I must’ve been really well-behaved, because sometime later, we made it to the pool.
The midnight water was warmer than my lake, but it was still refreshing as I made my way across the slippery pool under Nyktos’s watchful gaze. He stayed close as if he feared I’d venture too far and drown. I wondered if the minerals he’d spoken of eased my sore muscles as I let myself slip under the surface, loving the feeling of water rushing across my face and over my head. Or maybe it was the orgasm. I smiled underwater. Could’ve been both. I stayed submerged, eyes closed, and arms outstretched, floating—
A cool chest touched mine, startling me. Nyktos’s arms folded around my waist, lifting me. My eyes opened as my head broke the surface. Clutching his shoulders, I dragged in a mouthful of air as I looked up at him.
He scooped the wet hair plastered to my cheeks back from my face. “You were starting to worry me.”
“Sorry.” My face heated. I hadn’t thought about how holding myself underwater must look to someone else. “I didn’t think I was under that long.”
His eyes searched mine. “It was close to two minutes.” My brows shot up. “You were keeping track of the time?”
He nodded, lowering his arm from my waist as he drew his hand along my jaw. “Why do you do that?”
“I…I really don’t know.” I bit my lip as I drifted back. The water was chest-deep here on me, but on Nyktos, it barely reached his navel, and he was utterly too distracting when water slicked his hair back and coursed down his chest. “It’s just something I’ve done since I was a kid,” I said, resting my arms on the ledge of the cool stone wall. “Maybe I started doing it because instead of feeling like I couldn’t breathe, I was actually
controlling it, and it wasn’t controlling me? I don’t know. But it made me feel in control. Not weak or something.” I shrugged as Nyktos remained quiet. “Then again, I’m not even sure that makes sense. It’s just a weird habit of mine.” I cleared my throat. “So, anyway, I guess today was a failure.”
“Not really.” The water stirred as he drew closer. “Like I told you, I felt the essence in you. Honestly, I probably felt it in the woods that night, but I was…”
I glanced back to see him dip under the water and then resurface a few seconds later, rising like the Primal god he was. I got a little caught up in watching the muscles along his chest and biceps do all sorts of interesting things as he lifted his arms to run his hands over his face and push his hair back.
“I think we can draw it out,” he said, joining me at the wall. He looked over. “You’ve got to remember it’s not often that gods can use their eather in such a manner while in the Culling. You’re already way ahead of the game.”
Nodding, I rested my chin on my arm. “But I’m not supposed to even be in the game.”
“There is that.” Nyktos was quiet for a few moments. “Did I ever tell you about Lathan when he was younger?”
He hadn’t. I shook my head.
“He would have these…strange sensations. They always came at night, right as he was about to drift off to sleep,” he told me, resting his chin on his arm like I was. “And without warning, he would feel this sudden pressure in his chest and throat. Like he couldn’t breathe.”
I stilled.
“It was always swift and sudden, causing him to gulp for air. He said the attacks would come in spells, several nights in a row, and then he’d have nothing for weeks. He used to fear that a sekya was visiting him.”
“A what?”
He glanced at me. “It’s a creature that can be found in the Abyss and engages in a particular form of torture. They sit on your chest and steal your eather through your breath.”
“What the fuck?” I muttered, shuddering.
Nyktos chuckled. “My father would never allow the sekya to leave the Abyss. Lathan knew that, but it was the only thing that made sense. It
happened for years, but I never noticed until the one night I saw him do it— jerk as if he were waking up suddenly, gasping for air. Nektas was with us. Saw it, too. He taught Lathan similar breathing techniques to what I’ve seen you do.”
“Did he…did he know what caused the attacks?”
“Lathan was never sure, but Nektas said he thought it was anxiety. That even if Lathan weren’t thinking about anything when he was falling asleep, it was the things he thought about during the waking hours catching up to him when his mind was—”
“Quiet?” I whispered.
His gaze flickered to me again. “Yes.”
