Chapter Twenty WITCHING MOON

Chapter Twenty

WITCHING MOON

Week Two, Day Nine

Year 3000

After the third time Ash ignored a tentative knock on his tower door, he had to admit to himself the truth.

The Dragon was brooding.

He'd already sent both Inga and Aleksi away this evening. If there was an emergency, Elevia would break down his door no matter how studiously he ignored her, so he imagined whoever had come knocking only hoped to offer him support.

He didn't want support. He wanted to ignore the advice of every person he'd ever known and loved and fly directly into the Empire to face a battle he'd been avoiding for three thousand years.

But Sachi had asked them for more time. More time.

This was the fifth day he'd suffered without her. He didn't think he could survive a full week.

She'd been part of his life for so little time, and yet living already felt wrong without her. And it wasn't just the lack of her in his bed. A shroud had descended over Dragon's Keep, as if its inhabitants mourned the loss of their lady. Servants performed their tasks in tense silence. The laughter of children was too often shushed by those worried about respecting his grief. Even Camlia, his unshakable steward, seemed perpetually cross—though she stopped short of taking that anger out on him for losing Sachi.

The overall mood in the castle was not improved by Zanya's temperament. Ulric and Elevia had begun taking her on longer and longer training runs just to get her out of the castle. Left to her own devices, she paced the battlements like a shadow wraith, every movement that of a feral, penned creature waiting for a fracture in their cage.

Elevia still didn't know the location of the palace where Sachi was being held. All they had were the words Sachi had passed along to them from the Phoenix, words that soothed and enraged him in turn.

It's to be war. They must prepare. I'm coming for them as soon as I can.

There was nothing he could do but wait. And he hated the helplessness of it.

The shadows shifted in front of him with a tingle to which he'd become accustomed. So he didn't start when Zanya stepped out of them, her eyes alight with a feverish sort of energy. "Are you finished working for the day?"

"Unless Elevia has another task for me." He raised an eyebrow. "Did she send you?"

Zanya shrugged as if it didn't much matter and pulled two wooden practice swords from behind her back. "She doesn't have a task for you, but Ulric does."

"Oh, does he?"

She extended her hand. "Only if you're up for a little sparring."

Sparring was dangerous. With them, it usually led swiftly to either unchecked violence or unbridled arousal. The former might be a suitable outlet for his temper, but the latter would only sharpen it. Until Sachi was safely home, in the protective shelter of his arms, sex was the last thing on his mind. As if Zanya wouldn't stab him for the presumption in any case.

"I don't think it's a good idea," he rumbled, turning his gaze back to the fire. "Besides, Elevia and Ulric are training you now."

"Ulric says you've been holding back with me."

Then Ulric was clearly talking too much—a situation Ash would rectify with the Wolf the next time he took it upon himself to batter on his door. "I hold back with everyone," he said shortly. "Sparring is not deadly combat."

"It shouldn't be," she agreed softly. "But I'm not learning fast enough. We're going to rescue Sachi, and I have to be strong enough to keep her safe. Ulric said you're the only one who can teach me how to stop holding back."

Ash hesitated. All their previous sparring matches had been, if not polite, then at least following the gentle rules of human combat. While he'd always accepted the possibility that Zanya could very well kill him if she caught him by surprise, he knew in his bones that if it came down to a fight between gods—the kind that had once nearly shattered the world—she wasn't ready.

Which was undoubtedly Ulric's point. They could be called into the heart of the Empire, to war, at any moment. Zanya had too little time to become ready. In a perfect world, Ulric and Elevia would have led her to this point slowly, but slow wouldn't be good enough. Someone had to goad her into tapping into that primal part of her. Someone who knew just which buttons to press.

Someone with a personal enough connection to rile her.

It would be difficult for Ulric or Elevia to make her angry enough, but Ash certainly could ... if he was willing to face whatever ancient power he provoked.

If he could survive facing it.

A dangerous game, and one Elevia never would have agreed to if she hadn't thought there was a chance that they'd need Zanya— all of her—when the time came to rescue Sachi and face the Empire.

So Ash had no choice, in the end. He had to do this. For Sachi and for Zanya.

Rising, he reached out a hand. Her fingers brushed his, barely making contact. Then the shadows curled around him, a caress that had become familiar. Her power felt of her —sharp edges and fierce protectiveness and a snarling dominance that held a precious, wobbling edge of uncertainty. When she found her confidence and truly embraced that part of herself, he expected most of the world would fall to their knees for her.

