Chapter One Hundred and Three: Myla
Iquicklyshoveakey into one of the latches of the muzzle, but it jams, not pushing far enough in to unlock it.
Sunis’s wings flare as she stomps her feet, a muffled roar blasting heat past me. I tug at the stuck key with a frustrated growl, my adrenaline making my muscles shake and focus blur.
“They’re coming,” Navin says unhelpfully.
Sunis jerks against the restraint, tugging the stuck key from me and nearly knocking me down in the process. Behind us, dragons begin to stir, the sound of their claws lazily scraping against stone only making Sunis more restless. Her head snaps to the side, her gaze locking on where her mother still lies motionless, in a sleep somehow deeper than the others. Did the mages already get to her? Force her to bond with someone new after two hundred years?
“Sunis, come here,” I coax, my voice harsh enough to draw her gaze back down to me. “Let me get it off of you.” The keys dangle on the key ring as she swings her head side to side, the movement slowing until she finally lowers back down. My fingers wrap around the cold metal at the base of the key, and I brace a foot against the muzzle as I tug as hard as I can. It finally budges, sending me stumbling backwards, and right into Navin’s steady hand at my shoulder. Reaching for the next key on the ring, I quickly slide it into the lock. The click that rings out is satisfying, but I don’t get the chance to celebrate it. The voices behind us grow louder as I slip the key into the second latch, and then the third.
“Fuck, Myla—”
“We can do it.”
The fourth and final latch pops open, and I drop the keys to the ground as Navin and I pull the two halves apart, creating enough space for Sunis to shake her head. The muzzle crashes to the stone as it falls from her, her answering mighty roar reverberating through the air. The jostling of chains and dragon chuffs join the cacophony, and when I turn around, I spot the owners of the voices we heard moving directly towards us. The guards and King’s Riders are far enough away still that their faces are nondescript, but that won’t be the case soon enough.
“Let’s go.” I look over at Bali, but the black dragon must have been given a massive dose of belladragis, because despiteeverything that’s transpired, she’s still asleep. I tamp down the urge to unlock her chains. I can’t do anything to help her right now, but Icanget Sunis out. “Come on—”
“Myla—”
“What?” I snap, bracing myself as I reach for my discarded sword, eyeing the blades I threw but deciding to leave them embedded in the bodies they felled. Navin gestures for me to look back, and when I do, I find Sunis with her head lowered and her eyesglowing. Not with the normal yellow hue that all dragons have a variation of but withwhite. Pure, glittering white illuminates the entirety of her eyes, the gleam so bright I have to squint. “What is happening?”
“It’s the bond,” Navin whispers, awe and disbelief heavy in his voice. “She wants to initiate the bond.” My stomach flips, my fingers trembling as I let his words settle within me.
“Halt! By order of the king!”
Shit. I stare at Sunis, my hand aching to reach out and touch her, and I lift it about halfway before I take stock of the chaos around us. Spinning, I grab Navin and push him at Sunis. “You need to get on her and hide. Pull your mask up.”
“I can’t touch her when she’s ready to bond. It could sever it completely.” He shakes his head, tugging on his mask to show me that the fabric was shredded in his fight with Anya before reaching for a long dagger strapped to his belt. “Fuck, this is going to hurt.” My eyes flare wide, but he moves too quickly for me to intercept, plunging the dagger into the side of his torso, letting out a yelp as he falls to his knees. “Go,” he huffs out between labored breaths. His hand cups around the blade, putting pressure there. But it still leaks crimson, the sight inducing an unfamiliar amount of panic within me. “Myla,go!”
The footsteps of the running guards are right behind us now, and before I can second guess or allow myself to feel bad, I kick Navin at his shoulder, sending him sprawling backwards. Ifwe’re faking an attack, it needs to look fucking believable. Then I reach out for Sunis, my intent to climb up her leg and onto her back. But the moment I touch her, my entire world tilts. Black veils me on all sides, only peripheral white flashing as my stomach hollows to the sensation that I’m falling. Air rushes past me, the sound of it like when I’m flying on Lan’s back as my hair stirs around a phantom wind, and then all at once, it stills, and there is nothing but darkness.
“Welcome, Myla Ryuu, Princess of the Fae, Shadow of Khargis, and the First Bonded.”
A female’s voice—soft and lilting—trickles in my ears. It carries with it a soft caress of fingers against my cheek and the scent of something light and floral—jasmine. Am I asleep in the cavern that Aria and I meet in? No. I had been in a different hollowed out space—the enclosure with Navin. Attempting to rescue Sunis.
“Open your eyes, Dragon Queen,” the female says with another brush of gentle fingers. My mind is slow to catch up with what is happening. The voice and the touch. The fact that my eyes are even fucking closed. The information trickles to me one piece at a time. “Open,” she coaxes again, just as something brushes over me, tickling my arms and legs.
Someone is touching me.The thought wrenches my eyes open as I lurch up to sit, my curved blade already in my hand. My arm trembles with the anticipation of incapacitating someone, except I’m only met with an expanse of darkness. Darkness dotted with flecks of silver and white that glow as brilliantly as Sunis’s eyes did and flicker as if they are breathing in the distance. It’s a night sky, except I’ve never seen so many stars glow like this before.
I twist my head, taking in more of the same scenery. Miles and miles of an unending night sky. It is beautiful and completely unnerving because I have no clue where thefuckI am.
“Hello, Myla.”
A shiver races down my spine as I lift my blade in front of me, trying to stand but finding that my legs feel too heavy to move. The jasmine scent thickens, and when someone clears their throat behind me, I turn on my knees towards them, coming face to face with a pair of bright green eyes. “Who the fuck are you?” I ask on a breath as I take her in. Her fair skin is stark against the black satin dress she wears, the fabric reaching down to the tops of her feet. Golden hair frames her face, its soft waves cascading past her shoulders to her mid back. She stands perfectly straight, her expression somewhat serene as she looks at me. Pain throbs at my temples, my eyes narrowing as my palms begin to grow clammy. “Isaid, who thefuck—”
“I cannot answer, and we don’t have time,” she interrupts, taking a step towards me that I try—and fail—to move away from. The woman lifts her hand, and I’m pulled into a standing position, though nothing is visibly holding me up. “I have a message for you.”
“A message?” My eyes scan past her to more of that same night sky in the distance. It’s ethereal in its beauty, unlike anything I’ve ever seen in the Fae Kingdom. Everything about this place is, including the female in front of me. “Oh,fuck,” I whisper, realization hitting me as bluntly as a hilt to the temple. “I’m dead. I died while trying to bond with Sunis.” Anger surges as I drop the hand holding the blade to my side, blowing out a frustrated breath. I would fuckingdiebecause of the bond. This place is my purgatory, an endless expanse of boringnothingnessfor me to suffer for eternity in.
“You’re not dead,” she says, cutting into my thoughts, her tone amused. “And if it will help us move this conversation on more quickly, I will tell you that this place is a pocket of space between worlds.”
I blink, my brows drawing low as I repeat her words in my head, somehow more confused than before. “Did you bring me here?”
“No. And yes.” She lowers her hand just as I flip the dagger in my own. “You should know that you can’t kill me here—” The dagger sings through the air as it flips tip over hilt, sailingthroughthe woman. She stares at me with less amusement than a moment ago, her lips pinched in a straight line. I look at the spot the dagger passed through her body, not so much as a scratch or hint of the blade cutting her.
“Are you a goddess?” The question slips out, leaving room for fear to replace it within me. I did not believe in them, but wouldn’t it be just my luck to fucking meet one upon death?
