built in her chest, a slow-growing mote of—she did do that, didn’t she?
Avroz’s slow look was the most delicious feast, the most covetous prize she’d never asked for. Disbelief seethed off him like clumping mildew.
“Fionamara landed the killing blow,” Antal said.
Avroz cast his son a chiding glance. Did he think they were lying?
“Fi fought by my side,” Ixli seconded. “She cleaved the aedari’s head off.”
Fi should probably be standing for this.
She pushed to her feet, masking a wince at a few strained joints, but who cared about such mortal frivolities when she had Avroz’s entire string of emotions to devour?
First came confusion—always delectable on immortal features.
Then suspicion—insulting, but whatever. Then anger—which only fueled her.
The resignation caught her off guard.
Never in a thousand years did Fi expect Avroz to fill his palm one final time with gilded blood. To hold it out to her.
There was gravity to the gesture. Some binding ritual that superseded even the depth of his loathing. Her gut reaction to the offer was a visceral Void no, she wasn’t keen on drinking the blood of an immortal creature. Refusal would diminish her victory. Fi chewed her lip at the dilemma.
Pride won. Fi didn’t hesitate as she walked to him—that would be losing—but she stayed alert. She hadn’t ventured this close to Avroz since he’d ripped her stomach open. Since he’d had his claws in her scalp before that. Violence, every time she strayed within claws’ reach.
As Antal had done, she knelt. That didn’t feel great, either.
Fi contemplated the aedari blood glowing gold in Avroz’s palm.
“Is this… going to kill me?” she asked.
The stark silence from every daeyari wasn’t what she’d call comforting. Of course they didn’t know. How often did humans kill aedari?
“If you do not wish it, vavraesa…” Avroz said.
Fi scowled and grabbed his hand with spiteful gusto. She downed the blood in one gulp.
Then gagged.
It wasn’t awful. Just unexpected. Hardly even a liquid. The thickness of it coated her mouth, then her throat the whole way down, hot like embers. Smooth as syrup. Alarmingly sweet, like the spiciest honey she’d ever tasted.
The buzz followed, and Fi understood why Antal and Ixli were swaying. Like downing a shot, a swell of lightheadedness tilted her backward—quirked a victorious grin on her mouth.
Avroz spread his arms.
“To the new Sunsplitters,” he announced.
“To the new Sunsplitters!” Syvr seconded with more enthusiasm. Formalities over, they threw their arms over Antal and Ixli. “Now, did someone mention a celebration?”
The aedari’s body was important for the celebration, Fi was told. And again—weird. But she went along with it. Three warriors slung the corpse of an immortal across their shoulders, Fi between Antal and Ixli.
The journey to the Twilit Plane passed as a blur of Curtains. Fi paid more attention, but the route was dizzying, most of it hidden between teleports. No wonder the aedari had never found it. If they could only teleport line of sight, they’d never be able to follow a daeyari here.
The journey ended at Antal’s old home. Straight into the sitting room this time, those black tile floors and ambient lights, half-moon windows looking out upon the dusk-lit garden. This time, Fi felt less small in the space.
They dropped the body to the floor.
The vavriter steward, Geslam, appeared first, pausing at the threshold to the kitchen, wide red eyes settling on the arrivals. Then on their prey, collected like the trophy.
Avroz stepped forward. “Geslam, send a message to the Dusk Council. Tell them one aedari has been felled. A second remains. We’ll have its trail again soon.”
The vavriter nodded and slipped off into the study.
Next came a patter of claws on tile.
Yme lurched through the door to the patio, alert as a wildcat scenting blood. She gasped at the sight of a dead aedari upon her foyer. Wide crimson eyes snapped onto her guests.
Avroz greeted his wife with a soft hand to her arm, a purred “ezria” as he nuzzled his nose to her cheek. It was the most tender Fi had seen him with any creature. She supposed it made sense. They must have been tender at some point, to make Antal.
Yme shrugged Avroz off, reaching for her son.
“Antal!” She hugged him fiercely, fingers knotting the back of his shirt. “You’re here. You did it. You’re not hurt?” She pulled back, concerned eyes looking him up and down.
