The earth Kindred had spent the last two days surrounding their temporary home—a meager stone cottage—with lush greenery.
Kyan eyed it with distaste. “You’ll draw attention to us with all of this fresh life. Paelsia is a wasteland.”
“Not for long. I will restore it all to how it was long ago.” She looked up at him, unable to mask the cold look in her gaze before he saw it. “I couldn’t restore them.”
Nic knew she meant the former owners of this cottage—an elderly couple that had resisted giving up their home. Their corpses lay close enough that the scent of burned flesh still lingered in the cool night air.
“You don’t have that particular power, dear sister.” This came out more harshly than Kyan had intended. “Earth magic requires a spark of life on which to grasp hold.”
“Oh, much gratitude for explaining that to me, Kyan. I wouldn’t know such a thing, would I?”
The cutting manner in which she said this almost made him wince. “Apologies.”
“All these mortals will be gone soon enough, anyway. We’ll have a fresh canvas on which to start anew.” Olivia stood up and brushed her hands on the front of her dress. “Did you find Prince Magnus?”
“No,” Kyan lied. “It would have been convenient to have him enslaved to me, but it doesn’t matter.”
“Fine.” The earth Kindred’s face twisted with annoyance, distorting Olivia’s immortally beautiful features. “Then you need to set your sights on finding the sorceress and wooing her back to our side. We can’t finish this without her.”
Kyan summoned patience. “I know.”
It wasn’t as if Nic could hear the fire Kindred’s thoughts, but he could clearly sense them. Lucia was vital to them, more so than Kyan had ever believed.
The fact that he had to go to her, this mere girl who had destroyed his former shell, to beg for her help . . .
Kyan would rather burn the world right now and be done with it all.
But he couldn’t.
He desperately needed to be reunited with the others—water and air.
Cleo and Taran.
Panic coursed through Nic at the thought that Cleo was in terrible danger and he couldn’t do a damn thing to stop it.
He had to try to gain control. If he could think, he wasn’t gone. He wasn’t dead.
Focus, he told himself.
He focused on his hand. His right hand. He concentrated on trying to move it, something that had once been an easy and totally unconscious decision.
He tried to move it, to raise it up ever so slightly, but not enough for Kyan to notice.
He failed to move his hand. But he did move his little finger—ever so slightly.
Not much, but it’s a start, he thought grimly.
“He’s still waiting for you,” Olivia said as she went to the door of the cottage and opened it. “And asking so many questions I decided I needed the silence of outside.”
Kyan followed her into the cottage, sweeping his gaze across the meager home. He nodded at the hearth, and a fire lit within it. Then he shifted his gaze to the young man cowering in the corner.
They’d found him wandering nearby with two of his friends. Kyan had burned the friends into oblivion immediately but thought this one—Lord Kurtis Cirillo—might be useful to him.
“I don’t know w-why you’re doing this, Nicolo,” Kurtis stuttered. “But my father is a great and powerful man. He will pay you as much gold as you want for you to release me unharmed.”
Kyan just stared at him, finally allowing himself to smile.
He loved mortals the most when they begged.
“My name is Kyan.” He lit his hand up with flames, enjoying the look of terror that entered Kurtis’s wild gaze.
Nic, however, felt an odd jerk of sympathy for Kurtis, even though he thoroughly despised the former kingsliege. A swift death would be so much kinder than what Kyan had in mind.
Kyan cocked his head. “Let’s begin, shall we?”
CHAPTER 9
LUCIA
PAELSIA
Magnus would have thought her mad to stay here as Amara’s guest a moment longer than necessary.
And so Lucia embraced the thought of leaving this strange, dusty compound. It was her birthplace, but it wasn’t her home.
Limeros was her home. She craved her chambers at the palace and knew several trustworthy nursemaids there who could help her with Lyssa.
However, they were not headed for Limeros.
Her father wanted to go to the Auranian palace, where he could speak with Lord Gareth Cirillo. Gareth had remained grand kingsliege during the king’s lengthy absence.
Through Lord Gareth the king wanted to find his son, Kurtis.
And Lucia wanted to help him.
The evening before they were set to leave for the Auranian palace, Lucia searched the compound for Jonas, finding him sharpening his sword by his temporary quarters.
“Are you coming with us?” she asked. “Or are you staying in Paelsia?”
He looked up from his work, as if surprised to see her. “Should I come with you?”
Lucia had been forced to spend time with Jonas when he’d been tasked to return her to her father and brother, but now— after all this time together—the thought of parting from the rebel felt oddly painful.
But she certainly wasn’t going to admit that out loud.
“Cleo needs you,” she’d said instead.
Jonas’s brows raised. “She said that?”
“When Kyan returns, she will need all the help she can get. And I know Taran has chosen to stay with her until everything is resolved.”
His expression grew thoughtful. “You make it sound like a minor inconvenience with a simple solution.”
Hardly. Lucia needed time herself to strengthen her magic, to figure out how best to trap the fire Kindred—and now the earth Kindred as well—in their crystal prisons.
“I know it isn’t,” she allowed.
Jonas studied her. “For what it’s worth, I’d already decided to come with you to Auranos. I feel a great need to keep a close eye on you, princess. Both you and Lyssa.”
She searched his face, looking for any sign of deception, but found nothing but sincerity.
Jonas Agallon was, quite possibly, the most honest and forthright person she’d ever known in her life. She’d come to value him.
And the thought that she wouldn’t have to bid him farewell eased something unnamable within her.
And so they left the royal compound—Lucia and Lyssa, her father, Cleo, Jonas, Taran, Felix, an attendant named Nerissa, and a guard by the name of Enzo. They began their five-day journey south, with the empress’s full permission, taking a ship from Trader’s Harbor to the Auranian City of Gold.
Lucia didn’t speak to Cleo. The other princess had gone into seclusion since learning of Magnus’s death.
She loved him, Lucia realized without anyone confirming it for her in as many words.
This thought made her hate the princess just a little less.
The waters along the channel from King’s Harbor to the palace city were a blue-green that reminded Lucia of the aquamarine orb Cleo kept with her in a velvet drawstring pouch. A perfect match for the princess’s eyes.
Lucia would rather have that orb safely in her possession, along with the other three, but she hadn’t yet made any demands.