Ash certainly would.

He'd expected her to carry them down to the practice yard. But when the shadows receded, he found himself in a dusty training yard in the Witchwood, the circle lit by nothing but starlight and the glowing flowers on distant trees. He turned, getting his bearings, and recognized the shuttered campsite and the nearby stone cabin.

This was a stop along the consort's progress. Not just any stop, though. This was the one where he'd first coaxed her to spar with him. Where the sparks between them had first lit, and they'd ended their battle with her straddling him, any pleasure he'd taken in the fight swept away by the blade she'd held to his throat.

He turned to face Zanya and lifted a querying brow. "This is a long journey for a sparring match."

She stood in front of him, tense and wary. "Ulric said it should be far away from other people."

At least he'd told her that much. But how deep had the Wolf's warning run? Ash paced away from her before turning. "Do you know what this will mean? If I stop holding back?"

Zanya shrugged one shoulder, the forced casualness of it betraying her nervous anticipation. "I assume it would mean using all of your powers. Throwing fire at me, ripping up the ground underneath my feet. Pelting me with rocks and trying to slash me with your claws." She almost smiled. "Maybe you'd even turn into a giant dragon and try to eat me?"

That was a very short sampling of the many tactics he could—and had—deployed when the situation called for it. "And you want to face that?"

"Not particularly." Her stance widened, her chin drawing up. "But the Betrayer won't hold back. So I have to be ready."

A painful truth. More painful was the knowledge that she wouldn't thank him for what was about to happen. He'd have to peel away her layers of safety and truly make her believe her life was in peril. The one thing he'd hoped to avoid—but Zanya wouldn't thank him for coddling her. Not if it put Sachi's life at greater risk.

A test of the full breadth of her ability, then. He'd poke and he'd prod until she exploded into violent life. There was a shameful sort of thrill in knowing he'd be the first to glimpse the blazing dark star she would become.

He could only hope she wouldn't hate him for it.

Or kill him by mistake.

"All right," he said quietly. "We'll do this."

She exhaled roughly in relief and held out one of the practice swords. "Just don't let me kill you."

He ignored the statement as he plucked both solid practice swords from her hands. Before she could protest, he gripped them in both hands and reduced the pair of them to splinters with one brutal twist. "The first thing you must learn is this: this isn't a battle about weapons. We fight with weapons when we want to give mortals a chance on their battleground."

He brushed away the wood from his hands and paced a wide circle around her. As expected, Zanya watched him warily, pivoting with his movements to keep him in front of her. "Then what is this a battle about?" she demanded.

"You, Zanya." Fire danced at his fingertips, and he let her see his smile. The Dragon's smile, full of arrogance and fangs. "On the battlefields of the gods, you are the weapon."

She parted her lips, undoubtedly to ask another question, but Ash didn't give her the chance. Flames pooled in his palm. With a lazy flick of his wrist, he sent the fire streaking toward her. Not the safe fire he toyed with in the bedroom, but true flames—the kind that would burn if they struck her.

He stood braced to extinguish them if necessary, but he shouldn't have worried. Zanya flung herself out of their path and came up in a defensive crouch. She said nothing, but her eyes were wide with surprise. No doubt she'd felt the deadly serious heat—and the threat.

Either way, best to make it explicit. "You told me not to hold back," he reminded her. Fire danced above his palm again, gathering into a sizable sphere. "You think you can kill me? Try. "

She lunged at him.

It was fast, and she did something with the shadows to make her body harder to see. But Ash had been fighting for millennia. A flick of his fingers raised columns of fire that burned through the darkness. A lazy twist of his wrist broke off smaller pieces that rained down on her, forcing her to abort her attack and focus on staying out of their way.

And she did. She moved with a grace any dancer would envy, twirling between the flames and twisting away with impossible speed. After the fifth attempt, he realized she was testing him, watching his hands for tells as she attempted to map a path through his defenses. She was thinking , still reacting like a human-trained assassin among mortals.

He needed to prick her temper and unleash the god.

With a silent apology, he summoned a gout of fire in front of her next advance. She'd expected it and was already spinning out of its path when he plunged his power deep into the earth.

The ground exploded beneath her feet, sending her flying twice his height in a cloud of dirt and pebbles. Her yelp of surprise melted into a curse as she hit the ground and tumbled, her chaotic flailing of limbs turning into a deadly precise roll that ended in another defensive crouch.

