I snap my wings out, catching the current and levelling out. It’s jarring. All of it is jarring as land runs beneath me aggressively fast. I don’t even care where we are, but there is greenery and land and trees and I glide into it, tumbling to a stop on cool, dead leaves. I lie sprawled in my human form, then drag myself to my feet.
Xander’s mighty wing beats batter the branches above me, and I wait for my mates. Scythe and Savage drop down into the dark behind me, limber on their feet, coming close but giving me space. The sudden quiet tells me Xander has shifted, the heavy thump of his bare feet echoing in the small clearing.
They always come for me. My mates. The backs of my eyes burn, and I find the rough bark of a tree, grounding myself as I close my eyes, screwing my face closed to the world. It’s Scythe’s gentle voice that pierces the silence first. “What have you learned, regina?” he asks. “What did Mace’s general show you?”
There’s so much weight in that sentence. A weight I want to cast off like old armour. They need to know.
I swallow. “Ghoul has known me for a very long time.” Another swallow. “Longer than I ever could have guessed. He was the first occupant of the bungalow I was exiled to as a teenager. He…came across me shortly after.”
A moment of shocked silence passes. I don’t turn around. I keep my face turned to the dark.
“And you never knew?” Savage’s voice is so soft.
“Never.” There’s a sharp bite to my own voice.
“Turn around, Aurelia,” Xander says. Unlike the others, there is an edge to his voice. I cross my arms and remain turned away. I don’t know if I’m embarrassed, furious, or hurt. Perhaps a combination of all three. Perhaps one leads to the other. Where is Lyle when you need him? “Aurelia,” Xander says, stepping closer. “Look at me.”
I shake my head bitterly. Then heat, furious heat, lights up my back as Xander’s power spills from him and floods the area. My body stiffens, but I refuse to face them.
Xander’s guttural dragon’s voice strikes me where it hurts. “Why do you punish yourself for every fucking thing, Lady Boneweaver?”
I grind my teeth together. I whirl around, stabbing a finger at the naked chest that stands close to me. “Why does everyone think they canfuckinghide everything from me?”
Xander’s eyes flare gold, heat making the air ripple around him. Making the loose strands of hair fly on their own power. Helooks like a furious, wild dragon god. “You have secrets of your own,” Xander says, his guttural voice rippling over my skin. “If the basilisk lord hid things from you, that was his choice. You must respect that.”
“Oh, so he’s the basilisk lord now and not my father’s lackey?” I lean around him to stare pointedly at Scythe and Savage, who watch on with narrowed eyes.
My shark stalks forward to stand next to Xander, his own power flaring against the dragon’s heat. “Call him whatever name you desire, regina, but he cannot be trusted.”
“Are you implying that what he is showing me isn’t real?”
Scythe cocks his head. “Is that possible? To manipulate memories?”
“I’ve never heard of it. But he showed me a memory that would be impossible to fake. He was watching me from outside my bungalow window. I was fourteen, and it was the right brand of two-minute noodles. He wouldn’t be able to know what I looked like if he hadn’t seen me in person. It’s real. Everything was accurate.”
Suddenly, the pressure in the clearing escalates, and Savage’s low growl fills the air. Scythe stops breathing, and Xander’s nostrils flare.
I too go still, trying to figure out where this is coming from. “What?” I ask.
Xander cracks his neck. He reaches out with a finger and caresses my cheek. “I’ve never had the privilege of seeing you as a child in any life. What did he do to deserve that?”
My heart clenches, and I have to look away from him. I’ve seen them all as teenagers or younger in their memories. Savage had been in kindergarten in my first memory of him. “Can we stay out for a little bit before we go back?” I ask, glancing around. Savage, now in wolf form, rubs himself against my legs, and I scratch behind his ears.
“As you command, regina,” Xander says.
I have to side-eye him at that, but Savage then demands that I ride astride him like a horse while we walk through the empty bushland, and I have to oblige.
Chapter 62
Xander
Aurelia is asleep in Scythe’s arms by the time we get back to the academy. My senses tell me she’s not physically tired, but emotionally, as her mind tries to compute so many years of reframing. It’s theonlyreason my brothers and I ceased our fuming when she’d revealed Ghoul had been watching her as a merechild.
What a nasty shock. This whole time? This whole fucking time he’d been there? Watching her from the shadows, giving her food. He’d never touched her, by the sound of it, but the singular thought of his mere presence in the shadows of her past had us vibrating with rage. The minute we step foot in our suite and Scythe sets her down in Lyle’s arms, he rounds on me and Savage.
“Whatever you want to do to him,” he says, eyes near aflame with anger. “Do it.”
Savage almost leaps out of his skin in excitement. “Whatever we want?”
