“Are you real?” she managed in a voice so hoarse she barely heard it.
His face softened just noticeably, and he held out his hand. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
Her eyes narrowed at the man standing before her.
She remembered the stories of the Spy. Of the void that would plague your mind with tricks and consume your thoughts of what you wanted to hear, not the reality of it. Of how people would get stuck there in a realm that wasn’t their own, leaving their corporeal bodies to shrivel and die of hunger and thirst as your mind remained behind.
This wasn’t real.
She swallowed hard and looked at the figure before her, willing her eyes to look past the person before her.
I told you, Spy, she spoke to him.I. See. You.
A smile rose on Draven’s face, and his eyes flickered to solid black.
Darkness filled the forest once more.
Real breath returned to her lungs. It shortened as an attack on her body and she willed herself to calm, feeling the core of her raven push a comforting feeling through her bones. Her muscles felt of water against the ground.
Feet hit the dirt surrounding her. She jerked herself so quickly at the noise, she hit another root with her wrist.
The orange glow of fire lit up the dark as it had moments before. The real Draven stood over her, the same stern look she’d just seen on him in her vision plastered on his face. His fist clenched at his side, jaw tightened, and then he reached out for her.
She swatted his hand away and glared up at him. “Get your hands away from me,” she growled through clenched teeth. “You left me on this floor to be taken.”
“Would you have preferred for us to have interfered?” Draven asked with a tilt of his head.
Her nostrils flared in his direction, and she huffed shortly. “No,” she finally clarified.
“Look at that. A Queen not in need of saving,” Draven mumbled, eyes flickering to his men behind her as a ghost of a smile rose on his lips.
She wanted to slap his stupid face.
The men chuckled quietly, and Draven looked back down at her. “We were right here. Above you the entire time,” he swore.
Her fist clenched dirt in her palm.“And if I had been consumed by the Spy?”
“Actually would have saved me a bit of grief if you had.”
She heard a low growl emit from her own throat. He smirked and stretched his hand out once more.
“I’m impressed you knew him,” Draven mused then as she reluctantly took his arm. “How did you get out?”
Her jaw clenched as she was forced to put her arm around his shoulders so that she didn’t fall.
She hated herself for falling in his Forest.
“It’s—”
“Not my business.” Draven rolled his eyes and shook his head upon wrapping his hand around her waist. “Got it.”
It was the last she saw of his face before he plunged the fire into the wet dirt at her side.
“Come along, Spybreaker. We’ll all be consumed if we do not get moving.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
AYDRA PASSED OUT halfway through the night on Draven’s horse. Draven assumed she would, consumed by the exhaustion of her meeting with the Spy. He wasn’t sure how she’d gotten herself out of its void. In all honestly, he thought he was going to have to carry her coreless body back to Magnice, have to somehow explain it to her brother and the people of their kingdoms that he’d let the Queen be drained of her insides.
