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Lysander didn’t answer immediately. “Kage should be recovering,” he said finally. “The healers don’t know why he’s not. His body’s done it before—he’s a highblood and he’s strong—but it’s as if his power …” He shook his head.

I frowned. “What?”

Lysander lifted his head and looked over at me. He’d always had an ethereal quality to him. His features were so beautiful, his cheekbones so finely cut, his eyes so brilliantly blue and perfectly shaped that, all together, they might have been described as delicate. His long, silver-white hair was pulled in a bun. Strands had fallen out and hung around his face, softening his masculine features even more. He wasn’t a large man, though he was tall and long-legged.

I knew many people thought Orphos was the house of the weak. Those within its walls were considered odd and overly sensitive and were generally dismissed. In the grand scheme of things, Orphos had never seemed much of a contender in the battle for power in Sangratha. But I knew three things about Lysander. The first was that he’d stuck up for me at the Tribunal when no one else would; he’d said things that I had never expected from a highblood’s mouth. The second was that he’d competed in the House Leadership ceremony the year before I’d arrived; Blake said he’d always underestimated Lysander before that day, too. But when it came down to it, Lysander had utterly destroyed the other challengers, and he’d done it quickly and with finesse. Blake said he had made killing look easy. The third was that House Orphos had been helping to fund an uprising—so claimed Viktor Drakharrow, anyway. There was a saying in Aercanum that I knew was the same in Sangratha: The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

So now, when I looked at Lysander, I didn’t see someone weak. I saw a man who wanted to be underestimated so he could work in the shadows. I saw a man who considered himself my equal, even though he was a highblood and I was not. Someone who shared my pain. Someone whose heart was breaking just like mine after the long, terrible night we’d come through. Someone who didn’t have any easy answers for what might be coming next.

Lysander shook his head. “I don’t know.” He stood up suddenly, pushing back his chair. “I’m going to speak to the healers again.”

The door closed softly. For a moment, I stayed where I was. Then I pulled my chair a little closer to the bed. Kage Tanaka filled almost all the available space on the small cot. Like Blake, he was a large, powerful man. But now, as I looked down at him, I feared Lysander was right and that Kage’s power was being stripped away. He was so pale. His body was covered with so many bandages I could hardly make out the rise and fall of his chest. I’d heard that people blanched and heaved when Lysander had carried Kage in—just from the sight of those terrible wounds. I knew highbloods could heal, but it was hard to believe one could really come back from something like this.

Still, the look on Lysander’s face had told me this wasn’t about the wounds Kage had been dealt. Kage could be recovering. But something was holding him back—so what was it?

I leaned forward, resting my hands on the edge of the sheets gently, and lowered my voice. “Kage …” My throat tightened. The Avari wasn’t my enemy, but he wasn’t simply my friend either. We all needed him: He was a pillar holding up this broken world. “So, Blake is gone,” I said carefully. “You probably figured that would happen. He’s trapped with Vorago. He flew away.” I gave a little laugh. “Don’t ask me who he is, please. I have no fucking clue.” I swallowed. “Florence isn’t back yet. She and Nyxaris disappeared hours ago … And you probably already know we didn’t find Regan. She was gone when Lysander found you. Viktor disappeared, too.”

I tried to steady my voice. “Look, everything’s gone to shit—I doubt that surprises you much. Lysander and I are here, though. But Lysander looks … well, you’re scaring him, Kage. And that scares me.” I took a deep breath. “Because you can’t die. Do you hear me? All of us here need you. Too many things are falling apart already. You’re one of the only people who can help keep this place together.” My fingers curled into the fresh white sheet. “So I thought it was time I reminded you of something.”

I waited a moment, as if half expecting him to respond. “You owe me a favor. Remember that? You promised me anything. You agreed you’d come running, no matter when I called.” My voice broke a little. “Well, I want you to come running now. I’m calling the favor in. Are you ready? Here it is: I want you to live. I want you to heal. If you’re doing something to prevent that, if you’re trying not to … not to live, then I need you to fucking stop. Stop interfering—let yourself heal. Because you owe me, Avari. You fucking owe me, all right?”

