He turned and walked away from her then, leaving her words stuck in her throat. She inhaled a deep breath, hating that he was right.
“Then I must send word to my sister and Second. Let them know I am okay,” she called to him. “It would have been Lex’s responsibility to make sure I came home. And my sister… She is likely terrified. I do not know where she is.”
“We do,” came Balandria’s voice. “She’s in the Village of Dreams.”
Aydra eyed Balandria’s smirk, and if she could have crossed her arms over her chest, she would have.
“What’s wrong, Sun Queen? Didn’t think women Hunters would speak such to you?” came Draven’s voice as he started helping again with bags of food. “Balandria is my Second, and also our fiercest fighter. Be glad it was Dunthorne who was with me on patrol the other night and not her. Your princess would now be Queen.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“WHAT EXACTLY IS it you trade with?” Aydra asked Draven later when he brought her dinner.
Draven shrugged. “Why? Planning on telling your brother our secrets?” he asked, his fingers strumming on the cup.
“Despite what you think, Venari King, I do not tell my brother everything.”
A smirk rose on his face, and he sat up, elbows sitting on the table. “Do I sense a feud between Haerland’s most loved brother and sister? Squabbles between the perfect pair?”
Aydra gripped the cup in her hands.
“Do tell, Sun. I’d love to hear it,” he said with a smug wink.
A flash of blue flames poured through her memory, and she blinked to push it from mind. “It’s not your concern,” she managed.
His smirk widened. “I knew there was something not perfect about those banquets. Not everything can be that grand all the time.”
“And here?” she mocked. “Is everything always so ‘family first’ as you like to put it?”
Draven took a long swig of his drink, his eyebrows raising. “Generally yes,” he said. “We usually settle arguments with challenges. Duels. But, if you must know, those that have problems with our ways are usually of the Infi. And we do not let them walk among us.”
“Are the Infi not your brethren?”
Draven’s cup slammed into the table.
A wild look of anger flashed in his green eyes. “They are not my brothers,” he snarled.
She felt a brow raise on her face and she slowly sipped her wine. “And here I thought Venari King meant leader of all Duarb’s cursed.”
He avoided her eyes, jaw clenching at her statement. “The Infi are nothing more than savages, only living for themselves—”
“And that is different from Hunters how?” she interjected.
His gaze met hers and he stared at her for a long enough moment that she felt her weight shift.
“You know nothing of my people, Sun Queen,” he said in a hauntingly quiet voice. “Nothing of the sacrifices we have made defending your own kingdom. Did you even know about the ship that arrived on Lovi’s shores almost three weeks past?”
Her eyes widened. “What?”
“Exactly.”
“What kind of ship?”
“The enemy kind,” he replied shortly. “The kind carrying strangers and disease. With men not of our own, not of Haerland, suited up in armor and carrying weapons made from minerals not of our land. Men who were not created or sprung from the land, but rather of each other. The kind of ship that only means there will be more, and if we are not vigilant, the kind that will take over our land without question.”
Aydra swallowed hard. “What happened?” she asked.
“We took care of it. With the Honest,” he answered. “Fighting alongside those not of our own is something we do here in the southern realms.”
