“No,” Jasyn whispered, his eyes stinging with tears. He leaped over to grab the rope, but Bron stopped him.
“Wait.” Jasyn fought back, but Bron’s hold on him was tight. “Look.”
Jasyn followed Bron’s gaze to where Iskra began moving. Jasyn thought then that perhaps the gods didn't show Kryth everything, because as Iskra ripped his head off, that smile from earlier was gone.
Twenty-One
Back on the ground, Jasyn barely basked in the glory before he was sliding on his knees to Iskra in her human form. She was bare, and he hugged her tightly, feeling her shivering. All that fire must have blanked out of her the instant she had killed Kryth.
“Iskra, my Sundrop,” he whispered as he stroked her auburn hair. Her real hair. He brushed the tangles out, begging for her to wake up.
This couldn’t be the end for them both. He had too much to tell her.
Bron knelt beside him, taking her wrist in his hand. Jasyn wanted to yank it away from him, but Jasyn saw how he was applying pressure.
“There’s a pulse,” Bron said.
Jasyn didn’t realize how much he needed that reassurance, because he shattered. His body shook as he tightened his hold on Iskra, never wanting to let her go.
Iskra woke up surrounded by warmth. A part of her thought she was returned to Slone, but her body felt too real, too mundane, to be with the Gods.
Her head pounded as she tried sitting up, but it was like she was tied down.
“I told Jasyn he tucked you in too tight,” a familiar female voice said.
Swaths of dark hair appeared in Iskra’s vision, and it wasalmostlike looking in a mirror. She realized then that everything seemed muted around her, like everything was washed in a hazy gray. She went to touch her eyes, but they were obstructed by a pair of eyeglasses. Her brows scrunched, but she ignored that for now, focusing on the person in the room.
“Esi…” Iskra’s voice was hoarse, her throat inflamed. She coughed, but that only made it hurt more, and Esi huffed.
“That’s what you get for being a dragon.”
Iskra ignored the jibe. “What happened?”
“Jasyn decided to bend the rules. He refused to kill you.”
“The Heart?”
“Is his,” Esi responded and crossed her arms. “With a little help from Bron along the way.”
Flashes of the Undertaking came back to her, but it was still a blur. She doubted it would ever clearly come back to her, not with the herbal drugs Kryth had pumped into her.
“Why was Bron there?” Iskra felt she already knew the answer.
Esi sighed. “His history with the minister runs deep, and he felt like the only way out of his situation was becoming king and inheriting the royals’ wealth.”
Iskra blinked rapidly, letting the words sink in. It made sense why Bron chose to enter. He had been no way out of his dire situation with his uncle, but it still left a shooting ache in her chest to think of Bron competing against Jasyn.
Iskra’s heart raced as she asked a question she had been dreading. “When are you and Jasyn going to be wed?”
Esi didn’t say anything at first, wringing her hands together. That was when Iskra noticed her fingers were empty.
“We are not,” Esi finally replied.
Iskra shook her head, unable to comprehend her words. “What do you mean you are not? That was the whole plan.”
“Jasyn and I decided to forego the arrangement, to follow our hearts instead.”
“Meaning?” Iskra pushed, and she didn’t care how harsh it sounded.
