Page 58 of City of the Lost
His eyes locked on mine, the shadows seeping out to reach for me. The crack of the whip, the bite of the barbs, and Elora’s rage faded away as a strange, familiar heat infused my limbs. Home, I was coming home. There was nothing but Azren. Nothing but us.
Azren’s eyes widened and then his lips found mine. Heat rushed into me from the point of contact and slammed into my center, replacing the pool that was rapidly flowing into Azren. He swallowed my gasp, parted my lips, and claimed the inside of my mouth with a sweep of his tongue. His teeth sliced my tender flesh, and the coppery taste of blood filled my mouth, but he was quick to lick each nick, each puncture, healing me with his magic tongue and claiming me again and again. Elora’s scream of anguish faded as we floated away into dazzling light and through a waiting door.
We stumbled onto a battlefield, Shedim against Draconi, and at the helm of the Draconi force was an emerald dragon, eyes flashing, claws slashing, jaws feasting. Her wings folded tight and she shifted into her humanoid form. Elora stood on the rise and surveyed the carnage, triumph gleaming in her eyes.
The terrain shifted and we were in an assembly chamber where Shedim and Draconi stood side by side, shoulder to shoulder. A regal man stood on a platform, his hand clasped with a beautiful dark-haired female. Her lower body wavered like smoke. A Shedim.
“Today, we forge a new peace, a new hope, and a new world,” the Draconi male said. “Today, we are equal.”
The crowd erupted in applause. “All hail Liege Ivan.”
My eye caught movement to the right of Ivan. Elora—her eyes hard chips of disapproval, her mouth a thin, angry line.
The scene rushed away, and then we were back in the stone chamber, entwined, connected in a way I didn’t comprehend.
Azren pulled back, his eyes wide with horror, but his grip on me remained intense and desperate. “Wila. I remember. I remember it all.”
We glanced down at his chest in unison as black ink crawled across it in an intricate design.
“No!” Elora’s exclamation was a roar.
Azren’s head jerked up, his lips twisting in fury. “You! It was all a lie.”
Pain exploded at the back of my skull, and darkness claimed me.
13
Asharp sting across my cheek brought me rushing into consciousness. Glowing white eyes, too close, and rancid breath clogged my nasal passages making me gag.
“Awake, pretty skin,” Balen said. “Awake and ready to play.”
“Now, now, Balen.” Elora’s sultry voice pulled him away. “Give our pretty guest a little room to breathe.” Elora stepped into my line of sight. “Give her a moment to fully appreciate her predicament.” She leaned in, her face morphing so her jaws elongated outwards.
I jerked away, arms screaming in their sockets, metal clinking. Wait? What? I tugged at my shackled arms raised above my head. My coat was gone. It had torn, useless against the Draconi whip. But my legs were free. I kicked out, but Elora had already stepped back.
Balen laughed. “A fighter. Last longer when they fight. More fun.”
His words were guttural, uttered slowly, as if he had to think about each one. Whereas Azren spoke fluently, Balen spoke as if speech didn’t come naturally to him. Azren? Where was Azren?
“Where’s Azren?”
Elora’s face twisted in fury. “Do not say his name. Do not even think it. He belongs to me.”
Fuck her. “No, he doesn’t. You don’t own him, not anymore. Not now that whatever spell you had over him is broken, and he knows the truth of what you did.”
I’d expected her to balk, to take pause, or for surprise to glitter in her cold, emerald peepers, but she simply smirked.
“You know nothing, you fool. Whatever it is you think you saw is but a fraction of the truth.”
My gaze slid Balen’s way. “The truth that you killed Ivan to prevent a peace treaty with the Shedim. That you took away their chance at equality.”
Balen watched, unmoved.
Elora arched a brow, looking from me to the gormless demon. And then she tipped back her head and laughed—a full-throated guffaw that set my teeth on edge and sent a chill of terror racing down my spine.
Her laughter cut off abruptly. “You really don’t understand, do you? Do you think I’d alter historical memory, alter the Shedim’s hereditary memory, and take no precaution against the possibility of a loophole, of someone merely telling them the truth?”
My mouth was suddenly dry. Alter memories? She’d manipulated everyone’s minds? “How? How did you do it?”
