He nodded. “I know…I know.”
“Please do not ask me to stay behind again.”
“I’m not!” Azriel sighed and pressed his fists against his eyes for a brief moment before dropping them again. “I just need you to know where I’m at” —he gestured to his head— “in here.”
At that, Ariadne closed the distance between them and knelt on the furs beside him. She pressed her lips to his gently. “Then you know whereIam at as well.”
Azriel hated that she worried about him as much as he did her. Hated that there was any reason for her to doubt him on the battlefield. But it made sense. They’d both been through so much that she’d now seen him at his highest…and picked him up when he’d fallen to his lowest. Now she stood beside him, prepared to accompany him into the next life if that was what they were called to do by Keon.
“I love you,” he whispered, kissing her again.
She hummed in satisfaction. “Until the very end?”
“Until the very end, my love.”
Chapter 25
Ariadne walked alongside Azriel as they reentered Monsumbra at dusk, her muscles tensing beneath her armor as they strode past empty homes and businesses. On the roofs above, dhemons stood at regular intervals with crossbows and throwing knives, keeping the streets clear of any potential enemy soldiers who wished to take advantage of their fewer numbers within the city limits. The closer they got to the main hub, the more of their people she saw.
This is where they would meet the Caersan army, then. Allow them to move through the streets in hopes of regaining the ground lost yesterday, and remove them from the equation altogether. There was a chance some waited within the buildings they had just passed, in fact, waiting for their orders to begin the battle.
A dark shadow flew overhead. Ariadne snapped her attention skyward to watch the dragon soar overhead. Reaching outthrough her vinculum, she found it to be Dhanin with Jakhov on his back. Not far behind, Lhuka flew past astride Venja.
“Don’t land if you can help it,” Azriel instructed when the third shadow passed by. Razer.
“You don’t have to tell me twice,” Lhuka said with Venja’s echo of agreement.
No, Ariadne did not think they needed such instructions. Not after what happened to Gavrhil and Rhun. What Lhuka and Gavrhil had been—friends, partners, or closer to siblings—she had no idea. She had never asked, but hoped to one day broach the subject with the dhemon. All she knew as she continued on her path to the town square was that Lhuka had been devastated by Gavrhil’s death. His mourning was equivalent to hers for Kall, and that hurt ran deep.
“Get ready,” Razer said. “I see them moving in from the west.”
Ariadne’s heart fluttered in tandem with Almandine’s somewhere in the nearby mountains, and she resisted the urge to glance up at Azriel as they both picked up their pace. They were not yet in position and wanted to head off as many of the Caersan soldiers as they could. If too many got into the city, they feared they could become overwhelmed despite the smaller number of night-bound vampires.
“How many?” Azriel asked.
The dragon circled overhead, then swept into the distance. The next moment, Ariadne’s vision was clouded by an image projected from Razer’s eyes, through Almandine’s, so she could see the soldiers alongside her husband. Whether this was a wise decision or not, it was too late to say.
Heart lurching into her throat as the image faded, returning her vision, Ariadne said aloud, “There arehundredsof them.”
To his credit, Azriel did not appear fazed. How he managed to keep his expression so neutral, she had no idea. All those nights accompanying her to balls and watching her dance with Lorenhad paid off: she could not read him at all as he digested the new information.
“This changes nothing,” Azriel said, projecting his words to every nearby bondheart. The smaller dragons that flew overhead, though they bore no riders, delivered the message to the dhemons on foot. “Stay together and donotlet them past the town square.”
The instructions were repeated aloud by dhemons across the city, their voices echoing in their language and broken common from those who stood nearby fae or lycans or mages.
While there were so many Caersan vampires ready to fight here in Monsumbra, that meant one thing. Ariadne picked her way through her connection with Almandine to follow up, “Our victory here will secure our hold on Eastwood Province.There will be no one left to fight in the smaller towns.”
Azriel turned his attention to her. “How do you know this?”
“The perks of being raised the daughter of Valenul’s General.” Ariadne pulled her sword free from its sheath. That anyone had even located the blade after she was nearly crushed beneath a pile of Rusans was a miracle unto itself. She now rolled her shoulders as she was wont to do anytime she squared up against Kall. “I may have slacked in my governess’s lessons, but I hear everything the officers would discuss at our dinner table. There are not enough soldiers to properly protect any of the provinces aside from Central.”
“Loren has been re-assigning men here,” Azriel reminded her.
But Ariadne shook her head. “Even if there are greater numbers than normal, most will be incapable of living through an actual battle. He is pushing his men through training too quickly.”
His red eyes shimmered with wonder. “You and Madan are too much alike sometimes.”
A grin spread across her face. “Thank you.”
