He makes a dense sound in the back of his throat, suggesting an air of ease that betrays the tension strung between us. So tight that every breath makes my heart pump harder.
Faster.
“I’m curious,” he murmurs. “Your pah, what was he like?”
“Why?”
He shrugs. “Just trying to gauge your character.”
I frown.
There are two types of folk in this world. The type who believed in the manner in which Ostern Vaegor ruled—honoring onlypower,planting his seed in every corner of the globe, and ensuring his poisoned mindset spread. Then there are the ones who mourn the loss of those who ruled with a whole heart, valuing folk of all manner, with or without power. With or without title.
Like Kaan.
Like theNeváns.
The thought is a choke of poison. A brutal reminder that I didn’t just murder a loving family so many phases ago, but the figureheads of an ideal that shaped the world into a better place.
“Void of empathy,” I rasp, my voice breathless and bruised.I void the heavy guilt, stuffing it so fucking deep I barely register its presence. The hollow floods with a bulge of rabid hate for the male who sired me, the tips of my fingers itching as I spit a fresh wave of words. “Impulsive. Cruel. Aggressive. Want me to go on?”
His hand stills, voice almost soft as he says, “You lust for his blood on your hands …”
My lips pinch tight.
“But your brother took his life … Akinslayer—abhorred in all kingdoms but the one he stole.”
Something about the way he shapes the statement has my spine snapping straight.
“The one heliberated,” I snip past gritted teeth, eyes narrowed on the male, the air between us growing stiff and stale. Like mortar’s glugging the cavern full. “Kaan’s a good king. A good male. Ifanyonedeserved to take Pah’s life, it was him.”
Arkyn’s head ticks to the side. “Is that so?”
I frown, about to ask where this is heading—
Arkyn whistles, low and long.
The shrill sound of something clawing against stone makes the hairs on my arms lift.
Silence simmers before the telltalewhomp-whomp-whompof pulsating wings fills the cavern with a churn of ash-littered wind. Like Clode just donned a full-skirted gown and began dancing atop the clutter, spinning and dashing the heavy layers about.
I tip my head to the darkness above. See a flash of ruddy, glittering plumage before another blast of ash hits my eyes. I’m rubbing them clear when the ground shakes with a heavy landing, followed by the shrill screech of talons clawing across stone.
A terrible squawk shreds the silence, smelling like smoke and the putrid waft of rotting meat. Making my heartthrash.
I pull my fists from my stinging eyes …
My pulse scatters as a hooked, golden beak emerges from the gloom above the Scavenger King’s head, plumes of smoke huffing from the beast’s tear-shaped nostrils.
The creature pries from the shadows, its face swathed in red plumage curled at the tips, the glittering tone jolting me. As though it’s lifting free of one of the picture tomes Kaan read to me as a youngling.
I still. Breath caught.
Mind toiling.
I’m seeing things … Or maybe I died in the cold plains after all, currently being feasted on by the crowls. That, or this raging fever is making me hallucinate.
Because that’s anElding Bird. A creature that only exists in legends anymore, painted by storytellers or staining the walls of ancient caves. Hunted to extinction. The few remaining were believed to have fluttered back into the Book of Voyd from whence they came—born of another world.
