Chapter 29
KALLIE
Fire erupted behind Kallie and cast an eerie light on the figure before her.
The flames twirled across the iron helmet, painting swirls of gold and scarlet shades over the metal.
Smoke billowed from the bull’s nose. Domitius tightened his grip on the reins, his leather glove stretching over his knuckles.
The massive black stallion beneath him smacked its right hoof against the ground, sending up a plume of dust. Domitius kicked the side of his heel against the horse’s ribcage, and the horse bolted forward.
This time, though, Kallie was ready.
When Domitius reached down and snatched her by the arm, tossing her onto his lap, she twisted around, blade in hand. She raised her arm. But as she stared up at him, her hand trembled.
Domitius bellowed, the menacing laughter echoing beneath his full-face helmet. He snatched the dagger from her hand and struck—
Kallie’s eyes sprang open. Sweat coated her limbs, and her entire body trembled as she lay on the cold ground.
"Kal?" Graeson’s voice wrapped around her like a blanket, warm and comforting. She wanted to hug the sound and stay encased inside it. His hand rested on her ankle. "Are you all right?"
She rolled over and found him sitting by a pile of cold coals from a fire that had long since extinguished.
"Bad dream," she muttered, rubbing the sleep from her eyes as she propped herself onto her elbows. She should go back to sleep, and she most certainly should not get up and—
The thin blanket slipped off her. In her next breath, she was moving toward Graeson as if an invisible tether pulled her toward him. As she sat down, his gaze never left her, his brows knitting together and a protest frozen on his lips.
Kallie had thought the night terrors were in her past, but as she crept closer to coming face-to-face with Domitius, that was no longer the case. She would have preferred Terin infiltrating her dreams than returning to the nightmares that always seemed to chase her.
"For a while, the nightmares had stopped. But the closer we get…" Kallie’s words fell to the wind. Kallie glanced over at Ellie. The thin blanket was pulled over Ellie’s mouth, leaving only the upper half of her face exposed to the elements. She was still fast asleep.
"Is there anything I can do?" Graeson asked quietly, as if afraid to ask.
Her heart twisted from knowing her actions had made him fearful of offering his help.
"You should sleep," she whispered, knocking her knee into his. She didn’t know why she had done it. She didn’t even know why she had come over. Still, as seconds passed, his closeness seemed to dull some of the previous uneasiness that had been soaking her limbs.
"As should you," he said, returning the gesture.
Her lip twitched but stopped short of a full smile. "I’m serious, Gray."
"I promise I’ll go to sleep soon, all right?" he said. But she could see the lie resting between his pinched brows. "Go to sleep for a little longer. I’ll wake Ellie in an hour or two. "
"I’m already up. I might as well take watch."
Still, Graeson didn’t move. Instead, he returned his gaze to the dead fire. "Do you want to talk about it?"
She shook her head, knowing he was referring to the nightmare. "Not really."
Her attention dropped to her hand. The patch of skin where her ring had once sat was less pale after the days of travel, the tan-line fading. Yet its absence still felt strange. She pressed her palms against the dirt and looked up.
Graeson quickly looked away. He brushed his fingers through his hair, and Kallie tracked the movement.
She couldn’t help but marvel at the man sitting beside her.
The man who—despite Kallie constantly pushing him away and lying about her own feelings—stayed, who always came after her.
Who wanted to see her take ownership of her life.
"Perhaps, the next time you wake up from a nightmare," Graeson said, calling her attention back to their conversation, "try rewriting the ending."
"What do you mean?"
Graeson pointed to his head. "It helps rewire the brain. Your mother told me that once when I used to get them a lot."
"You suffered from night terrors?"
He shrugged as if the answer was inconsequential, but it did matter. A lot mattered, especially when it came to Graeson. His past, his present, his future. She wanted to know what haunted him.
"I suppose you don’t want to talk about it either, then?" Kallie asked, throwing his question back at him.
"It’s not that I don’t want to, but…" His silver eyes fell on her. There was a weight to them that had Kallie dropping her gaze and rolling her shoulders back.
"Does it work?" Kallie asked. "The rewriting or whatever?"
Graeson was silent for a moment as he stared out toward the shadows shifting in the forest when the leaves rustled in the wind. "Sometimes. But sometimes I don’t bother, wanting the reminder of what could happen instead."
"What do you mean?"
He hung his arms over his propped-up knees. "Sometimes, we need the darkness to appreciate the happy moments—the good moments. My nightmares remind me what I’m fighting for, what I’m trying to accomplish. They remind me to continue working to be better."
