Chapter 27

Karys

"Andrel." Just speaking his name made my stomach curl.

"Hello, Karys."

I resisted the urge to back away as he drew closer. Beneath his familiar spice and sandalwood scent, he smelled strongly of blood and burned flesh. He looked poised and perfectly put together, though—as if he'd had time to clean himself up between the battle at Mindoth and now, yet was unable to fully wash the proof of it from his skin. As he came to a stop before me, I saw part of that proof more clearly: Thick bandages covered one of his hands.

Or what was left of it, at least.

Perhaps it was a trick of the moonlight, but it looked as though part of that hand was entirely… gone .

I swallowed hard. "Missing something, aren't we?"

"Ah. Yes. This." His expression remained unbothered—the practiced indifference I expected from him—as he lifted the injury so I could better inspect it. "Your other half took himself a souvenir, I'm afraid."

My heart clenched at the mention of Dravyn, but I didn't let any emotion show. "You're lucky he only took your hand."

Andrel chuckled at this, though the sound was disturbingly without humor. His eyes seemed to darken as he said, "I would ask what you see in that barbaric, brutish monster, but I think I'm past trying to understand it."

I looked away from his injury, focusing on the small garden in the corner of the yard instead.

With our mother's help, my sister and I had planted the golden blooms within that garden when we were children; it was one of the last memories I had of the three of us. To my surprise, the flowers were still neatly intact, with no weeds to be seen between them. Had Savna been tending to them?

A chill crept down my spine. I couldn't decide which was worse to look at: The flowers—painful reminders of the family I once had—or Andrel.

I eventually settled on him, though meeting his eyes made the rage swirling in my gut rise up and settle uncomfortably tight in my chest. "Why are you here?"

"Because I wanted to be a part of the reunion, of course. Why else? Your sister has been looking forward to seeing you again for a very long time."

"And you thought we would want you here to witness things?"

"Not you, perhaps. But Savna and I have gotten very close, as of late. So I'm here as her partner and supporter."

I shoved past him, heading for the bed of flowers.

I needed space.

"Partner , " I hissed. "Does your partner know what you did to me after we fought in the middle-heavens, by chance? Does she know you essentially killed me?"

"No one knows what happened except for you and me. I wouldn't betray you like that."

I couldn't keep the heated emotion from my voice this time. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Oh, did you want me to tell your sister how many of our kind you killed that day in Nerithyl? How you stole our prized weapon and ruined what should have been our most successful attack against the gods to date? It might put a damper on your heartwarming reunion, don't you think? If she realizes all the disappointing decisions you made that day, well…"

I started to reply, but the words died in my throat. I was spiraling into that awful memory once more. Back on the shores of the river with his knife, his betrayal, his words slithering over my skin—

Your sister will be so disappointed in you.

"That's what I thought," he said, mistaking my silence for agreement. "So we can keep it our little secret. No one but me needs to know the depths of your traitorous behavior, Kare."

I glared at him over my shoulder. "I am not the traitorous one between us."

"You don't think so?" He held up his bandaged hand, studying the misshapen end as though seriously considering my words, only to dismiss them with another cruel, hollow laugh. "Well. I am not the one fucking a god whose hands are drenched in the blood of our kind, now am I?"

Streaks of red blurred my vision.

The wards surrounding the yard were clearly even more powerful than I'd feared—because if they hadn't been, fire would have engulfed everything around us with my next breath.

Whatever was caging me in was enough to reduce my magic to mere flickers.

I tried the same trick I'd used against the Sun Court goddesses, gathering those flickers and shaping them into something sharp that I might wield. But the resulting weapon was not nearly as impressive this time—a mere dagger of fading firelight that wouldn't hold its shape.

"Relax," Andrel said, stepping closer. "I'm not going to tell anyone about that part, either. Most of them still think you're a victim of the God of Fire, being forced to do his bidding."

Lies . So many lies it made my head spin just trying to keep track of them. I tossed the dagger of fire away and knelt down, picking one of the flowers. The bloom of pale gold felt velvety and cold beneath my fingertips—something tangible to focus on.

"You have an opportunity before you, you know."

I didn't reply, but he continued all the same.

"You could start over here as though what our followers believe is true. You could be an inspiration to them—a victim, but one who escaped the chains the gods attempted to bind you with."