Fire erupted beneath her before she gained her balance. His instincts screamed at him to hold back, but he crushed them in a brutal grip.

And let her burn.

The heartbeat before she rolled across the dirt, extinguishing the flames, lasted forever. Her clothing had protected her from the worst of it, but her hands battered at the burning tip of her braid. The scent of burnt hair lingered on the night air as he stood, impassive, hiding the need to comfort her as she rolled to her knees.

Something vast and terrifying stirred behind her dark-brown eyes as she watched him, panting for breath. He could taste her frustration on the night breeze. His instincts screamed at the recklessness of poking at her, as if even the Dragon could sense a predator stirring beneath that golden skin.

He ignored it and let his lips curl into a small, mocking smile. "Let's worry less about whether or not you can kill me. Can you even lay a finger on me, Zanya?"

She growled and lunged. He let her get two steps before he punched his gift into the earth and sent her flying again.

Zanya hit the dirt on her back this time, seething. Ash gave her a moment to get to her knees before he warned her with a rumble beneath her feet. She flung herself into a tumble and came up with daggers in both hands, facing a wall of fire. The noise she made sounded like some unholy cross between a snarling beast and a teakettle about to explode.

The flush in her cheeks wasn't mere exertion. She was embarrassed, and Ash used his words as ruthlessly as he had his power. Folding his hands behind his back with a lack of concern that was a direct insult, he let the fire die and strolled around her. "Knives again. What do you think to do with those?"

She actually snarled at him. "Stab you in the face."

He could summon massive avalanches of flame. He could summon a single spark, too. It landed on the tip of one knife and circled it before rolling down, heating the metal until even the grip was so hot she had to spread her fingers with a hiss and let it clatter to the dirt.

"Stop playing with mortal toys," he instructed her. "You have better weapons at your disposal, if you'd simply start using them."

Her eyes didn't look brown anymore. Blackness swallowed the irises as she stabbed the second knife into the dirt and rose with a predatory slowness that sparked warning down his spine. Something ancient and unknowable stared at him from behind those dark, glorious eyes.

"There you are," he whispered.

Zanya laughed, dark and eager.

Then she lunged again.

It was faster than before. He barely had time to raise a wall of fire in front of her. Shadows exploded as flames swept across the spot where she'd been, and Ash only had time to think finally before a heavy weight slammed into him from above, driving him face down into the dirt.

Strong fingers grasped his hair and jerked his head back. Lips brushed his ear. "Here I am," she rasped, and the shivery echo beneath her voice was the closest he'd heard to that midnight choir from the night she'd first manifested.

He'd invited a god to the fight. It was time to see what she could do.

In a surge of muscle he rolled them, slamming her back into the ground. She responded with a punch to the jaw hard enough to rattle his teeth and both legs wrapping around him, denying him the leverage to rise.

So Ash called flames.

They slid over his skin in a protective coating of armor. A second later his back hit the dirt as Zanya vanished, reappearing a dozen paces away. He lunged to his feet as she vaulted toward him. The ground exploded in front of her, and she dove into a twisting vortex of shadows and slammed into him from behind.

He staggered, and her laughter cut through the night as he whirled to find those damnable shadows. A fist launched out of them, smashing into his face. Lightning-fast, he caught her wrist and flung her across the practice yard, but she learned so swiftly . In another surge of darkness she vanished, only to appear sweeping his feet out from under him with a force that crashed him back into the dirt.

She was on him in a heartbeat, her fingers tight around his throat. "Still think I can't lay hands on the Dragon?"

He formed claws and dragged them up her outer thighs, the prick all the warning he intended to give her before he swiped. But she was gone already, leaving only shadows, and this time he swore he could feel them, like a cool touch along his skin.

Ash rolled to his feet, breathing hard. The fabric of his shirt felt too confining, too human , so he stripped it off and tossed it aside. He sank his awareness into the earth, waiting for the vibrations that would tell him she'd come back.

There, just behind him. A tremor.

Ash let go of the lesson, let go of planning ... and let the Dragon play.

They crashed together, and it was glorious. The more he turned earth or fire against her, the more refined her use of the shadows became. Sometimes she exploded out of them in daring attacks. Sometimes they whispered past him, carrying her away. She fell from the sky and crashed into him. She surged up from the earth at his feet in ways that defied logic.

