It had taken her a hundred years after the arach were dethroned, and an outsider claimed the realm and the dragons, to realize her eggs weren’t going to hatch. It should have only taken a couple of months for her young to hatch, but she kept waiting, hoping, and waiting some more until it finally sank in.
She was ashamed it had taken so long. Sosho accepted it before her, but she’d clung to the hope she would one day meet their babies.
And then her hope faded into nothingness.Nodragon eggs had hatched since the arach fell, andnodragons had laid eggs since.
It wasn’t common knowledge, and it never could be as it meant the dragons were dying out, but it was true. Her eggs had never hatched, and neither would any of the few others hidden in the land, trapped in a time before mad Lords ruled the realm.
She should have gotten rid of them; she should have moved on from thetinyhope still tugging at her heart, but she couldn’t do either. Once Sosho died, these eggs were all she had left.
It was foolish, she was a brokenhearted idiot, but she curled up with her eggs and nudged each to rotate them. She told them about her day as she worked and sang a dragon lullaby while the torchlight reflected off the walls and the loneliness crept in.
Maybe an arach on the throne would bring some life back to the land and the dragons could start breeding again. It would do nothing forheras she’d lost her mate and the offspring within these eggs, but the dragons needed life again.
Lowering her head, Alina used her chin to draw the eggs closer and tucked them against her side before falling asleep.
CHAPTERFIFTEEN
Lexi kept her shoulders back,her chin held high, and a look of confidence on her face. It was a confidence she didn’t feel as they strolled into the land of Aerie, home of the sirens.
Maybe she would feel more confident if she hadn’t spent the past two days working on spells with Kaylia only to have it amount to nothing. She had no idea what the arach were entirely capable of, but it certainly wasn’t casting spells like a witch.
Kaylia had managed to figure out how to help her erect her shield, but she couldn’t figure out a way to unlock whatever other abilities Lexi might possess. Lexi was becoming increasingly frustrated by her lack of progress inallthings, but at least her hand had healed while they worked.
And now they traversed this narrow pathway while eyes stared down at them from the high cliffs to their left. Lexi glanced at the sirens perched above them. She’d feel alotmore comfortable about the lethal creatures if she had something, besides fire, to counteract them should they attack.
The sirens sitting on their lofty perches didn’t make any noise. They looked strangely indifferent to their presence, considering most of those who came to Aerie never left it.
Cole wasn’t thrilled about bringing her here, but he didn’t have much choice. A few sirens attended his ball, but the Lord had little to do with them for the most part. It was time to start recruiting an army, and their best option was to start with the immortals shoved aside or ignored by the Lord.
He never asked them to participate in the Lord’s war. Lexi didn’t know if that was because the sirens were all women, and therefore the Lord saw them as inferior, or if it was because no one trusted the beautiful, lethal creatures.
The sirens were known to lure mortals into Aerie with their beautiful voices and smash them against the jagged cliffs to her right… if they didn’t keep them as slaves.
The sirens could also enslave immortals with their song but often preferred the easier prey of the mortals, which might be another reason the Lord shunned them. Many immortals saw the sirens as scavengers who could only take out those weaker than them. Therefore, many immortals deemed them pathetic.
Lexi didn’t know what to think of the sirens, but they unnerved her. She didnotwant to be a slave to these women.
Lexi gulped. Cole told her he’d been here before and never had a problem with leaving—if one could resist the siren’s song, they were allowed to go—but she’d never been here before and worried she might run into an issue.
However, they couldn’t expect the sirens to follow the last living arach into a war against the Lord if they didn’tmeether. So as much as he hated it, Cole couldn’t deny she had to be here.
Afraid the others might be affected by the siren’s song, they remained at the prison. Her dad and Orin weren’t happy about it.
Above them, the half women, half birds cocked their heads as they strode higher along the path. When the sirens shifted, rocks broke away from beneath their talons.
The stones bounced down the cliffs to clatter against the rocky pathway she and Cole traversed. As they passed, the sirens took flight. Some of them flew ahead to land on the cliffs and settled in to watch her and Cole approach. The others vanished; she didn’t know where they went, making her more nervous.
The wind howling down the pathway tore at her hair and battered her face. The higher they climbed, the colder it grew. When snow began to dot the tops of the cliffs, her fingers and nose went numb.
Despite the thick coat Cole told her to wear, the cold air crept in to ice her bones. Or maybe it was the hundreds of eerie eyes staring at them that chilled her so much.
Stay calm. Stay calm.
She restrained herself from tugging at the collar of her coat and the fae tunic a woman guard at the prison gave her. Sahira had tailored the green tunic and black pants to fit her better.
She may not look as royal or well dressed as she’d always imagined a queen, but she was okay with that. The heavy coat was too big, but she was glad as she huddled deeper into the hood while the wind battered them.
To their right, the purple water of the Sea of Demise crashed against the rocky cliffs and hammered the numerous broken ships below. The wooden remains of masts, bowsprits, and the shells of boats poked out of the high, crashing waves rolling in and out. There were so many skeletal ships out there she couldn’t begin to count them, and she was sure the water hid thousands of others.
