“What happened?” I asked.
“Memory. Bad one.”
“I’m here,” I said. “And you’re here with me. We’re alive, we’re together.” I soothed the wrinkle he’d made with his brow, until his eyes closed, his breathing slowing. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.”
“Lyr,” he breathed softly. His eyes were closing, but there was still some tension in his body.
“Rhyan,” I said, shifting my hand to massage his back.
“Even after I fall asleep,” he whispered, his voice shaking. “Will you still hold me a little longer?”
“I’ll hold you, even while you’re dreaming.”
Golden light emanated from my chest, the Valalumir inside of me had awakened. I drew the blankets up over his shoulders, holding him as close as I could. And when the light faded, his breathing even, I closed my eyes, too.
Chapter
Thirty-Seven
RHYAN
By the Gods. By the fucking Gods. My chest tightened with such visceral pain, I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t breathe. Fuck. Fuck. Everything hurt. Every limb, every organ, like I was being torn apart, sewn back together and ripped through again.
“What’s going on? What the hell is happening to me?” I cried out.
Auriel appeared, my mirror image, except with hair the color of gold, and skin nearly as tan.
“What is this?” I clutched at my chest. “What’s wrong with me?” I asked.
“Nothing,” he said. “Just your memories coming back to you.”
“But I haven’t forgotten anything.”
“No, but you didn’t cross over, you still have to experience them.”
I shook my head. “Why does this hurt so bad? What memory is this?”
“It’s the night you died,” he said solemnly. “I’m sorry.”
“No. NO! ” But there it was again. The Nutavian Katurium laid out before me. Tears filled my vision so completely, I could barely see. I could hear the screams in the stadiums as I approached, the yells coming from the Palace prison fading behind me. The chains around my legs and arms clinked and clanged with each step I took.Dust flew at my heels, further fogging my vision as I was led into the center of the arena.
The curses were coming now—the calls for my death, the condemnation, the insults. They rained down on me, growing louder and more insistent with each step. Rising to a crescendo,my father pushed me up onto the dais, my heart thundering so loud, for a moment it drowned out the noise.
Lyr. I was thinking of Lyr. Her name had become a mantra, a prayer, one I was making to her, to a Goddess. I wasn’t praying for her to save me. I was beyond hope for that. But for a distraction—some comfort—a moment to forget the pain coming for me, the humiliation, the debilitating fear.
Lyr, Lyr. Lyr,please.
But the roar of the crowd was too much, too loud, too powerful, and too violent. It pulled me back into my body. The chains were removed.My armsfelt heavy, almost useless as they were lifted over my head and strung up, tiedto the stripping pole. A soturion came up behind me, and I heard the rip of my tunic, felt the material bite into my flesh as it was torn away. My back was exposed. My tattoo on display.
I could almost see it in my mind, as clear as the day I’d gotten it. The gryphon—the one that had saved my life, helped me escape Glemaria, and the rope around its leg. The torn rope. The symbol of my own strength and will, the power I’d clawed and fought for.
A very different kind of rope held me down now. And with my power bound—and the chains still wrapped around my feet, I knew it was the last one. The last rope.
The one I’d never tear through.
I was shivering now, my entire body shaking with cold. There was a breeze in the air carrying a chill from the shore that lay beyond the Palace. But that wasn’t what was leaving my body trembling. Being from the North, this kind of cold was somewhat warm to me.
No. The shivers covering my skin came from my growing fear.
