My ears are ringing, my chest heaving, my hands shaking.
It’s over. For one second. For one impossible second, it’s over.
Then Kael and Drazan turn to face each other.
They snap into position as if they’re both answering the same instinct. Wings snapping wide, tails rising, shoulders squared, eyes locked.
They don’t speak, but the air shifts. Heavy. Charged. Dangerous.
Kael’s chest rises and falls with harsh, shallow breaths. His hands flex, fingers curling like he’s still holding the machine’s guts.
Drazan stands like carved stone, shoulders wide, muscles taut, breath steady but shallow. Rage rolls off both of them. Raw. Fueled by something I do not understand, but there is no mistaking it.
Kael takes a step forward. Drazan doesn’t back away. Neither one blinks. Neither one yields an inch.
The team behind Drazan tenses, raising their weapons, but clearly uncertain which direction this fight will go. My heart pounds so hard it feels like it might break out of my ribs.
This isn’t over. It’s changed into something else.
Something older. Something deeper.
They’re not seeing each other as allies. They look like two predators who’ve found themselves in the same territory. Neither one is willing to give ground.
For a single heartbeat, I’m not sure which one will move first, or whether the next strike will be against what remains of the hunter—or each other.
27
LEENA
For a heartbeat, nothing moves. Every eye is fixed on them. Two scarred Zmaj warriors facing off.
I’m frozen too. I don’t know what to do. How to stop this crash happening before my eyes.
Kaelreth and Drazan stand, chests heaving, blood dark on their skin, shoulders tight and squared like neither one knows how to back down. They’re almost mirrors of each other.
Scars upon scars, damage no one should ever have to endure. They both survived.
I have to stop this. Somehow.
They aren’t looking at the dead machine. They’re glaring at each other. The danger didn’t go away when the hunter fell. It just changed shape.
Drazan stands with a blade in hand. He hasn’t lowered it. His breathing is steady, but something sits under the stillness—something locked tight and straining at the edges.
Kael hasn’t moved either. Not toward me. Not away.
He’s standing on his own, even though I know it’s costing him. His body is trembling, but it isn’t from exhaustion or pain. The way he’s staring at Drazan… it isn’t confusion.
It’s sharp. Focused. Alive with something that’s been waiting for a long time.
“Kael,” I say quietly.
He doesn’t look at me. He doesn’t even blink.
Every muscle in him is tight, drawn forward, like he’s standing on the edge of something, and he knows if he moves, he won’t stop.
The air feels wrong. Not hot. Not cold. Tight. Pulled thin. Like the whole desert is holding its breath.
Drazan’s gaze hasn’t left him. Not once.