I faced the walls of the chamber, doubt beginning to creep in on me. “Are you trying to tell me that a godling had issues with anxiety? Or are you trying to make me feel better about freaking out for no good reason?”
“First off, I don’t think you freak out. Secondly, what causes you to feel as if you can’t breathe is neither a good nor a bad reason. It just is,” he said, and I arched a brow. “And, finally, you make it sound like it’s impossible for Lathan to have had anxiety.”
“Because a godling is powerful. Strong. Whatever.”
“You have embers of life in you. Primal embers.” His leg brushed mine underwater as he angled his body toward me. “You’re strong. Lathan was just as recklessly brave as you are. None of that has anything to do with the mind.”
Brave.
Strong.
I opened my mouth but fell silent for a couple of moments. “Did…did it ever stop before he…before he died?”
“There were years where he didn’t experience them. At some point, they came back.” He plucked up several strands of my hair that were stuck to my arm and draped them down my back. “But he managed them once he accepted that it wasn’t a sekya coming for him.”
I buried my chin between my arms. “When I was younger, I would hold my breath whenever I felt that way, not just when underwater.” My face felt hot again. “That was before Holland picked up on it. You’d think that would have made the feeling of not being able to breathe worse, but I kind of had the opposite reaction. I don’t know why.”
“Even I don’t know why the body and mind do what they do half the time,” he said. And for some reason, that made me smile a little. “I don’t think any of the Primals do. But if it helps you to do that and doesn’t hurt you, do what you need to do.” He lowered his head toward mine. “Either way, you’re not weak, Sera. Not physically, but more importantly, not mentally. You are one of the strongest people I’ve ever met, mortal or not.” The tips of his fingers grazed the curve of my arm. “With or without the embers.”
The crack in my chest throbbed. A knot of emotion swelled so quickly in my throat that even if I had known how to respond to that, I wouldn’t have been able to. The back of my throat burned as I rapidly blinked away dampness I knew had nothing to do with being in the water. I knew I was likely projecting whatever messy feelings popped up, but he’d said I was strong. Not the embers. Me. And that mattered.
Because it reminded me that I mattered.
Pushing off the wall, I turned away from Nyktos and let myself slip underwater before the knot of emotion decided to make an appearance in the form of hot, fat tears. I didn’t know how long I stayed under, but Nyktos didn’t come for me this time. He was waiting when I resurfaced, though. Watching. Our eyes met.
“I’m beginning to think you may have a bit of ceeren blood in your family line,” he said with a faint grin.
“Shut up.” I shoved a hand through the water, sending a small wave cresting over his chest.
He raised his brows. “Did you just…splash me?” I shrugged. “Maybe.”
Nyktos stared at me for several seconds and then placed his palm over the water. He didn’t run his hand through it like I had. There was a charge to the air, and then the water began to rise beneath his palm, spinning into a small cyclone. My mouth dropped open as the water continued to spin, the funnel growing wider and taller until I could no longer see him behind it.
“I know you’re impressed into silence,” he drawled from behind the funnel, “but I’d close that mouth if I were you.”
I snapped my mouth shut. That was all I could do as the cyclone of water arced and tipped over. A sound that was half-shriek, half-laugh left me as the funnel came down, pelting me as if I had been caught in a heavy
rainstorm. I staggered back, shoving the hair from my face. “Okay, that’s not fair.”
“I know.”
Grinning, I drifted closer to him. “Do it again.” Nyktos laughed. “So demanding.”
But he did it again. And again. Drawing the water into multiple little funnels and larger ones that changed shapes from a winged creature to a large, racing wolf that whipped the water of the pool into a frothing frenzy. I was equally awed, amused, and completely enthralled by Nyktos as he eventually joined me in the center of the pool, keeping one arm securely around my waist as the water whipped back and forth around us. Not because he could create such things from water, but because he, a Primal of Death, played.
As our time alone slowly but too quickly came to an end, I felt that noticeable change again. That intangible shift between us as he retrieved towels from a shelf along the back of the chamber. In me as I dressed, finding it difficult to keep my eyes off him and the smile from my face. In him, in the relaxed lines of his features that made him seem so young as he took the time to blot the water from my hair. And I couldn’t help but think this felt like…more.
