Stars, is this it? Is this the end?
Suddenly, the blazing arena is covered in a swatch of darkness as something—wings—expands wide above us. They’re the most amazing things I’ve ever seen. A pale green, and nearly translucent. I smile in shivering delight. They’re healthy and unmarred.
“Raz... your wings... so beautiful...”
Stay with me, little queen.
Dimly, I see huge bloodstained claws coming toward me. Ever so gently, I feel those talons wrap around my body, and then a huge gust of wind whips around us as we are propelled upward. I’m tucked into his belly, face pressed to his heated hide. Razulek’s roar thunders right as his body collides with the roof. Then there’s an unholy crash and the sound of splintering wood, but I only hear them dully as if my ears are failing along with the rest of my blissed-out senses.
But those wings spread wide on the wind, and we’re flying. Up and up and up.
My head lolls back as darkness dims the edges of my vision and a rhapsodic paralysis snakes through my veins. In the waning twilight, I catch a glimpse of the moon... and the first twinkling of my beautiful, precious stars.
Tears drip and blood bubbles from my lips, and I succumb to oblivion.
Chapter Ten
THENIGHTKING
For a moment, a blinding agony rips through me, felling me to my knees.
Frantic, I press palms to my torso and thigh, but find no indication of injury. Two tender spots sting as if they’ve been impaled by something sharp, and pain radiates everywhere. I can barely figure out the source before my shadows burst from me in an onyx cloud as I topple into an indecent rapture, and I gasp, fighting for control over delirium that isn’t mine.
By the blood, it’s fuckinghers.
The starblessed bond I’d despaired about for years has been silent for weeks.
Until now.
At first, I had been skeptical—the magic that had dampened it for so many years had been her mother’s, but this was something different. But as the days turned into weeks, the weight of the cursed tether had vanished. Either my regrettable mate had garnered enough magic to block the bond herself, perhaps after the cruel way I had left her the last time... or someone else had.
Either way, I was exultant. I could no longer feel my soul-fated. She was finally out of my reach.Safe.My mind had rejoiced while something deep inside of me mourned the loss. If I had a heart, perhaps that is where such an ache would have resided.
But hearts were for mortals.
Not gods.
Or so I’d thought...
Dimly, I hear the triumphant scream of my azdaha in my head, but I’m distracted as the delirious feelings swamping me vanish abruptly, and I feel nothing but the hollow dearth in my chest that I’ve become used to. My shadows flutter limply, the bond divinely silent once more.
All I can feel now is my azdaha’s unbridled joy.
Indira, what is it? Are you well?
She chuffs.He comes, Darrius. My mate!
Recently, she’d been able to feel him weakening, and we’d prepared for war against a cowardly Oryndhrian king to take back what had been stolen from us when negotiations to retrieve Razulek had failed. I had sent my most trusted adviser—my brilliant sister—and our straightforward terms had been rejected. War, she’d proclaimed sadly, would be the only way to get Razulek back.
You’re certain it’s him?I ask Indira via the bond.
As sure as the stars grace the night sky. Yours comes, too.
My breath stutters to a fucking stop.Mywhatcomes?
He brings your mate.
Part II