I crushed the flower against my palm, staring at the bright yellow stain it left behind as I said, "Start over with you holding those chains instead, I assume?"

I kept my back to him, but I could hear the smile in his voice as he said, "I've always held your chains, Karys. Nothing has really changed about that."

I straightened, unclenching my fist and letting the bits of flower fall from it as I replied in a low, furious voice: " I've changed. And I am more than just a victim."

He cocked his head, eyes dancing between darkness and amusement. "Your time among the gods really has made you delusional, hasn't it?"

I flexed my fingers as claws extended.

"You don't belong among them," he said. "You don't belong with him . And the sooner you admit that to yourself and come back to your true home, the happier you'll be. You were happy before, weren't you? Before he stole you away from us."

"You think he stole me from you? Is that why you and my sister attacked his kingdom?"

He laughed the idea off, but there was violence in the sound, which made me think I'd struck somewhere close to a truth he was trying to keep buried.

"I wasn't taken from you," I said, turning to face him more fully. "I was never yours."

I held my ground even as he closed the space between us, tilted his face uncomfortably close to mine, and said, "I must be misremembering all the times you and I laid together, then. And all the times you swore your loyalty to me, among other promises."

My claws twitched. I wanted to rake them across his mouth to shut him up. I hated his words. I hated myself for not being able to deny them. I wanted to set fire to us both—turn it all to ashes that I could rise up from, reborn into something entirely new. Something he had never touched.

He stepped past me before I could do any of these things, however, moving to study something in the distance. His boots crushed a few stray flowers along the garden's edge as he went. He paid them no mind.

"But to answer your question," he continued, matter-of-factly, "No. I'm not orchestrating a war merely because I'm some pathetic jilted lover. Galizur is a strategic target for us, and one that had it coming long before you ran off and started fraternizing with the gods.

"And they're only the start of our plans—we have other kingdoms on our list, of course. Other operations that have already started elsewhere. The fact that targeting Galizur also gets under the God of Fire's skin is really just a lovely coincidence. You should have seen his face when he realized his brother was our true target in Mindoth."

"…Your true target?"

Had they succeeded in killing the king?

Fresh horror and rage tore through me as I pictured Dravyn losing the only family he had left, and that rage carried me forward before I could stop myself.

I swiped my claws toward Andrel's neck. My first strike grazed skin. He spun around and quickly blocked the second, catching me by the elbow and twisting my arm painfully away from his body, his beastly, inhuman strength surging to meet my own divine vigor.

"Looking rather weak for the goddess he claimed you were," he sneered.

I jerked free of his hold. Embers flew out from my body. Suppressed, but still there, bristling beneath the surface. Maybe I could still summon more if I tried harder…

Or maybe trying to force it while within this oppressive space would result in me passing out—or worse.

The debate distracted me. My magic dimmed.

Overthinking it, again , I silently chastised myself.

"Your new divine skills aren't worth much in this place, are they?" Andrel mused.

I swept a cold, calculating look around the yard's perimeter, studying the way the air around it wavered and occasionally shimmered. "The ward around this yard is stronger than what I encountered around Ederis."

"Yes." He looked entirely too pleased with himself. "We actually have your visit to Ederis to thank for that; it helped us realize some of the weaknesses in our previous designs. Your sister thought this location would be a nice, confined place to visit with you and test out new spells."

"A nice, confined place to imprison me, you mean."

He shrugged. "Or keep you safe. It depends on your perspective."

I took a step closer to the boundary, even though drawing nearer made my skin tingle with warning.

I couldn't be trapped here.

I wouldn't be trapped here.

Another rush of anger overcame me and sent me charging forward once more—this time, toward escape.

Andrel didn't attempt to stop me.

He didn't need to.

Running into the ward was like running into an invisible, electrified wall—it sent a jolt of uncomfortable energy hissing through me, stealing my breath away.

Stranger sensations followed.

The buzzing current settled, but the discomfort continued as I tried to keep moving; it was like the very air was sticking to my skin, threatening to peel it from my bones if I didn't hold still.

Even after I'd stopped, I felt like parts of me were being pulled in different directions. The world twisted and turned. I stared at my boots as I attempted to keep my balance, and it was then that I noticed the runes that had been sketched along the ground.