That we felt like more.
 |
I spent the rest of the day with the young draken and Aios, and even if I hadn’t spent the morning training and then playing in the pool, the hours spent trying to keep Jadis from attempting to fly or set something on fire every other minute would’ve sufficiently exhausted me.
A moment to simply breathe without fear of something going epically wrong only came when Jadis scampered over to where I sat on the couch, lifting her thin, scaled arms to me. I bent to pick her up, but in a sparkling silver shimmer, she shifted into her mortal form, right then and there, naked as the day she was born.
Which caused Reaver to squawk and dart from the chamber faster than I’d ever seen him fly. I sort of wanted to follow him as Ector popped his
head into the chamber, saw what had happened, and immediately returned to the hall, obviously wanting nothing to do with what was going on.
Luckily, Aios was prepared for the impromptu nakedness, whipping out a tiny light blue nightgown and managing to drag it over Jadis’s dark-haired head as she all but crawled into my arms and buried her face in my hair. She was out in seconds.
“I wish I could fall asleep that easily.” Aios lowered herself to the floor next to the plates of leftover food. I’d managed to get Jadis to eat from a fork again, but if I took my eyes off her for longer than a second, I likely would’ve lost a finger. “And don’t worry about waking her. The palace could come down on our heads, and she’d sleep through it.”
“Must be nice.” I leaned back against the couch’s arm as I glanced down at the wispy dark waves of her hair. “I wonder why she shifted. I’ve seen her sleep in her draken form.”
“None of the draken sleep in their mortal form unless they feel safe.” Aios brushed a wine-red lock of hair back from her face as she crossed her legs. I noticed the shadows had faded a little from her eyes. “Especially as younglings. So, it just means she feels comfortable with you.”
“Oh,” I murmured, glancing down at Jadis again. She’d turned her head slightly, baring one rosy cheek as she kept her hands clenched around my hair. Her lashes were unbelievably thick. “I think it’s my hair. Nektas thought the color might remind her of her mother.”
“Makes sense.” Aios’s smile was faint as she eyed the sleeping draken. “It’s kind of sad but also a bit sweet if that’s the case.” She lifted her gaze to me. “I haven’t gotten a chance to ask how you’re dealing with the delay of the coronation and the news of the summons.”
Keeping my arms folded around Jadis, I tipped my head back. “I really haven’t been letting myself think too much about it,” I admitted with a wry grin. “Probably not the best method, but it can’t be changed.”
“No, it cannot.”
I nodded, even though we might be able to change things if we could find Delfai before Kolis summoned us. However, if we didn’t, and I looked like Sotoria… I said none of that. Aios wasn’t aware of that part, and if she knew that I was Kolis’s graeca, I was sure those shadows would return. But I wasn’t allowing myself to dwell on it. Any of it. If I did, I would be a wreck.
The sound of approaching footsteps drew our attention to the doors. I managed to keep any surprise from my expression. Reaver had returned, now in his mortal form. He wore loose, dark pants and a plain undershirt and carried a roll of something white in his hands.
Blond hair hid most of his angular features as he came to where we sat, kneeling by the couch. “She’ll want her blanket,” he said in that oddly serious voice of his. A tone that seemed far too mature for a child who looked no older than ten years of age.
“That is very thoughtful of you, Reaver,” Aios said.
He shrugged a small shoulder as he draped the soft blanket over Jadis’s shoulders with my help. Once he was sure she was covered, he sat on the floor near us.
I glanced at Aios. She grinned.
Reaver looked up at me with expectant ruby-hued eyes as if waiting. For what, I truly had no idea, and I was quickly reminded of exactly how terrible I was with children.
“Would you like something to eat?” Aios picked up a bowl of mixed fruit. “I’m confident that Jadis didn’t have her hands in this.”
I snorted softly as Reaver hesitated and then nodded. The fruit was probably the only food Jadis hadn’t had her fingers on—sticky fingers that were now wrapped tightly around my hair. “Do you know when Nektas is returning?”
