Page 47 of Wings of Destruction

“Already?” Evie asks, half curse, half plea.

She wants me to ignore it but my blood goes sluggish the second I recognize the tiny scrawl on the front of the envelope.

The man’s thumb obscures the wax crest of our house. I don’t need it to understand exactly what’s written inside the letter.

“He’s been here a grand total of five minutes,” Evie argues.

Like it’s her place to do so.

I push the hair out of my eyes. “Sorry, darling. Duty calls.”

The server bows low and holds out the envelope for me to take, his arms straight, before disappearing into the bowels of the castle the moment the paper lifts away from his skin.

Evie’s indecipherable eyes take my measure. “You’re a busy man.”

My smile doesn’t touch my eyes. Apologizing, I make excuses to Evie and take off down the stairs, into the heart of DragonSpear.

A letter, already.

My heart constricts, stomach flipping like I’m readying for the next battle on the heels of the last. It has apparently taken Roman Ryson no time to script a message expressing his disappointment in me. I’d bet everything I have I’m right.

I crumple the letter in my fist and stalk down to my room on the third floor.

The false grin is still pinned in place when I stop in front of my room, pushing my thumb to release the brass lever and pulling the door open. Flames burn my midsection and my stillness breaks when Mozi’s presence fills my mind, awareness expanding.

Uh oh. What’s wrong, Kieran?

A message from my father. I scour my hand through my hair, grabbing the strands and using the bite of pain for clarity.

I check the corners of the room, the hidden places and the armoire near the door, but find nothing out of the ordinary. The mattress bows under my weight once I’m sure I’m alone.

The great curved legs of the wooden platform absorb my drop as I peel open the edges of the letter.

You know better than to let anything he says affect you.

Easy for you to say. You’re a dragon. You don’t get reprimanded by your sire, I reply.

No, but there are others more powerful than me, and they take great delight in crushing me underfoot. Mozi snaps invisible teeth in my mind before retreating.

Leaving me alone with whatever insults my father decided to bestow today.

My father’s usual tiny script is impossible to read and this time, he’s made it even smaller, extending the punishment to my eyes.

“You are my son and the expectations on your shoulders are greater than—” I read.

I groan and flop onto my back, holding the letter above my head. Great beams of sunlight from the wide arched windows let in enough of a glow for me to see motes of fluff from the bedspread dancing in the air. It’s also bright enough to make out the exact flavor of my father’s disappointment.

It’s a familiar taste on my tongue and down in the bowels of my stomach like it’s been written into my organs.

I scan to the bottom paragraph of the first page.

“You know better than to flaunt a survivor within the hallowed halls of the most elite academy in Manifest.” I affect my tone to be more like my father. “Your failure to properly dispose of the Fallkirk survivor shows a concerning weakness of character. Sentiment has no place in leadership. Tristan understood this—why can’t you?”

The words slice deeper than any blade. Because he’s not wrong. Sentiment did stay my hand. And now Morgan suffers for it.

Gruff, smoky, a timbre designed to give children nightmares for the rest of their days. It seems like every time he gets a whiff of me caring, he strikes, carving it out of me before the desire hooks in too deep.

Apparently, not killing the woman who tried to defy me by protecting the village children is a sign of weakness. Who would have guessed?