“Well, at least I can back mine up.” Ericen’s voice rose, floating down to where Res had started picking pieces of grass free with his beak. The crow perked up, indignation flashing down the cord.
With a huff, he snapped his wings out and leapt up to the next terrace, and then the next, not slowing as he ascended level after level. Then, as he landed on the one before us, he beat his wings in a powerful flutter and flew over our heads. He nearly smacked Ericen in the face with his tail, but the prince ducked in time.
Res flapped his wings, catching a draft that carried him up and out. He soared over the valley. An undercurrent of sheer joy hummed along the connection.
I only realized I’d closed my eyes and lifted my arms when I felt the heat of Ericen staring at me.
I peered up at him. “What?”
A smile crinkled his eyes. “You looked…peaceful.” He said it almost longingly.
I cringed before it occurred to me that Ericen didn’t know what’d happened today. He’d never known about the alliance meeting, and he didn’t know that it had fallen apart. It felt good to stand next to someone without that weight.
“Can you feel what he’s feeling?” He nodded at Res.
“An echo of it,” I replied. “I wish I could show you.”
The truth of that statement caught me as off guard as it did Ericen, who stared back at me with parted lips.
A pulse of delight was all the warning I had before Res brushed by us, wings nearly slapping us both in the face. He let out a cackling caw, spiraling up high into the air before letting himself fall. He caught himself a hairsbreadth from the ground, the grass swaying beneath his current.
We both laughed.
“That’s incredible,” Ericen said.
I grinned back.
* * *
We spent a couple of hours sending Res through flight drill after flight drill. His skills were developing at an impressive speed, his control over the wind as effortless as if his magic guided it.
We watched as he glided in lazy circles above the long, thin trees dotting the valley below, the sky slowly darkening into a sea of stormy blues. In that comfortable silence, I finally said the thing that had been nagging at me since we fled Illucia.
“You didn’t call the guards,” I said softly. “When we were escaping. You could have called the guards on the grounds to stop us, but you let us go.”
“Is that why you decided to trust me?” he asked, the weight in his voice pulling my gaze to him. He made for a forlorn figure with the backdrop of the mountains now cast in purple shadows, and it struck me how alone he truly was now. He’d always been somewhat of an outsider in Illucia, but at least then he’d had a purpose, a goal.
I knew what it was to lose those things.
I pushed aside the urge to tease him, the solemn weight in his eyes too heavy to budge with anything so light.
“I trust you for a lot of reasons,” I replied. Months ago, I would never have believed I could say those words to him. Now, they felt right.
“You missed the Centerian, didn’t you?” I asked.
Razel had made Ericen a deal: if he won the kingdom’s bloody sword tournament, she would make him Valix, leader of the elite Vykryn soldiers of Illucia. It was what he had been working toward his entire life.
He shrugged, a wistful smile pulling at his lips. “I thought I’d give someone else the chance to win. We all know no one could have challenged me.”
I rolled my eyes. “There’s that familiar arrogance. I was starting to think you’d reformed entirely.”
He gave me a lazy grin. “Never.”
I laughed. “I could use a little bit of that right now.”
He frowned, and I hesitated. Telling myself I trusted him was one thing; actually doing it was another. But I had to start somewhere.
I told him about the alliance.