“Later,” Reaver answered as he nibbled on a piece of strawberry. “I think he went to Vathi to visit Aurelia.”
“Aurelia?” I murmured, holding back a yawn.
“She’s a draken in Attes’s Court,” Aios answered, glancing at me. “I’ve met her a couple of times. She’s pretty nice.” She poured Reaver a glass of water, something he hadn’t been able to drink with Jadis chasing him around. Her eyes briefly met mine again. “I wonder if he’s checking to see if she’s heard anything about that draken who came here.”
That would make sense.
“Don’t know.” Reaver took the napkin Aios handed him, dropping it onto a bent knee. “But I think Nek is sweet on her.”
My brows shot up, at the nickname and the idea of Nektas being sweet on anyone when it was clear that he was still in love with his wife.
Aios grinned at the young boy. “And why would you think that?”
Reaver shrugged as he finished off a slice of melon. “He always smiles whenever her name is mentioned.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s sweet on her,” Aios said.
He pinned her with a very serious look. “Then why does Bele smile when someone says your name?”
I grinned as Aios’s face flushed about a dozen shades of pink, thinking of how I’d seen the two of them interact with each other. I had thought there might be something between them.
“That’s because Bele is silly.” Aios cleared her throat. “Did Nyktos go with him?”
My heart immediately skipped, and my face felt like it was probably a dozen or so shades of red. I focused on rubbing the center of Jadis’s back. While Reaver told Aios that he’d seen the Primal outside, working with the guards, and then proceeded to ask her why some melons were sweet and others sour, I stared at the glossy, black ceiling.
Nyktos.
I repeated his name over and over in my mind, and no matter how many times I said it, the name didn’t sit right. I knew why, and it was all Nek’s fault.
Because at some point, I’d started seeing Nyktos as I wanted to.
And that seemed like a problem because thinking of him as Nyktos felt wise. Less. Not more. Nyktos was right now, pleasure for the sake of pleasure, and that was the safest way to navigate this union with him. There was no guarantee that whatever this Delfai knew about removing the embers would work. Even so, there was still no promise of a future, not until we dealt with Kolis and restored some kind of order to Iliseeum.
And thinking of him as Ash felt too much like endless possibilities. Ash felt like more, and there could never be more with him.
Jadis wiggled a little as my chest tightened. I asked myself for the hundredth time what exactly I was doing here, going through a questionable plan when I had a duty, a destiny. When people were dying because I was here. And if Kolis ever discovered the whole soul thing? He would do just as Penellaphe had warned.
Pressure built because I…I knew why I hadn’t made another attempt to escape. It wasn’t because I feared being caught again. It wasn’t because of the plan. It was the why behind wanting his plan to work. There were all the obvious reasons—stopping Kolis, ending the Rot, and restoring Nyktos to
his rightful destiny as the King of Gods. But I had other reasons, purely selfish ones.
I didn’t want to do what I’d have to do to weaken Kolis.
Instead, I wanted a future of my own, one where I could try to keep that part of me good—just like Nyktos did. A future that had more moments like the ones I’d spent with him earlier. Moments of peace. I wanted years like his friend Lathan had, where he didn’t struggle to find his breath when things became overwhelming. Maybe even moments like this, where I held a sleeping child in my arms, one that was mine. I wanted a future where I was—
I tried to stop the thought from finishing, but it was too late. The why behind what I wanted was already fully formed, and the strangest, most terrifying thing occurred to me as I held Jadis closer.
Nyktos…he was all that I already knew—a Primal of Death who wanted to give the Shades the chance to face justice or redemption instead of the nothingness of the final death. He cared and thought of others, even at great risk to himself. What he’d done for Saion and Rhahar and countless others was evidence of not only that but also that he was succeeding at trying to be good. Breathe in.
Nyktos was a protector with far more than one decent bone, but some of that did belong to me and only me.
