Page 39 of The Horde King of Shadow

I stilled and asked carefully, “The mating season?”

Sarkin leveled me a hard look. “For the Elthika.” He waved his hand to the east of the horde. “The hatchery.”

Amazement shot through me, momentarily making me forget about the pain in my body and the way I was attracting the attention and whispers of the horde as we passed by. A millions questions bubbled up in my mind.

“Ah, ah,aralye,” Sarkin said, surprising me, his hand still on my back, guiding me down a stone pathway. Was my curiosity so evident? “My priority is not to answer your questions this night. It is to get your wounds checked and get you rested, so I can attend to mysaruk, as you call it.”

“I don’t have any wounds,” I lied.

He snorted with derision. “You forget so easily that I was once a new rider myself.”

“I’m not a rider,” I said quickly, a large part of me still rejecting the idea of what was expected of me.

“Yet you will be, Klara. Your instruction begins in the morning, which is why you need to sleep tonight.”

I sucked in a deep breath as we started up an incline. “You cannot be serious.”

“I am deadly serious,” he replied, cutting me a sharp look. “And I never say anything in jest when it comes to the Elthika. You’d best remember that.”

“Can I not have one day to rest, Sarkin?” I asked, stopping in the middle of the pathway when the muscles in my legs tightened so painfully that they began to spasm. I clenchedmy jaw. “Please,” I whispered, so onlookers wouldn’t hear my pleading.

Sarkin studied my features, those colorful eyes flitting back and forth. I wondered what he was looking for.

Finally he nodded. “Very well. One day of rest. Instead of your instruction beginning tomorrow, we will go seal our marriage bond in the temple of Lishara.”

My eyes widened. “Is there a rush to do that so soon?”

I would bemarriedtomorrow?

Sarkin shrugged. “And I ask you, why wait? I want this done. I have an oath myself to Elysom that I am eager to see through.”

I remembered him mentioning that to his aunt. Something aboutmysarcommands, whatever that meant. Elysom, I knew, seemed to be the governing body of the Karag, and his aunt was on the council.

“My mind is made up, and it will not change,” he added, his voice lowering as our eyes held. “I have chosen you as my wife, Klara. Waiting will not change that.”

My heart gave a frantic skip, my lips parting. Theshockof hearing those words…they pleased a primal part of me I’d never known I’d needed calmed to begin with.

But, with the exception of my mother and Dannik, I had never been chosen by anyone. Even my own blood. My half sisters, my father…they had all turned their backs on me at the urging of my stepmother, and I had felt their rejection and sting for years. In Dothik, I hadneverfelt like enough. For any of them. I’d been a disappointment. A painful reminder.

So to hear Sarkin say that he hadchosenmeand that it would not change…those words filled a desperate, gaping ache in me, one I hadn’t realized was an incredible, lonely void.

“Lysi?” he questioned softly, tipping my chin up with his calloused index finger.

I blinked, reality returning in a rush. I’d been staring at his exposed neck, tracking small scars there, as I processed his words.

“Lysi,” I whispered.

He nodded, pleased, though my thoughts raced. Before last week, I had never given much thought to marriage. I had filled my days with the pursuit of research and knowledge, to try to better understand my dreams and my mother’s own stories. I had always had an obsession with the dragon riders from across Drukkar’s Sea, ever since I’d seen one fly over Dothik when I’d been only twelve.

In the span of a week, my life had altered and shifted so drastically that it was hardly believable.

“What is it?” Sarkin grunted, urging me into a walk once more.

“This time last week, I was…” I took in a deep breath. “I was walking home in Dothik after a day in the archives trying to understandthis. This place. Your people. What it all meant. I’ve given over a decade of my life trying to make sense of this. And I’m beginning to realize that it might have been a waste. Because I don’t understand anything at all.”

I’m wholly unprepared for this, and that frightens me,I thought, but I left that thought unspoken.

“But you will,” Sarkin said. An easy answer to a complicated worry.

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