All the warmth leaves my veins, an itch flaring at the tips of my fingers as I look around, scanning the carnage. The blood. The bodies.
They weren’t waiting for me.
They were waiting forhim.
My gaze snaps to the doors ahead, blood dribbling down the rays of sunshine carved deep into the wood like the flow of a ruddy river.
A knot in my mind begins to unravel.
Suspicion mounting.
“Please d-don’t kill me. I-I have a little sister. She depends on th-the bloodstone I send her. She’s sick.”
I drop my chin, looking into the boy’s bloodshot eyes. “I need you to pass a message on.”
His nod is so frantic he almost slits his own throat on the sword still pinned against his flesh.
“You will return to Bothaim immediately and tell the Tri-Council that if they lay a single finger on Kaan Vaegor, I will personally blow their precious Citadel to rubble,” I say, a low tremor in my voice, born from the rumble of words on the back of my tongue.
I may not yet be equipped to sculpt as well as Kaan, with anywhere near the precision it would take to construct something so grand as the Citadel, but Creators know I can fuck it up.
“Their prized arches may protect them from the moonfalls, but they willcrumblebeneath my wrath. Just like every bone in their bodies.” I rip my shroud away as my Other rises, perching just below my skin. Probably contemplating taking over for a swift mastication we certainly don’t have time for. “Tell me you understand.”
The guard flinches. Nods again, taking me in with slow sweeps of hiswide eyes, his next words blasted with puffs of milky breath. “I-I understand. I’ll pass the message on. I promise.”
My Other recedes.
I lift the blade and wait for him to scramble up. Though he stands a head above me, something about his posture makes him seem so much smaller.
Wiping some of the blood from his cheek, he glances over his shoulder toward the sunshine doors, seeming to hesitate.
“What is it?”
“I—Pleasedon’t hurt Ahvi. He’s a really good kid. He’s had it worse than most.”
Kid?
Another piece of puzzle slots into place.
… I think I’ve found the protégé Kaan’s looking for.
“Do I look like a monster?”
He opens his mouth to speak—
“You know what, don’t answer that.” I toss my sword amongst the gory rubble. “I swear on the Creators, I won’t harm Ahvi.”
Relief loosens the Bothaimian’s face. “Your, ah— Your message.” He clears his throat. “Who do I tell them it’s from?”
“Prisoner Seventy-Three,” I mutter, charging for the red-splattered yellow doors, drenched in so much blood it drips off me with each stalked step. “Tell them the dragon shat me outrealangry.”
Beyond the doors is a circular chamber with a domed ceiling, immaculately mosaicked to look like the sky in The Fade—each shard smaller than my fingernail, etched in runes barely visible to the naked eye. But I see them.
Sensethem.
My steps echo as I move forward, leaving a litter of bloody prints, eyes pinned on what sits at the base of the gently sloping ground.
A makeshift Moltenmaw nest made from branches bound together with dried vines. Similar in both size and shape to the Sabersythe moon I paid tribute to before my Tookah Trial, it has a stout opening that looks almost too small for me to fit through.
