Soul of Smoke (11 page)

Chapter Ten

Burn

Fire had always belonged to Rhys: a weapon, a tool, a toy. He had never felt what it was to burn. Now an inferno raged where his heart used to be.

Kai stared at him, wide-eyed and fidgeting. He’d thought she was pretty before, but now...he suppressed a groan. He wanted to know her in every sense of the word. Not just physically, but mentally, emotionally. It was as if he’d been living in a dark room, and when someone finally turned on the light he’d discovered half of him was missing.
The stories lie.
This isn’t love.
This...

It was
need
. Pure, incandescent need.

Griffith hauled him to his feet, and Rhys shook off his friend’s steadying hand. He hadn’t meant to touch her. Ancients, he’d barely registered the smooth softness of her skin before a wave of magic had rolled over him. The world had gone black, then white, then red. A vast emptiness of soul yawned open inside him, an emptiness only she could fill. Instinct had screamed that if he didn’t possess her in that very instant, he would be consumed. Gone into ash, into dust, into nothing. Rational thought had been demolished.

He remembered attacking Deryn, but barely. He clenched his hands into fists to keep them from shaking. He would have killed his own sister for keeping him from his mate.

Mate.
He thought he’d be ready when it happened. He’d thought he was prepared. He’d been a scalebrained fool.

Human.
She’s human.
Like mother.
She had no idea
,
like mother.
Then, panicking a little,
Ancients
,
the Council.
Everything will fall apart.

The others stood around them in a loose semi-circle, tense and waiting. Cadoc swayed next to Rhys. He’d taken Rhys’s power and drawn it into himself to save Deryn. Rhys could channel far more magic than Cadoc. “
Twp.
You could have died. Are you all right?”

Cadoc’s grin was a shadow. He wiggled his fingers. The skin of his hands was red, but no permanent damage had been done. “As long as these work, boyo, I’m golden.”

Guilt and embarrassment burrowed into Rhys’s chest. He’d never lost control before. He turned to Deryn. “Are you hurt?”

She put a hand on his shoulder, her expression pained and knowing. “It’s not your fault. No one can control heartswearing.”

“You guys keep saying that.” Kai’s voice was filled with anger, but she clenched the carabiners hooked through her belt loop with a shaking, white-knuckled fist. “It had better not mean what I think it means.”

He met her gaze for an instant before she looked away, but it had been long enough to see her fear.
I
could have her.
I
could complete the bond.
All it would take was a kiss. Even weakened, he was probably five times stronger than her. If he wanted, there would be nothing she could do.

The thought turned his stomach.
Curse instinct and biology.
I
will
not
be my father.
He rubbed his chest over his heart. The need was turning into an almost physical ache.

He switched to Welsh and forced his face to relax. “If she’s to swear to me, I want her to do it on her own. I will not have a repeat of my parents’ relationship.” He gritted his teeth, hoping Kai wouldn’t notice. He met each of their gazes in turn. “Don’t tell her anything that will put pressure on her. Absolutely nothing.” Suddenly, the need
was
pain, a white-hot spear through his heart. He fought not to double over.
Blood of the Ancients.

“What’s wrong?” Ashem asked sharply.

Rhys shook his head.

Ffion toyed with her armband, responding in Welsh. “Rhys, if she’s going to be your heartsworn, she needs to know what she’s getting into.”

The ache in his chest sharpened, and Rhys swore. It was bad enough that he had to try and convince Kai to heartswear to him when she thought he was a soldier.

It would be a thousand times worse to convince her to heartswear to a king.

Not only a king: a target. One of two people standing between Owain—his own cousin—and the murder of the human race. Kai wanted freedom, and the only things Rhys the king could offer were responsibility and war.

Perhaps, if she could be convinced to heartswear him—just him, not his crown—she might find it easier to adjust. And, Ancients, was it so wrong to want to be wanted for himself?

Ashem didn’t bother with Welsh. “You don’t have a choice, Rhys. Do it and be done.”

“Do what?” Kai looked pleadingly at Cadoc.

Rhys closed his eyes, clenching and releasing his fists at a burst of sudden, unreasonable rage that she would look at Cadoc for help instead of him. Another sharp pain speared through him, worse than the last. With massive effort, Rhys focused on Ashem.
Do it and be done.
If he kissed her now, without explaining, she’d have no idea what was happening until it was over.

“Do what?” Kai glared, but her voice shook.

