She held him tighter. And finally, the wordsbroke loose from her throat—shaky and breathless and soaked in guilt and rage.
“They didn’t do it because they were afraid.” Her voice cracked on the last word. Midas lifted his head slowly. She looked down at her son’s bruised cheek, her tears falling soundlessly onto his curls. “They didn’t cut his horn to protect themselves. They didn’t think it would stop him from becoming like you. They just…wanted him to suffer.”
Midas said nothing. He didn’t need to. She could feel the tension rolling off him like smoke. But she couldn’t stop. The words kept coming, hot and shaking.
“I should’ve stopped them. I should’ve fought harder. I should’ve let them kill me before they touched him.” Her body began to shake. “I couldn’t move—I couldn’t save him—” She bent over, folding protectively over Kalen’s small body, sobbing silently. “I let them hurt our baby.”
Midas finally moved. He closed the space between them and held her to his chest much in the same way she cradled Kalen. His long tail curled around them all.
“I flew so fast I tore the wind apart, but too slow to stop his suffering.” His gaze went to the children, his breath shallow. “I failed to protect. It is what I was made for but when they needed me, I wasn’t there. They knew it would not grow back. They knew it would mark him. They knew it would remind us how cruel they are.” Elowen flinched, her hand pressing over Kalen’s curls again. “They wanted him to feel the missing bone, to feel shame for how he was born.” Midas’ voice trembled. “That is not justified fear. That is evil.”
Elowen whispered, “Will he remember it? Thepain?”
“Yes.”
She swallowed hard.
“But not just that,” Midas said. “He will remember that you held him. That I came. That he is ours. That he survived.”
Her lips trembled.
“You gave him love,” Midas said. “I gave him fire. They may take his horns, but the world cannot take those things away from him.”
“I want to kill them,” Elowen whispered suddenly, shaking. “I want to tear them apart.”
“You will not have to,” Midas said, softly. “Watch over our boys. Rest. When you wake, there will be nothing to fear.”
Midas left just before dawn.The air was still. The stars beginning to fade into the violet-blue veil of morning.
When he reached the edge of Elowen’s old village, he did not speak. He did not land. He did not offer warnings. He simply flew over the gates and unfolded his fury on a village he should have wiped out the day he rescued Elowen from them. His wings tore through the sky like the unfurling of judgment. His roar cracked the hills. Doors slammed open, and people screamed.
He came down like the ancient God of Flame, claws slicing through wood and bone alike. Fire bled from his mouth in torrents, licking across rooftops, sweeping through crops, searing flesh from fleeing bodies.
He spared no one. Not the men, not the women, not the children.
They burned. They all burned. And by the time the sun crested over the trees, the village was gone; reduced to ash. Buried. Erased.
Midas did not linger to revel in the carnage, for there was nothing left to see but scorched grass and crumbled stones.
He returned to his den before his family woke, his wings black with soot. His claws stained dark. But his eyes were soft again the moment they saw Elowen and his children.
She stirred as he entered the cave, blinking awake, her body still aching and raw. Her eyes flickered to the evidence on his wings and claws, but she did not speak. She knew what he had done, felt it in her bones.
And she wasproud.
Thirty-Seven
One Moon Later
The twins were fighting again.
They had been increasingly restless. Their play had turned rough and their sleep turned fitful and short. They growled, low and angry when things startled them. They flashed teeth at their mother. When Midas approached, tiny embers of fire flared from their mouths, and smoke curled from their noses when they didn’t get their way.
It was getting harder to soothe them. Impossible, even. Kalen, the stronger and larger of the two, lashed out quickly and often, especially when Elowen tried to tend to his scarred horn.
They had grown quickly after the attack at the lake, the fear forcing them to develop quicker. Kalen often snapped when Elowen asked to see his wound, and Auric would often stand between them as if their mother would bring more harm.
“Don’t touch me!” he’d scream, throwing the salve across the cave, breaking the clay jar against the stone wall. When Auric turned to comfort him, he’d push back, yelling at his twin: “Leave me alone! Your horns are still there!”
