Total pages in book: 362
Estimated words: 347293 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1736(@200wpm)___ 1389(@250wpm)___ 1158(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 347293 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1736(@200wpm)___ 1389(@250wpm)___ 1158(@300wpm)
Good gods.
Wondering what could’ve gone so drastically wrong, I turned my attention back to the riverbed, unable to understand the difference between giving a creature a dual life and creating one from a mortal. But the line between them was thin. Eythos had given the dragons a dual life, creating the draken. Why had—?
I stiffened, my skin tingling. “He…he didn’t give them a choice.”
Ash’s head snapped in my direction. “How did you—?” He inhaled deeply, his chin lifting. “Foresight.”
Nodding, I swallowed hard. “Why didn’t he give them a choice?”
Ash held my stare for a moment before his gaze slid away. “I don’t know. All of that happened long before I was born, but my father wasn’t without flaws.”
A knot lodged in my chest. No, he was not. “Kolis believes that everyone saw his brother as flawless.”
“And Kolis is a fucking idiot,” he snarled, shadows appearing beneath his thinning flesh. “There were likely those who did believe that, but no one who knew my father could’ve possibly continued doing so. He made mistakes.”
“Like with Sotoria?” I blurted out.
His gaze swung back to mine. “You’re talking about what he did with her soul—the deal he made with your ancestor?”
Now, it was I who looked away. I nodded, but I wasn’t thinking about Eythos’s deal with King Roderick Mierel and how he’d placed Sotoria’s soul along with the embers of life in my bloodline. It was what Kolis had claimed Eythos had done to Sotoria. What I knew was true.
Eythos had been the one to end Sotoria’s second life.
“Even though whatever he planned didn’t work as intended, what he did can’t be a mistake,” Ash said quietly, but he was closer. I could feel him. “If he hadn’t done that, our paths may not have crossed.”
Slowly, I turned to him. The shadows had receded from his flesh, but the eather pulsed brightly in his eyes. I started to tell him that wasn’t what I’d meant, but that would open a door, and it wasn’t a good time to walk through it because that conversation would lead to another truth Kolis had spoken—albeit a partial one. The one about Ash’s mother.
So, I did what Ash normally did.
I got the subject back on track. “I know you said you don’t know why your father didn’t give them a choice, but do you have any guesses? Because it seems so out of character for him.”
Eyeing me for a moment, he shook his head. “If I had to guess? Ego. He thought he knew best.”
“And he learned quickly that he didn’t?” Sighing, I turned back to the riverbed. “I should probably stop delaying this.”
“You know, you don’t have to try this,” Ash countered as a shadow of one of the draken fell over us. “Since the Rot has lifted, it will eventually rain. Even with winter on the way.”
I nodded. “I know.”
A moment passed. “And neither of us has any idea how much energy something like this will take. There’s no reason to tax yourself.”
But there was.
Parts of the Shadowlands had already fallen to the Rot by the time Ash had been born, but he’d said much of it resembled the Dark Elms of Lasania. Wild and lush. It hadn’t become this even when his father died.
Nearly twenty-one years ago, all the trees lost their leaves, and all the bodies of water, except for the Black Bay, dried up.
That had happened the night of my birth, signaling the start of the slow death of the embers.
Even though I knew it wasn’t my fault, I felt responsible for the final thing stolen from Ash and all those who resided in the Shadowlands.
I wanted to give it back to them. Now. Not later.
But again, it was more than that. Life needed to return to the Shadowlands. “I…I don’t know how to explain it, but I just have this feeling. Here.” I pressed my hand to my upper abdomen. “Like I have to do this. It’s an urge, and…” I glanced at him. “I don’t know if I can’t not try. I need to.”
Ash frowned. “Like you’re unable to stop yourself?”
I thought that over. “Not in the same sense as the lyrue being unable to stop themselves from eating people.”
“Well, that’s a relief to hear,” he said dryly.
I smiled. “But I don’t think I would be able to rest if I didn’t try. Like, I already feel a restlessness and an inexplicable sense of urgency.”
“Nektas mentioned something like this to you, didn’t he? When you asked him about my father’s abilities.”
I nodded. “I think this is like that.”
The draken dipped low then, blotting out the remaining rays of sun and starlight. The wind whipped, catching strands of my hair and tossing them across my face. Extending their wings, the draken slowed, landing on their forelegs first.
Odin snorted, shaking his mane and stomping his front hoof as he eyed the black-and-brown-scaled Crolee.