“Kai...he...” Ffion, who always had an answer for everything, closed her mouth and shrugged. She gave Rhys a
you-need-to-tell-her
look. Rhys pretended not to see.

“He what?” Kai’s voice was growing more desperate, more frightened.

Rhys stepped toward her, wanting to comfort, but she scuttled back.

“Oh, hell no! Don’t you come near me.”

“I shouldn’t have stopped you,” Deryn murmured in Welsh. “I just...our parents.”

He shook his head. “I’m glad you did.” With a hope he didn’t feel, he added, “Maybe it won’t be like it was with them.”

Ashem glared, and this time he spoke Welsh, as well. “It’s stupid to act like she has a choice. It’s selfish. The Council won’t like it, but they’ll live. You might not. Even if you insist on this idiocy, you can’t give her more than a few days.”

“Then I’ll give her a few days,” Rhys growled.

“Translation?” Kai snapped.

No one answered.

Rhys wanted to sit. He hadn’t recovered from the Azhdahā venom yet, and now this.

Kai was still twisting her carabineers. “Listen, it’s been cool, but it’s seriously time for me to go home.”

“Home?” Rhys had to fight the urge to stride forward and grab her, tie her down, do anything to make sure she didn’t leave him. Ever. If she didn’t complete the bond, his fate would be insanity and death. He couldn’t afford to die.
Ancients
,
this is monstrous.

Ashem must have been listening to his mind, because he clamped a firm hand on Rhys’s uninjured shoulder. “Your departure has been delayed,” he said to Kai. “Things have become complicated.”

“Complicated?” Kai’s voice rose to a near-shriek. “I don’t give a damn about your complications. You are going to take me home!”

Ashem gestured at Ffion. “Take her outside and explain what you can.”

Ffion pursed her lips. “Rhys needs to explain. They’re in this together.”

“You are all insane!” Kai shouted, backing away.

Ashem indicated Rhys’s injured shoulder. “He’s bleeding, Ffion.”

Rhys tore his eyes from Kai. Blood soaked his sleeve, dripping down his arm. As if it had been waiting for him to notice, the wound throbbed, joining another pain in his chest. This one lasted longer than the others. Suddenly light-headed as well as exhausted, his knees gave out.

Cadoc caught him. “Steady, boyo.”

Rhys pushed Cadoc away and forced himself to stand straight. He could not be weak.

“
Hang on
,” Ashem spoke into his mind. “Griffith, take Deryn to the kitchen and get some food in her. Cadoc, help me get Rhys to his room.”

Cadoc nodded, but shot a long look at Kai, an emotion swirling behind his eyes that made Rhys want to growl and flame him to char. He stamped it down and straightened. “I can manage.” He forced himself to turn from Kai, heard Ffion murmur to her in her soft, chirping voice.

He left the main cavern, the fire inside him burning hotter with every step. The pain no longer stabbed—only stayed. Burning. Raging. The farther he got from her, the stronger the agony grew. He made it to the archway before he collapsed.

* * *

Cadoc, Ashem and Rhys were barely out of sight when the others began to whisper frantically to each other in Welsh. Ffion turned to Kai, concern furrowing her brows. “I’m going to explain. One moment.”

“Gee, thanks.” Too full of furious, terrified energy to wait, Kai strode out onto the ledge and sat. The rain had turned to snow. Big, fat, slow-falling flakes that were far too soft for her mood. She pulled up her hood and yanked her hoodie tight around her, and then stomped to the edge and sat on the wet stone, her feet dangling two hundred feet above the ground. She glared out over a landscape quickly disappearing behind a curtain of white, replaying the moment in her mind. The touch of Rhys’s fingers, the burst of energy, the attack, the sweltering heat inside Deryn’s water shield as it shrank and Deryn fell to her knees—

Ffion settled on her left. “What a morning.” Her voice was high and sweet and calm.

“Yeah. What a morning,” Kai repeated, her voice dry. She kicked her feet, bouncing them hard enough against the cliff to send little shocks of pain through her heels. “What did Ashem mean, ‘do it and be done’? Was Rhys trying to kill me?”

“Kill you?” Ffion sounded appalled. “Ancients, no. You’ve never been safer in your life.”

“Safe?” The word came out high and harsh. “Really? Because having fireballs and flame-jets aimed right at me sure didn’t
feel
safe.”

“Hmm. Perhaps not.” Ffion tapped her fingers against her lips. “Do you know anything about heartswearing?”

