Prologue
Warm metal touches my neck. I don’t even have time to process that it’s a blade before Loa slices across my throat with it.
Pain explodes across my neck, and then I can feel warmth gushing out of me. I try to gasp, but the sound is a sick gurgling that hammers home the reality of what just happened. I press my palms to my slit throat, terrified by how quickly they’re covered in blood. I press at the wound and watch as Treno falls to his knees, his large hands clutching his own neck.
The realization that he’s experiencing some fucked up echo of what I am flashes through my mind as I press at my wound and wonder how the fuck I’m going to survive this. I blink slowly, and it’s as if the world around me has exploded. It’s hard to focus, because my mind seems to only want to be aware of the fact that I’m bleeding to death. I feel like I’m moving underwater as I try to comprehend what’s happening.
Panes and shards of shattered crystal come raining down from above me, and I fall to my knees, unsure if they are too weak to hold me up anymore or if the strong burst of wind in the room shoved me down. I feel pieces of things fall on me, but all I can really focus on is trying to press the escaping blood from my throat back into my body. I fumble for the skirt of my dress and shakily bring a wad of the fabric up to my throat and press it there.
I’m having trouble breathing, but I can tell some oxygen is getting into my lungs and brain because neither is screaming for air, or maybe my brain is no longer working right because of the blood.
A roar fills the air, but I can’t focus on the rage and retribution billowing out and surrounding me. All I can focus on is clumsily pulling more of my dress up and pressing it as hard as I can against my neck. I taste blood in my mouth, and for some reason, it sparks a flash of panic. I try to rein it in, knowing instinctively that keeping my heart rate down is better right now, but it takes root despite my efforts to crush it down.
I don’t want to die.
Black talons and skin drop down in my line of sight. They step closer to me, and I can just make out a black paw impossibly far behind the ebony forelegs of what has to be a gargantuan gryphon. I blink lazily, and my vision blurs. Something sniffs at me and nudges me gently, and I can feel strength draining out of my hands. A keening purr kind of a sound reaches out to me, and I want to go to it. More roars and crashes suddenly fill my ears as if someone just unmuted a battle scene in a movie.
I go weightless.
I know I’m dying. I can feel myself rising in the air, like my soul is finally leaving my body. I’m surrounded by warmth and surprisingly...pissed. I’ve never thought about what it would be like to die, but there’s no loved one to greet me. No calm or peace for my soul to float on as I make my way wherever souls go. There’s not even a light. There’s just pain and guilt and sorrow. All I can think, over and over again, is that I’m sorry any of this happened.
I know my death will pull the others with me, and it feels horrible.
I’m jostled, and my hazy vision blinks out altogether. I grumble internally about how the road to the afterlife shouldn’t have potholes. This shit should be gentle and easy; why does it hurt? Something wraps around me, and then the sensation of flying fills the last of my working senses. Peace finally trickles through me, but so does panic because this must be it.
I don’t want to die!
Everything around me grows quiet, and in spite of the cool wind I feel caressing my body, I’m warm all over. A flash of Ryn, then Treno, and finally Zeph streaks by the last of my consciousness before I can feel it finally start to shut down. I whimper, and death squeezes me tighter.
“Don’t worry, little sparrow, I have you,” it growls deeply into my ear, and then everything...goes...black.
1
I’m floating, but not in a soothing, calm kind of way. I feel like I’m floating in a vat of pain. It burns, and the sensation is draining. I would feel like a popsicle being dipped into hellfire, except the burning is cold. Instead of a searing sensation, I feel like a million needles are all trying to stab me at once. I get the distinct impression that something’s trying to settle in the cells of my skin, but for some reason it can’t, and now it’s angry and punishing me painfully for it.
I wait for the torture to ebb. For some reason, I know that it will, and that alone is keeping me from giving up and just saying fuck it.Am I dead?Because if I am, it sure does hurt, and it’s noisy as hell too. I focus on the angry voices swimming around me and try to make sense of everything going on.
“Why did you bring him here?” a deep menacing voice snarls.
“I had no choice, he’s her mate now too,” the other, normally smooth voice bites back.
“And how did you let that happen?”
“How did I let that happen? How didIlet that happen!” Ryn roars. “I should rip you apart right now. How I ever listened to anything you had to say is beyond my understanding. You forced her to leave. You knew she wouldn’t be safe, and you did it anyway! I didn’tletthis happen. You did!”
“Watch yourself. I am still your Syta!” Zeph barks.
The laugh that fills the void all around me sounds manic and angry. If every inch of me wasn’t currently frostbitten and hurting, that laugh would give me the chills.
“My Syta? You’re Syta of nothing. You were so busy looking for outside threats that neither one of us saw the one sitting right beneath our noses. We have no idea what damage my sister did to the Hidden. We don’t have the slightest clue what she told him, but if it was one word shy of everything, I’d be surprised. We have no chance against the Avowed now. They’ll know the entirety of what we’ve been planning. Lazza will be ready for every move we ever thought to make.”
“So we’ll start over,” Zeph states simply.
“Not with me, you won’t,” Ryn declares evenly.
“What does that mean? You’d walk away from everything we’ve worked for...for some female?” Zeph demands, his tone seething.
“Not for some female, for my mate. I listened to you and your poisonous thoughts about who she was and who she might be. I let your issues cloud the truth.”
