“No, it’s not,” I whisper. “My father has refused my place within the Order. Even after I brought him the beads I stole from you. It’s why I volunteered to join the trials. I’ll never be a Priest because I’m a woman.”
He lets out a mirthless laugh. “Misogynist assholes. It doesn’t matter, though. You’re going to earn a place at the actual table while your father and his little Order will be forgotten by time.”
“Why do you say that? The Order has…”
“The Order of Priests is a bump in the road. That’s all. Do you drive the carriage over the bumps, or do you go around them? No one wants to be jostled, but you don’t remember the potholes either. If you’re forced to cross them, then you simply accept the jostling. They’re an annoyance, nothing more. At this point, the most valuable thing they’ve done is create you, someone who will stand beside me when the true war begins as the Champion of Nyxthos.”
I frown. “How do you know I’ll stand beside you?”
The look on Azric’s face is terrifying, not because he’s threatening, but because he doesn’t show even a hint of doubt. “The cunning women in the villages would say that the omens never lie. I prefer to think there’s simply no such thing as coincidence. You were put in my path when I most needed you. That wasn’t justgood luck. That wasperfectluck, which means it wasn’t luck at all. It means there’s a plan, one I simply haven’t found all the pieces to yet.”
I take a step toward him. “Whose plan?”
“The gods. Or destiny. Or maybe the Web, as the silkies of Selithar would describe it. Does it matter? Little Priestess, you can’t deny that the timing is too perfect to be anything random.”
How can I deny that? But also, what exactly does it mean? “You think the gods or destiny or whatever has put me in your path so that I’ll work with you to defend Nyth from these Hunters? Aren’t there plenty of other champions you’ve known for longer, all of whom are more powerful than I’ll ever be, even if I become Nyxthos’s champion? They’ve all had the luxury of eighty years of training—the original purpose of this supposed war game. Why do you give a damn that I’ve been put in your path?”
He shakes his head before bowing it. “Why does everyone listen to me, little Priestess? Tell me, you must have noticed this already. Even Lucine, a champion herself, backed down without a fight when I stepped between the two of you. Why? Is it just because I’m so much more powerful? Am I nearly a god myself?”
I don’t have an answer. “Why do you think I know the intricacies of a world I’ve only just entered?”
He disappears in a puff of shadows, and from behind me, he whispers in my ear, “Because you’re more perceptive than anyone gives you credit for.”
I turn around and he’s not even a foot away from me. “Because they don’t know what you can or will do. No one expected you to kill Echo. You hide everything about yourself.”
He nods. “Good. It helps that I’m actually stronger than the rest of them.” His gaze meets mine, and the orange flames in his eyes set my body alight. For the first time since he’s been training me, I feel myself falling into that seductive web he’s so capable of weaving.
I can’t help myself. I’m entranced by his gaze, but it’s his nearness that makes my body thrum. It’s the warmth that still fills me from when he healed me. “I ask, again, why do you care about me?” I whisper.
He runs his nails from my cheek where he’d touched me down my neck to where my cloak is tied, and he slowly undoes it. This time, when the black fabric hits the stone at my feet, fear doesn’t overtake me. He already knows my secrets, or at least enough that hiding my skin from him isn’t worth the effort.
“I don’t know, little Priestess. You were put in my path, and while only a fool trusts destiny or the gods thoughtlessly, it would be just as foolish to ignore them. What I know is that if Inni is terrified of the Hunters, I doubt very much that Lucine Reden or Calistra Fenrow will be capable of becoming the storm walls that hold back the flood that is coming. You, on the other hand, are more than you appear. You hold secrets even from yourself.”
I frown at the thought, but then he moves to untie the boot laces that hold my tunic together. A shiver runs down my spine. Is hereally going to take me right here on the dragon roost? Is that what he wants from me rather than training while we take a break?
“What secrets do I hold, Prince of Bones?” I whisper. He pulls my tunic from me, putting my armor on display. His nail runs over the Marks that will hopefully keep me safe in the trials.
“You are not your father’s daughter, little Priestess,” he whispers. “You are something else, something very different.”
I’m struggling to hold onto Azric’s words as he sensuously undoes my armor. I’ve known since the beginning that his powers can ensnare me in lust, but I’ve fought against them each time prior. This time, though, after he healed me… I don’t know if I want to stop him.
“What am I then? Am I some creature just as dangerous as the Godforged?” My armor falls to the ground, and I’m left in only my wrap, a bare piece of linen protecting me from the most dangerous man in the world.
His eyes roam over my body. “You are unlike anything I’ve seen before. Built outside the Pact. Changed in ways no one else in Nyth ever has been.” His lips brush against my neck, and the dragonfire he forced into my body roars to life. Shadows slowly climb my legs, not binding me in place as they’ve done so many times in the past, but caressing me like a lover. “You are unique, just as I am, little Priestess. Just as you did not stumble upon my path by coincidence, neither did you stumble upon yourfather’s. You were meant to be here. You were meant to stand beside me.”
He snakes a single finger between my wrap and my breasts to pull it loose, but my hand moves to his, stopping him. “What do youmean?” I say even as the flame of desire burns like a bonfire inside me. Everything in me wants him to strip me of this last layer, of this last bit of protection against his eyes and touch.
But what he’s said has caught my attention as well. If he pulls my wrap from me, his words will fade, and my questions will never be answered. For another moment, I need to keep control. I need to maintain some semblance of sanity to glean answers before he draws me into madness.
“What do you mean?” I repeat.
He removes his hand and moves it to the cleft between my breasts, still hidden behind the wrap. His crimson nail trails over the linen, down to my stomach as he watches my eyes.
He pulls away and turns around. “You were adopted, weren’t you, Fiona Thorne?”
“Yes,” I say, trying to fight through the lust that’s desperately trying to control me.
“Is it not strange that Rhaskar Thorne, the creator of the only group in Nyth that needs god-touched items, found an orphan who could miraculously find such items? Do you remember what happened to your parents?”