She countered every attack, but there could be no frustration in defeat, not when the punishment was feeling her strength grow, feeling her awaken , her dark laughter curling around them both as her confidence soared and her hunger for victory deepened.

He tried everything against her. Walls of fire. Slashing claws. Explosions of dirt that catapulted her skyward and rents in the earth that tried to drag her down. He simply couldn't lay his hands on her unless she allowed him to.

Finally, when she landed on his back for the fourth time, he summoned fire—not to burn, but to transform. "Jump off or hold on," he told her, his only warning before the flames formed wings that swept out to either side in majestic fury.

And the Dragon exploded out of him.

He'd expected the cold bite of shadows, but he could feel her there at the base of his neck, strongly muscled legs squeezing tight at his shoulders. Then her hands pressed to his hide, fingers spread wide, and he almost forgot his purpose as she stroked wondering fingers over him. The whisper that the wind carried to him wasn't a midnight choir, but soft Zanya. "You're magnificent."

Yes, he was. And to show her just how much, he gathered himself and launched them both into the sky.

She shrieked into the night, the sound half outrage and half joy. But as he flapped his wings and carried her higher, it was the joy that lingered, bubbling up out of her in laughter that rang like glorious bells. He banked, giving her another moment to enjoy the wind whipping past them and the freedom of being high in the air with the world stretched before you in perfect miniature like Elevia's little wooden table.

But this night wasn't about play. So he warned her with another sharp turn that tipped one wing toward the ground. A drop from this height wouldn't injure a god, but it would certainly knock the wind out of her. A solid lesson learned.

So he gave her a chance to leap free. And when she didn't, he flipped.

She managed to cling to him for a few sweeps of his wings, but the buffeting air was too much. She slipped free with a yelp, spinning head over feet and clearly too disoriented to summon her shadows. The ancient wisdom of a teacher willing to let her learn a hard lesson vanished under a wave of protectiveness, and he folded his wings to dive after her, with every intention of catching her before she crashed into the earth.

The ground surged up too quickly. But just as he got his claws in place to catch her, shadows exploded through his talons and she vanished.

A heavy weight crashed into his back. Darkness spiraled wide, climbing up his arms and torso and wrapping him in midnight. Something inside him jerked , like Zanya was trying to pull the essence that was him into the Void, but the massive body of the Dragon simply wouldn't follow. The pressure intensified, tightening so much that he roared and spun, summoning his own flames.

Fire and darkness twisted around them as they fell. The Dragon burned away in an inky inferno, leaving Ash and Zanya fighting for supremacy as they crashed into the earth hard enough to leave a perfect crater in the center of the practice yard.

She was just stunned enough that he managed to roll her beneath him, pinning her hands as she snarled. Shadows immediately appeared, twining down their arms, but he leaned over her and clucked his tongue in a mockery he knew would stiffen her pride. "Running again?"

She hissed at him, but the shadows slowed.

Ash let his hands form claws, let the fire dance in his eyes as his fangs appeared. "Fight like a god, handmaid."

The dark brown of her eyes bled to black and expanded, until staring down into them was like staring into the Void itself. The shadows slid up his arms and around his body, and he could feel them—a touch every bit as tangible as his own flames, and not the ones he used in battle. A treacherously distracting tingle followed the path of those shadows, as if her hands were stroking over him.

Her lips curled in a dangerous smile. It was the only warning he got before those wisps of shadow clenched tight, like the fingers of a giant wrapped around his body. He was airborne in the next moment, slamming face down into the dirt hard enough to knock the breath from his lungs.

Zanya crouched a few paces away, that glorious black rainbow exploding around her. The breeze lifted her dark hair, and she stared at him as if studying a puzzle. She lifted her hand experimentally, and the shadows swirled around him jerked him upward. She twisted her wrist, and he tumbled over and slammed back into the dirt, this time on his back.

The shadows held him pinned in place. He bucked against them, using a force that would have shattered stone. His fingers barely scrabbled against the dirt. Summoning fire to burn through them did nothing—the shadows simply churned, drawing the fire into their depths, where it vanished as if snuffed out. Out of instinct he lashed out, tearing at the earth beneath her feet. She launched into the air, swirling away in a vortex of shadow.

