Chapter 122

Dayanara moved closer to me, and Lyle came with her, still keeping a steady hand on her. Dayanara was on high alert as she held her hand in a defensive position.

Look at those eyes. There is no fear. Nothing. They know what we are and look how they stand there confidently. Dayanara’s voice entered my mind. Be ready for anything.

“Eira, to my flank,” the drangel barked. Her voice was cold and sharp, a whip-crack that brooked no delay.

The water dragon moved instantly, her feet a whisper over the bare ground. But before she could close the distance, Squall shot out a hand and snatched Eira’s wrist. His claws dug in, not to hurt, but to possess. To claim.

The air shimmered with a hot pulse of dragon magic, and for a moment, I thought he might shift right there and drag the whole cave down on our heads just to keep her. “Let my servant go,” the drangel snapped, wings flaring as she stepped forward, lips curled in disdain as her eyes glowed with power.

“Squall.” Dayanara’s voice was sharp as she whipped her head to glare at him.

Squall didn’t move, didn’t blink. “She is my mate.” His voice radiated with power and authority that did not reach the drangel. Instead, I heard her scoff as her wings flickered.

“Should that mean something to me, dragon?” She mocked his species. The coolness in her eyes showed there was no fear. I felt Dayanara’s tension as her eyes pleaded with Squall to stop. Were they really so powerful that Dayanara would be this uneasy?

“A dragon’s mate is sacred!”

The drangel clicked her tongue. “All mates are sacred. Almost everyone out there has a mate. Did it stop you from killing? Have you ever spared a life thinking that that person is someone’s mate? Someone’s partner? Yet, I should smile and throw the rice since you’ve found your mate?”

“You’ve been keeping my mate as a servant?!” Smoke erupted from Squall’s nose in big black puffs.

“Better than using her decaying body as fertilizer.”

A sound like a kettle boiling escaped from Squall’s throat, but before he could say something, Eira lifted her hand to Squall.

“It’s not like that,” she said, her voice was soft and gentle. “My parents—they killed her family. The bond … it’s my punishment. My duty.”

Squall’s grip tightened. “So, you’re a prisoner. I’ll kill you, drangel,” Squall growled, eyes wild, smoke curling from his nostrils in slow, seething spirals. “I’ll burn you to cinders.”

Toril’s response was a laugh that cut through everything. “Can you, dragon? Well, please, come at me. Show me your powerful dragon strength that your species loves to brag about.” She was provoking him, which meant she was confident in her ability. And I felt it. A lethal intent in the air that promised death.

I slid in front of Darren, ignoring the way his hand went to my shoulder, protective but not restraining. “Can we all take a breath? Let’s calm down. I think there’s been enough killing by your two species.”

The drow watched me, eyes unreadable. A slow smile crawled up one corner of his mouth. “You are indeed Evette’s daughter,” he said, nodding with an odd formality. “She was always the voice of reason. My name is Sven and this is Toril.” He motioned to the drangel next to him.

Toril’s gaze softened for a second, something flickering behind the blade of her cheekbones. I heard a small shriek and looked to see Eira had yanked her hand free from Squall’s grip and ran to Toril’s side, head bowed, arms wrapped around herself. It hurt to watch, the way she folded herself up, small and tight, trying to vanish into the air.

Squall’s face collapsed in on itself, fury giving way to heartbreak. “Eira,” he said, voice so gentle it might have been a whisper. “You don’t have to do this. I will fight for you.”

“Careful, dragon, or you could make things much worse for her.” Toril seemed to relish in provoking Squall.

Sven’s eyes pinned me to the spot. If the drangel was a storm, then Sven was the eye, calm and cold and terrifying in his certainty. Every move he made was measured, calculated, as if he already knew the consequences and found them irrelevant. Even his voice, when it finally uncoiled, was devoid of warmth, just a flat obsidian echo that soaked into the cave walls. “You’ve finally come for Evette.”

Darren’s hand tightened around mine, the heat of him a grounding wire. I tried to take strength from it, but my thoughts were already running wild, tripping over the implications. “Wait—” I swallowed, trying to wet my throat that felt unusually dry. “Is my mother … really alive?”

Toril’s wings stilled, her mouth twitching in something like regret. “Not in the way you understand it,” she said. “Her body is gone … well it is and it isn’t. It’s complicated. Her soul, her essence … remains. When your father was taken, her spirit was tethered in a holding cell. She stretched the bond as long as she could, long enough to see you safe. Her body was dying without the soul, but she stayed with you until you were older.” Toril tilted her head. “She waited until she knew you would survive. That your future was secure. Then she surrendered herself entirely.” The words dropped into the silence, each one a pebble sinking deeper. I felt them all.

“Why didn’t she tell me?” The question ripped out of me before I could stop it, too raw to be dignified. “Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

Sven’s eyes narrowed, the blue crystals overhead painting his skin in strange, shifting light. “She was forbidden,” he said. “When the gods decreed your destiny, they placed a lock on her voice, a geas that even she could not break. You had to walk the path alone.” He gestured to the cave, the water, the world. “It is the way of things. Trial by pain, trial by loss.”

Darren, for his part, was done playing the audience. “Why do you know all this?” he demanded, voice low and rough as a growl. “You talk like you’ve seen it yourself.”

Sven’s mouth curved into the faintest suggestion of a smile. “Because I have,” he said. “I am a seer. My bloodline walks the future as easily as most walk the earth.” He looked at me, his gaze so intense it felt like a hand around my throat. “I have seen the past and the future. I have seen your child’s birth.” My child’s birth? I placed my hand over my stomach protectively. He didn’t say that for no reason.

