With Myles behind me, I march up the two, five, fifteen red-carpeted stairs to a room almost completely made of windows except for a wall and door on my right. Three wraiths stare at us, and the two young boys seated at a bench of what appear to be knobs and wheels for steering this blasted ship turn to look at me.
One of them is Kel.
“Lady Isobel,” he says.
I don’t answer. I’m too busy staring back. He’s alive. And here. As a ship captain? Is that how he stowed away on the airship at Faelen’s Keep?
I peer at his face, his hands, his shoulders. He’s hunched over and near broken looking, but his expression is hard and hateful as he glares at me. For a second I cringe until I realize his loathing is not actually directed at me, but for Lady Isobel, and it’s all I can do not to step forward and hug him. They’ve forced him to fly this.
One of the wraiths glides forward. “How may we helllllp you, Eminencccce?” he hisses.
I blink and turn from Kel. “My father. Where is he?”
The wraith angles his cloaked face until it’s tilted all the way to the side and studies me—like a pythanese snake. It occurs to me that his hood-shadowed face is covered in wide, flat, mottled-green scales that make the hair on my neck prickle. A second later he raises a crooked finger and points to the only door on my right.
Before I can move for it though, the handle turns and it opens and Eogan is standing there. His face widens a split second before narrowing in anger. He glances at Myles and back at me before emitting a low growl and springing for both of our throats.
The airship swerves and the wraiths’ hissing soars as Draewulf’s hands clamp onto us. “What do you think you’re doing?” he snarls.
“Your wraiths killed our men,” I snarl back. I place my hand over the one that’s gripping my throat, and rather than push his off, I press it tighter to my neck. It’s burning my skin—cutting into the ice in my bones like a torch. I sense the beat-beat-beat of his pulse through his fingers.
They’re bleeding into the fury of my own heartpulse.
The wraiths behind us are hissing their confusion at seeing their master attack his own daughter. They don’t move though. Just stay standing in my peripheral as do Kel and the other captain who’ve half risen from their positions at the steering bench.
The beating in Draewulf’s fingers grows stronger and his hand grips tighter.
“Now would be a good time,” Myles half mutters, half gasps beside me.
The mirage around us shudders but stays in place. Suddenly one of Myles’s hands has clasped onto my owner-circled wrist. He begins squeezing as my lungs begin failing.
I swerve my attention to Draewulf’s eyes. Eogan’s eyes. Rimmed with barely a hint of green. Or is there? My gaze is blurring, and the hunger for power that has been scratching up my veins since Lady Isobel erupts to the surface.
I slide my fingers from his hand on my neck all the way up his arm, onto his shoulder, then to his chest. To warn the trainer inside to brace for what I’m about to do. What I now know how to do. What Myles and I can do.
Except . . .
I glance at Myles. What is he doing?
The look on his face has gone dark, and there’s a struggle clearly etched across it. A temptation. A hunger like that which is opening up the vortex in my chest.
My gut twists and my hand falters.
He wants to kill both Draewulf and Eogan.
Draewulf looks startled for a second. He snarls but I swear there’s an amused undertone to it. As if this is, on some bizarre level, a delightful turn of events to entertain him. He turns toward Myles and sinks his fingers all the way around the man’s neck.
Myles’s grip on my wrist weakens.
The vortex inside me wobbles.
His neck looks like a twig. It is a twig. He must know it, too, because the expression in Myles’s eyes goes from hunger to pure terror. He chokes as the mirage covering the two of us dissipates, and then Myles screams like I’ve never heard him, even when I hurt him back at the cave. This time . . . this time he is in agony.
It’s the scream that can only come from Draewulf using Eogan’s block to cut out Myles’s ability just like he did my Elemental power.
I shove both hands against Draewulf’s shirt and press into his skin beneath. I feel his muscles wince and weaken, but if he notices he doesn’t care because he waits, seemingly unperturbed, until Myles’s scream stops and his neck goes limp.
Draewulf tosses him to the wraith. “Take him below,” he roars. “Keep him and the princess locked up until I slit both their throats. And check on my daughter!”
Next thing I know he’s dragging me into his quarters. The last glance I get of the room is of the boys—their eyes are big as orange-fruit. Kel’s mouth wide open.
The door slams behind us and Draewulf drags me toward the room’s far window, still holding my throat, muttering something about the powers having to be in order. About needing me to understand that it will only be a little longer.
The first thought that enters my head is that he’s insane.