Staring at the fingerbone all night would give me nothing, so I grabbed onto it quickly.
It stole me away . . .
“You thinkssss you can hide from ussss?” a voice snarled.
Hide?
I peered around, but it was almost too dark to see inside the big cave. A lance of fear told me I knew this cavern much too well.
Kinart died here.
Then I saw Vexxion crouched behind a boulder near the looming cavern entrance.
“Where do you hide?” the billowing voice cried out.
The words raked through me, though Vexxion didn’t flinch. He huddled lower, tucking his head close to his crouched thighs.
“You can’t hide from me!” Blue flames erupted in the cave, turning night to icy day, revealing Iasar blustering his wings to hold position near the top of the cavern. Wind swept through me and across Vexxion, fluttering his dark hair.
He was not yet the man I knew, but he was also not the boy who’d hung on the wall in his wretched father’s dungeon while Ivenrail tortured him for information.
“Where issss my mate?” Iasar snarled, blasting fire against the roof, the walls, and even the boulder behind which Vexxion huddled. “What did you do to him?”
Vexxion lifted his arm, and his threads whipped out to encase him. He straightened and walked around the boulder to stand boldly below Iasar. His clenched hand held something, but I couldn’t tell what it might be.
“I didn’t do it,” he said, his voice strong but still higher pitched than that of the man I loved. From his size, I guessed he was twelve or thirteen.
“You did!” Iasar shot fire at Vexxion, but his threads protected him from harm.
He lifted his chin, and even now, I could see hints of the brave, heroic man he would one day be. “He stole the memory from me.”
“You . . .” Iasar’s snarl echoed in the cavern, cratered withenough pain to make me stagger and fall against the stone wall. “Amronth. Amronth.”
“I’ll fix it,” Vexxion said. “I promise.”
“You cannot. You are jusssst like him. Your tortured ssssoul matchessss your tortured sssskin.”
Vexxion sucked in a sharp breath and his hand rose, his fingers jerking back before he touched the scar on the right side of his neck. Despair flashed across his face before it tightened to a mask of indifference. His hand dropped back to his side. “I’ll find a way. I swear it to you.”
“Your word meanssss nothing.” His mouth a gaping, jagged-fanged maw, Iasar dove toward Vexxion.
Vexxion flung himself to the side, rolling across the rocky floor before coming up to a crouch near the boulder. “I had to do it. You know this.”
Iasar landed on the floor of the cavern but kept his wings outstretched. The dragon I’d thought was a friend and ally was actually an icy blue menace, a murderous beast who’d erupted from another world or time. He arched his neck and flexed his spine, making the jagged spikes jut toward the peak of the cavern.
His spiked tail whipped around and gouged the ground in front of Vexxion. With his claws raking the stone ground, he stalked toward the slender boy who remained in place, stoically facing the enormous threat with steel in his eyes.
He’d already been molded into the man I loved, the one who would sacrifice his very soul to protect everyone else.
Iasar might think Vexxion had hurt Amronth, but if he had, he was given no choice. He’d never told me if he could foretellor not, but he must be able to see something because he knew me right away, and he sensed what I could one day become.
He’d given me the spell to free Amronth and Iasar. This was one of the many reasons he’d brought me to Bledmire.
“You’ll die here,” Iasar bellowed.
“Don’t. Please.” Vexxion held up his hand. He flipped it over and revealed what it held.
“What good are bone coinssss to me?” Iasar roared. “They serve one purpose only.”