Kai shrugged, irritable, trying to cover her boiling emotions with nonchalance. She wished, now, that she hadn’t let Cadoc off the hook so easily the other night, or that she’d asked Rhys about heartswearing before he’d turned into a terrifying dragon berserker. “It’s basically dragon marriage, right? Except ‘more.’ You and Griffith are heartsworn.”

Ffion sighed, the light, breathy sound sending a puff of fog into the air. “When humans say they’re married, it’s symbolic. Words and paper. Heartswearing is magically and physically binding. It’s real and permanent. They are not the same.”

Kai gave Ffion a disgusted look. “Like hell. Family and love don’t need magic to make them real. Or permanent. Or binding.”

Ffion frowned thoughtfully. “I apologize. Of course they don’t. But heartswearing, as I’ve said, is significantly less...intangible. To be heartsworn comes with physical and mental consequences. When Rhys came into contact with your skin, he became bonded to you. Magically and permanently.”

Kai slammed her heels down. Chips of rock went spinning into space. “I am
not
married to Rhys. I’m twenty. I’m not worrying about that mess for another decade. And when I do, I’ll take a guy who’s my own species, thanks.”

“Kai, this is it for Rhys. He’ll never be able to be with anyone but you. Well, he could
be
with someone else, I suppose, but he couldn’t have what you two could have together. Heartswearing doesn’t allow for choice.”

Kai stared. It took her a full ten seconds to find words. “You don’t get any say who you spend all of your thousands of years with? None at all? How do you know you’ll love them?”

Ffion’s gaze went far away. “You don’t. Many times dragons who are sworn don’t know each other.”

Confusion, fear and anger heaped inside Kai, tangling into knots that made her head ache. This whole situation was impossible. Yes, she liked Rhys. Yes, there had been something about him. Sparks. The feeling of an impending storm. But that didn’t mean she was going to freaking marry him, a dragon/man who shouldn’t exist. A soldier likely to die in an invisible, ancient war.

Kai pressed her hands to her temples. No wonder Rhys hadn’t wanted to touch her. “Can it be broken?”

“Technically, yes. But not without extreme pain and potential death.”

Kai closed her eyes. If they had told her this could happen with a touch, she would’ve worn ten layers of clothing the entire time she’d been there. “I can’t become heartsworn again, can I? To more than one dragon?”

Ffion let out a surprised laugh. “No.” Then her face turned thoughtful. “Though there is lore...” She shook her head. “Rhys only has sisters, in any case...” She looked thoughtful again, then said, decisively, “Definitely not.”

Well, that, at least, was a relief. “He has sisters?” Kai couldn’t help her curiosity. “I thought it was only him and Deryn.”

“Rhys is the oldest and Deryn is the youngest. Their middle sister, Seren, is back in Eryri. She’s a gold dragon—our Seeress. Her powers allow her to catch glimpses of the future, and that makes her rather sacred. She never leaves the island.” Ffion’s mouth curved in a small, wry smile. “Or at least, she isn’t supposed to.” Her smile turned sad. “She isn’t allowed to heartswear at all. If she does, she loses the Sight. But we’ve gone off-topic.”

Kai rubbed her temples. Honestly, it sounded like this Seren, if she really couldn’t heartswear, had it better than everyone else. “What about you and Griffith? Did you know each other?”

Ffion smiled wistfully. “We’ve known each other since we were children. I love Griffith now, of course. But I didn’t love him when it happened. Heartswearing doesn’t guarantee love.”

“Did you love someone else?” Kai didn’t realize how personal the question was until it hung in the air between them.

Ffion hesitated, watching the snow fall. “I thought I was in love with Ashem. I had hoped...but it was just infatuation. Ashem never reciprocated.”

“Ashem? Seriously?”

Ffion impaled her with an icy blue glare. “You don’t know any of us. Not yet. Don’t be so quick to judge.”

Anger flared. A group of strangers had just declared her life
over
, and one of them had the gall to sit here and tell her not to be snarky. A noise of frustrated rage erupted from her throat. “That’s the point, isn’t it? I don’t know you. I don’t know Rhys. I don’t want dragon battles and hiding in caves and war!”

Ffion pressed her lips softly together, her glare fading into sympathy. “At least he’s giving you time to adjust to the idea. Dragons don’t get that luxury. When we touch someone compatible, we’re sworn.”