Page 47 of Beast of Blood and Ash
He grinned wider, rolling his shoulders, letting the chains rattle and ring. The noise was calculated, a performance for our benefit. He wanted to remind me of the bonds I’d once worn, of Ignarath’s ability to cage even its best monsters. He was chained, but his posture was pure predator, leaning forward until the shackles bit, head canted as if listening for the sweet sound of a scream.
“Talk?” he drawled, savoring every syllable. “Why would I waste words on rabble? You’ve traded the scent of victory for the stink of desperation. Look at you. Scalvaris’s lapdog. Broken, caged, sniffing after the humans like they’re worth more than blood on the sand.”
I didn’t blink. Didn’t waver.
Inside, the old rage simmered, warred with shame and the sticky residue of Reika’s touch. I hated the taste of violence, but it lived inside me, coiled and waiting. Every word Dravka spat was meant to draw it out, to make me brutal, to prove I had never changed.
He rattled his chains, a savage music meant for my ears alone. “Did they let you keep your claws, Traitor? Or did you hand them over with your spine?”
I forced a flat smile, stepping closer so he could smell my conviction, not my fear. “You want to test me, Dravka? You can try. But you’ll lose more than dignity.”
He just laughed, low and rough, a sound like grinding stone. “You’ve been so busy playing guard dog for your little human pet … so focused on the one cage.” He leaned forward, his eyes gleaming with malicious triumph. “Did you even notice the other doors swinging open?”
Ice. Pure, arctic ice flooded my veins. He wasn’t a threat.
He was a distraction.
The realization snapped through me with the sharpness of a fresh blade. The slow, showy infiltration. Letting himself be seen. Asking for me, of all people. His presence here was no accident. It was theater.
A decoy.
I took a step back. My mind raced, summoning every detail Nyx had given me, every security protocol I’d ever mapped through these tunnels.
Whatever was happening, it was already underway. The humans. The enclave.
Reika.
Panic ripped through me, primal and undeniable. The city wasn’t holding its breath because it trusted me to solve this. It was waiting for the wound to open.
I was out of the cell in a heartbeat, my mind racing. “He’s stalling,” I snarled at Nyx. “He wanted to get caught. He’s playing with us.”
Nyx’s eyes widened, every bit as ruthless as mine in that instant, the warning sinking in. I grabbed him by the shoulder before he could move.
“Get to the human enclave,” I roared. Protocol, politics, none of it mattered. “Check on all of the humans. Now!”
He didn’t waste time with questions. Nyx sprinted away without a word, his footsteps pounding down the corridor, echoing like war drums. The world narrowed to action, to the pulse of duty and desperation crashing together.
I was torn. My every instinct screamed to run back to my rooms, back to Reika. But the other humans … they were vulnerable. Unprotected. I saw their faces in a flash: Kira, Selene, Eden, Kinsley, and more. My claws flexed, scraping deep gouges in the stone, anchoring me to the moment.
She wouldn’t forgive me if I left them to suffer.
I broke into a run, my claws scrabbling for purchase on the stone, heading for the distant human quarters. My heart hammered against my ribs, each beat a prayer and a curse.
Stones flew beneath me. Air moved sharp and fast, the scent of blood rising ahead, Ignarath, thick and unmistakable, slicing through the rich stew of market and river and sweat. I tore through the tunnels, vision narrowing, body reduced to need and velocity. Reika’s name rang behind my teeth, but I forced it back. Duty first. Hope later.
A new sound cut through the wail of the alarm, echoing from a side tunnel up ahead, followed by the unmistakable roar of Drakarn under attack.
I crashed forward. The city’s veins boiled with panic and resistance. Up ahead, the darkness flickered with the strobe of enemy blades, the ring of Drakarn war cries, the shrieks of Ignarath’s invaders punching into Scalvaris’s heart. I heard steel on stone, felt the deep-throated bellow of a warrior cut down, the sick heat of another death thrown like a torch into the dark.
The world was burning, and I was already too late.
20
REIKA
Our quarters.
I kept repeating the words in my head, as if I might transform their meaning into something less loaded, less dangerous. But there was no mistaking what Omvar had said. I could still hear the deep roll of his voice, echoing in my head.
