The creature screeched in rage and pain, sending its own blast of fire at me. Yellow flames licked over my shield as Bayne’s power ignited from its other side. White fire engulfed the skydrake’s long neck, and now blood, not fire, poured from its mouth.
Its body writhed as it slid over the edge of the walkway and into the pit. White smoke rose from the ground, clogging the crater we stood in, and I met Bayne’s gaze before he shot it to the rocky landing where the mouth of the cave used to sit.
His lips fell apart, and he rubbed a hand at his chest as disbelief slackened the lines on his face. His eyes narrowed in on her, and his features morphed into a hard determination I’d come to recognize after decades by his side… as if the last piece of some long-forgotten puzzle had clicked into place. It lasted but a moment before something akin to fear—to disgust, even—widened his eyes.
I followed his gaze to where Lyvia sat mounted on Tiberius, and I couldn’t help but stare in awe. Wild, gilded shadows danced beneath the skin on her arms and neck, stopping just below her chin.
She’dlived.
I’dmournedher. I thought her stupidity had doomed her. Doomed the Realm of Vael. Isla and Aeriden had been the only ones who insisted she’d come back. Insisted she’d live. But it had been three godsdamned months, and the only things coming out of that gate were creatures from hell.
Astraeus maintained a grip around her waist, one that six months ago would have earned the pirate lord a dagger to his throat. Lyvia was either too weak to care or had more than one reason to go after Lord Astraeus when Ganmira and Renova pulled him through the gate.
Her gaze landed on mine, and she offered me that stupid, too-trusting smile she had. I squashed the nonsensical urge togrin back and offered her a twitch of my lips. Her smile stretched into a grin, and she began to laugh.
For fuck’s sake.
“Took you long enough,” I called, my voice nearly lost in the frigid wind that whipped through the rocky crater.
Lyvia doubled over in laughter, her arms stretching around Tiberius’s broad, velvety neck and burying her face in his mane. Her back began to shake, and my brows narrowed. Was she laughing or crying?
I shook my head and glanced at Astraeus, but the pirate lord maintained a somber expression. His dark eyes were focused on the gate. Right. We had a lot to fill them in on.
Aquila’s trill finally reached us, and a wave of relief and joy flooded our bond as my ancient hawk landed near Bayne.
Take him back first, I told Aquila.
I can carry you both, my giant bird replied, a note of indignation in his ancient voice, and I shook my head.
I’ll stay and set up a patrol to watch the gate while I wait.
Aquila’s copper and gold feathers flashed brightly in the morning rays as he stretched and then pumped them quickly, sending gusts of smoke and ash billowing along the rocky edge.
Tiberius followed, their forms buckling against the wild wind that whipped off the swells of the sea surrounding the Island of Kayj. The Soleia power blazed in reaction to the frigid weather, and I stepped to the edge of the crater.
My gaze raked over the devastated land. Burned fields lined the hills where thick forests used to stand, all destroyed by the skydrakes and other horrors that had escaped through the archway in those first few days after the Vael Lacrima had been opened.
My eyes caught on the downed fences surrounding the old ashen camps where Dark King Daimos had housedtens of thousands of the creatures he’d created with the transformational power belonging to Lyvia.
And the Bonder had returned to save them all. She’d come back once more, the one capable of uniting the powers of the Bellators and creating their caeluma. Would she be the difference between saving the Realm of Vael and burning it?
“Commander!” Kresida called, waiting for orders for herself and Vulcan.
I turned, and my eyes pulled toward Tiberius in the distance as he flew Lyvia to the Onyx Tower.
My friend, I remembered. Our months together in the past year had solidified a title I bestowed upon very few in my two-hundred-year existence.
Friend. Bonder.Elf.
Bellator reborn.
CHAPTER SIX
NERISSA
Ten years in Pyracantha for the theft of restricted books and destruction of the entrance to the Rooted Section in the Living Library
– Official Indictment, signed by King Bayne Ravindra.
