He staggered to his feet, clothing turning to cinders, and turned in a slow circle. His gaze passed right over their tunnel entrance without pausing—which didn’t surprise Daemon a bit. Between the blinding glare from the lava, the distortion from the heat, and the fact that they were all dressed in black that matched their tunnel, there was no way his eyes could have adjusted enough to see them yet.
Elianne made a strangled noise and tried to dart forward—that nurturing spirit of hers that she usually offered to everyone but him no doubt taking hold.
Daemon snatched her around the waist to hold her back. “Not yet,” he said into her ear, more gruffly than he intended. “Let him get his bearings first. Give the High Council time to disperse. He survived this long—he’s one of us. He’ll be fine for a few more minutes.”
She struggled against him, writhing like a madwoman. “Let me go! Let me help him!”
“He doesn’t need your help.” When she strained still more, clawing at his arm, he growled and heaved her back, straight into Logi’s waiting arms. “Get ahold of yourself, Elianne. You would endanger us all.”
Wildness in her eyes, she used Logi’s chest as leverage and kicked at Daemon.
He caught her calf and held it there aloft until the awkwardness of her position forced her to stop struggling. Not that a shake of his head would do any more to redirect her than it ever did. “You’re stronger than this. Stop it, or Logi will have to take you back to Ember.”
Her chest heaved. “You don’t know. You don’tknow. Let me go!”
Had this reaction been to witnessing death, or had Eldrid not been beside him, perhaps Daemon would have given in to the urge to pull her against his chest instead of letting Logi be the one to hold her steady. Perhaps he would have run a hand down her fire-bright hair until she calmed, invited her to help him understand why the plunge of this new brother struck her so deeply.
But there was no time for coddling. He met Logi’s gaze, not even needing words.
His oldest friend nodded, turned, and dragged Elianne back toward their quarters.
Daemon and Eldrid exchanged a bemused look, then turned their attention to their newest brother.
The man was older than Daemon had been when he ran into Helviti’s embrace, with the square jaw and broad shoulders so common among the thanes. But dark hair, which was rare on the island.
From Above came a declaration that Daemon could pick out easily enough over the gurgling of lava. “He lives.”
The new brother likely didn’t hear—the rumble and rush and pops of deadly bubbles would be overwhelming his eardrums. But Daemon and Eldrid both did, and it was odd enough to draw them closer to the tunnel’s opening.
Their movement must have finally caught the man’s attention. He looked their way, stared at them for a long moment. No doubt thinking himself hallucinating. Seeing a mirage, a distortion from the waves of heat.
Eldrid, always the clown, gave him a salute and waved the leathers in a taunt. Maybe an offer—but probably a taunt, the way he brandished the pants like a flag.
Daemon was more concerned with peering up, straining for a glimpse of whoever had actually looked into the lava in search ofthe Cursed. He saw a face, dark curls, there and gone. Female, to match the voice, but then she retreated.
“What are they saying?” Eldrid strained forward too, his promised leathers apparently not as interesting as whatever was happening Above.
Another face appeared, the heat’s distortion doing nothing to hide the rich color of it. Not Fjordic, of that he was certain. There were occasional brunettes like this new brother, a redhead now and then like Elianne, but most of them were blondes, and all fair of skin. The long curls, lighter in color than the hair of the first woman—an interesting contrast, given the darker skin—indicated another female, but details of features he couldn’t make out.
Though the next face to appear he had no trouble recognizing, and what distance and heat hid in Isidor’s expression, Daemon’s imagination provided easily enough. He’d be furious—either at the man’s survival or the women’s calling out of it.
No one had ever looked over the side before. Never. Even Isidor, who surely knew what the flint blade had Awakened or not within them, didn’t ever check—likely because his protective ice melted too quickly, and the heat blasting up the volcano’s throat was too scalding. He simply asked during his next delivery of supplies whether his last victim was now daemon or cinders.
Something was afoot. Something odd.
Even knowing it, nothing could have prepared him for the sight that next met his eyes. Voluminous blue fabric fluttered, shapely brown legs strode into the air as if it were solid as glass, and the second woman halted there a stone’s throw from the edge. She said something about needing space and then glanced down toward the new man, who was staring upward, agape, clearly so shocked he didn’t even realize he was unclothed.
“Hey, Nik? Hang tight a minute. Kyrja just needs to do a bit of reorganizing up here, and then you can climb back up.”
Her words clarified a few things, anyway. Nik was the man—though if he kept to their usual tradition, he would choose a new name in the coming weeks, one that spoke to his new purpose. All of their names appealed to the idea of flame in one way or another.
Kyrja must be the other woman, the first to have peered down.
Valkyrja—the only remaining heir to Isidor. The weakling who stood in the way of the offspring Isidor meant to produce with Elianne. Apparently she was causing her father some trouble, and Daemon immediately liked her for it.
As for reorganizing? He thought he heard the word “challenge” shouted Above.
“Flames.” He turned to Eldrid. “Get him the leathers. We likely only have a matter of minutes before Isidor silences her and the attention of the lady in blue returns to Nik there. I daresay he’d like the dignity of being dressed.”
