Page 69 of Between Fear and Favor

My beautiful wife stood, just too far away, Lux towering behind her. Like a mountain, enormous and immovable, the dragon stood guard at her back. The same blue eyes shared by Em and her sister stared down at me, now nearly as large as I was. My jaw dropped as I took in my deliverance. Despite every hesitation I’d had, every fear that she would come to harm, she was here. She was the one saving me.

It always came back to this, didn’t it? I needed her more than she needed me. It didn’t make me inadequate or pitiable, but instead, filled me with pride. I was lucky that Em—this beautiful, intelligent, headstrong woman—was the other half of me.

I might have once felt torn, watching her be in such close proximity to our enemies, beside the dragons that were both her greatest strength and vulnerability in one, but all I felt was awe. She stood with her head high, hands tucked primly behind her, and waited.

My wife wouldn’t look at me, and I couldn’t understand why. Perhaps I’d disappointed her in getting myself caught in that trap. Perhaps she couldn’t stand to out of fear for what might happen. She wore a grimace. It wasn’t as if I had expected her to be grinning over our predicament, but she seemed more distressed than I would have imagined. I was sure the tiny movement she made was a flinch of pain, especially when she adjusted her posture in the way she did when her back ached in the mornings.

I could only stare at her, until suddenly a loud thud sounded behind me. Whirling around, my breath stuttered as I found Ryo, bound and beaten. The poor creature had been stabbed—so many times. A dozen daggers stuck out from his spine, between the twining shadows which bound him.

I nearly retched.

Emhadbeen in pain.

Because she certainly felt every bit of Ryo’s agony.

“If you think I will let you continue to torture the both of them, you are sorely mistaken,” she said, without a hint of fear or pain creeping into her voice. “They’ll burn along with you, if it must come to that.”

At that moment, I didn’t doubt her words.

She pulled her pack in front of her, hair falling forward. Opening her bag, she reached into it, and across the bond, righteous anger and terrible fear danced like courtiers at a royal ball. Embers from her fire fell from the sky before her, surrounding her in ruinous fireflies.

She looked like a goddess. When her golden-brown tresses lifted in the wind, and she jutted that chin out and narrowed her eyes, I thought perhaps Hanwen had been born again.

Nereza stood beside Ryo, and when she gasped, I didn’t understand. I stared at Em, dumbfounded, as she lifted something high above her head.

“Do you think I can kill the other seven before you retreat? I’ve managed two in just a few short months.” Em’s voice rang out, crisp and refined, such a stark juxtaposition to what she held in her grasp. Nereza’s shadows threw me to the ground, and the woman swallowed a sob. And in a low voice, almost unsettling coming from a mother as she spoke to another grieving a daughter, Em continued. “Although I’d prefer a nice, even number when we display them on pikes outside the city walls. Perhaps you’ll join your Nine and make it ten?”

In Em’s hand, suspended by long, light brown hair, swung Cethina’s severed head.

Chapter 35

EMMELINE

As I tossedCethina’s head onto the ground before me, agony sliced through my back. I couldn’t look at Ryo, the poor dragon whining in pain that only I could understand the true horror of. As they’d been pulling Rain out of the pit, my knees had buckled, and I’d barely been able to keep standing. If it weren’t for my shadows, I would have been on the ground. Using them to remain upright was a tiresome drain on my divinity, but healing myself had done nothing. What I truly needed was to get those daggers out of Ryo’s back, and to press healing hands upon him.

In the meantime, I swallowed the pain. I used my divinity to support me, hoping to mask how badly I ached. Because if they knew my dragons were connected to me in this way, I was certain to meet a gruesome end. This had been exactly what Rain was afraid of. He hadn’t wanted me to put myself in danger while bringing my dragons out to meet our enemy. But this was never going to end another way.

My shadows took on a mind of their own as I walked forward, encircling my legs beneath my armor. Out of sight, they forced my knee to bend as I approached our enemy.

I couldn’t let my gaze fall upon Rain. He’d looked half-dead when Nereza lifted him from that pit. The bond between us was strong though, and I knew he was alive. That was the best I could offer myself in this moment. Because the second I looked at my husband, I knew I would break. He would see to the core of me, like he always had. And I wasn’t sure I could maintain my farce if I saw his expression. That love and comfort and healing he’d want to give me, that anger and frustration over what had happened—I would collapse the minute his emerald gaze met mine.

“Now, now, Nereza. Do not tempt her to use that beast,” the Supreme said, placing a hand on the Nythyrian queen’s shoulder. He was right to warn her. We were easily close enough now for Lux to open her deadly mouth and breathe divine fire on every person who stood in my way.

My only fear was that I would need to do what I threatened. If they had the blood of the Beloved, how much would they still need to summon a god? Cyran’s letter had mentioned my sister’s bones, and even though I couldn’t possibly understand how she could be his bane, the Supreme was probably closer than I was to seeking an audience with the divine. But I couldn’t watch them hurt Ryo and Rain either. Would I need to burn every single one of us beneath Lux’s divine fire?

Swallowing, I pulled the vial I’d taken from Cethina from beneath my armor. Holding it just as I had Cethina’s head, I let it sway in front of me. My blood moved slowly as the vial swung back and forth, and I stuffed my displeasure away. I was prepared to make a sacrifice. Especially if I could get what we needed out of it. Eyeing the Supreme as he walked closer, he seemed much thinner than the last time I saw him. Gaunt, his cheeks were sunken, and I could tell his robes were looser. And yet when he saw my blood, his eyes lit up.

The arrogant man hadn’t even bothered with armor. Considering what I wanted from him, I hoped that hubris would cause his downfall.

“Let my soldiers go,” I ordered, voice somehow far louder in the dawn than I’d anticipated. “Let my husband go. Let my dragon go. Leave our city and go back to the hovel which you came from, and this vial of blood is yours.”

“Em,” Rain’s voice croaked, but there was no alternative. I didn’t look at him.

Nereza laughed, but the Supreme tilted his head in thought. “Perhaps an arrangement can be made.”

“Willbe made,” I corrected. “Or everyone with the poor luck to be standing in my dragon’s path will meet their end in the next few moments.”

Lux snarled behind me, readjusting her massive frame, and the soldiers standing behind the Supreme shifted uncomfortably. The Supreme frowned in displeasure, but said nothing. Lifting his hand to his chin, he turned away from Lux, as if the sight of her unnerved him. His light brown hair had grown long while they attacked our city, curling at his nape. He rubbed his hand over the back of his neck, and his posture shifted, and I took a small measure of pride in knowing Lux had discomfited him. Even Nereza looked uneasy. She’d stifled her sobs rather quickly after I threw her daughter’s head on the ground between us, though her pinched expression and white-knuckled grasp on Rain’s shoulder told me she wanted retribution. But at the sight of my dragon’s threatening stance, she visibly blanched.

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