“How would I know?” His lips scrunched up. “They’re drained. We’re not. Move on.”
Never. Did it hurt when it happened? The thought of Brodine and Reyla writhing in pain like they had at the Claiming made me want to curl into a ball and cry. Vexxion knew this. He let his father do it. “Whoever claims them takes everything they’ve got?”
“I don’t know much about it, actually. What I do know is that they get turned into real Nullens. Funny, huh?Nullens.All this time, we thought we had nothing when we had some unknown power the fae are eager to steal.”
Vexxion hadn’t drained me—not yet. A hysterical laugh gurgled up my throat, but I forced it back down. My draining would come soon since I was a gift for his father.
But that blink.
I couldn’t quite reconcile what he’d done in the throne room with that tell, assuming it wasn’t more manipulation on his part. He was clever, too smart when compared to a lowly orphan rider raised in a remote border fortress like me.
He’d played me, and I went along willingly.
Two other collared Nullens left the stalls on the right and strode past us, sending curious glances my way. More Nullens without enough power to make it worth the effort of draining? Maybe this was more common than I’d thought. Even the women who’d come to the suite with Reyla to unpack had chatted together. Their power hadn’t been fully sucked away either.
The king and Vexxion knew I had more to give than others long before I was claimed. Why bother to collar someone without much to drain? Too many questions without answers.
“We could run,” I said softly, after the other two Nullens had left the aerie. “Leave the castle and flee.”
“Not while we’re collared,” Will said. “Even if we could survive its removal, they’d hunt us. Track us down with dregs and kill us outright. Or bring us back to—”
“Back to what?” My brain flailed, trying to absorb everything he’d just said. Dregs were used to hunt us here as well?
He leaned close. “You’ve seen the creatures in the paintings. The ones forced into the front doors and everywhere else.”
“They’re real,” I breathed.
“Exactly. If you think being collared and working here is bad, try fleeing the castle, and you’ll find out what it’s like to be pinned and tortured forever. That’s what happens to those who misbehave.”
A shudder ripped through me. “Can they be freed?”
“You want to die fast, don’t you?”
“No, but they—”
Something banged near the entrance to the aerie.
Will’s gaze shot around wildly. He curled his finger, urging me closer, and his voice dropped to a whisper. “I wish I could do something about the collars and those trapped in the doors and paintings, but that would take more magic than I’ll ever possess. I don’t want to draw attention. You understand.” Straightening, he grunted. “I need to work. Go away. Find someone else to bother.” He scooped up some more leather oil and dabbed it here and there along one side of the saddle before rubbing it in with the cloth.
He wasn’t going to tell me anything else.
I slipped past him, limping to the end of the hall where I opened the gate to Glim’s stall. Inside, I secured the latch and walked over to the dragon’s head, holding his cheeks gently.
He huffed, showering me with sparks I batted away.
The gesture reminded me of Seevar.
That was all it took to slice me wide open all over again. I dropped to my knees, my thigh protesting the movement, and sobbed into Glim’s snout.
When I tumbled back onto my ass, he lowered his head onto my lap and huffed, thankfully without sparks, though at this point, did I care if I burned?
Actually, I did. I’d honed myself into a weapon from the time I was dumped at the fortress, and I wasn’t going to allow my edge to become dull now. I’d have to adjust my plan, but it hadn’t changed.
I had even more reason to kill the king now.
Drask soared in through the cliffside opening covered with a band of mesh and landed on the floor beside me. His beadyblack eyes locked on me, and he tilted his head one way, then the other.
I knew who he was spying for.
