Page 22 of A Dream Shrouded in Fury
“What do you plan to do with them?”My words were heavy, each syllable setting off a fresh ache in my head.In a voice barely loud enough to be heard over the din, I asked, “Can he stay?”
The sympathy that had glinted in Thorn’s eyes faded, her expression transforming into that of our hardened leader.“I’ve yet to decide.I need time to think.And seeing you will not put me in a better mood until I’ve calmed down.Go wash up and get settled.First we’ll deal with them—then we’ll decide what to do about you.”
Jael
XV
“We’ve been here for days, and they’ve only let us out of this room once to bathe,” Hethyr said.Her nose wrinkled.“Thank goodness for that, because we were rank.All that blood.It was nice to wash the near death off.And those hot springs are divine.”
She rolled her eyes skywards, and I experienced a pinch of jealousy that she’d gotten to enjoy those dragon-heated waters when I might never have the chance.I might have if these people hadn’t survived… and guilt chased me that I was disappointed to find them here.
The Coynfare was the reason I’d survived Leonine’s wrath.I owed them everything.
I even owed Corban, though I couldn’t help but feel the universe had given me a raw deal in dragging him back from the grave.
I looked them over, the three of them appearing in good form, and asked, “How badly were you hit?Corban, I saw you go down.There’s no way you should still be breathing.”
He scoffed.“That guard got lucky.I clung to life because I was too fucking stubborn to die.The vampires found us, carted us here, stuffed us full of vampire blood and foul salves, and here we are, almost as good as new.”
He tugged up the bottom of his shirt to show off the massive red scar still healing across his chest.
Hethyr shuddered.“It wasn’t pretty.Pimmin and I went down beside each other, me with a dagger to the thigh, Pim with one to the gut.”
Pimmin slid their arm around Hethyr’s shoulders and pulled her against their side.“Too close.By chance, I passed out with my head on Hethyr’s leg.It’s the only reason she made it.Thank the sun.”
They pressed a kiss into her hair, and another surge of jealousy passed through me.I wondered where Kalla was and if she’d had her conversation with Thorn.If so, what the verdict had been.If her situation would change when she discovered my intentions were now in doubt.
My insides squeezed, and I forced my attention back to the others.
“If we left tomorrow, would you be in any shape to try this again?”I asked, desperate to make them admit we were better off leaving our schemes behind us.“We were twenty-four, now we’re four.Even if half of Brynna’s remaining soldiers are injured, the odds of us succeeding are next to nothing.They’re even worse if we run into the guards searching the woods.”
We’d be walking into our final deaths—they had to know that.By the glance Hethyr and Pimmin exchanged, they weren’t sold on the idea, but Corban’s eyes burned, the rage within him undampened by our previous failure.
“Then we die,” he said.“What are our other options, ledsha?Staying here under this nice, cushy mountain being scowled at by vampires until they decide to make a meal of us?Because I’ll tell you, that’s not how I’m going to go.I would rather die in our attempt to save Soldara than give up the cause because it’s too hard.Why are you pushing back on this?Did you forget what Leonine did to you?Did you forget the sounds you made when his knife tore into your flesh?The way you cried for mercy in the dark?You might think you can put Soldara behind you, but what will you do when the memories rear their ugly heads and you realize you had a chance to put an end to it and did nothing?”
He stared at me like he expected me to flinch, but I didn’t.Nothing he said could hurt me because there was nothing to hurt.The darkness—that deep, all-encompassing emptiness that subsisted solely on anger and hate—was encroaching on me again, pressing everything else so far down that I felt nothing.
For the past four nights, Kalla had kept my fears at bay.She’d brought up the subject of Leonine but hadn’t pushed, and her compassionate approach had made me realize that even with the worst he’d done to me, he didn’t define me.
But with Corban oozing those words into my ears, dropping rage like globs of boiling oil, I couldn’t take the risk that he was right.Thoughts of Kalla as we’d sat together and discussed my options swam through my mind, but every idyllic vision that had seemed possible in our haven wisped away like clouds.If I stayed here for ten years, twenty, fifty, and one day woke up resenting her for not holding off my desire for vengeance, where would that leave us?
“Have you looked for a way out of here?”I asked.
Pimmin dragged their fingers through their wheat-blond hair.“We’ve tried, but there’s always a guard standing at the door.”
“We kept an eye out to and from the hot spring,” Hethyr said.“I think I know where the exit is, but it’s across the cavern, and there are always vampires out there.If we want to escape, we’ll need to pray to the sun for a miracle.”
Or help.I didn’t know what the chances were that Kalla would be willing, but I knew there was no way we were stepping foot out of here without her support.
“Then for now, we wait,” I said.
Corban surged to his feet and closed in on me.“Wait?The longer we wait, ledsha, the farther the princess will get.I think you’re hoping that’s the case.I don’t know why Zath chose you as his second.You talk about revenge and how much your need for it drives you, but where is that drive now?Zath would have tackled the first vampire to come through that door and forced them to guide him out.But you won’t do that, will you?”He spat on my chest and wobbled on his feet as he returned to his spot on the floor.
Hethyr watched him with a bland, disapproving stare, and Pimmin squeezed their eyes shut as if fending off a headache.I was impressed they’d managed to survive three days in the same room with Corban without killing him.
Finally, Hethyr turned her attention to me.“You’re our leader, Jael.Whatever your orders, we’ll follow them.Foighal do Soldara.”
Freedom for Soldara.Like that mattered anymore.Like that had ever mattered.