All the air left his body when she landed on top of him, straddling his chest. Her hand shot for his throat, clenching so tightly he couldn't wheeze in another breath. For a heartbeat her eyes seethed fully black, and her nails dug into his skin deeply enough to draw blood. She tilted her head, and whatever was watching him from behind those dark eyes was pure predator.

The god of destruction, in human flesh.

And he couldn't do a godsdamned thing to stop her from strangling the life from him. Except rasp out her name with the last of his breath. "Zanya."

The shadows trapping him vanished abruptly. Her fingers loosened, and she rolled off him and sprawled in the dirt next to him. Her braid had mostly unraveled, and she lifted it, staring at the charred ends of her hair in silence punctuated only by their breathless pants.

He wanted to apologize for burning her, but he held his tongue. If a warrior wouldn't appreciate being coddled, he could only imagine how poorly an ancient, primal god would take it. And that was what she was—a trueborn warrior god, with instincts that would only sharpen with experience.

Elevia would be giddy. Zanya wasn't. She stroked her thumb over the singed ends of her hair, again and again. When she spoke, it wasn't of her hair.

"I burned the bread," she whispered softly. "At the orphanage. I don't think Sachi remembers, but that's what started it. Ma'am had one of her headaches—she was the one who ran the house for lost children—and the older girl had run away. I can't remember her name. She must have only been fourteen or fifteen but she seemed so old to us. The older girl used to make Ma'am her tonic and toast, but she was gone and it was just me and Sachi. I tried to make it, but I burned the bread, and she was so mad at me for wasting it. So she took out the strap, but Sachi got in the way. On purpose."

Ash dug his fingers into the earth, pulling on its strength to keep his voice even. "Is that when the Terrors came?"

"Not at that moment. I was so scared, I tried to put myself between them, but Ma'am was furious with Sachi, so she shoved me into the closet. In the dark. And I had to listen ..." Zanya's voice hitched. "Sachi tried not to cry, but we were so little, and that bitch hit her so hard . The healer had to come, and the old woman glared at Ma'am the whole time ... and I thought, She'll take Sachi away. She won't leave her here, not with the woman that hurt her. "

"But she left you both."

"She left us both." He heard Zanya swallow. "Sachi was whimpering in her sleep because it still hurt. I couldn't even hold her. And I wasn't scared anymore. I was angry , because how could that healer look at Sachi and not take her away? How could anyone want to hurt her, when she only ever wanted to make people happy? And I don't think I even understood what death was, but I wanted them all to stop being . To go away. To never, ever, ever be able to hurt us again."

And so the Terrors had come. Ash turned his head to look at her profile, silvered by moonlight. "Elevia heard they destroyed the whole village."

"Everyone," Zanya said dully. "I regret some of it. There weren't many children in the village, but there were some. They were older than us, and I know now that they couldn't have done anything. But when you're five or six, a teenager seems like a god. So I hated them, too. I hated all of them, and I was glad they were dying. Until Sachi started crying."

Her voice cracked. The soft light of the double moons caught a tear glistening on her cheek. "She looked at me ... and she knew . I don't know how, but she knew that I'd called the Terrors. And she looked at me like I was one of them. A nightmare. A monster ."

The bitterness in that single word held a mortal lifetime of self-loathing. Ash swallowed the sympathy that she wasn't ready to hear and let her finish.

"So I shouted for them to stop," she whispered. "And they did. I didn't exactly mean to call them, but I did know they came from someplace inside me. I just didn't know that place was wrong until Sachi started begging for it all to stop. I didn't know I was a monster."

This time, he couldn't hold his tongue. "Do you still think Sachi sees you that way?"

Zanya's abrupt laugh was hoarse with tears. "No, of course not. She was young and scared and didn't mean it. Sachi loves me, and that's the end of it as far as she's concerned."

"But not as far as you're concerned?"

A huff. "Sachi has a big heart and a soft spot for unlovable monsters."

He'd thought he was beyond feeling the sting of that word, but his heart twinged at the truth of it. After all, what was Ash if not a monster the world had forgotten how to love? But Sachi had opened that fearless heart to him at once.

She'd had practice.

"Elevia wants me to learn how to summon the Terrors," Zanya whispered. "She's frustrated that I won't. She doesn't understand that nothing good has ever come of it. I slaughtered a village the first time. And the last ..."

The last, she'd been planning to slaughter him . The arrival of the Terrors had stayed her hand, but it had also forced her to reveal her power to the High Court and the inhabitants of the Villa.

