“With all my heart,” he answered back, breathless with worry.
Joach remained at the doorway. “I’m going to check with Tol’chuk and make sure the og’re clans have gathered before I seek my bed.”
Er’ril nodded and led Elena to their cabin. She had yet to speak a word. She seemed again the little girl he had once rescued from these very lands—just as mute, just as worn of heart.
Inside, coals shone brightly in the small hearth, and the warmth melted away the chill almost immediately. Er’ril guided Elena to the bed, then bent to help remove her boots.
“I can manage,” she finally said, and shook the stubborn boot off. Her voice was not nearly as lost as he would have expected. She fought the other boot to join its twin. It thumped to the floor, followed by a long sigh.
“Are you all right?” Er’ril asked, still on one knee.
She nodded slowly, but her lower lip trembled.
He read her expression and did not press her. Instead, he stood and kicked off his own boots. “We should catch what sleep we can,” he said softly.
She stripped out of her calfskin jacket, while he shrugged out of his cloak. Slowly they shed their outer trappings until both stood only in their undergarments. Elena unbound the sash around her waist to let her linen shift fall loose, draping from shoulders to midthigh.
Er’ril rolled back the furs and heavy woolen blanket. He turned to invite her into the bed first, but he found her eyes upon him. Before he could utter a word, she gently pushed him to the bed. She slid her hands under the edge of his own shirt, her palms warm on his still-cold skin. She slid her fingers up his chest, drawing his shirt up with it.
He reached and trapped her hands halfway up. “Elena . . .” They had not slept bare-skinned together since the night of her near freezing in the si’luran glade.
She freed her hands from his grip with a stolid determination and continued to remove his shirt, drawing it over his head and tossing it aside.
He stared into her eyes and saw her need. She stood back and loosened the ties to her own shift from around her neck. The drape of linen fell, shivering down from her shoulders to pile at her ankles. She stepped out, naked, a woman of startling beauty in the light of the hearth. The glow bathed her skin like a flow of liquid light, casting all into warm hues, from the curve of her neck, to the swell of her breasts, to the fullness of her hips.
She came to him in all her womanliness, and he found no breath for words. He made a sound half between drowning and desire.
Standing before him, she let her hands touch him again: his cheek, his neck, down an arm. She drew his own hand and placed his palm on her belly.
He finally found his voice. “Elena, we mustn’t . . . not like this . . . not now . . .”
Thunder rumbled from the skies beyond, reminding of the war to come. Its roar trembled through the ship.
Elena slid beside him on the bed. “Why?” she whispered, ignoring his words.
“With dawn, the battle begins. We should—”
She drew the furs over them, drawing him down to the pillows and nest of blankets. Her skin on his own melted his reason. “Why?” she repeated in his ear.
“The war—”
“No,” she interrupted again, her lips brushing the tender skin below his ear. “The reason in your heart.”
Er’ril closed his eyes as a shudder of desire swept from his toes to the core of his being. He fought to speak without a moan. “I don’t know what you mean.”
She shifted to stare him in the eye. Flecks of gold swam in her emerald eyes. “You know,” she said huskily. “I know. It’s been unspoken between us too long.”
He was overly conscious of her breast on his arm, but he did know. “I . . . I’m an old man . . . too old.” It came out with a relieved rush. “I’ve lived for over five centuries.”
Elena sighed. “And I’m too young.”
He opened his eyes and found his voice again. “Despite your womanly body, you’re still just a girl of fifteen winters.” He could not keep the shame out of his voice.
She stared sadly at him. “Fifteen winters? Perhaps. But in these past winters, it’s not only magick that has aged me into this womanly body. On this journey, I’ve slain both enemies and those I’ve loved. I’ve led armies to victory and to ruin. I’ve entered the very heart of darkness and survived death itself. And along this road, I’ve learned . . . “ Tears filled her eyes. “I learned to love . . . you.”
“Elena . . .” He pulled her into his arms, wrapping her tight to him.