“I’m fine, azaevi.” Antal tapped his nose to her cheek.
Yme seemed loath to release him. She consented at last, tail high and a beaming smile shifting to Ixli.
“Congratulations on your hunt, kezri. And thank you. For keeping Antal safe.”
“My honor, as always.” Ixli touched a claw to her highest antler tip. Then, a sly glance sideways. “Fi fought just as hard. At Antal’s side more than I was.”
“And,” Syvr added, peeking over Fi’s shoulder like a mischievous sprite, “she’s the one who killed it. Veshri’s sharpened teeth, how wild is that?”
Yme’s stunned silence was, unfortunately, the answer Fi expected.
Antal grabbed Fi by the waist, drawing a startled yelp as he spun her feet off the ground.
“Fierce as any creature with fangs,” he praised, pressing a kiss to her temple.
Yme stared with eyes wide. Not at Fi.
At Antal: smiling broad enough to bare his teeth.
They took the aedari’s body to the kitchen, strung it upside down like an elk. One of the grislier sights Fi had witnessed. She watched with morbid fascination as the daeyari drained the blood, collecting every golden drop. Precious, apparently.
They settled on the patio, a splay of midnight blue sitting cushions.
Moonlight slipped through the glass dome in the cavern overhead.
A sweet of flowers and tilled soil wafted from the garden.
Fi was handed a small glass of aedari blood.
Antal and Ixli took their own glasses, joined by Syvr this time, celebration rather than ritual. They toasted.
Well, it hadn’t killed her the first time, right?
Fi tipped the glass back. It was just as thick, just as sweet, though easier down her throat on the second try. The shot left a buzz in her head, heat down her spine. She laughed with the daeyari, enjoying the sensation.
A flicker caught her eye.
Inside the house, Avroz lurked near the doorway. Fi glimpsed gold, him handing a glass to Yme, her cradling it in her claws. Avroz stepped closer, nipping affectionately at her cheek. A private moment. Fi was about to look away.
But Yme pulled away again. The gesture was quicker this time, colder, making Avroz scowl. Curiosity gnawed at Fi like wood rot.
She pushed it from her mind. She didn’t want to ruin this, didn’t want to see Antal’s smile fall. For tonight, maybe not everything had to be fixed. This could be good enough.
Yme joined them, settling on a cushion. Avroz followed, selecting a seat distant from his wife. Fi forced herself not to dissect that, either.
“If we’re done with formalities,” Syvr drawled, a blissful reprieve from her unease, empty glass dangling from their claws as they leaned back against the cushions. “You’re going to indulge us the story of how you plucked that bird, aren’t you? Every delicious detail?”
“Fi was on the road,” Ixli said, pinning Fi beneath a squint. “The aedari took her. How in the endless black Void did you get it to bring you back?”
Fi laughed. “Oh, that? Easy.”
She fell back against Antal. He caught her—points to him for the speedy reaction, only a brief fumble. Claws clamped her waist as Fi swooned a dramatic arm across her forehead.
“Oh, woe is me, a poor human at the mercy of those wretched daeyari. Surely, I only helped them because I feared they’d eat me. Surely, I’m so eager to escape their clutches. I’ll show you how to reach the Twilit Plane, if you just take me back to where you found me.”
Antal’s grip on her tightened. A glint caught his eyes, not the timid creature he usually was in this place, around his family. Fi delighted to see the beast she’d so often sparred with. The one she’d honed her claws on.
The one who’d stolen her heart.
His grin came wicked. He held a hand above her belly, black claws curled.
“And why wouldn’t you be terrified?” he growled. “A soft little hare, so easy to devour?”
Fi swooned harder, cheek pressed to his chest. “Mercy, cruel beast. My savior aedari have promised to rescue me from your foul fangs.”
He laughed, breaking the act to press his forehead to hers. Fi savored the moment. Clung to it. A feeling like threads finally mending.
Next in the story came the combat. Fi ceded the floor to Ixli, who tackled the details of their ambush with militant efficiency.
