I almost trip on a root reaching out of the ground but catch myself before anyone sees.
“Why wouldn’t you just open one of your fancy portals here again?” I complain, stepping away from the living tree, shaking what looks like soot from my fingers. “You dragged me halfway across your little kingdom this morning. Seems like a waste of legs.”
Legend’s laugh is low and amused, and before I can dodge, he nips the top of my shoulder, his teeth greedy. Heat flares across my skin and I’ve got the sudden urge to tell him tobite.
I want to feel his teeth sink into my flesh, I want him to claim me and—
Shit. This thing between us. It has a fucking heartbeat.
“We walk because…” he murmurs against my ear as his hands slide to my hips, lifting me over the shimmering sludge like I weigh nothing. “Portals disturb here. Their young are among these lands, and their mothers are very, very protective. A portal has a certain scent marker, and it smells like a threat to them. If you walk their lands, letting them scent you, they trust in your intent. If you pop in, what is to stop you from taking their little ones and popping out?” Another nip. “Assuming you can escape before they get to you. And if they see you as a threat anyway, well…it’s bone to ash, baby.”
“That’s comforting,” I mutter as my feet touch solid ground again.
He smirks down at me, hugging me to him before stepping away.
“Fool,” Creed grumbles behind us.
“Jealous?” Legend fires back.
“Disgusted.”
“Same thing, brother.”
Knight glares. “Focus.”
Right. Flowers. Murder.Death.
I turn toward the scorched rock face ahead. The wind shifts, carrying a faint metallic sweetness I remember too vividly—the scent that drifted through the caverns on Exile, clinging to my hair, my clothes, my nightmares.
“Dragons?” I guess, voice low as a rush of something I can’t name washes over me.
“Dragons.” Legend confirms. “Welcome to the Darkadia, home of the dragons.”
“Maybe we can say hi to Benny boy while we’re here.” Sinner jokes, and London slams him with a wave of magic, knocking him to his feet with a laugh.
“Leave my best friend alone,” she pouts. “He’s adapting.”
My feet carry me up the final hillside even faster, excitementcoursing through my veins.
A few more miles and then I see it. My lungs open up as a sense of calm washes over me.
I’ve never seen this side of Rathe before, having only entered near the royal estate, and the sight before me is…wow.
Darkadia is like nothing I’ve seen before yet somehow feels familiar.
Black cliffs jut up like broken fangs, steam curling from the cracks where the underground fires breathe. The sky itself feels different here—darker, sharper, threaded with old magic that doesn’t exist on Earth’s polite little campus.
And gods help me…it feels like home.
A weird comfort crawls up my spine, settling behind my ribs like it recognizes the chaos in the landscape. Strange, because this is the place where they claim they saw the Isle’s Kiss.
Even fucking weirder, because the flowers shouldn’t exist here at all.
My boot sinks into something soft and warm.
I look down.
A slick, iridescent film coats the ground, the colors shifting like oil in water—greens bleeding into glittery violets, violets twisting to black. It pulses once beneath my heel, like it’s breathing. Like it’s…reaching for me.