“What does the count of winters matter?” she whispered. “My heart is far older than even the handful of winters that the spell has aged me.” Another shuddering sob. A fist thumped his chest, in both irritation and hopelessness. “And you . . . you hardened your heart against the world from the time you were scarcely older than I am now. Your immortality didn’t just freeze your age . . . it froze your heart.”
Er’ril lay with her and could find no argument for her words. Ever since the Blood Diary had been forged in the inn at Winterfell, he had walked the world one step away from all others. Over the centuries, he had marched thousands of roads and fought countless battles in unnamed fields, but only in the brief time he had spent with Vira’ni had he ever let his heart thaw from the ice of immortality. And even after that short respite, he had let it harden again.
He shifted, lifting Elena’s face between his palms. He studied the woman in his arms. Were they truly so far apart in age? In her eyes, he finally saw the truth. The depth of sadness, the age of the woman who stared back at him . . .
“Er’ril—”
“Hush.” He rolled to his side, pulling her slightly under him. He now stared down at the woman he loved—the woman he wanted to love. For the first time since lying with her, he allowed his desire to break free. It was a fire that burned through his heart and limbs. He gasped, surprised by the intensity of his feelings.
He bent down and kissed her, his will taken from him. Now it was her turn to gasp, lips crushed, breaths shared. Their arms tightened into iron, fingers struggling to hold even tighter.
Thunder cracked somewhere far overhead, while a gust of rain pattered against the wooden sides of the boat, sounding like an arrow barrage. The boat rocked and lurched in the sudden surge of storm winds.
But neither of them acknowledged it, locked in each other’s arms, locked in each other’s heart.
Er’ril broke finally from the kiss, moving his lips to her neck, to her breast. She arched to meet him, crying out.
“Elena . . . ,” he moaned in chorus with her. He lifted his eyes for a moment to meet hers. He rode the crest of a wave from which he was about to tumble. Their gazes met. He sought one last time for a warding signal, some sign to hold off. But all he saw in her eyes was the same shared passion, a fire that melted the boundaries between them.
No words were needed at this moment, but Elena whispered them anyway. “Don’t save me . . . just love me.”
“Always . . . ,” he answered, falling into her. “Always and forever.”
From a promontory a league away, Greshym sat atop his roan gelding and stared up at the storm-tossed boat. He studied his target.
The iron keel of the Windsprite was a streak of fire in the night. Lightning briefly illuminated the reefed sails and rain-swept masts. The ship bobbed and skipped like a cork riding the winds of the storm. He could just make out the azure brightness of a figure at the stern deck—the captain, he supposed, struggling to ride out the storm. The others must all be below, waiting out the wild weather, waiting for the dawn.
He smiled as a gust parted the limbs of the oak under which he stood and drenched him with water. He shifted the staff in his hands and dried his clothes and body with a small spell, casting out a shield of magick to insulate himself from the storm’s cold and dampness.
It was good to have his power returned to him. He glanced to the beast cowering in the lee of his horse, rain sluicing from the stu
mp gnome’s gray skin, its peaked ears flat against its skull. Rukh trembled. The gnome’s ribs showed along its leathery side, and it moved with a slight limp. The beast had been hard-pressed to cross the forest and meet its master as instructed.
After being freed by Joach, Greshym had fled west beyond the reach of the book’s spell—almost five leagues. He had known when he crossed beyond Cho’s tether. It was as if something burst inside him, and he knew he was free, his magick available to him again.
Unleashed, it was not hard to discover Rukh’s location and meet the gnome. He was relieved that the beast still had his staff. While it was just a hollow length of bone, he would have wasted precious time fashioning a new one. He reclaimed it gratefully and fueled it with simple energies—a woodsman and his family had proven a surprisingly rich source of power. With Rukh’s help, he had fed all their hearts’ blood into the hollow bone’s marrow. The youngest child, a lad of only three winters, even bore a small spark of elemental fire. Enlivened by this surprising fuel, his staff had ripened with magicks. Afterward, Rukh had fed on the meat off the woodsman’s bones, the gnome’s first decent meal in ages.
