“Cael? Bud? Where are you? I can’t see shit,” Drayce repeated, nearly pleading with his friend. He’d pray to the god and goddesses, but he was sure they were the ones who’d gotten Caelan into this mess in the first place.
Tree limbs creaked and groaned around him as if a massive wind were forcing them to bend at awkward angles. Drayce stumbled a step and looked upward as a shaft of light pierced the gloom. The trees were moving, pulling back the leafy canopy to create an opening straight to the blue sky.
He followed the light down to find Caelan sitting in the perfect golden swath in the middle of the darkness. His friend was frighteningly pale and his hair a tangled mess as if he’d been pulling at it, but Caelan Talos was still alive and offering him an opening.
Drayce’s every instinct was to fall on the man and wrap him up tightly so no one—man or god—could ever touch him again, but he checked that urge and took one careful step after another toward him. Something inside of Caelan’s mind had fractured under the strain, and Drayce needed to remember to treat his friend gently.
“Hey, Cael,” Drayce started. When he was within a couple of feet of the king, he kneeled in front of him. “Are you okay?”
Haunted blue eyes rimmed red rose to meet his, and the remains of Drayce’s heart shattered. If this was the doing of the gods, he’d destroy them all. He’d shatter their crystals one by one and grind them into dust.
“Did I hurt him?” Caelan inquired in a rough, shaking voice.
“Who? Rayne?” Drayce inwardly hoped that was who Caelan was talking about, because otherwise the news was going to be really fucking bad.
Caelan gave the tiniest of nods.
“No, Rayne is fine. Absolutely fine,” he answered in a rush. At least he thought Rayne was fine. The advisor was a little foggy and confused, but he was pretty sure that was a result of the head injury and not Caelan.
A shudder ran through every inch of Caelan and a broken sob was caught in his throat. “I was afraid…”
Drayce threw the last of his caution aside and plopped down at Caelan’s side, placing one leg behind his friend’s back and the other across his lap before wrapping him tightly in his arms. If only there had been more of him, he would have been able to place Caelan in a perfect cocoon of love and protection. This would have to do for now.
Caelan grabbed his forearm in an unbreakable grip, his fingers digging into flesh, but Drayce didn’t care. His friend needed him. Lowering his head, he pressed his face into Caelan’s sweat-damp hair. “Talk to me, Cael. What happened?”
“I can’t control them,” the king admitted brokenly. “I’ve got two gods whispering in my head constantly, and too often what they are saying makes sense. Especially when someone is threatening you or Rayne or Eno. You’re all that’s left of my family. And Ram was trying to take you from me.”
“Ram?”
“The man who held the knife to your throat.”
“Ah.” Yeah, that made sense as a trigger for Caelan. Drayce wasn’t too sure he’d be able to stay calm and controlled if someone were threatening Caelan’s life.
Scratch that.
He definitely couldn’t stay calm and controlled.
Except the major difference was that Caelan out of control was a lot more dangerous for all of Thia.
“I saw it in his head. They wanted us dead. They wanted money and they were planning to kill us. Tula demanded I destroy them all, punish them.”
“And Kaes?”
“Destruction.”
Drayce closed his eyes and tried to steady his own breathing. Well, yes of course the God of Storms wanted destruction. It was what he was good at.
Caelan trembled in his arms. “I can’t control them. I can’t block them out. I think I’m doing the right thing to protect the people I love, but then I look at you and I know it’s somehow gone too far. Or when she started whispering about Rayne…”
The words were tumbling out of Caelan in a torrent and suddenly died off when he mentioned the advisor’s name. A knot tightened in Drayce’s stomach, and he tried not to let his fear show to Caelan. He was in enough pain, but he had to ask. “What about Rayne?”
The man in his arms didn’t speak. He just ducked his head, seeming to burrow deeper into Drayce’s embrace.
With infinite care, Drayce cupped the side of Caelan’s cheek and lifted his head so those wounded blue eyes finally met his. “Talk to me, Cael. What about Rayne?”
“I’ve been betrayed so many times, Drayce. My mother, Chancellor Croft. Even Vale set us up—”
“What?” he barked out before he could stop himself. “Seriously? Vale? She’s the reason we were kidnapped?”
“I saw it in Ram’s head.” He closed his eyes and pressed his cheek to Drayce’s hand as if seeking warmth or protection from whatever he was thinking. “Then Tula started whispering about controlling everyone. That if I had control of everyone, it was the only way I’d be sure I couldn’t be betrayed again.”