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CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
“You’re very quiet,” Nektas noted as we entered the gardens.
“I’m just thinking.”
“Are they good thoughts?”
Passing the statue of Maia, I nodded. “They are.”
“Relieved to hear that,” he said. “Your mother is…”
“Something else?”
The sound that came from him was part laugh and part growl. “That is one way of putting it.”
A surprisingly wry grin tugged at my lips. I was still processing everything that had happened with my mother. We hadn’t talked long, but it felt like a major step in a good direction. I wasn’t sure what the outcome would be. There was a lot of messy stuff to sift through, but I meant what I said. I wanted to move on. Let go. And I wanted to have real conversations with her. Maybe I would tell her what had happened before my father died, what he’d attempted to do. Though I didn’t think that would bring her any peace.
“Your sister is very inquisitive,” he said as we stopped near the nepeta blue.
My grin turned a lot larger then. “How many questions did she manage to ask?”
The cool breeze lifted the long strands of his hair, tossing them across his face and chest. “Far more than a mortal should’ve been capable of doing in such a short period of time.”
I laughed. “Sorry about that.”
A dark brow rose. “No need to apologize. The Queen is…amusing. And her wife is extraordinarily polite.” He offered his hands. “They both handled the news of who you are fairly well.”
“Ezra’s known about my ability to restore life for a while, and she’s always been very…pragmatic,” I explained, taking his warm hands in mine. “And her wife? She was the first person I brought back to life. That was before I knew that restoring a mortal’s life meant another paid the price. She doesn’t know. And I don’t want her ever finding out.”
“Understandable.” His fingers curled around mine.
“But I think she…kind of senses something. I don’t know what, but maybe she knows on some kind of unconscious level,” I said, glancing back at the castle’s lit windows.
For the first time since…well, forever, I didn’t feel an overwhelming sense of anger, inadequacy, or hurt. All of that was still there. One decent conversation with my mother wouldn’t erase all of it, but it was muted by something new. Hope.
I pulled my gaze from Wayfair. “Ready?”
Nektas nodded.
I had originally hoped to visit Cauldra Manor—the ancestral Balfour home in Massene—to see if Delfai was still there. Him knowing how the Ancients had been entombed was a long shot, but it was the best we had. However, that was before I’d found Callum having supper with my family. Discovering what the fuck he was up to was the priority now.
Clearing my mind, I pictured the damn empty pedestal in the foyer as eather swelled. Tendrils of gold-streaked silver essence rose from the ground beneath us. The mist thickened and swirled, spi
The throbbing sensation of another Primal echoed in my chest before the mist evaporated. The feeling felt…familiar as I let go of Nektas’s hands and turned, glancing at the closed main doors past the pointed archways.
“A Primal is here,” I a
“There is.” Nektas brushed red-and-black strands back over his shoulder. “It’s Attes.”
Well, that kind of explained why the awareness felt familiar. I had totally forgotten that Ash had said he would ask Attes to be here.
As we entered the left hall, I spotted Rhahar and Kars at the end, guarding the door near the back stairwell. Rhain stood with them.
The auburn-haired god turned as we passed Ash’s office. He waited until we were almost upon them to ask, “How did things go?”
“Other than finding an unexpected visitor with them? Good. My step—my sister is going to alert the other kingdoms of possible impact.” I stopped before them. “Do you know if the Revenant has come to?”
“I’m not sure, but we’re about to find out,” Rhain answered as Rhahar opened the door. “After we’re finished down here, there’s something I need to show you and Nyktos.”
I nodded as I entered the narrow, torchlit stairwell. The musty scent of the underground lair surrounded me as I thought about the underground pool and wished that was the source of my visit to the dank space as goldish-red flames danced off the damp walls.
That prickly sensation of u
The bones weren’t gold nor carved from those of an Ancient, but my stomach still roiled upon seeing them. I dragged in a breath, forcing my gaze forward.
Ash drew his booted foot off one of the bars and rose from the wooden chair he’d been seated in as Attes turned.
Ash was before me in an instant, his arms around me and his mouth cool and firm against mine. He kissed me as he had before. Fierce. Hungry.
A throat cleared, but Ash was in no rush. I gripped the front of his shirt as he slowly ended the kiss, drawing my bottom lip between his. “How did things go?” he asked, resting his forehead against mine.
