His horns were straight, no longer curving along his skull. And a deep growl was rumbling constantly from his chest.
Berserker,I reminded myself. Sometimes it was hard to remember that at their core, that was what the Kylorr were. Berserkers. It was what made them so dangerous. With my father, I’d never seen him so berserk. I couldn’t imagine him hurting another living being.
Kythel, however?
There was a madness in his gaze, unleashed and furious. Hewasdangerous. So why wasn’t I afraid of him?
Because he went berserk for me,I realized.
He is scared for me,I realized next, especially when he batted a trembling palm the size of my head along my cheek, smoothing away my tears. His whole body was shaking.
“I’m okay,” I rasped out, my voice raw and husky from the smoke. It hurt to talk. I wondered if the insides of throats could be burned because mine felt like it. “I’m okay, Kythel.”
His shoulders shuddered, and he dipped his head. His forehead met the side of my face, holding himself there as if to assure himself that I was speaking the truth. The small movement brought a fresh wave of tears to my eyes, and then I began to cry. I’d cried so much over the last few days for this male. I’d thought I was fresh out of tears, but I supposed a near-death experience changed that. I could still feel the heat of the flames, and through the strands of Kythel’s dark hair, I watched as my cottage burned.
My father’s letters. The last of his stores. All my belongings. They all might be gone.
His cloak, however, was still wound around my fist.
I closed my eyes, not wanting to believe it.
This was a nightmare Ineededto wake up from. Only, I never did.
CHAPTER38
KYTHEL
“You need to rest,” I urged Millie quietly, trying to catch her bandaged arm, though I avoided the burns caused by the molten metal from the front door of the cottage.
“No, I need to see what’s left,” she said, not quite meeting my eyes as she stepped forward in determination.
“Millie,” I growled, catching the small wince on her features when she stepped over a charred beam, when she landed on her blistered feet, though the healer had bandaged and padded the wounds as best as he was able. Humans healed more slowly than Kylorr, but I’d mixed in some of my blood and venom into the burn paste to help speed it along.
“I’m fine,” she insisted. Only she wasn’t. Her skin was still covered in soot and ash, making the tear tracks that ran down her cheeks all the more obvious. Her arms and right hand were bandaged in thick cloth, as were her knees, shins, and feet. The stone had been so hot that it had burned her exposed flesh. She was still dressed in a tunic that ended at her mid-thighs, and she looked so vulnerable and sad, picking through the rubble of the cottage she’d worked so hard on.
My fists clenched at my sides. Just recalling the fear I’d felt and the desperation I’d heard in her screams…I felt the rage building. Right now, I needed to keep it at bay. I’d never experienced anything like this before, but with mykyrana’s life having been threatened, it took everything in me to keep from going berserk again.
I almost lost her,I realized. If I had reached her even a few moments later, she might’ve been crushed underneath the beams of the ceiling.
When all I wanted was to hold her against me, to keep her pressed close to my side—since my heart was a living, breathing thing outside of my body now—Millie was keeping me at arm’s length, with good reason.
It was morning now. Dawn was breaking over Stellara, spilling soft-hued purple and pink streaks across the sky like watery paints. The clearing was filled up with more Kylorr than I’d ever seen it hold—Telaana, Vadyn, various keepers who had woken in the middle of the night to help put out the flames. Azur stood with the healer, speaking in low tones, across the clearing. I watched as a solider approached him, who I’d ordered to comb every inch of the surrounding area, and I watched him hand my brother something.
The fire had been no accident. Millie had insisted she’d put out the fire in the hearth before going to bed. There had been a black metal brace against the door, locking her inside, and bolts nailed against the frames of the front windows, barring all escape. Someone had wanted her dead. House Kaalium had many enemies—the Kylorr across the seas, for example, who Zyre had warned had spies throughout the Kaalium. And while Zyre wasn’t quite an enemy, he wasn’t an ally either. He had every reason to try to strike against us where it would hurt most.
Even still, I thought the assassins were much closer to home. Especially when Azur approached me, observing me watch Millie poke through the blackened ash of her beloved cottage.
Azur pressed something into my hand. When I felt the cool metal, I knew what it was without looking down, and I was impressed that the solider had found it all, though they’d been trained to have keen eyes and ears.
A tracker scout. The same model as the one I’d found nearby not that long ago.
“Where?” I asked.
Azur gestured to the tree I’d buried Ruaala under. “He heard it over by the tree. Then it wiped itself.”
Someone had been watching. Just now.
“I thought they had been watchingme,” I said quietly, looking back up at Millie, my eyes tracking her every movement, however slow. “But they’ve been watching her this whole time.”