I didn’t need him to prove that because he already had, three years ago when he refused to take me as his Consort. I just hadn’t realized it then, and gods knew it hadn’t turned out how he’d expected, but he’d wanted to give me freedom. Hold. And he’d proven it over and over again since then, when he prevented me from getting myself killed in the Luxe and didn’t touch a single hair on my head when I stabbed him in the heart. He’d stopped Tavius when no one else would or could. He’d saved my life again by giving me a rare antidote to a deadly toxin, and he did so before he even knew about the embers. He’d taken my mother down by several notches and then some. Then there was what Rhain had claimed after the Cimmerian came to the gates of the Rise. The unknown sacrifice Nyktos denied. Breathe out.
Even after he’d learned what I’d planned, he had proven it. No one, not even me, would’ve blamed Nyktos if he had locked me away in one of those many cells I’d seen earlier. But he hadn’t. He’d been angry, rightfully so, but the anger hadn’t lasted.
I knew this. After all, he’d given me his blood because he didn’t want to see me in pain.
Nektas had been right.
Nyktos did understand my actions. He accepted them. Two things even I knew were far more important than forgiveness. Nyktos knew me. Heard me. And he made sure I understood that a part of me was good. That he didn’t see me as a ghost. Or a monster. He saw me, as someone strong and brave with or without the embers, and I now knew he’d been telling the truth when he claimed to be angrier about what he believed to be my lack of regard for my life. That he cared despite his resolve not to see me as anything more than a Consort in title only. Despite his very real inability to love. And because of that, all of that…
I wanted more.
I wanted to be his wife. His partner.
His Queen.
I wanted to be Nyktos’s Consort.
 |
Afraid Jadis was falling, my arms tightened around her out of instinct as I became aware of her weight easing from my chest.
“It’s okay. I have her now.”
My eyes fluttered open in confusion at the sound of Nektas’s voice. He was seated at my hip, carefully untangling his daughter’s fingers from my hair. It was clear she still slept, her legs limp, even though her hold on my hair was stubborn.
“She doesn’t want to let go,” Nektas noted with a faint grin.
Realizing I must’ve fallen asleep, I glanced at the floor. Aios and the dishes were gone. My gaze flicked up to where Reaver was curled in the chair next to the couch, eyes open but sleepy.
“I’ve never seen her sleep this long.” Reaver rubbed at his cheeks with his fist. “Ever.”
Exactly how long had we been napping? I wasn’t sure, and it didn’t matter because I also realized my chest was humming faintly, meaning only
one thing. My gaze swung back to Nektas’s hands. Nyktos was here. In this chamber.
Everything that I had been thinking about before I fell asleep came back to me in a rush. What I knew. What I wanted. Oh, gods. My heart was pounding all over the place, and I was a second away from tearing my hair free and running from the room as if I’d woken up and found a sekya sitting on my chest. It might be a bit of an extreme reaction, but I didn’t know what to think about any of this. What to do or how to act. The wanting of something I could have was foreign to me. Because just like Nyktos, I’d spent a life of just existing, and wanting felt like living.
And that scared me even more since there was a really good chance I’d screw up a possible future—if there turned out to be one—with Nyktos. One that could be real. I wasn’t just a messy person. I was the mess. I was temperamental. Violent. Stubborn. Prone to moodiness, anxious one second and overly confident the next. I could barely deal with myself on most days, but I wanted Nyktos to be able to handle me. My breath wheezed as Nektas worked all but one last tangle from Jadis’s fingers.
“This is all your fault,” I muttered under my breath. Nektas’s hands halted. “What is?”
“Everything,” I grumbled. “Except the current situation with Jadis and my hair.”
“It’s been a long time since someone blamed me for nearly everything while I had no idea what I’d done.” A quizzical smile appeared. “Strangely, I think I missed that.” Nektas’s eyes lifted to mine—
I stiffened.
His eyes flashed a shade of blue so bright and intense that they briefly resembled polished sapphires before they returned to the deep red hue I knew.
