“Ravenwood green.” Riyan said with a smile as he tapped me on the nose. “Now you look just like—”
He stopped himself, but I knew he meant I looked like my brothers.
I needed to tell him they were alive, but he would see them soon if Daigen kept his word…which I now doubted.
I bit down a scowl. Daigen wanted us dressed before he met with us on the other side of the pass, but what could he possibly say after he had betrayed me? Whatever it was, I did not want Riyan to hear.
I handed Riyan the grey and green cloak. “Do you trust me?”
“Does a bear shit in the woods?”
Not the time for jokes. I shot him a look and his smirk softened into a loving smile. “Of course I do.”
I turned my head toward the low-rolling fog in the rocks that led further down the mountain. “Daigen is here. Give me ten minutes to speak with him. Alone. I will call for you when we are done.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Call for me?”
“Through our bond.” I could not help but smile. “You will know when it happens.”
Riyan shook out his cloak as I turned away. I passed by the destroyed rune, taking in the image on the bottom half and mentally stitching it together with the broken top half—a woman with an outstretched arm and blank eyes.
And only because I had seen her did I understand who the rune depicted. Even though the chill of the wind stung my cheeks, my chest was warm as I stared at the destroyed rune—reminding me of what my bargain was for.
The totem we had shattered with our love was Death.
I held that warmth around my heart like an unbreakable promise as I stepped into the fog.
The rolling fog was warmer. The snow beneath my feet was softer. The darkness was less suffocating.
Only when the fog parted and I met violet eyes and white hair did ice stab me between my ribs. Daigen clasped his hands, his grey and white dappled cloak fluttering around his shoulders.
For a moment we merely exchanged looks as heavy as the towering boulders around us.
I would not break, so he spoke first. “If you want an apology, you won’t get one.”
The image of his purple face as Alastar the Conqueror strangled him flashed in my mind. He would have rather died than condemn Fraleigh, but he was more than willing to condemn me.
Blazing heat poured into my hands as they curled into fists at my side. The tears in the air and the snow quivered in fear as they waited for my orders.
My voice came out in a heavy whisper. “I trusted you.”
“And you still need to. This is not over.”
I held my breath as my heart punched my ribs. “I am through listening to you, you monster.”
Daigen smirked and all the delicious ways to torture him ran through my mind. Rope of fire around the throat. Ice shards inhis stomach. A scream of frost and flame that would linger in his ears until the end of time.
“A monster, am I?” he said. “Do you really think your Riyan would be any different?”
I let out my breath and the tears in the air stopped shimmering. How dare he think Riyan was ever capable of such a horrible betrayal?
Daigen walked through the snow, punctuating his words with every step. “I begged. Sold my skills. Built a fucking palace.Noneof it was enough to free her.”
He stood in front of me, his eyes swimming with nearly five centuries of rage. “And then I switched tactics.”
Metal gleamed in the moonlight. He held his ancient knife in front of his heart. The tears in the air whispered its name against my ears.Reginbani. Reginbani.
And only because I had heard that ancient barbarian tongue in Fraleigh’s memories did my heart know the knife’s true meaning.
