Fates, I just wanted to get out of here. This place made my skin crawl.
I shrugged. “A quick one, perhaps.”
He strode to his liquor cart and pulled the stopper on a bottle of clear liquid. Pouring a generous serving into a glass, he turned to me with a smile. A dangerous, feline glint shone in his dark eyes. “You’ve done well, Nox. Perhaps a visit with your sister is in order.”
The words jolted through me, eliciting a sharp inhale as my spine straightened. Inwardly, I cursed myself for giving him any sort of reaction. It only fueled his control over me. But to see Vera again?
I hadn’t laid eyes on her in five years. Not since my mother tried to break her out of Scarven’s cells and was banished from the province. I hadn’t seen my mother in that long either, but I knew where she was. I had Kieran hunt her down so Scarven wouldn’t suspect anything. Mother was safely harbored in Tenebra, as close to our border as she could possibly get while still obeying Scarven’s commands to stay out of Drakorum.
Scarven’s men were watching her, though. Always watching. Alwaysright thereto suck any happiness from my life. So I still hadn’t seen her, but at least I knew she was alright. Desperate, longing for her children, probably riddled with anxiety…but alive. And I would bring her back home one day to reunite with Vera and me if it was the last thing I did.
Vera, however…I may have lived in this wretched mansion for many of my teenage years, but my sister had beenraisedhere. Her first word was spoken in these halls. She took her first steps in her captor’s manor. All because Scarven feared she would turn into something likeme. A dragon. A rarity. A weapon.
He never imagined she would be so much more.
If Scarven had it his way, she wouldneversee the light of day again.
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Nox?” he drew out my name and handed me the glass. “To see her again. That can be arranged, of course.”
I gripped the edges of the glass, reining in my emotions before my hand could shift into a claw. I merely dipped my head. “Thank you, Scarven.”
His smirk slipped into a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. Stretching out an arm, he touched his glass to mine, sending a sharpclinkthrough the small room. “To loyalty, my brother.”
I held his gaze. “To loyalty.”
6
Devora
Crash.
I shot up from my bed, mind foggy and heart pounding. I squinted in the dark for the sudden sound. Half of me hoped to see shadows curling around my body, finally showing themselves after months of silence.
No such luck. Just a bundle of twisted sheets, a frame knocked off the armoire, and an empty room.
But when my gaze slipped further down, a four-legged shadow stretched across the floor. It was unnaturally long in the moonlight. It crept forward inch by inch, its silhouette clawing toward me in silence.
I held my breath, pulse racing.
A small, tan and black-speckled head peeked its way around the corner of my bed.
“Holy Fa—how do you keep getting in here, girl?” I clutched my hand to my chest. The cat rubbed against the leg of the bed and flicked her tail in greeting.
She kept showing up, even when I knew the door was locked tight. Trust me. I’d tried it countless times, hoping to catch that pesky force field unaware.
“Did you come back to see me, little friend?” I cooed. I held outa hand, and she jumped onto the bed. Sliding her soft head under my fingers, she arched her back and purred louder. I chuckled as it vibrated up my arm. “Myonlyfriend, it seems.”
Her first visit was a week after I’d arrived. Those glowing yellow eyes staring from the dark had nearly stopped my heart. Since then, she came and went, sometimes vanishing behind the tapestry by the bathing room. I’d examined the wall, but couldn’t find anything out of the ordinary. It was simply a solid wall.
But I knew better than to trust anything in this magical empire. In Mysthelm, it might’ve beenjusta wall. Here…it was probably an invisible door that could only be revealed by the blood of a virgin on a full moon.
“You sure do like scaring me, Jaggy.” I ran my hand through the silky fur of her neck. I called her that because she looked like a miniature jaguar I’d seen in picture books. I thought she approved. “You knocked over the?—”
A click sounded from the door, stopping me mid-sentence.
I tossed the sheets aside and threw my legs over the bed, slowly padding across the floor. A small sliver of candlelight came from beneath the cracked door.
My eyes widened. I pulled on the handle and cautiously held out my palm to the empty space, waiting for the shock of magic to punch me back inside.