“Your eyes,” I whispered as he finally got his daughter’s hand free of my hair, tucking her and her blanket against his broad chest. “Not sure if you’re aware of this, but they just changed color for a couple of seconds.”
Everything about Nektas changed in an instant. The smile was gone. His features sharpened as the faint ridges of scales became more prominent. “What color did they turn?”
“Blue.” I glanced at Reaver, who looked as if he was still half-asleep. “A really bright, intense blue.” I thought his skin lost a little of the rich, coppery hue it usually had, but I wasn’t sure. “Is that normal?”
“Sometimes,” he murmured, then leaned forward. He pressed a quick kiss to my forehead, stunning me into silence. “Thank you for watching over the younglings.”
I watched Nektas rise, not quite sure how I’d watched over them unless falling asleep counted. Reaver clamored from his chair as Nektas stepped to the side, and then I finally saw him.
Nyktos leaned against the bare wall, arms crossed over the dark gray tunic he must’ve changed into. His head was tilted to the side, and I was no longer thinking of changing eye colors because the expression on his face was soft and warm.
Nektas stopped by the Primal, speaking too low for me to hear. Whatever Nektas said to him caused Nyktos to push off the wall. His arms unfolded as he glanced at me.
I resisted the urge to wiggle myself between the cushions.
Nektas nodded at something Nyktos said, then turned to Reaver. The young boy gave me a little wave, and then the trio disappeared into the hall. We were alone, and Nyktos was walking toward me. I was a mess, only managing to sit up as he came to me, taking the seat Nektas had occupied as I busied myself with straightening the hem of my vest.
“I see someone likes your hair as much as I do.” “Yeah,” I whispered, and that was all I said.
There was a beat of silence. “You okay?”
“I…I think my hair is sticky.” Closing my eyes, I ordered myself to get it together. There was no reason for me to behave so strangely. My big, unnecessary epiphany didn’t change Nyktos, and I needed to treat this the same way I treated the looming summons or the matter of who the soul inside me belonged to: deal with it by…not dealing with it.
Sounded like a plan.
I peeked up at him. Tension had gathered in the lines of his mouth and brow. Concern blossomed.
His gaze swept over my face so intensely I wondered if he was counting my freckles again. Or if I’d been projecting the wild mix of emotions earlier, and he was trying to figure out what had caused them. I really hoped it was the former.
It was neither.
“You’ve been sleeping a lot more lately,” he said.
A little bit of relief swept through me, but it was brief. “I know. I feel fine,” I quickly added. “No headaches or anything, but I didn’t sleep this much before. I guess it’s the Culling,” I finally admitted aloud—and to myself.
Nyktos nodded. “It could’ve been the training this morning—” “I don’t want to stop.”
He pulled back as I swung my legs off the couch and scooted to the edge. “I’m not suggesting we do.”
“I feel like there is a but coming.”
Nyktos was still watching me closely. Too closely. “You saw Nektas’s eyes change color.”
I frowned. “To blue. Is there something wrong with them?”
“No,” he answered, brushing a few tangled curls back from my shoulder. “I’ve never seen them that color, but all of the draken used to have blue eyes.”
“Really?” Surprise flickered through me. “Why are they now red?” “They turned that way after Kolis took the embers of life from my
father,” he said. “It’s a sort of notam—a Primal bond between the draken and the true Primal of Life. It was severed when the embers were taken, and their eye color has stayed that way since there has been no true Primal of Life—no true Primal of Life who Ascended.”
“Then why did they just—?” I sucked in a sharp breath, rising to my feet. “Did they momentarily change because of me? But I haven’t Ascended. Obviously.”
“The embers could be growing stronger in you, and that innate, Primal bond between the draken and the true Primal of Life was temporarily responding to them.”
I crossed my arms. “Okay. I mean, that’s not a big deal. Right?” “Normally, the increase in the strength of Primal embers isn’t a big
deal,” he agreed…or didn’t, because the concern was clear in his deep silver eyes.
“What is the big deal then?”
Nyktos didn’t answer for a long moment. “It could mean that you’re closer to Ascension than we realized.”
