Black brows met in a frown. “I can’t take that risk, Prince.”
Ronan twisted, raising a brow toward me.
“Is it still under Velli control?” I asked. “You say it’s larger than the capital—Tallon didn’t have enough men to hold Reem.”
“If I open that door, I endanger my family.” Hur’s eyes sharpened with accusation. “They’re a disease. Everywhere and nowhere at once. Aye, there may not be one waitin’ on the other side, but what if there is? Then my children are nothin’ more than blood bags.”
“Hur!” Fiona’s hand fell over his, tightening in a calming press.
“Don’t forget who I am,” Ronan said, voice deathly still. Fingers snapped; a spark erupted and roared to a hovering blaze above his palm. “I swear to protect your queen and family.”
The man’s jaw shifted in thought, a muscle ticking under the skin.
“Hur, I would never ask you to do anything that might put your family in danger,” I said. “I am your queen—take me to see the true city of Sol.”
Fiona’s eyes fluttered closed, a silent surrender, while Hur’s nostrils flared, irritation honing every line of his face.
“Aye, then.” He loosed a harsh sigh. “But only to a vantage point. No deeper. For that, ye’ll need more than a ball of wee flame.” He pushed to his feet, stride long and purposeful, storming from the table.
Ronan sniffed, kicking back his chair. “Wee flame, he says.” His fist clenched, squeezing the spark into oblivion.
Fiona led us through the tight rooms, cozy but small. The gray stone brightened a bit the deeper we went, but the light did little to ease the mounting paranoia pressing against my chest, the weight of the Andeluith pressing down on me.
Here I was trapped. No flight, no escape if the mountain fell. I craved open sky, the sight of my dragons circling above. No matter how I reminded myself these people had lived here for generations, the fear clung, threatening to crush me beneath the knowledge that it could all come crashing down at any moment.
“If I can’t name Oreo, ye don’t open this door, hear?” Hur’s white-knuckled hands gripped the thick wood. Behind it, his children, wife, and goat would remain safe until our return.
“You come back to me, Hur of Sol,” Fiona said, fingers clutching her skirts with a death grip.
The big man smirked, leaning down to give her a quick peck on the cheek. “Bar it now.” He shut the door with a solid clang, the sound echoing through the hall like a drumbeat of doom.
His hand rested against the wood, hesitation in his posture—torn between obeying his queen and following caution. Lurching, he pushed away and stalked down the corridor, silent but resolute. Rude, perhaps, but I did not want to shake his determination.
We wound deeper into the house, glimpsing generations of paintings and tapestries on the walls. Our haste didn’t allow for a proper study. We plunged down a second, brighter corridor, following Hur to a dark, formidable door locked with three iron bars across its length.
He wasted no time, shoving each heavy bar aside one by one. The metal fell into place with solid thuds, each sound echoing like a heartbeat through the stone.
With all three removed, he glanced once at Ronan, then heaved the door open, the hinges groaning in protest.
Chapter Forty-Three
Kallias
The sword felt like a boulder, its weight grinding through my shoulder and down my spine, my armor pressing into muscle and bone as though I bore the Andeluith itself across my back. Each step jarred my ribs. Exhaustion slowed my movements, dragging my boots along crimson-slicked stone. Blood seeped through the cracks of my plate, sticky against flushed skin, mixing with the sweat that soaked my clothing.
I stumbled backward. A sharp yank at my cuirass wrenched me aside before a blade could split my throat. Greaves surged in front of me, a Velli grappling with him in a snarl of limbs and steel. My thoughts moved through mud, tracking the struggle a heartbeat too late. With a savage thrust, he drove his sword through the soft flesh under its chin. The tip speared through the top of its head in a wet burst, bone cracking, dark spray misting his vambrace. He shrugged the body off with a curse, letting it crumple at our feet, then backed into me while our troops flooded past in a roar of shields and boots.
Stone met my spine as I slammed against a wall, closing my eyes against the burn in my lungs.
“Kal, we’ve got to stop.” Greaves growled, shoving me deeper into the alcove where shadow clung to damp mortar. “Let the fresh troops clear the lower levels.”
I was a walking hazard. My fingers locked around my sword hilt, knuckles blanched beneath leather, frozen in place. My grip refused to release the blade, but I could barely stand.
Light crept through the smoke. Morning broke above Sol, pale and thin, and Elohios’ radiance faded from my skin like heat slipping from cooling metal. I had fought through the night, leading my men with the glow of their god burning beneath my flesh. That radiance dimmed now, leaving only ache and cold. They could fight without me for a few hours.
The manor seemed leagues away.
Lead pooled in my thighs. Each shift of weight felt like wading through tar, thick and sucking at my boots, a labor that demanded more than I had left.