And startling modesty. Words alone couldn’t capture how Ixli had fought like a storm, an unrelenting typhoon of flashing spear, striking and parrying as if she were made of wind.
Fi’s tipsy revelation of the night: she understood why Antal had fucked Ixli. If Fi were single, she’d be tempted herself.
Now, as Fi was no longer on the market for fucking, she’d settle for making this daeyari a friend. Another alliance that would only be a problem for Antal. All positives, really.
Ixli was generous, too. She included Fi in the battle, her scheme to plant the transport stone. How they’d worked together to bring the aedari down.
Avroz reclined on a pillow, expression unreadable, tracing a claw around the rim of his glass. Let him pout like a damp cat. Tonight, Fi was untouchable.
When Ixli finished, they all filled glasses and toasted again. Fi drank again.
Each shot brought her a pleasant buzz, the edge of tipsy but nothing more.
It was becoming clear, however, the daeyari were more affected.
Ixli and Syvr leaned back on their cushions, tails languid, grinning like children.
Antal’s eyes softened, his weight heavy against Fi’s side, laughing too hard when Ixli teased him about finally fighting with daggers.
Fi was having a marvelous time.
Especially when the conversation turned to… talking. No more aedari. No peril. Ixli regaled them with a story of tracking a derived daeyari across a Plane of purple sand. Syvr teased a tale of Antal’s teething phase, Antal groaning and threatening to push them into the Void.
“A long five years,” Yme observed mildly, taking her drink in small sips. “We lost so much furniture.”
Antal groaned louder.
Someone filled Fi’s glass again. She drank carelessly as she laughed, dribbling gold down her chin. She lifted a hand to wipe it.
Antal caught her wrist. Her heart fluttered as he leaned close— thundered at the brush of his tongue, long and rough across her chin, her lips, licking her clean. His eyes hung lidded, glassy from drink, but focused on her. Fi knew that look. That desire.
He leaned closer. A soft nip to her chin sent a jolt through her, stunned at his boldness. Fi had never been one for public exhibition. This was a subtler thing, a silent question between them as the others talked.
She preened a little, to have him claim her so brazenly.
Her reply came equally discreet, a tiny bite to his jaw. Antal growled so low, she felt it more than heard it.
“So, which one of you is the top?”
Syvr sprawled on their back, head propped on one arm to lift their antlers, inspecting Fi and Antal with an upside-down smirk.
Ixli’s tail swatted them. Her grin stayed playful. “Syvr, don’t be crass.”
“What? It’s not obvious, right? Surprisingly.”
Antal opened his mouth to speak.
“It depends on what I feel like,” Fi answered for him, donning an imperious air.
Antal growled at her, baring his fangs.
“Oh hush, daeyari.” She pressed a commanding finger to his mouth. Like a good beast, he quieted to a scowl.
Syvr cackled.
“Good woman,” they said. “Look, this human fights like a daeyari. In every sense.”
Avroz huffed, glaring at the cavern ceiling—not his son.
“Oh, let it rest, Avroz,” Syvr practically whined. “He’s two and a half centuries old. What do you care where he puts his tongue?”
Avroz wouldn’t care, Fi assumed, if she were a daeyari. When he met her gaze, there was no fluster, just that calculated cold. Will you be more useful to me than the last one? Today, she’d helped Antal slay an aedari.
Avroz kept his mouth shut.
Antal stood and offered a hand. When Fi took it, he pulled her to her feet with too much gusto, swaying them off balance. She caught herself against his chest, laughing.
“If you’ll excuse us,” Antal bid the others.
He touched an antler tip to his mother. She sat silent, not derisive, a quiet curiosity in the tilt of her head.
Next, a nod to his father. Avroz was granite, distaste etched into a subtle frown.
“You’ll report to the Dusk Council early tomorrow,” he said. “Be ready.”
Fi marked it as a victory.
She gasped when Antal scooped her into his arms. He staggered. Caught himself. Fi chuckled, wrapping her hands around his neck as he carried her into the house. Before they’d left the patio, he was kissing her, heedless of Syvr’s jeers behind them.
Her daeyari.
That was the victory she cared for more than anything else.