Page 24 of Beast of Blood and Ash
My breathing slowed a fraction. I let my arm fall, a silent permission. He brushed his huge, warm fingers over my wrist, grounding me. Anchoring, not caging. The heat of his touch was a shock, a sudden fire that burned away some of the cold. The nightmare receded, just a little.
He leaned in, his voice a low whisper.
“If you stay here, they’ll find you. Ignarath infiltrators are coming. No one else can stop them. I won’t let you be taken. I swear it, on my own life.”
Drakarn didn’t break a Forge vow.
The stone under me felt sharp and real. The air still stank of blood and old fear, but I could taste something else now. A sliver of hope, tangled in dread. My hands still trembled, but I didn’t pull away.
He was right. No one else was coming.
This wasn’t surrender. This was survival.
I met his eyes, forcing myself not to look away. “Where are we going?”
9
OMVAR
If I lookedat Reika too hard, she might just disappear.
Her presence in my rooms was a fragile thing, smoke cupped in my hands. Every move I made felt like a threat that could send her scattering into nothing.
The air was thick, heavy with the rawness of recent violence and the sharp, metallic tang of blood still clinging to my scales. I’d dragged her there straight from the chaos, a warning still ringing in my throat, Ignarath blood splattered from my jaw to my wrist.
I tried to walk with care, to keep my shadow from swallowing her whole. But now, with the battered door shut behind us, the silence was a living, gnawing animal.
She hovered by the entrance, the strap of her satchel digging into her shoulder, her knuckles tense and white. I filled the small guest quarters to bursting. The stone walls, once a cool sanctuary, now pressed in, shrinking with every shallow breath she took.
Blooded warriors of Scalvaris had bigger rooms. Guest quarters weren’t meant to be welcoming. It hadn’t seemed small until she was in it.
Every sound drilled itself into my skull. The soft, quick scrape of Reika’s breath. The brittle snap of her boots against stone as she set her bag down by the door, so careful, as if a sudden movement would shatter the uneasy peace between us. Even the faintest shuffle of her weight felt like a challenge, a test I was doomed to fail.
I was still covered in blood. A warrior always carried battle on him, but this felt different, dirtier. That she hadn’t run screaming was a miracle forged in stubbornness. She anchored herself to the far wall, shoulders hunched, chin tucked, eyes darting anywhere but at me. It was instinctive. Her body screamed danger while her spirit refused to break.
My own heart thundered, too big for this space, too loud for what passed for comfort. I kept my hands open and my movements slow, my voice softened to careful edges.
You can’t force trust into a wounded thing.
Caution, stillness, a softening of the voice. These were the tools that coaxed a frightened creature close sometimes. Patience had always been a weapon in my arsenal.
But this wasn’t patience. This was torment.
The memory of our kiss hung in the air, unspoken but blistering between us. I wanted to comfort her, to close the gap and crush my mouth to hers, to promise safety in the only language that felt true. But the urge itself was poison. Any wrong step, any show of strength, would make everything worse.
My want was a blade pointed at my own throat.
I scrubbed a hand down my jaw, feeling the sticky smear of drying blood. I had to get clean. I made myself small, as small as a thing like me could be.
I retreated into the narrow bathing alcove, careful to close the partition only halfway so she could see. No traps. No surprises. Just me, washing away the blood and the horror I carried on my skin.
I worked fast. Cold water bit at fresh cuts, old battle-aches coming alive beneath my scales as I peeled off battered armor and the bloodstained tunic. Symbols of what I was, of what I’d done. The copper tang of blood chased me, refusing to be banished, but I scoured my arms clean and let the cold numb my hands.
My reflection caught me in a shard of polished obsidian above the basin: gold eyes too bright, jaw set, a monster staring back. I found a fresh shirt, black and simple, softer than what I’d worn in the field. No armor. No weapons. No claim, save the scars winding over my shoulder and chest, stories written in flesh that no amount of scrubbing could erase.
When I stepped back into the main room, Reika flinched. It was barely there, just a tightening around her eyes, a jerk of her chin. But I saw it. I felt it like a wound reopening.
I slowed everything. Breath in. Shoulders hunched, posture closed, my hands visible and empty. Part of me wanted to drop to my knees, to show her my throat, to offer every vulnerable piece of myself to prove I wasn’t the monster she remembered.