Both of them renewed, they had set off back east again in pursuit of Shadowsedge, the wit’ch sword. Greshym had used a bit of magick to make his steed’s hooves fly through the woods. He raced back over the pass to close the distance to the marching armies, following their trail, keeping himself cloaked in magick. By nightfall, he was within sight of the ship.
And as he suspected, his magick remained his own. Once broken, Cho’s dampening spell had not renewed itself. It would take a fresh spell to bind him again to the book—something he would not let happen. “I’ll have my sword,” he promised the night.
His plan was simple. During the confusion of the battle tomorrow, he would simply use a black portal to reach the ship, snatch the sword, and be off before anyone was aware. He dared not risk such a venture this night. On this eve of battle, everyone was at their most alert. No, he would be cautious, patient. He would not lose this one chance to gain Shadowsedge for himself. With the blade, there was no one who could stand before him—not Shorkan, not even the Dark Lord himself.
Greshym licked his lips. With the sword’s ability to shatter any spell, nothing could touch him. After five centuries, he would finally be free!
A bolt of lightning crackled across the breadth of the sky from one horizon to another. The entire world appeared out of the darkness, limned in silver, frozen in time.
The Windsprite hung in the night, a glowing lantern.
Greshym narrowed his eyes. Tuned to all things magickal, he sensed some profound shift in the world, as if a nexus of power had been torn wide. He held his breath, overwhelmed.
Then the lightning flashed away, taking the world with it, leaving only an endless rumble of thunder. The forest around him seemed darker than a moment before.
Despite his insulating spell, Greshym shivered. Something had changed in that moment . . . but what?
He turned his steed and fled deeper into the rimwood forest.
No, this was not a night to tread where he was not wanted. Tomorrow would be soon enough.
As dawn neared, Elena lay in the rumple of furs and blankets, listening to the wail of winds and tumult of thunder. In the tiny hearth, the fire had burned down to scant coals, leaving the room dark. Er’ril remained curled at her side, spent, sleeping now as dawn drew nearer.
She could not sleep. Instead, she nestled against the man she loved. His skin kept her warm, his breath on her cheek calmed her, and the beat of his heart echoed between them. She wished this moment to last forever, though she knew that the world would claim them both again.
She stared into the darkness, appreciating the warm ache in the pit of her belly, remembering, trying to understand all that had happened.
As they had joined this stormy night, Er’ril had moved slowly, despite his raging passion. Her virginal blood had been spilled with a brief sharp pain, her cries captured between Er’ril’s lips. Then he had moved with a rhythm that she slowly rode to match, first hesitantly, then with a rising passion of her own. The moment seemed endless, ageless, a wave that welled through her, then out in a cry of release and joy, an impossible blend of pain and pleasure. Er’ril met her cry with his own, thunder in her ears.
At that exact moment, a crack of lightning had shattered the world. Blinding light pierced through the small window, a lance of brilliance that cast everything in silver. Elena’s eyes had been closed at that moment, but somehow she saw everything in that burst of light: Er’ril poised over her, his face frozen in silver, his mouth open in a grimace of surprise and joy, his brow bunched with the same impossible mix of sensation.
And in that moment of brilliance, the world had shattered away around her. For a heartbeat, she was again lost in the silvery web of all living things. Her mind and body blew outward as she gasped in Er’ril’s arms. She heard a thousand voices, experienced all the sensations that the world entertained, saw sights from a million facets—too many to comprehend, but each as clear as a crystal bell. And in the center of the endless web, she sensed an immense presence turn slowly toward her. Cho had once warned her to stay away from this immensity. But now, riding on the waves of her own passion, she was both blown outward and drawn inward at the same time.
There seemed no escape.
Then the lightning across the sky shattered away, dying in an explosion of thunder that shook the very keel of the ship. Elena fell back into her body, back into her bed, back into Er’ril’s arms.
As Er’ril was released, too, he fell atop her, kissing her back to reality, Elena had been too stunned to speak of the moment. Tears flowed down her cheeks. She had been a breath away from being lost, destroyed in the very moment of their shared love.
Er’ril mistook her tears, kissing her as any lover might. “I love you,” he had whispered in her ear.
