“Because I want to rip every bone of the War-Father apart for taking you away from us and making you someone I was supposed to hate instead of someone I was supposed to love.”
“Love?” I whisper. “Thats…”
“I’m notsupposedto love you, Cai,” he rasps. “Don’t ask me if I do.”
He hasn’t earned my forgiveness. He still tricked me, and he had no right, no matter what excuses he thinks justified it. But relief tastes so sweet that my anger stands no chance.
I reach up and grab his shirt collar in my fist, and drag his mouth to mine.
Roiven’s body slams back against me, pressing me into the wall as his tongue sweeps into my mouth. His anger and frustration and lust pound into my head. I let go of his collar and dig my hands into his hair, pulling on his scalp and kissing him back just as deeply.
His lips drag away from me and he pants, his breath hot on my skin.
“I have nothing to promise you.” One of his hands runs up my leg, until he finds my hip and grabs it.
“So what,” I whisper.
“I took a gamble you’d be on our side instead of against us,” he says. “That if you could just feel what I feel, if you just saw thesepeople through my eyes, maybe you’d give a shit about what happens to them.”
“I’m not heartless,” I mutter. “I care. The bond goes both ways—you mustknowI care. But how did you expect me to feel? I don’t want to be treated like a pawn.”
Roiven’s eyes darken.
“Of course you’re not a pawn,” he says, his voice so low it’s nearly a growl. “Haven’t you been listening to a word I said? The kraken, the most powerful of ancients, choseyou.You’re our long-lost Queen, and the future of this world depends on whether you care enough to do anything about it. So? Are you going to help me save our people, or are you going to run?”
34
Myhead is still spinning as I follow Roiven back up the stairs. Being some long-lost queen of these people, all because a terrifying beast in the ocean decided to latch onto me as a child, is so impossibly weird that I can’t believe him. And yet, I know he still can’t lie.
I don’t know that it makes any difference. I didn’t agree to be a queen any more than I agreed to be his wife. But Iknowtrying to reach a Hellion in a rowboat is idiotic, and if the Hellions aren’t coming here, I want to find out where they’re going.
The room he was in before is dark now, the door shut. We pass it and go all the way up to the caldera. Climbing the stairs back up to the top of the mountain uses different muscles than the ones I brutalized by riding Sava here, but my thighs scream with every step anyways.
“What’s Lusern?”
“A place.”
“Is it a secret?” I ask, trying not to sound annoyed, but his answer told me little I couldn’t have already guessed.
“Only to the Empire.” It’s dark on the staircase we’re using. Roiven takes a moment to press his hand to one of the stones and it slowly lights up in response, glowing at his touch. The shadows shrink away.
“And to me, apparently.” How can he say I’m a queen here, a statement that already makes no sense, if he won’t tell me the basic facts? Roiven sighs.
“This Tower used to just be a place for the dragons, their bonded, their families. A small community. After our last city fell, we Crafted one here…”
“I’m sorry,Crafted?”
“Torain and his brothers are Crafters. It’s their power,” Roiven says. I blink at his back and try to make sense of that. “They moved the earth to make spaces for us. Magic built all of this. That tree, in the coven room? It didn’t grow indoors. The indoors grew to hide it from sight.”
Rearranging a whole mountain seems like an immense amount of power. If he thinks my power is bigger, I’m bound to disappoint him.
“Most of our people moved here. But not everybody was willing to leave their homes. And some argued putting us all in one place made us too easy a target, even if we could concentrate our strength to defend it.”
“So Lusern is a village like we came from,” I guess.
“Bigger. Nearly three hundred people. But yes, it’s another hidden village.”
“Aria said Nor’s magic lets them speak with the people here. Can Nor see the Hellions, too?”