Unsure how to respond at first, Kallie was silent. What Graeson said made sense, but there was also something sad about it. Her nightmares only ever left her shaken and terrified. But maybe there was something to be said about conquering that fear, about using it to one’s advantage.
She scooted closer. "Here," she said, tossing the blanket that was wrapped around her over his farthest shoulder.
He caught the blanket and started unwrapping it. "You really don’t need to do that. You should—"
"Stop telling me what I should and shouldn’t do, Gray," she interrupted.
He frowned, regret coating his countenance immediately.
A small smile appeared on her face, and she nudged him with her shoulder. "Just take the blanket."
"If you insist." He slipped the blanket back over his shoulders.
When she felt the blanket tug, she scooted closer. Their thighs and shoulders were pressed against each other. Even through her clothes, she could feel how cold he was. She didn’t understand how he wasn’t shivering.
"Thank you," he said.
Kallie simply nodded.
Although she should have been putting space between Graeson and herself, in case the plan didn’t go accordingly when she met with Domitius, she found it harder and harder to do.
She enjoyed Graeson’s closeness. His proximity settled something inside her.
Maybe it was the result of the soul bond, yet that felt too simple—even though being soul bonds was anything but simple.
She wondered how their lives would have been different if Domitius had never taken her.
It was something she had thought about often since she had learned the truth about her past. Would Esmeray have told her that Lysanthia had a vision of them being soul bonds when she was a child?
Or would her mother have let Kallie find out on her own?
Would she have followed Graeson around like a lost puppy as a child?
Would she have been one of those teenagers who tried to shake off her feelings and appear aloof?
Or would they have already been happily married?
That life seemed so simple, so uncomplicated. Kallie couldn’t imagine it. Although she certainly tried as she dozed off.
At some point, her head fell against Graeson’s shoulder. Minutes or hours later, her eyes fluttered open. She tried to sit upright and move away, but her head was too heavy. The fog of sleep beckoned her to return, to fall back into its warm embrace.
"Go lay down," Graeson whispered as though he could feel her trying to fight the exhaustion.
Kallie mumbled a disagreement yet found herself moving. But for once, she wasn’t moving away from him. She drifted onto his lap, propping her arm beneath her head and resting it on his thigh.
Instead of persuading her to move, though, he pulled the blanket tightly around her.
Kallie turned flat on her back and nestled against him.
He draped his arm over her, its weight comforting.
When she opened her eyes, Graeson was looking off into the woods again, the same twisted expression drawing his brows together.
She wanted to console him and say it would be fine, but she couldn’t find it in her heart to promise something she couldn’t.
She was no seer. Instead, she said the one true thing she could.
"For what it’s worth, I’m glad you found us."
Graeson looked down at her with wide eyes, either surprised that she was still awake or that she had said those words at all.
But it was true; Kallie was glad. She found comfort in knowing he was with her.
Not because she needed his protection, but because he reminded her who she was, who she could be.
"I will always find you, Kalisandre." He gave her a small smile, but sadness swirled across the sea of silver. "You should know that by now."
He turned away, focusing his attention once more on the surrounding forest.
In that moment, Kallie wanted to take back what she had said to him the night she had left. She wanted to wipe the despair from his gaze. Yet she remained silent.
She took a slow breath and stared at the stars peeking through the leaves.
Since they had left Tetria, Kallie often wondered about Rian’s theory that ancient dragons created the stars by burning holes into the blanket separating the mortal and immortal realms. She wondered whether the story had any merit or if it was just another myth told to lull children to sleep.
In the grand scheme of things, she supposed it didn’t matter.
The dragons were extinct, and the gods barely showed themselves these days.
Still, Kallie couldn’t help but wonder if it could work in reverse.
If the legendary beasts could create holes to other worlds—if other worlds even existed.
Her eyes danced across the constellations, and she spotted Sabina’s constellation easily. Was there war and political strife in the immortal world?
Kallie wanted to believe that the gods were better than humans.
After all, that’s what the stories alluded to—that the gods were superior, higher beings who were stronger and wiser than mortals.
But if that was the case, then why did they come to the mortal world in the first place?
Were they so bored with their immortality that they needed to mess with the affairs of humans?
Graeson swiped his thumb across the blanket, calling her attention to him once more. She curled into him and closed her eyes, her thoughts spinning.
It would have been so much easier, Kallie thought, if the gods hadn’t come here at all. If they hadn’t, the powers Kallie and the others possessed would never have existed. Then maybe Domitius wouldn’t have taken her from her home and started a war.
Then again, she supposed Graeson wouldn’t have existed either, and she wasn’t so sure she wanted to live in a world without him.