Page 42 of Awakened Ash and Alchemy

“Who?” Gellar demanded. “A witch? An athame is a tool of their trade.”

“No. She’s not a witch. I’d know if she were.”

“Then what is she?” Gellar pushed.

Zarek shrugged because he didn’t know if she was a power or a curse dressed up with a sweet smile and different colored eyes. All he knew was the way her hands shook as she tied the scarf around his ribs, and how she held the pressure against his wound like she could push death itself back into the ground—even while terrified, she did it for him.

“Who, Zarek?” Gellar demanded again.

Zarek stared at him. But refused to answer.

He couldn’t.

Martar said it instead, “Angela Duboise.”

That’s when the entire world tilted on its side and the dragon in Zarek’s chest exploded, fully awake. It surged through him with a raw, violent, and ancient heat that filled his veins like molten liquid fire. Not the controlled burn he wore like armor, or the disciplined restraint he’d carried for centuries; this was unleashed from the depth of the soul he didn’t know he had, and it ignited the staves etched into his armor to glow in warning.

Zarek rose so fast the chair scraped hard across the floor to hit the wall, unable to contain it, as the deeply etched staves on his suit glowed from red, orange to white.

“Leave her alone.” His voice didn’t sound like his own, but it was embedded with a warning. “She’s MINE.”

The power roared like a possessive dragon that was feral and uncontrolled; it spread like a shockwave of unseen heat and power across the room. The heavy wheel chandeliers of flickering candles trembled on their chains, as dust rained from the beams and the air bristled with energy from his words that vibrated like an echo after an explosion.

Every brother at the table sat back, stunned—not by the words, but by the force behind them. Worse, every soldier in the Great Hall had fallen silent, too.

A Captain. Him. A Sworn Exarch. Not only was his armor glowing from the warning staves, but the flames and sparks that covered his leathers were flaring as if ready to battle each and every one of them.

Zarek stood with his chest heaving and fists clenched tight. He never lost control, but he had.

As the last echo of his roar bounced off the high stone ceiling, the horror punched through him for what he’d done.

He doused the flames, which silenced the staves on his armor, and without another word, he strode out of the Great Hall, with shame chasing him down the corridor like smoke.

But underneath his skin, the dragon paced like it could never be put back in its cage, now that the door was open.

It should have worried him, but it didn’t, because what bothered him more was that his brothers knew her name.

NINETEEN

“Into the Oaths Chamber. Now.” Gellar didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to. But his eyes landed on Martar like a command.

Damn. When Martar would rather go after Zarek, he joined the rest of the Sworn Exarchs through the stone corridors of the Keep, boots striking in unison as their echoes were swallowed by ancient wards carved into the high stone walls. The double doors at the end of the hall opened without touch or turn of a key, because entry was only allowed by recognizing the blood from their vow, sealing quietly shut behind them.

The chamber’s circular, smooth stone walls rose to meet the unseen ceiling. The side door was open, showing a room filled with shelves, heavy with leather-bound tomes older than the Accords themselves that made up the Hidden Hall of Histories.

In this place, they could talk freely, without fear of being overheard.

Agitated, Martar paced the center of the Oath’s Chamber, absently brushing imaginary dust from his leathers. He didn’t sit. Couldn’t.

“What in the realms was that?” Condorr dropped into a chair that creaked ominously beneath his bulk, pushing back his blond hair. “I’ve felt battlefield surges before, but that was bigger than all of them.”

Gellar took his place in the high-back chair and brushed over his graying beard in a habitual gesture of restraint to remain calm. “Martar, tell us everything you know about this female. No omissions.”

Martar exhaled slowly. Hands on hips, he faced the table that seated his brothers. “Zarek first heard her scream over forty miles away in the mortal realm. He answered it.”

Rocharde frowned, fiddling with his single gold hoop earring. “That’s not possible.”

“It happened,” Martar defensively snapped. “And it keeps happening. It’s like they can sense each other.”