“What about my pup? Why these trials?!”

Sven’s voice went even quieter, as if the truth was too heavy to speak at full volume. “Because it’s not just a child. It’s the answer to a question the gods themselves have forgotten. Your mate bond, your power … it created a new thing in this world. A creature that belongs to the stars, and to the earth, and to all kingdoms. The gods cannot interfere directly, so they breed weapons.” He shrugged, a gesture as casual as discussing the weather. “Your pup was conceived from twin flames. It won't be a normal pup but a celestial one. When twin flames unite, they align the stars, creating a new one. It is an occurrence that goes beyond the universe, creating a heavenly being."

"Wait ... a deity?!" Lyle asked.

"No. A celestial creature. A heavenly being, blessed with powers that rival the gods, but isn't one. It is also … well … it will be able to do what the gods cannot. It can interfere and attack what the gods can't."

"So they want to use my child as their tool? For them to be their sword and fight the battles that go against their own rules?!" I was livid and I could feel Darren’s anger rippling out from him as well.

Toril stepped forward, her wings twitching, her voice softer now. “But it’s not just a tool. The child will have a choice. You all will.” She looked at me, something close to sympathy in her eyes. For a second, her predatory edge collapsed, and I glimpsed something raw and almost human behind her eyes. “Your child's future is not for you to decide,” she said, voice sharp but thinning. “Not the gods or the courts ... the future belongs to your child. But right now, the future is a luxury. Your mother, Evette is trapped, somewhere between the living and the dead. If she is not released soon, she will be lost to the darkness. And that is not a fate she deserves.”

The word “darkness” cracked something inside me. The years I spent grieving her, clawing for answers on her sudden death, all the while she was just out of reach, stitched to this nightmare by the gods. I would have burned the world to bring her back. Now, apparently, the world wanted to see me try.

“If I can free her, I will,” I said. It wasn’t a promise. It was an oath.

Sven’s smile was gone. His eyes drifted to Eira, who was still trembling at Toril’s side, her shoulders hunched so tight she looked ready to splinter. I could see something slicker in the depths. Compassion? Concern? But that fast it was gone. “We will help,” he said, glancing at Toril, who gave a single, grudging nod.

Beside me, Squall hadn’t taken his gaze off Eira. His voice was smoke and stone. “Would you release her to me?”

Toril’s wings flexed, then went still. “No.”

“Would you release her from her bond?” I asked, Toril’s gaze pinned me with the full force of her glare.

“Ten years,” she said, the words slapping the air. “She must serve a decade more, or the bond will kill her.” Her lips curled up into a calculating grin. “However … you can accept the bond yourself. I’ll give her to you as your own servant for ten years, and the bond will be yours to release after the ten years.”

My mouth opened before my brain could catch up. “You want me to take her as a hostage? What’s to stop me from breaking the bond once she’s under my roof?” It wasn’t really a question. I could taste the trap in it.

Toril grinned, showing the points of her canines. “Try, and the blood bond will kill her. If you die … the bond doesn’t die but kills her as well. The gods may not act, but their rules do. Eira is both shield and dagger. Accept her and her protection as your personal guard. Refuse, and she remains with me, far from her mate. Oh … and you won’t be able to transfer the bond. Only the original blood bond owner can do that. Don’t think you can bond her to the dragon later.”

“I’ll take her,” I said, staring Toril dead in the eye. “But only if you swear, by whatever gods you still fear, that you won’t try to interfere with her life once I take her.” I understood the look in her eyes. Toril wanted Eira and Squall to remain close to me. She wanted the power of the dragons to keep me safe. Clever … but why? Or was it for my unborn child?

Toril’s mouth twisted. “I swear it.”

Squall exhaled, the tension in his shoulders dropping all at once. “I will live in the lycan kingdom as long as she does,” he said, and the finality in his voice brooked no argument. “Ten years will go in a blink.” I saw the look in Toril’s eyes. This was exactly what she wanted and knew would happen.

Toril nodded, once, sharp as a blade. “First, you free Evette. Then Eira is yours, and we’re even.” She glanced at Sven, who gave her a look that was an irritating challenge, one that she ignored. There was something behind the look. I couldn’t quite place it, but he didn’t like the idea of her releasing Eira to me. Or maybe just releasing her, period? I didn’t have time to analyze it.

“I’m ready to do what I need to do.” Whatever it was that I had to do. I still had no idea why I was needed.

Toril smiled, but there was no joy in it. “Good. The gods will be watching.”

And then the pain started.

It began as a spark in my palm, the one I’d clenched so tight I’d broken the skin. It seared upward, a burning line of fire tracing up my arm and into my chest. I doubled over, gasping. The ticking in my ears was back, louder than ever, drowning out every sound but my own pulse.

The watch. The memory of its metal face pressed to my skin, the hands spinning out of control, a time bomb in my veins. I would have fallen if it wasn’t for Darren. His arms were around me as darkness closed in, thick as oil. The watch seemed to grow bigger and engulf me inside of it.

For a moment, I saw my mother. She stood at the edge of the ticking hand of the watch. I reached for her, but the darkness pulled me under, dragging me down and down and down. The ticking banged into my ears. I was alone … no, I wasn’t. Darren was with me, his strong embrace never leaving my body. He was falling with me.

Faster. Deeper. Darker. Downward. Darkness. Nothing.

Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.

Then, a growl.

“Death is here.”