A deep frown appeared as he glanced at Nyktos. “What the hell?”
“Go!” I shouted, causing Attes to blink.
“Do it,” Nyktos ordered. “Quickly.”
Attes hesitated for just a moment, then a silvery mist whirled around him. A heartbeat later, he was gone. Slowly, I turned to Nyktos. We weren’t exactly alone. Across the courtyard, a black draken perched on the Rise, eyeing us warily.
“Thank you,” I uttered.
“Don’t thank me.” Nyktos stepped away, scrubbing a hand over his head.
“I’m sorry. I have to do this.” Heart twisting as Nyktos looked away, I rubbed my bloodless palms over the bodice of mygown, jerking them away when I felt tiny holes there. The draken’s blood had burned through my gown but hadn’t reached my skin. Memories of his pale, resigned face appeared once more, and bile choked me.
Nyktos made a rough sound as he turned, reaching for me.
“No! Don’t—” Unable to bear the contact, I stepped to the side. A gods-awful sourness settled in my chest, curdling my stomach. “I need to bring him back because he didn’t deserve that—I mean, he was basically a kid. And I don’t understand why Kolis would do that to one of Kyn’s draken. Simply because he can?”
“He did it because he knew the draken are one of the few things Kyn cares about. Kolis obviously planned to demand that price, and summoned him for that very reason,” he said, and I wondered if that was why Kyn had been so intoxicated. “Kolis knew what he was doing. He was making Kyn our enemy.”
I’d seen the hatred in Kyn’s eyes. There was no doubt in my mind that Kolis had succeeded. “But that draken did nothing wrong—”
“You’re right. He didn’t.” Tension bracketed his mouth. “But that doesn’t matter to Kolis. I doubt it ever has.”
I inhaled, but the breath barely went anywhere. “Do you think we can trust Attes?”
“It’s a little late to ask that question now,” he said. “But I fucking hope so.”
I shoved a mass of tangled curls back from my face as that oily, insidious weight slithered through my veins again.
What if we were too late? What if this didn’t work? I’d never brought back someone with a dual life.
Pressure began to build, and I turned, grasping the railing. I felt…sick in my own skin. As if I couldn’t scrape off the ugliness even if I took a wire brush to it.
“He returns,” Nyktos stated as I felt a faint tremor in my chest.
I turned back to the room, almost crying out when I saw Attes laying the slender, fair-haired draken on a table inside. I rushed in, nearly knocking over a potted snake plant in my haste.
“Kyn left to find himself some whiskey before he got started,” Attes said, his brows pinched as he drew a hand over the draken’s bloodless cheek. He looked at us. “I really don’tknow what either of you think you’re going to do.”
“Yeah, well, you’re about to find out.” Nyktos stalked in behind me as I reached the draken’s side. “No one comes here.”
The blow I had delivered had been clean, but not all that quick. It would’ve taken several minutes for him to bleed out, and I hated thinking about those minutes, but I needed that extra time. The draken’s soul could’ve already entered Arcadia, and I couldn’t let myself think on what it meant to pull his soul back. And maybe I should. Because who was I to make this choice?
But nothing about this draken’s death had been natural. It hadn’t been his time. It hadn’t been my choice.
Thiswas.
And right or wrong, I was willing to live with this one.
I placed my hands on his chest, mindful of the dried blood.
“No one ever comes into my private chambers,” Attes said in response to Nyktos’s order. “Until today, that is.”
“And you will not speak of what you’re about to see,” Nyktos continued, coming closer to the table as I closed my eyes, summoning the embers of life. “If you do, I will level your Court, Attes. And I will hunt you down. And it will not be your eyes I remove when I find you.”
The embers responded with a rush of heat and energy, flooding my veins. I saw silver, even behind my closed lids. I felt the power rushing through me, running down my arms and across my fingers. My palms warmed as eather sparked, tingling and absolute.
“You know, I’m getting really tired of your threats, Nyktos. You could actuallythinkto—” Attes cut himself off with a gasp as the scent of freshly bloomed lilacs filled the space. “Holy fuck.”