“Are you okay?” he asks.
She nods, then starts as the dragon jumps back into her lap.
Kaida!The voice in her mind is delighted.
Are you sure? Because—
Sure!
Okay, Skylar agrees.Kaida. I like it.
She put off training for five whole days after Kaida hatched. In part, she didn’t want to train. She still doesn’t want to learn to use her power, given she knows what it can do. But she was also being truthful when she said that she needed to be with Kaida. Because now, the first time that she’s left her with Mjolnir as babysitter, she feels twitchy, keeps reaching out with her mind to check she’s okay.
“You’re not concentrating,” Axel says—which is totally true. They are in the designated training area of the castle—with walls of weapons and mats designed for people to slam into. He is holding out a plant to her, which she is supposed to be draining the life from.
She shoves the plant away from her. “I don’t want to kill it.” She is aware she sounds defensive, almost petulant, and pulls an impatient hand through her hair—impatience with herself, for not being able to do it, and with him, for making her.
“You need to practice,” Axel says firmly. “You have a dragon, but unless she has a big growth spurt imminently, this is your best shot of winning.”
She reluctantly eyes the spider plant. She can feel it, a subtle hum of life. But what has the plant ever done to her?
“How’s it going?” Zryan asks, appearing by the wall of daggers. Skylar turns to him, ready to make some scathing comment—but he is not alone.
Skylar can only stare at the man standing behind Zryan, the gauntlets removed but the marks of them still evident.
His skin is deathly pale, frame almost skeletal. His eyes are sunken into his face, and they squint against the sun, like he isn’t used to seeing it. Her stomach turns. The only other Exhauster alive.
“We thought it might be helpful to learn from someone experienced in using your power.” Experienced. How many lives has he taken? she wonders. Does ever he think of them, alone in his cell? He meets her gaze. And his mouth turns up a fraction—a subtle, knowing smile. She feels sickened. By him, by herself.
She shakes her head—but she can’t argue. Because she needs to know, doesn’t she? If she’s going to try to survive, she needs to learn. And because a part of her wants to ask him if it feels the same for him. If he craves power, the way she does.
“Do you have a name?” she asks the Exhauster.
He blinks at her. Once. Twice. “Ezra.” His voice is hoarse—and he says his name like a question. She wonders how long he’s been trapped in the castle. Wonders how they found him, if he had a family on the outside.
Sick. This whole thing is fucking sick.
Zryan gestures to the space in front of Skylar. To the plant, which Axel is now placing on the ground. “Ezra?” Zryan’s voice is polite. But although he might not condone this, he allows it, doesn’t he? It’shisfamily doing this. She glares at him, and he meets her gaze evenly. He shakes his head. And she knows he’s telling her that now is not the time. But then when the fuck is?
Ezra looks down at the plant. She notices how both Axel and Zryan edge back from him. Out of reach, she realizes. Because without chains, he could turn, lay his hands on them.
He kneels, placing his palms on the base of the plant. The spiky leaves seem to rustle, like they can sense the threat. But it’s no use. It takes less than a second for Ezra to pull the life from it—turning it to dust. He looks up at Skylar, and she can see the blackened veins across his face. She can see the look in his eyes. The spark there.
“Your turn,” Axel says, producing another plant. There’s a whole line of them, waiting to be sacrificed.
“You need to lay your hands on it,” Ezra says, as Skylar stares at the plant. Zryan is staring, too, his lips pressed tightly together. She wonders if he’s imagining Astrid, in place of that plant.
But Axel frowns. “She didn’t touch anything on the island. It was more like she pulled everything in—all the life from the plants around her—and then it sort of… exploded out of her.”
Skylar grimaces, remembering the rubble.
Zryan, however, raises his eyebrows. “Exploded?” He glances at Ezra.
“That’s never happened to me,” he says in his rasping voice.
“And of course,” Skylar mutters bitterly, “there are no other Exhausters around to ask, are there?” The look Ezra gives her now is different—and a flash of something passes between them. Understanding? Sympathy? It could so easily have been her, couldn’t it?
She wouldn’t have done it. The thought comes so easily. But she wonders if it’s true. She would rather die than be the king’s executioner… But what if the choice wasn’therlife but Cam’s? How does she know that this man doesn’t have someone on the outside—someone he’s protecting?