But the thousand voices of the web still echoed in her head, drowning out his words. She pulled him down to her. “Hold me,” she had whispered. “Don’t let go of me.”
He did just that, encircling her with his arms, wrapping her in his strong legs. She lay with him, breathing in the musky scent of his cooling skin, bathed in his breaths as they receded into a light slumber.
Now, alone with her thoughts and worries, she closed her eyes against the approach of morning as the ship rocked under her. Long ago, her journey had been heralded by the blood of her first menstra. She sensed now, with the shedding of her virginal blood, that the end was near. The circle complete. First bleed to first blood . . .
Elena lay in Er’ril’s arms. With limbs tangled, the heat of their bodies blurred where one began and the other ended. Still, Elena had never felt more alone. The end of all neared, and according to Sisa’kofa, she would face it alone. But what would be the ultimate fate?
From blood to blood . . . where will it all end?
Book Six
THE LONGEST
NIGHT
23
Kast waited for Sy-wen to be dragged up from her cell below. From the deck of the Dragonsheart, he watched the gray hint of dawn glow to the east. Here in this strange sea of ice and fire, mists hung over the waters, while the sky remained a slate of dark clouds, a roil of smoke and storm. It was near impossible to tell night from day.
But despite the darkness, day was upon them.
Horns sounded in the distance, a call to arms. Sails snapped overhead. The gathered fleets were under way, headed toward Blackhall: the elv’in in the air, the Dre’rendi atop the sea, and the mer’ai below. The last great war was about to begin.
A scuffle sounded behind him. A hatch battered open. He turned to see Sy-wen carried between two Bloodriders, bound wrist and ankle. She kicked and spat and spouted curses. A crazed thing, she was dragged before him. While the larger war loomed, he faced his own first battle.
“We’ll eat your hearts!” she screamed at the guards. But when her eyes met his, she went quiet. A s
low smile formed on her lips, cold and foul.
“Sy-wen,” he said, ignoring the evil before him. “It is time to wake Ragnar’k.”
She stared at him with eyes ablaze in madness. Since nearing the shadow of Blackhall, her ravings had worsened. She had scratched gouges in her own face, now scabbed and raw. Her lips were chewed bloody.
“Sy-wen . . .” His heart ached to see her hurt. He nodded to the men.
They unbound her wrists, and one of the guards forced her hand to Kast’s cheek. Her fingers were cold on his dragon tattoo, and nails dug at his skin. “She is lost!” A wail rose in her throat. “She is mine!”
Kast ignored the lie. He would know if Sy-wen was truly gone. Two hearts beat in his chest: dragon and man, both bound to the mer’ai woman. He stared into the mad-bright eyes. “Sy-wen, come to me.”
Laughter pealed across the deck.
“Come to me . . . one more time.”
With the proximity to Blackhall, the tentacled simaltra had rooted deeper into her skull, but Kast needed Sy-wen to break free for only a moment. She had but to take control for a heartbeat and desire the transformation.
He closed his eyes and brought his hand up. He pushed aside the guard’s fingers, replacing the man’s hand with his own. He leaned his cheek against her palm, fingers lacing with hers. “Sy-wen, my love, my heart . . .” He was not ashamed to display such affection in front of the guards. He was beyond feigning the usual Dre’rendi stoicism. “One last time . . .”
Crawling fingers suddenly relaxed into his own. He felt a gentle warmth infuse the palm. “Stand back,” he warned the guards.
Suddenly released, Sy-wen fell into his arms. Her voice was a kitten newly born, a feeble mewl. “Kast . . .”
He opened his eyes and saw the woman he loved. He leaned to kiss her, but the magick ignited between them, driving them apart as a larger heart overtook his and swallowed him away. He tumbled into darkness, where his sensations blurred with those of the dragon.
But he kept a secret in his heart, the words spoken to him by Sheeshon. The dragon must die. That was his burden alone. He knew this was truly Sy-wen’s last flight. Once she returned to the Dragonsheart and released Kast from the dragon, he knew what he had to do. There was no way he could kill Ragnar’k—or rather, only one way.