He could still see her in memory, stiff and proud, walking back through the darkness past dozens of terrified faces with the whispers of Void-touched and cursed following in her wake. And he could remember well the instinctive reactions of the High Court—horror, mistrust, animosity.

They might not have said the word monster , but what screamed it more loudly than the fearful enmity of literal gods?

"I'll talk to Elevia," he promised. Not that Zanya could put it off forever. She would have to learn to control this power. But if the Huntress understood the traumatic origins of Zanya's resistance, she might be able to handle it with delicacy.

If they had time.

Zanya sighed softly. "Maybe it's foolish to still care. But I was so little the first time, Ash. And then Nikkon came and took us, and he told me Sachi was beautiful and would be a princess, but that I was an abomination. And that was all I felt like, for the longest time. Except when Sachi was there. Because she knew the worst part of me, and she knew it was wrong. But she still loved me."

More tears glistened on her cheeks, but Ash was afraid to move, afraid to do anything that might shatter this fragile moment of trust. "Zanya ..."

"I am a monster without her," she whispered. "Don't you see that? I care about you, Ash. I care about Ulric, and Elevia. Even Aleksi and Inga. But some part of me is always going to be that little girl who summoned Terrors to destroy an entire village and was glad they died, because they hurt Sachi. If something happens to her—"

"Shh." Now he did roll onto his side, cupping her cheek with one hand. The tears spilled forth as fast as he could wipe them away. "Zanya, we will find her. We'll bring her home."

Zanya pressed a closed fist to her chest. "I can't live without her. Do you understand? I can't—" A gasp. "I can't—"

Ash sat up and hauled her into his lap. She stiffened, arms flailing, but when he only settled her across his legs with her head tucked against his throat, she shuddered and pressed her face to his chest, as if to hide her tears.

"She's too brave." The words trembled on the edge of a sob. "She'll take too many risks. I know I said we have to trust her, but I'm terrified . I can't protect her this time."

"I know," he whispered, stroking her back. The charred ends of her hair tangled around his fingers. "But you aren't trying to protect her alone anymore. Every last member of the High Court will lay down their lives for her. So would all of the Raven Guard. The new Dreamers who haven't earned titles or followings but still have power. Me ." He spread his fingers wide when they reached the back of her head, cradling her gently. "I will never let you carry this burden alone, Zanya. Never again."

Another shudder rocked her body, and it was as if the tension inside her finally shattered. Her fingers came up, splayed against his bare shoulder, clinging to him as the first sob ripped through her.

The tears kept coming. A trickle. A wave. A river. His throat and collarbone were slick with them, but he ignored it just like he ignored the way her nails bit into his skin, staying rock steady beneath her. Only his hand moved, stroking down her hair and across her back in gentle, soothing circles as he whispered against her temple. "You've done so well," and, "You've kept her safe." Over and over, interspersed with other whispered promises.

You're safe, Zanya.

She'll be safe soon, too.

You're not alone.

I'm here.

We'll always come save her.

We'll always come save you.

That last only made her cry harder, and he knew these weren't just the tears of her grief and fear over Sachi. She'd unlocked something primal in herself tonight, something as elemental and feral as that tiny little girl who had destroyed a town in retribution for Sachi's pain.

That monster wasn't going away. It was as much a part of her as his dragon was of him. And people would fear her for it. They would revile her and flee from her, and no one knew better than he how the pain of that could calcify over the years. But he'd been a grown man with centuries of life behind him the first time he'd been called a monster.

She'd been little more than a baby.

So he stroked her hair until her sobs eased, then carefully wiped the tears from her cheeks. When she stared up at him self-consciously, he cupped her cheeks and pressed a tender kiss to her forehead.

"There's only one thing to remember," he said softly. "Sometimes the world needs monsters. Everything you learned today? You'll have it to use against the Betrayer."

She nodded, her eyes shadowed.

"He's a monster for the sake of being a monster. You?" He smiled. "You're her monster. And that makes all the difference."

He watched something shift in her. She didn't look young or lost or nervous anymore. She looked ancient and unfathomable, like those first moments when she'd stood before him in her newly awakened glory. An elemental force of the world stared up at him, and Ash knew that somewhere in the vastness of the Empire, its equal opposing force rested in the deceptively fragile body of a captive princess who might manifest her full power at any moment.

For the first time in many, many years, Ash almost pitied the Betrayer.