The source of these ward spells?

They must have been.

Similar symbols likely covered the landscape in the Hollowlands, near the barriers I'd crossed before entering Ederis. Though they must have been better hidden there; I hadn't noticed anything when passing through.

The analytical side of my brain longed to sit with these marks and try to sort out their magic. My gaze swept over all the ones I could see, doing my best to commit them to memory. Later, I would try to recreate them and search for patterns and meanings.

In the meantime, I needed to escape their hold before it destroyed me.

The more I tried to move through the barrier, the more it felt like I was being torn apart. Trying to push forward made things worse, leaving me with no choice but to stumble backward into the yard instead. I lost my balance as I did.

Andrel caught me as I fell.

I was too stunned by the ward's power to immediately fight my way free of his hold. My limbs dangled uselessly as he carried me toward the cracked, moss-covered bench of stone near the center of the yard.

"Put me down ," I snarled.

He did—placing me on the bench—but he stayed entirely too close. I longed to shut my eyes to try and fight off the spinning, but I didn't dare. Not when he could so easily reach out and touch me.

"I wish Dravyn had ripped both your hands off," I muttered.

Andrel expelled another low, humorless laugh. He settled down on the bench beside me, leaning forward and resting his elbows against his knees.

How many times had we sat together on this very bench, just like this, dreaming and plotting and chatting together? It had always felt like a place of infinite possibilities to my younger, more naive self.

Stupid, stupid, stupid younger self.

Thinking about it made the spinning in my vision and the churning in my stomach worse.

Quietly, Andrel said, "I'm sure he wishes he'd ripped them both off, too. Too bad. And now he won't be able to find us, either—yet another tragedy."

"You underestimate how connected we are." I risked closing my eyes just for a moment. "There is no ward you could create that would stop him from finding me."

"Hmm."

I looked over to find him watching me as though I was an experiment of some sort, making me regret opening my mouth.

"I have heard that the gods can connect with one another without the need for speech, or even proximity," he said. "That within their own court and the line of their hierarchy, the ability to communicate is even stronger..."

I averted my gaze so he couldn't see the confirmation in it.

"It could be useful to know more about how this power works."

I attempted to put more space between us. Trying to properly sit up and move made my dizziness worse, but I still managed to drag myself all the way to the end of the bench, gripping the corner of the backrest for support.

"In fact, I'm sure you have lots of useful information about the gods that you could pass along to us," Andrel continued, his arms still resting casually against his knees, his tone still easygoing—still eerily similar to the countless bench chats we'd shared in the past.

"What makes you believe I would give you any of that information?"

"It would be easier than making me force it out of you."

"You won't force anything out of me."

He cut me a sidelong glance that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. "Maybe not," he said with a shrug. "But I'm still willing to try."

I gripped the back of the bench harder. Pulled myself up taller.

"I wonder…how much would it take to catch his attention through the impressive wards we've created?" His appraising gaze drifted between me and those wards. "My theory is it would take quite a bit of pain for the sensation to pass through and reach him. Shall we experiment?" He leaned back, propping a foot upon the opposite knee and reaching for the knife sheathed at his ankle.

I stood, still holding onto the bench as I tested my balance. "Stay away from me."

"I want to," he said, holding up his bandaged, crudely amputated hand, "but I do owe him for this." He got to his feet, stretching, the knife clutched loosely in his hand.

I held my ground as he turned to me. Heat swirled in my gut, my magic still fighting for a chance to rise up and confront him regardless of all the different things trying to shove it down.

He twisted the knife around in his hand, speaking more to the blade than me as he said, "What torture it would be to him, to feel your pain but not be able to reach you."

His eyes flashed to mine.

He lunged.

I swung my fist forward and flames exploded from it, forcing him to a stop. He took a step back, throwing his arm up to block the scorching air from his smiling face. "A bit of a goddess in you after all, it seems."

"If you take one more step toward me, it's a demon you're going to encounter, not a goddess."

He smirked at the challenge. "One in the same, as far as I'm concerned."

In the next breath he was darting forward again, sidestepping more flames I managed to summon, then curving around behind me.

I sensed his arm falling toward my shoulder. I ducked and dove out of the way of his first slash, but the evasion triggered another wave of dizziness that slowed me down. He took advantage when I stumbled, immediately following up his first swipe with another.

