“Draven?”
“I wish I knew the peace you speak of,” he said in a quiet voice, his hand moving away from hers. “You’ve no idea how lucky you have it here. To not have to worry of crime in your streets, the largest threat being when the sheep herders do not have enough of the luxury milks your Dreamers crave. You’ve no idea this adrenaline you crave, this so-called adventure you say you want. I live in that every day. If you wanted true darkness, all you had to do was stay in the forest a little longer. I can show you darkness.”
She swallowed hard, and her chest emptied as she thought about the things he did not know. As blue flames flashed before her eyes, and a ringing began in her ears.
“What— with the creatures that crowd your forest?” she managed. “The shadows?”
“No,” he said firmly. “Not the creatures.”
“Then what?” she argued, feeling the frustration rise as he seemed to mock her. “The ships? Having to defend the realm against strangers? Your Infi broth—”
A knife found the skin of her throat. Her heart dropped and he pulled her head back by her hair, exposing her throat.
“You want to know darkness, my Queen?” he growled over her. “Tell me how many infants you’ve stuck your own blade through,” he dared in a quiet voice. “Tell me how many wailing children’s bones you’ve watched be ripped from their insides and pulled into the dirt beneath your giver’s roots. Tell me how you would look upon the face of a child you’ve watched grow for ten years, only to have him marked with the cursed fate instead of the Venari, to be forced with the choice of killing it, or allowing it live and its life threaten this entire land.”
He released her with such force that she fell into the sand. The knife landed in the wet at her feet, and her body chilled at the glare he stared at her with as he stood.
“Do not wish for a darkness you know nothing of,” he breathed.
“Perhaps you should point this darkness towards your own giver instead of taking it out on—”
“Why would I point this on my giver?” Draven spat. “My giver has been the scapegoat of every race on this land. He has been accused of things over the last Age he never did.”
“Like what? Like seducing my own mother into slavery? Betraying her for his creatures?”
“Lies of your Chronicles,” he hissed.
“Then tell me the truth of it. Tell me what your Honest Scrolls say of it.”
Draven sighed heavily, and she could see the vein in his neck pulsating. “I should have known this would never work,” he uttered under his breath.
Aydra’s stomach dropped. “Excuse me?” she managed.
His hands were on his hips, and he turned back towards her, gaze darting over her heaving figure. “I have to go,” he breathed.
Her heart throbbed in her ears as she stared after his retreating figure.
“I told you you wouldn’t love me after,” she called.
He paused in his step, seemingly frozen to the ground on which he stood. His fist clenched and unclenched at his side once more. His head turned just slightly, and she met his eyes over his shoulder.
“You’re wrong.”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
IN THE WEEKS between the meetings, Aydra tried not to let her broken heart show in her features. She poured herself into helping Lex prepare for the Belwark trials happening in the coming days, trying to keep her mind off her own stupidity of allowing Draven to leave her kingdom in anger. But at night, she found herself hardly able to sleep, curled up in his shirt and toying with the pipe he’d given her as she stared at the ceiling or the moons outside.
During the Dead Moons cycle, she crawled outside onto the roof of one of the towers each night, and she sat in silence, wishing she could hear the Noctuan cries and songs from the Forest in her ears. On one of these nights, Nyssa followed her and sat with her, her head lying on her sister’s shoulder as they stared at the bright stars above them.
“You didn’t want to go to the forest for this turn?” Nyssa asked her.
The thought made Aydra’s stomach knot. “Not this time.”
Nyssa rolled over to her stomach then, and began to play in Aydra’s hair. “You seem… not yourself these last couple of weeks,” she said, avoiding Aydra’s gaze.
Aydra’s heart skipped. “What do you mean?”
“I mean… You were you, and then there was a few weeks when you were a lot happier, and now these last couple of weeks… I’m—I’m not sure. You seem sort of… sad.”
Aydra had thought herself well at hiding the things her core dared not show even herself. “Blame it on the pressures of the kingdom,” she sighed, giving her sister a forced smile.
A small smirk rose on Nyssa’s lips at her sister’s lie. “You know, Dorian told me a secret. He said you met someone.”
Aydra’s lips pressed together thinly. “Dorian exaggerates,” she mumbled. “Besides, it doesn’t matter. He and I had a fight. It’s over. I don’t know that he’ll ever want to speak with me again.”
“I doubt that’s true,” Nyssa argued. “It’s you.”
Aydra sighed and settled back onto the blanket they’d brought with them. Nyssa sank back down beside her, and Aydra wrapped an arm around her shoulders.
They fell asleep talking about the stars that night.
The week before the great meeting came the Belwark Trial day.
Lex had been excited about it for weeks, training with Dorian and Aydra on their downtime to keep her skills sharp.
