“I found out spending some time on Lysip.” Dawyn answered the unspoken question.
“On Lysip?” Arianna narrowed her eyes at the girl. She didn’t have much reason to love her, and now she might have a reason to hate her.
“It’s not like that.” Dawyn shook her head and added hastily, “I went there after the wine incident. I wanted to know what happened and wasn’t getting anywhere on Ruana. So, I went to spend time with a relative.”
“You’re Rok?” The Dragon in front of Arianna was as blue as the sky.
Dawyn shook her head. “My mother’s sister mated with a Rok; their son, my cousin, came out red, so she stayed there and joined Rok.”
“I’m sorry.” Cvareh sounded sincere. Arianna withheld comment that this was the danger of the whole idea of families on Nova. It was so much simpler on Loom without them.
“The situation proved useful enough.” Dawyn shrugged but her magic had the sour note of regret all around it. “I heard the rumors of Coletta’Ryu’s flowers there. Yveun has his Riders and, while most think she’s a disgrace of a Ryu, she has her flowers to act out her nefarious plans.”
Arianna looked to the poisoned Dragon, prone on the ground. Sure enough, a lacquered flower sat around her neck. “Who would’ve thought flowers of all things would be so important,” she muttered, and Cvareh hummed his agreement. “We should dispose of the bodies.”
“Dispose of them?” Cain looked to Cvareh. “You heard what this wench said.” He pointed to the Dragon foaming at the mouth. “She just watched as Petra died. I say we leave their bodies as a message that—”
“We will dispose of them,” Cvareh interrupted firmly.
“You’re taking her side?” Cain was aghast.
“I’m taking the side of reason. The only message would be that they need to wage war against Xin and now have cause to do it.”
“No bodies, no deaths, and no stupid duels,” Arianna finished with a nod of affirmation from Cvareh.
Cain looked as if he still wanted to object, but he had the sense to keep it to himself.
One by one, they carried the Rok corpses to the edge of the island, tossing them over like a great offering to the world below.
“The boco, too,” Arianna suggested when they were finished.
“The boco?” Dawyn repeated with surprise.
“No trace they even made it to the island tonight.” Cvareh unsheathed his claws in agreement with Arianna’s suggestion. “We kill the boco, send them over the edge, then we take as many flowers as we can back to your family’s vineyard before dawn.”
Dawyn and Cain shared a look, then nodded in agreement.
“Whatever you say, not-Oji.”
Arianna gave a sideways glance at Cvareh. Of course he wouldn’t be the Oji; that role fell to Petra.
“I’m going to take you somewhere safe.” He clearly mistook her look as an expectation of attention.
“I was fine on Nova last time.” Arianna pressed her fingers together, summoning the guise of Ari Xin’Anh Bek for emphasis.
Cvareh radiated pure happiness. It fluttered from him and soared through his magic. Arianna wasn’t used to feeling so much joy from one person, and especially not at the sight of her. She was unsure how to process it, so she ignored it entirely. “We need to move the glider, too.”
She hopped back onto the piloting platform, gripping the handles. “If we fly with the dawn, we may be able to hide the trail in your watercolor skies.”
“My thoughts exactly.” Cvareh brought his fingers to his lips and gave a sharp whistle, summoning his boco. “Follow me, and fly low.”
The boco took off with a hop and a flap of its wide wings. Arianna sparked the glider to life, following behind as the bird tucked its feathers and dove toward the clouds below at Cvareh’s command. The rising sun lightened the sky from a pale, ethereal gray to the colors of spun candy, brightening almost to white by the time they directed themselves upwards and toward the isle of Ruana.
At first, Arianna thought they were headed for the Xin Manor. But they were too far back; Cvareh pointed at a waterfall ahead of them, pouring between the massive towers and structures carved into the underbelly of Ruana. Whatever he shouted to her was lost, so Arianna was left curious, but followed dutifully behind.
The waterfall was attached to a massive opening into the earth itself. Cvareh went ahead unhindered, but Ariana slowed as she crossed into the vast unknown of the cave beyond the falls. The magic of her glider lit up the darkness, just enough in combination with her magic eyes to make out the path ahead.
Pulling right, pulling left, weaving between columns of stone, stalagmites, and stalactites, there was only one course for her to go and Arianna for once found herself struggling to keep up with Cvareh. He charged ahead with the dexterity of a Raven and just as much disregard for the dangers of how he progressed. Arianna gritted her teeth. Her back felt as though it was going to snap in half from tension.
Light filtered into the blackness, and Arianna breathed a sigh of relief as she heard the squawking of the bird ahead and felt the buffet of wings that usually signaled landing.
The cave had opened up into a small cavern with a wide-ledged mouth. Arianna parked the glider and mentally forced every white-knuckled finger to uncurl.
“Are you trying to kill me?”
“Was it hard to navigate?” Cvareh seemed genuinely concerned.
Arianna sighed heavily. It may not have been hard for a suicidal Raven like Helen or Will, but Arianna had come to start valuing her life, as insane as the notion was. “It’ll be fine as a transport route. If I can do it, a Raven can make it twice as fast.”
“Careful, Arianna—that sounded like humility.” Cvareh extended a hand to her, offering to help her off the glider. Arianna stared at it, but stepped off unassisted thanks to that remark.
“So, where are we?”
“We are at the refinery of Ruana.”
“Refinery of Ruana?” Arianna repeated, utterly dumbfounded.
“This way.”
Curiosity propelled her to follow Cvareh without further comment around a lip of stone and into a narrow passage that quickly opened up into a cut staircase. The walls transformed from rough and natural to carved, as they ascended into what was clearly a Dragon-built structure.
She watched the back of the man ahead of her, as if the skin between his shoulder blades had some secret to reveal. Not for the first time, Arianna found herself studying him, wondering just what it was about Cvareh that drew her. It was not the depth of his mind, nor the muscle of his frame. Their pull to one another was indescribable; the features she would not usually find her eye drawn toward attracted her like the sheen of a freshly oiled gearbox.
At least, until her eye was pulled in a different direction.