The men scrambled for their weapons. With their mouths hanging open in shock, they seemed to be at a loss whether to fight or to flee.
“Ray is not—” one of them mumbled, but Timur didn’t let him finish.
“I didn’t ask,” he snapped. “I’ll see Ray right now, and I don’t care what state he's in. You can either take me to him, or I’ll find the way on my own.”
The two men backed away a step, not taking their eyes from us, or more precisely from Timur, who wore no cloak and had most of his dragon attributes in plain view. His long, spiked tail lashed slowly, menacingly. His great wings beat the airconfidently, as if he was born with them. His red eye glowed brightly in the shadows of the cave.
“General, is that you?” A large fae man entered from a side corridor.
His head was completely bald, which was unusual for a shadow fae. They normally wore their hair long regardless of their gender. His chest armor seemed heavier than that of the others. An orange stone glistened in the piercing in one of his nostrils. Like the other two men, this one also gaped at Timur in shock, but he seemed to recognize him.
“Good day, Zayr,” Timur greeted him. “I know I gave you twenty-four hours, but it turns out, I can’t wait that long. I’ll have that long-overdue meeting with Ray right now. Would you point me in the direction of his cave? Or should I fly through all the caves in here until I find him and kill anyone who’d try to stop me?”
The tone of his voice left no doubt that he would do as he said. Zayr must’ve understood that too. He gave Timur an assessing once-over, pausing on his wings.
“It’d be easier for you to get to his cave from the outside,” he said. “It’s the second patio to the left from here.”
Timur nodded, turning to leave, then seemed to have thought of something.
“Would you and your men get my chair from the beach please? I left it not far from the entrance to the cavern where we met last.”
To my surprise, Zayr nodded briefly before gesturing to the other two fae to follow him.
“He listens to you?” I whispered to Timur as he flew out of the cave.
He grinned. “I asked nicely, didn’t I?”
A spark of humor danced in his blue eye, and my breath hitched. He joked. In a light, playful tone. With the mostincredible smile playing on his lips. My heart melted, even as I understood that the joy of humor that caused him to smile like that came from me through his tendril still attached to my arm. I’d never seen Timur like this, and now I wished to see this teasing grin every day.
After a short flight outside, we entered the cave off the second patio on the left. There were two guards in here too. They seemed to be even more shocked by Timur’s appearance and our sudden arrival. They didn’t even try to grab their weapons and just stood there, gaping at us.
One of them then screamed in horror and dissolved into shadows in fear. The other one finally remembered his duty and fumbled for the handle of his sword on his belt.
“Is Ray in here?” Timur asked, already flying past the poor guard toward a short corridor leading deeper into the Wall.
The man glanced in the direction of a wide arched doorway with a set of wooden double doors in a metal frame.
“Wait!” he screamed as Timur immediately swerved toward the doors.
“You can’t go in there!” The second guard suddenly appeared, his shadows solidifying in front of us to block the way.
Timur flew over his head, not sparing him a glance. With a shove of his shoulder, the heavy doors screeched and gave way, opening wide enough for Timur to fly through.
Stale, musty air hit my nostrils. Weird slurping noises and strangled moans reached my hearing before I could see anything in the amber glow of the cave.
Timur made a wide circle under the high ceiling, then descended to a pile of cushions by the wall and sat in them, putting me on his lap. His legs dropped limply on the floor in front of him, and I held my breath in anticipation of a pained roar from him, a groan, or a grimace at least. But he didn’t react at all, as if the pain wasn’t there or it was dull enough to ignore.He adjusted his left leg, bending it at the knee and gingerly propping the clawed foot onto the floor rug.
I’d seen him move his legs before, when spreading his knees or adjusting his thighs while sitting. Those movements had always been slow, careful, and sparse. Now Timur left his right foot on the floor where it landed. He made no attempt to move it, and I assumed he had even less motion left in his right leg than in his left.
The spiked spinal column of his tail draped casually over the cushions, looking ominous even when completely motionless like that.
The moans grew louder.
“Who’s in here?” I asked Timur in a whisper.
He waved his right wing, making the stale air move around the brazier nearby. The coals in the brazier came to life. The flames flickered with shadows dancing on the walls.
A wide, low-sitting bed came into view in the middle of the cave. Unmade and messy, with crumpled sheets, tossed blankets, and pillows strewn all over, it appeared empty.