I stood up abruptly as the door opened and Lysander came back in. He took up his position on the other side of the bed again in silence. “I’m heading out. I’m going to see if Florence is back.”

He nodded without looking up. I wondered what he’d talked to the healers about, but I guessed it didn’t really matter.

I walked to the door quickly, before the tears in my eyes could fall. Kage Tanaka was going to survive. He was going to survive because he had no other fucking choice.

Chapter 3

FLORENCE

The world was on fire. I could taste the ash, smell the smoke, see the flames far off in the distance—and I didn’t care. I couldn’t comprehend anything outside of the small circle of field in which I stood. I couldn’t see anything else but him.

I realized I was kneeling on flattened reams of grass. Neville had disappeared. My hands were still coated with emberfern sap. Shakily, I wiped them on the clean grass by my sides, never once taking my eyes off what was happening in front of me.

He rose up like a resurrected god. I’d never known a god before. But I was pretty sure this was as close as I was ever going to get. Earlier that same night, I’d learned a man could become a dragon. Somehow I’d never dreamed a dragon could become a man.

But here Nyxaris stood before me. On two legs. And very, very naked.

The realization was vaguely disorienting. Dimly, I felt my cheeks flush—not with embarrassment but with awareness. Of the sheer, unapologetic fact of him. His skin. His heat. His wings. They were still there, obsidian and vast, stretching wide enough to dwarf the ruined field around us. He was huge—tall, broad-shouldered. Big in every aspect from head to toe … not to put it in an overly vulgar or specific way. And yet, his wings were bigger, now unnaturally large compared to the narrow frame of his body. They should have been too heavy to be borne, but he held them easily, anchored to his back as if some law of nature had been rewritten just for him.

I belatedly realized his eyes were locked on mine. They were still amber, still glowing with a draconic fire. That much had not changed.

“Fireheart.”

I flinched. His voice was the same … yet different. Deep but more mellow. I studied those eyes. I had always known them; they hadn’t really changed. They had watched me from above, patient and unyielding. At turns gentle, at others terrifying. I tried to stand and failed, falling back trembling, my wrists weak from the effort.

Nyxaris moved at once, suddenly next to me. His hands closed around my waist, lifting me upright, steady and warm. Then they were gone. His face was uncertain. Silver-white hair hung loose and long around his face. Such a pale silver shade was the sign of an ancient highblood, but his skin was smooth and unlined.

Before I could stop myself, I’d lifted a hand and brushed a strand of his hair back, tucking it behind his ear. As I went to lower my hand, he grasped my wrist and looked down at it, as if as amazed by me as I was by him. Which was, of course, impossible. Because this man had been alive for hundreds of years. Yet in appearance, he looked no older than Professor Rodriguez.

I felt the blush on my cheeks deepen. Nyxaris was naked … but there was absolutely nothing vulnerable about him. I was the one who felt vulnerable. I’d never felt so small, so weak. So mortal.

“You’re very tall,” I said weakly. He smiled slightly, still grasping my wrist. I didn’t pull it away.

He might not have been a dragon—not fully—but he still was large in a way that seemed to retune the space around him. I had to tilt my head up to meet his gaze, my neck slightly straining. And yet it seemed the way it should be. This man, this being, was an impossibility. I stared at his chest. His skin was warm and golden and covered with swirling curls of hair. Celestial-looking silver tattoos trailed over his upper body. Crescent-moon patterns were drawn on each of his upper arms. Symbols of House Avari. His body was built for power, his frame large yet still innately elegant, even graceful, despite the broad expanses of muscle and sinew. I looked up at his face: cheekbones anyone would kill for, an arrogant brow (but who would expect anything less?), his mouth beautiful and stern. But when he smiled …

He shifted slightly, and his wings moved with him. I sucked in a breath. I couldn’t decide if he was more dragon or more man in this moment. Despite how familiar parts of him were to me, he was different. His eyes were molten and bright. I felt pinned in place, like a rabbit held under a fox’s gaze. I felt suddenly, acutely, painfully self-aware. Small, battered, smelling like blood and smoke and sap, the leather armor Visha had dressed me in now embarrassingly sticky with sweat, hot and heavy where it clung to me.