Page 139 of Three Dark Kings and the Gilded Serpent

He flops to his belly along the ledge, his head to the ground, slumped low, his body only partially visible as he gives a long, sighing hiss.

I rub my temples, trying to process.

“If I am a—” I can’t even say it. “I have no way forward. Even if I knew how to remove a blood bind, I can’t safely touch Thyra to help her because of my fire. I need her to break the curse first so my fire is safe. But she clearly can’t do that until the blood bind is broken and—Fuck.”

Again, I thump my fist against the rock behind me.

I’m caught in an impossible situation with impossible options.

The dragon’s hide was a solution as long as I could wrap Thyra completely up in it. I can’t very well have her huddle beneath it with her arm outstretched and hope the rest of her doesn’t accidentally catch fire. Ugh.

Is that really my only choice? Or…

Or.

I find out what these runes on my arms mean and work on my own body first.

I clamber to my feet, sliding upward in the cramped space. My pants are in tatters, but I don’t much care as I climb the wall, my fingertips melting the rock to create handholds.

Minutes later, I emerge into the hot sun on the side of the ravine opposite my serpent. The way he’s lying, the charcoal scales on his left side are fully visible to me.

He raises his head and doesn’t retreat.

“I’m going to the Tol-Dakri,” I call to him across the narrow ravine. “I don’t expect you to fly me there.”

He huffs at me, then launches himself across the air toward me. I don’t insult him by ignoring his offer.

Leaping upward, I catch his left horn and swing myself onto his back before he soars into the air.

I can’t unsee the runes along his left side, marks that even now look like scars. They lit up when he revived and now the shapes are burned into my memory. As are the images along my arms. Some are the same between us. Some are different. Their intent unknown.

One thing I do know: Blood Fae originated from among the Tol-Dakri.

The Tol-Dakri’s fiercest warriors, the Merovians, developed blood magic out of necessity when dragons threatened to wipe out their entire tribe. The Merovians took down the fiercest dragons with that dark sorcery. It was blood magic that won the Battle of Fire Dragons.

Ortansia, the Tol-Dakri’s formidable leader, must have answers.

I scale the wall of the coastal city, where the Tol-Dakri live aboveground.

Before coming here, I went to my cave, where I retrieved a full set of clothing, including a hood and cowl with which to conceal my identity.

Once we got near the city, my serpent slithered into the dunes to wait for me while I ran on, carefully evading the smaller, tawny-brown serpents patrolling the sky.

Like the last time I visited, I’ve arrived at dusk, both a boon and a danger. Into the shadows I creep, praying my fire won’t light up and betray me.

Reaching Ortansia’s quarters, a humble clay building like nearly every other, I slip through the side entrance and toward the back rooms.

I make it ten paces.

Three daggers fly from the darkened room at the end of the hall, each blade shooting at a different part of my body: heart, throat, groin, fuck!

I throw myself to the side and down, evading the first two, only for the third to slide across my lower thigh, a deep cut. With a burst of flame, the wound seals, but the onslaught doesn’t end.

Swoosh-swoosh, the blades keep coming as I dart back and forth, running up the walls before I crash down toward my assailant.

Ortansia somersaults backward through the darkened room, landing at a crouch in the empty space between a table and the wall, two more blades in her hands and an arsenal of daggers strapped to her person.

“You were seen, Ember King,” she hisses, her long, deep-black hair and black clothing camouflaging her against the darker-than-normal room.