Chapter Six
RONAN
I’d never been on a boat before. I glanced around, fascinated by the intricate wood carving in the railings, the dozens of sails, and the knots tied in seemingly chaotic ways.
Of course, that was nothing to the bombshell just dropped by the vampyre. The implications were startling.
“Do you think Anar’s note could have been from this Veskor?” I asked Nerissa, my mind already spinning with possibilities as it tried to connect every imaginable scenario.
Benedict grumbled. “Maybe.”
No doubt he had badly wanted Thad to be the villain in this story. He always did. He would have loved an excuse to fly out beyond Aldur’s wall and rip the black draken a new asshole, and happily take Xana back to Lyoness.
I snorted.
If she didn’t eviscerate him for his audacity, first.
Blood dripped down the blade of Nerissa’s sword as she held it loosely in her hand, staring out at the sea.
“I suppose it would make sense. If this … Veskor knew where our island was but couldn’t find it due to the wards, so it would be logical to try to draw someone out. And unlike others,” she shot us a look, “our wards are strong.”
Benedict bristled.
“But why?” Wren asked, clutching her stomach and wincing. “Why draw out one male draken? Why not one of your daughters?”
Nerissa went silent.
Benedict turned to me. “Ronan, please escort Wren home. That has been enough for today. We will follow, we need to speak to the Elders about our next course of action.”
Wren winced again and didn’t protest Benedict’s decision. That’s how I knew she was exhausted.
“She can rest here in my cabin, if she wishes,” Nerissa offered, eyeing Wren’s stomach.
“No, I want her behind the wards,” Benedict ordered, wings flaring. “Failing or not.”
Nerissa raised her eyebrows, but said nothing.
I held my hands out and gathered Wren into me, her arms going around my neck. She yawned into my chest. I made a mental note to feed her blood when we got back to the treehouse.
“Come on, sleepy.”
Kieran helped me step onto the rail and I jumped off the ship, pumping my wings hard to take flight back to the island.
Wren was heavier with the child in her belly, but still it was not hard for me to carry and fly.
I wanted badly to stay and discuss the latest revelations and help the others form a plan, but Wren was tired. My responsibilities were clear.
The island came under us quickly, the western beach calm this high up.
I should’ve catalogued the wards’ pulse signatures from earlier, or sketched Anar’s sigil while it was fresh in my memory. That might help us. If Nerissa said the wards were failing, they had to be cause for concern. We would figure it out and—
My eyes caught on something small down on the beach: a splash of bright color amongst the sand where none should be.
I tilted my wings and steered down toward it.
“Wren, look!” I pointed to it.
She leaned over my arms, looking. “A flower?”
Not just any flower—a strange flower.
It shouldn’t have survived the salt spray.
Its petals were thin as parchment, pale blue streaked with silver veins that shimmered faintly when I leaned closer.
Not native to Lyoness, and not anything I’d seen in a thousand years of botanical study.
It carried the faint hum of bloodmagick, a rhythm closer to heartbeat than bloom.
Nerissa’s island, then? A clue from the vampyres?
“What is it?” Wren asked as I gently put her down onto the sand.
“Curious little thing,” I murmured, crouching to brush my fingertips over it. The air tingled like it was reactive, alive. When I lifted my hand away, faint runes glowed on my skin before fading again.
Definitely magickal.
“It’s beautiful!” Wren exclaimed, bending as low as she could to see it before the child in her belly stopped her.
I grinned at her, then frowned.
I needed my notes to record it before it faded, and it would likely die if I tried to bring it to the treehouse. My notebook with all of my sketches and my pens were back on my desk in the treehouse. It would take five minutes, ten at most, to fly there and back.
“Do you mind if I were to pop over to the treehouse quickly to grab my notebook? If I can sketch it before it dies, I’ll be able to study it better.
Wren gave me a wistful smile. “The only true danger here is boredom.”
