Everyone is silent as my stepfathers and our other allies look on. Because we all feel we’re on the brink of madness now.
Darkness sweeping us in a fell tide—ready to devour us.
It’s Svanhild Magnussen who finally bustles in like the old Matriarch she is, getting Olander to help her levitate Bjorn up on their exhausted Bloodwinds, and get him some place he can rest and heal.
The gentle Bloodwinds of my stepfathers bolster me and my drakes up now as Trublut comes in to help me up with my arm around his shoulder. Khosh gets Ström up, and the fiercely gentle Vjen helps the Thorsen twins.
We’re all moving slowly as we head back to the dormitory hall where I had a room before, although a different room, since I blasted the last one out.
A sorcerous fire blazes in a brazier here, the room so similar to our original one that it seems like we never left. Ages have passed for me now, however, as my stepfathers and our allies get us settled, Bjorn in the large stone bed, resting.
Our allies leave, and it’s suddenly just my Bloodbond, as the fire crackles and blazes. True night has settled in; though our battle at Stockholm lasted just one day, it feels like forever, as we pick through a meal already sitting on the modest stone table.
No one is hungry, despite our famished state. No appetite fills us, with one of our Bloodbond so mercilessly torn from us. We sit on Bjorn’s bed now, monitoring his condition as we take turns pouring our life-force and love into him.
But we are no longer Bloodbonded to him, and he can’t pull from our strength the way he usually can. Because not only is our Bloodbond to Bjorn gone, his soul is trapped.
Inside the Usurper’s Void—lost.
24
FOUND
Isigh now as I cuddle up next to the unconscious Bjorn on the bed, laying my head on his shoulder. It breaks our Bloodbond’s tense silence; as Ström heaves a sigh and comes to me, Baldur sits quietly on the other side of the bed while the twins idle near the food.
“We will get him back, Rikyava. I swear it. And you know I don’t make promises lightly.” Ström touches my shoulder, sweet but sad. He leans in, giving me a brief kiss on the lips, saying everything our hearts know right now but our words can’t, because it just fucking hurts too much.
“Bjorn’s a fighter. He won’t be lost inside the Black Dragon’s Void. We’ll find him,” Mikkel says now as he and his sister come to the bed. An intense calm is in both of them, though they are tender as they take my hands, and Mikkel leans in for a short kiss. His kiss is gently dark now, a thing of beautiful midnight skies, as we share a brief moment. Lærke is fierce but tender as she grips my hand hard.
“We will weather this storm, sister. Nobody’s lost quite yet,” Lærke asserts, as she faces everything head-on with her usual determined fierceness.
“Even Bjorn’s not lost yet.” A strange look comes into Baldur’s eyes. Taking Bjorn’s pulse for the umpteenth time, Baldur goes deep into the Void yet again, seeing something there with his cosmic blue eyes that even I can’t. He draws a deep breath, as if fortifying himself for battle, then slowly lets it out. Flicking to me, his gaze is deeply serious.
Though a strange fire is in his eyes, with a flicker of excitement.
“Everybody out, to a separate room so we can recover. Let’s leave Bjorn and Rikyava alone for a while to rest.” Baldur watches me with his infinite blue gaze. Soberly, he takes me in, although iron is in his constitution as he weighs me, as if looking into my very soul.
And finding my true life’s purpose, at last.
“Stay with him, Yava,” Baldur says now, as he pierces me with his intense, endless look. “Find him where he dwells. Follow his essence, and use our united power, however much you need, as you traverse the most ancient skies. Find him; be with him where he is… and bring him back to us.”
I can’t understand what Baldur knows, as he stares me down with one foot in the cosmos now and one foot here with us. I can feel from him that even he doesn’t know quite what he’s sensing now, far out in the endless Void-skies. What I do know is that he’s sensed something about Bjorn, way out where we live and die in the Void.
And that something is important now, as he tells me to go there.
Soberly, I nod, taking his hand with a squeeze and thanking him for whatever he’s found. Because what I see in his eyes, as he leans in and briefly kisses me, is a glimmer of hope. Hope is what I need right now as I gently kiss him back, then my drakes and Lærke usher out.
So I can go find my First Drake.
And get him the fuck back.
I lay down naked beside Bjorn, as my drakes and Lærke leave the room. Though the fire in the brazier is enough to warm me, it suddenly seems drafty in the ancient abode, as the rest of my Bloodbond exit.
I cuddle close to Bjorn, snuggling under his arm now as I cinch a legup over his hip. I toss the duvet over us both, tucking us in as I cling close to him like a monkey.
I hope it tells him, wherever he is, that like hell am I ever giving him up.
Determination fills me now, rather than my loss of faith, feeling Baldur’s hope fill me, that we can get Bjorn back. Because Baldur has sensed something important; though I know Bjorn has been taken into the Black Dragon’s maw, I also know Baldur suggested I search for him in the regular Void, having sensed something there that might aid us.
