“I am here, mi lasko,” Ilyan soothed. His arms came around me, his lips soft as he spoke against my forehead.
Ilyan’s magic ran through me until I felt it inside every inch of my body. I moved my head, careful not to let too much of myself become exposed. Even though I knew this wasn’t a trap, I couldn’t ignore the learned responses that were still ingrained in my mind.
“Are you all right?”
“I don’t understand, Ilyan. I can heal him. I need to save him,” I whispered into the dark.
“You know why you cannot, Joclyn,” he said, his fingers running down my face as he pressed his lips into a tight line. “The Drak believe their sight to be infallible. I know Dramin has told you this, my love. You cannot change a sight.” Ilyan soothed me, his voice low as my heartbeat slowed to match his.
“I know, but I can’t just let him die, Ilyan.”
“You have to. We cannot let it become one of the zlomeny,” he whispered, his lips pressing into a tight line.
Yes. But, Ilyan, the zlomeny are sights which have never come… This has come.
I knew I was pleading, but I didn’t care. A man was dying only feet from me, and no one would let me save him. I didn’t care about the sight, about my magic showing me what was to come. Right then, I only cared about saving Dramin.
“Not in its whole, and by healing him, you would be changing the future of a sight thus creating a zlomeny.”
I cringed at his words as well as the truth behind them. He was right; there had been no burial, so the sight was not completed. But I couldn’t imagine him dead like the rest of the Drak; all of his children, his grandchildren, and his mate. My chest seized at the thought of Dramin being placed in the cold ground, only to be covered by dirt and snow.
“That doesn’t make any sense. If I can change it, why wouldn’t I? Change it, create a better future,” I said aloud, pleading with him to understand me.
“It is the way of the Drak. Dramin would want it this way as well.”
I gasped at the words I didn’t want to hear, their utterance sharp and poisonous.
“You sound like my father.”
“It has to be this way, my love. Whether or not you or I agree, it is the way of the Drak—of your father—and, as Dramin’s father, you have to respect Sain’s wishes.”
I wanted so much to say Ilyan was right—that this choice was right—but I couldn’t. I couldn’t accept that Dramin wanted to die. He wouldn’t have fought for life for so long only to give in. I had seen the sadness in his eyes when I had foreseen his death. He had been accepting of it, but he hadn’t wanted it, not really.
Dramin’s plea for me not to tell anyone suddenly made sense. It wasn’t out of worry for others. He didn’t want anyone to change it; he didn’t want me to change it, and he had known that I would try.
I wasn’t sure I still wouldn’t.
If I can’t change the sights… what does that mean for me, Ilyan?
Ilyan’s thoughts stopped abruptly at my question. The image of him screaming in agony as he held my body surged through me. The sight’s promise of what was coming for me loomed heavy and unwanted. His eyes burrowed into me, so bright I could almost see into him. Into his soul. His movement was slow as his hand came up to cradle my face, the soft skin hot.
“It means I stand by your side,” Ilyan whispered, his thumb softly tracing the line of my lips. “For you were born and you were bred to only protect her.” His voice deepened as he quoted the sight, my heart seizing even under his delicate touch.
It wasn’t the words that he had said that had affected me so; it was the words that came after.
The ones that told of my death.
It was those words that made me doubt the truth of the sights at all.
Because if I didn’t, if all the sights were set in stone, then my life was coming to an end just as Dramin’s was. And I wasn’t ready to give up yet.
Five
Dark-blue clouds rolled over the forest that surrounded me from where I sat on the ancient balcony in Ilyan’s room. They blocked out the stars and cast a dull grey shadow over everything. I knew it was well past midnight—it had to be after the night we’d had—but with the storm, there was no way of being certain. The dark blanket of clouds lit up before the distant rumble sounded, warning us of the storm that, when I had been awakened by Ilyan’s war meeting, had been off in the distance. The storm that was now right over us.
I took another drink from the earthen mug I held, the Black Water keeping me nice and warm against the chilled air that caught on the thin cotton pants I wore.