I closed my eyes, soaking in the feel of him. “Okay.”
“Don’t mind any of us,” Attes drawled. “Take your time. We’ll just stand here and wait.”
“Shut your damn mouth,” Ash said, and I gri
I may have been a little irritated by his unexpected presence, but the moment he’d said why he had come? How could I be upset with him? He’d felt that deep, cutting pain and defended me. I couldn’t love him more for that. “I’m not angry with you.”
His fingers curled into my hair. “I missed you, liessa.”
Gods.
Every beat of my heart was his. “Show me how much you missed me later.”
The deep, sexy rumble that came from him sent a heated thrill through my blood. “I can’t wait.”
Neither could I.
Pressing one last kiss to my forehead, Ash stepped back and turned. Down the hall, Rhain was studying the floor as if it held the answers to life.
I cleared my throat. “Has he woken up?”
“He did right after I got him here,” Ash said as we walked ahead.
“Huh,” I murmured, sca
Attes snorted. “That’s because he started ru
I glanced up at Ash as the faint stench of stale lilacs reached me. “What did you do?”
One side of his lips curved up as we stopped in front of a cell. “Quieted him.”
I faced the narrow cell. There were no cots or chairs. Just bone chains co
I squinted. Something dark and wet was splattered on the back wall. My gaze lowered to where Callum lay sprawled on his back in the middle of the torchlit floor. The entire front of his gold tunic was drenched in blood, and there was a large puddle beneath him.
“Exactly how did you quiet him?” I asked, spotting a rather straight, pinkish-red line across Callum’s throat.
“Removed his head,” Ash answered.
I slowly turned to him. “You did what?”
“Decapitated him,” Ash said as if he were listing an uninteresting step in a recipe. “With a sword.”
“His head reattached itself,” Attes shared, folding his arms over his armor-covered chest. “It was quite disturbing to watch the tendons and muscles do their thing. They sort of crept and slithered across the floor until they reached his head.” He sent me a grin as the picture he painted formed in my mind. “You should’ve seen it.”
“I’m glad I didn’t.” Nausea rose so sharply I thought for a moment I might vomit all over Ash, but as my stomach calmed, I remembered something. “You threatened Callum once,” I said to Attes. I couldn’t believe I’d forgotten this. “You said you knew how to kill a Revenant.”
A dimple appeared on Attes’s cheek as he gri
Ash frowned. “Draken fire?”
“I’ve seen that work on a fresh Revenant,” he said, and I immediately wondered exactly how that had come about. “But ones that have been around for a while? They have to be burned beyond just a crisp, and they take longer to die that way. They need to be turned to ash. But what Kolis was talking about—the Fire of the Gods—it’s draken blood. Ingested draken blood. Burns them up from the inside.”
Nektas’s brow rose. “Makes sense. Just coming into contact with our blood kills or severely wounds most. Ingesting our blood would kill almost anything.”
But not a Primal or Ancient. Instinct told me that draken blood did something else entirely in that case. Something not good.
“I’m not sure I’m entirely comfortable asking the draken to open their veins for us,” I said.
Nektas shrugged. “As long as it doesn’t require much, it wouldn’t be a problem. Our bodies heal quickly.” The draken peered into the cell and smiled. “We can test it out with that one.”
“You can open your vein and force-feed Callum, but that won’t work with every Revenant out there,” Attes pointed out. “We would need to have it bottled, and as you well know, storing draken blood isn’t easy since it also burns through most fireproof stone. The only thing it doesn’t is—”
“Basalt,” Nektas cut in. “Another type of shadowstone.”
My stomach churned. “You mean more slag?”
“The slaggiest of slag,” Ash corrected, causing my lip to curl. “It’s where dragon fire impacts a surface and the temperature is at its highest, creating a medium to dark gray stone. The problem is, it’s been a really long time since dragon fire has touched anything. Whatever is out there would’ve been long since buried.”
Frustration started to rise, but then I stiffened. “I saw the creation of the Star diamond when I was in stasis—dragon fire killed an Ancient, leaving behind that diamond, but also—”
“Basalt,” Ash finished, a slow grin appearing. “The Undying Hills.”