Page 28 of Burning Ice
Davon-tus.
The word lingered through the air, a hush that seemed to glow together with the Dariux map that resonated on Cyprian’s body.
Cyprian started crying, his eyes shining a fierce yellow with every tear he shed. “You were there, that day. In the arena. You were with me. I felt you. You killed Ludo with me. Good Light, that was you, wasn’t it? I’ve searched for so long. How did you find me? I thought I’d dreamt it only, the voice, the ice. But that was you?”
“Let him talk, lover,” Moargan mumbled, his hands tightening around Cyprian’s shoulders as he pulled him against his chest. His eyes landed on Kylix in both a warning and a worry.
“Of course,” Cyprian smiled through his tears.
“F-found me,” Mirel mumbled. With all the attention, he seemed to have shrunk.
“Hang on, you’re the one who created the ice?” Helianth asked. “You’re so small. I mean, I never thought… you saved me that day. From those monsters.”
The name burned through him like a fuse. Heat folded in his chest, sharp and hollow.Brother.The word struck like impact, not sound. He looked again at Mirel and saw it now, the gold flicker under the frost, the same light that lived behind Cyprian’s eyes. Every breath that left the boy shimmered faint, catching in the air as if the blood itself remembered.
Kylix’s pulse stuttered. His fire should have risen. It did not. It turned inward, confused, tasting its own smoke. He thought of the arena, of Cyprian’s glow cutting through the dark, of a second pulse he had felt that night but never named. That echo had belonged to this man. All this time he had chained the other half of Helion’s fire.
He wanted to speak, to ask how such a thing could live inside the same body that trembled beneath his hands. Instead he reached for silence, the only thing that hid him. The heat in his palms shivered. The air thinned. Vandor shifted behind him, sensing the crack that ran through command. Kylix forced his shoulders straight. Control first. Questions later. The world could burn after.
Cyprian’s blood. He saw it now, the gold under the frost, the same impossible pulse. For once, the fire in him didn’t know whether to rise or bow.
“I-I…” Mirel shrugged, shoulders deflating.
Kylix pulled on the chain to bring him in closer. “You’re scaring him,” he barked.
“And you lied to us, didn’t you?” Moargan’s grin was lethal. “When we came over the other day, you already had him in your custody. Care to explain?”
The room held its breath.
Cyprian’s voice cracked through the hush. “He’s really mine?”
No one answered. The word hung there, trembling like heat.
The silence was heavy, bright around the edges. He could hear hearts again, each one separate, beating out of time. Cyprian’s was the loudest, quick with wonder. Mirel’s trembled against it, fragile but steady.
Kylix kept still. He felt the pull between them, blood recognizing blood, a light that had nothing to do with flame. It tore at him. For a moment he saw himself from outside, the chain in his hand, the mark of control over something that should never have been bound.
Moargan waited, eyes sharp. Helianth’s curiosity gleamed like a blade. Even Aviel had gone still, the smoke from his cigarette curling upward and holding shape.
Kylix’s throat burned. He thought of tearing the chain away, of stepping back, of pretending the fire had not just met its reflection. But the instinct that had brought him here refused to loosen.
Mirel’s shoulder brushed his chest. The touch steadied and condemned him at once. Frost caught the light, small shards rising, almost weightless. The fire inside him answered, low and hungry.
“Say something, Kylix,” Moargan said quietly. “Before the boy burns himself out.”
Kylix lifted his head. The silence that followed felt deliberate, edged. He could feel the tremor in Mirel’s body, the quick rhythm of a heart that still did not trust him. He set his hand on the chain, slow, measured. “Later,” he said. Heat hummed under his palm.
It wasn’t a promise. It was a warning.
9
Mirel saw Cyprian move toward him and the room seemed to slow. Every step dragged light across the floor. Sound thinned until only breath remained. Then his arms were around him, closing tight across narrow shoulders. Black hair mixed with pale strands. Their cheeks touched.
“My brother,” he whispered.
My blood.
The room tilted around the word. Mirel felt the press of sound against his ribs, as if the air itself waited to see whether the truth would hold. He caught the faintest hitch of breath from Kylix while Moargan’s smile faltered. For a heartbeat the whole chamber belonged to that single admission.