I gave her a kiss and launched into the air, wings catching the wind’s current and lifting me effortlessly up. I neared the treehouse from the west side, seeing only a few earth witches lounging about near the jungle. The wards shimmered faintly as I passed through.
Lyoness rose below me, green and gold, new life growing over old scars. Smoke curled from cooking fires; children played on the bridges between the trees. The peace we’d built here was fragile, but it was real.
I landed near the treehouse's platform, folded my wings, and ducked inside.
My desk smelled of parchment, salt, and the faint tang of iron ink.
I grabbed my notebook and the charcoal set from the shelf, flipping through sketches of sigils, herbs, and ruins until I found an empty page.
I could almost see the flower again, luminous and strange.
Stuffing my notebook and charcoal into the pouch at my waist, I jumped into the air and lazily circled the island. Below, on the western beach were several Elders, heads bent in heated discussion. I could hear them even before I descended.
“I should go,” Wyrren was saying. “I’m excited to meet these new drakens. I’m very friendly.”
“We should encourage the royal family to stay here,” another agreed. “She’s safest with all of them together until the drakling is born.”
“We should wait until after the birth for anyone to leave,” Thane argued, kicking a bit of sand with his foot claws. “It is too momentous an occasion.”
“If there really are other drakens, we need to meet them,” Wyrren countered. “Now, not after another decade of isolation.”
Thane’s jaw flexed. “You sound like one of the hatchlings, eager for adventure. This isn’t a game. I do not want to weaken the wards if there is a hostile draken out there. Let alone a horde of them.”
“This is part of that future,” Wyrren shot back.
Elder fighting was a rare thing. I should probably make sure everything was OK.
I landed hard in the sand, shaking off my wings. They looked ready to claw each other when Wyrren stepped forward, trying to make peace.
“I want to meet new drakens!” They turned as a small voice split the air, high and whining. A little witchling–one of the daughters of a draken witch pair, tugged at Wyrren’s belt. She didn’t have wings or claws, but her skin did shimmer oddly under the sunlight just like a draken in human form.
“Perri, have you wandered off again?” Wyrren chastised her, trying to sound gruff but unable to as she stared up at him with big eyes.
“I wanna play!” she said.
And just like that, the fight was broken up. I turned to get back in the air, and back to Wren, when a horn blast split the air: low, mournful, and wrong.
We all froze.
Then came the shouting. “From the east! Vampyres—fifty at least this time!”
The sound of wings overtook everything as the Elders took to the air, and I followed. The sky darkened with shapes moving just beyond the cliff line. Overhead, Benedict and Kieran’s silhouettes threw shadows over us as they flew to the other side.
Wyrren’s face went pale, then hardened to stone. “Fifty?” He gathered little Perri in his arms. “Come, little one, back to your parents.” He veered off from the others, dropping down into the jungle.
“They must have gathered during the night,” Thane gasped. “More from the continent—”
Benedict called down to us, issuing orders before anyone could panic. “Form perimeter lines! Get the hatchlings off the beach!”
That last command hit me like a blow.
The beach.
Where Wren was alone.
I wheeled immediately in the air, almost losing my balance in my haste to get back to my mate.
“Where is the queen?” Thane called out.
“Safe with Ronan!” Benedick called back.
It was the precise moment Benedict turned and saw me flying behind the elders.
Alone.
Oh, fuck.
The wind rose, carrying the smell of ash and salt.
I went to Wren anyway, not caring. I only made it a few feet before I was tackled out of the air and to the beach. Hands grabbed me and threw me down to the sand. I spit it out as it got everywhere—my scales, my mouth, and under my claws. My tools and notebook went flying.
“Stay the fuck away from me. You no longer speak. You have endangered our mate, our queen, and our unborn drakling!” Benedict roared at me.
The horizon blazed red—not dawn, not dusk. Blood and fire.
I shook under Benedict’s fury, the elders’ gazes on me pitying, but they did nothing to step in.
They took off into the air, leaving me wet and choking on the beach.
My notebook dissolved in the shallows.