Encouraging him to take another drink, Constantin continued, “There was an attack on the solstice. Not just you, but every leader in the UTA. There’s a lot of evidence that it was coordinated by a militant faction of Glory’s Temple — some new version of the Ardeo — but actually linking the attacks has been difficult. It looks like every hit was planned by them but carried out by separate groups either hired or with their own motives. It’s been a fucking mess to untangle.”
The Ardeo?Taevas frowned. The Ardeo had once been a spectacularly powerful military branch of Glory’s Temple, but it’d been disbanded hundreds of years ago when the Collapse began. Since then, Glory’s Temple had taken a much less active role in politics and state games, but since they were the largest religious organization in the world, they still held considerable power.
None of that explained why they’d coordinate hits on all the leaders of the UTA, or how in the world Sergei was involved.
Dread coiled in his belly when he asked, “Deaths?”
Constantin set the empty cup on the bedside table with a sigh. “One.”
“Who?” Bile crawled up his throat.Please don’t say Teddy. He’s just a boy, and he’s freshly mated. Killing him… that’s too fucking cruel.
“Queen Sigrid,” Constantin answered, his tone grave. “She was shot in her home. Lee was attacked but came out fine. Sophie Goode was in critical condition for a while. She was just released from the hospital.”
“What about Teddy?”
Only his uncle’s small smile stopped Taevas from snapping at him to talk faster. “Yourprotegeis fine. He and Healer Goode were nearly shot at a solstice ceremony, but were saved by High Priestess Zaskodna and her mate, who broke open the whole mad plot.”
Taevas felt a little bad for the amount of relief he experienced, but he’d never been particularly fond of the old war bat Queen Sigrid, so it couldn’t be helped. He liked her daughter Astrid more anyway.
Relaxing a little, he said, “That explains a little bit of what happened to me. I was kidnapped, but something clearly went wrong. They weren’t prepared to hold me for as long as they did.”
The smile fell from Constantin’s face. “Our understanding is that the new Ardeo were working in collaboration with other groups. If they’d planned to pass you off or something, that could’ve been disrupted when everything was exposed.”
“I don’t know who else they were working with, but I know who kidnappedme.”
Constantin’s expression hardened. “Who?”
“One of Jaak’s offspring. A man named Sergei.” Taevas let out a long breath. “I don’t think he’s dead, so we’ll need to hunt him down. Shouldn’t be too hard. He’s a big blue bastard with gilded horns. Hard to miss.”
“One ofJaak’ssons?” Constantin looked as confused as Taevas had been. “We knew there was a dragon involved, but wedidn’t even think it could be connected to one of them. They’ve been quiet for decades. Was this all for revenge?”
Taevas tried to shrug, but the bindings on his wings made it difficult. “I don’t know. Things got a little messy when I tried to ask him about it.”
“I’ll let the investigators know. If he’s anywhere in the UTA, we’ll have him in custody within the week. If he’s flying… That might be a bit harder.”
Taevas allowed himself a grim smile. “He’s not flying. I injected him with the same suppressant he gave me.”
“That sure makes it easier.” His uncle shook his head, his salt and pepper curls swaying around his horns. He clapped his hands. “We’ll talk more, but for now we need to make sure you’re healthy. The ’Riik is fine, our enemies are on the run, and we have our Isand back. Everything else can wait.”
It very much did notfeellike everything else could wait. Taevas had a thousand questions, but the one on the tip of his tongue wasn’t about his territory or his people or the Ardeo, of all things. It was about Alashiya.
Before he could demand to know where she was, his uncle had already pressed a button on one of the many screens scattered around the large hospital bed. What felt like less than a second later, a small fleet of healers, nurses, and doctors swarmed the room.
Everything was a bit of a blur for a while after that as they asked him to wiggle his toes, take deep breaths, and stare into little pen lights. There was a lot of murmuring, and although everyone fawned over him and seemed palpably relieved he was awake, no one spoke to him about his injuries or recovery. Someone said something about getting him checked by a mind healer, and another made baffled noises about not being able to heal a scar on his right palm, but that was all he caught.
It was a storm of activity, little of which made any sense to him. They moved as a unit and, after assuring him that all was well, they left as one.
Exhausted and even more irritable than he’d been before, Taevas pressed the button to elevate his bed, which put him into a slightly more dignified sitting position.
It wasn’t comfortable, necessarily, but he didn’t feel the pain that came from having his wings wedged between his back and the mattress, so there had been many improvements since he was last awake.“Onu,”he began, quickly reaching the end of his rope, “where is my?—”
A knock on the door interrupted him. Letting out a sharp breath, Taevas gestured for his uncle to open it.
He supposed he should’ve expected it, but it still came as a surprise when practically his entire clan burst into the room. Purple and red and white and green and tan faces gathered around him in a swirl of activity and tears. Even the far-flung members of his clan had come to see him.
Everyone spoke at once, and he lost track of the number of one-armed hugs he received. A toddler was carefully hovered over him so she could plant a series of messy kisses onto his cheeks, her little red wings flapping with delight.
Taevas gratefully stroked Emilia’s dark hair out of her eyes and tried to summon a smile for her, but he couldn’t quite manage it. Paloma, his cousin Artem’s mate, gave him a worried look as she gently pulled her daughter away. While everyone else was overjoyed, only she seemed to notice that Taevas’s gaze couldn’t settle in one place for long, or that he grew more tense with every passing second.