Still half-unbalanced, I parried wildly with all the unbridled divine strength I could summon. My fist struck his forearm, forcing his grip on the knife to unclench for an instant. As his hold faltered, I hooked another, more accurate punch into his wrist. The knife slipped free and thudded against the dirt.

His hand caught me by the throat as I focused on kicking the blade away. He jerked me back against him, trapping me in a close embrace that was worse than any knife trailing across my skin.

"Just like old times," he murmured in my ear. "I miss training with you."

I slammed my hand into his thigh. Claws sprang forth as I did, accompanied by a rush of heat—enough fire and sharpness to make him curse and send him staggering backward once more.

"And all those training sessions we had together seem to be paying off now," he said. "Well done."

"Trying to take credit for my strength, even now," I growled. "What a fucking delusional bastard you are."

"Maybe I'm not the one responsible for your strength," he countered, "but let's not forget that I do know your weaknesses ."

He proved this an instant later by striking forward again without restraint, aiming for my face. For my scars. He knew my tendency to flinch whenever anybody focused on those scars.

I knew it, too, yet I couldn't stop myself from twisting frantically away, leaving my shoulder vulnerable to a blow that sent me sprawling across the ground.

Countless times, he'd used this same move during all those training sessions we'd endured together—and almost every time, it ended with me on the ground. It was usually the move that signaled the end of our practice.

It would not be the end of me this time.

Despite my awkward landing, I recovered quickly and sprang back to my feet. My skin was burning, my magic glowing faintly, lighting symbols over my body and illuminating the old scars along my face and neck.

Proof of my power, not my mistakes, I reminded myself, fiercely.

My claws came to rest against Andrel's chest in the same instant his fingers wrapped once more around my throat.

For every bit of pressure I inflicted against him, he countered with a tighter hold, crushing my windpipe and threatening to choke the breath from my lungs.

We remained in this stalemate for a long, tense moment, until a lantern flickered to life in the house and briefly drew our gazes toward it.

"I wonder what your sister will say if she finds us like this?" Andrel mused.

"I have no problems explaining myself to her."

"You think she would listen to you?"

"Of course, she—"

"Are you sure about that?"

I inhaled a little too sharply, a little too painfully, as I realized: I wasn't sure.

Who would she side with? The one she had apparently spent years plotting a revolution with? Or me? Me—who she believed was deliriously confused, a victim of the gods being forced to attack my own kind against my will.

"For her sake, let's hope she doesn't listen to you," Andrel said. "I'm running out of patience for those who test my loyalty. So keep that in mind if you're going to try and win her over to your side."

"My sister is not a fool. She'll realize the truth about you before the end. I am going to make certain of that."

"The truth can be a tricky thing," he replied, relaxing his stance and calmly stepping away as though we hadn't just been locked in a deadly embrace.

I remained tense, claws extended, even once he'd put considerable space between us.

He eyed those claws for a long moment before he said, "Stop this. Stop fighting and come home for good. Stop breaking your sister's heart."

What about my heart?

It was a question I wouldn't have been able to ask months ago, but now it was all I could think in response.

"You don't belong with the gods," he said. "You belong with us."

It was almost refreshing compared to my conversations with Cillian and my sister—because Andrel was not asking me whose side I was on.

He was telling me.

Which made it so much easier to lift my head up and say, "No. I don't."

I might not have known exactly who I was yet, but I was beginning to understand who I wasn't .

The light in the house brightened. Beckoning me. Andrel's gaze followed me as I started toward it, though he remained perfectly still, holding like a predator tensing and waiting for the exact moment to pounce on its prey.

"I have worked very hard to prepare for the grand ending we're now approaching," he called after me. "Your sister is a large part my plans, and I will be watching both of you more closely, now, making sure neither of you does anything to derail things."

I paused, one foot on the porch steps, and tilted my head just enough to keep him in my sight.

"So if I were you," he said, "I would rethink my loyalty one more time, and I would choose my next steps very carefully. For Savna's sake, if nothing else." His gaze finally left me, sliding instead to where my sister's silhouette had appeared in the kitchen window.

I couldn't reply over the lump forming in my throat.

"You've already lost enough," he said. "I would so hate for you to lose anything else."