Page 26 of Tethered Thrones

“Your souls share the same color and tragic fate beyond the tether, Clem,” he mused cryptically, circling me with poise and grace befitting the stealthy nightwings, holding my end of the tether like a leash.

He had called me by my name. I straightened my shoulders, unhunching my body, trying not to buckle under his critical gaze.

“All that responsibility placed on such fragile shoulders. Surely, the gods are crazy after all,” he said, stopping in front of me so my forked toes pressed against his clawed feet.

Nguyen’s eyes suddenly flicked to the night sky as if anticipating a bolt of lightning, “Forgive me. You are righteous, and I was wrong to say that.”

Then, he stared at me. Something sinister lurked behind his golden gaze framed by dark, feathery hair that fell just past his narrow shoulders. He was graceful, elegant even, and I hadn’t taken a second to appreciate him earlier in the evening. With the tongue of the most venomous viper and fanaticism of the most fervent follower, Nguyen was an enigma. I could not read the colors of his soul while he read mine like an open book.

“Speaking of books, here,” he said.

I groaned as a heavy weight filled all four of my hands. I tilted forward as he stepped back so my face wouldn’t collide with his chest. Then, I whipped back as the black mass of swirling shadows solidified into something small and portable, able to fit in one hand.

“Travel-sized, just for you. All the secrets and spell work I have gathered over the years. All my notes from audiences with Tsuki, and all the ways a weakling like you can outwit the powerful, to bring to heel the strong with her gift,” he pointed to the moon. “Magic most pure. Now, I must return. It is hard to send my avatar this far, and frankly, you’re not worth wasting another breath. The least I can do is honor the chosen and the goddess by making you less of a noose around their necks.”

With that, his body began to break apart.

“Leaving so soon?” I said much too forcibly.

“Why not?” he asked, cocking his head to the side at a near-full tilt, “We’re done here. Go back to play with your heathens.”

Mirth danced in his eyes now, and laughter, too. I knew he was laughing at me that I dared speak angrily after receiving such a gift.

“Well,” I began quietly, “It feels as though you have more to tell me.”

“Perceptive.” he clapped, the mockery grating now. “Maybe that’s why Tsuki made you her emissary,” he said, and the jealousy in his tone was undeniable now.

“Alas, I wouldn’t want to bear that weight either, so feeling betrayed is foolish,” Nguyen murmured, examining dirt underneath a perfectly curved nail.

“But I want to help m-more,” I whispered in a small voice, clutching the book a little too tightly. Too small, too insignificant. I raised my chin a hair and said a touch louder. “If you teach me more, I can help Sun. Help the goddess, Tsuki, too.The nocs. The humans. Peace. Surely, if you can do all this, your avatar can teach me more before we reach the capital city.”

Nguyen sneered, but there was no malice in his eyes this time. There was something like affection almost. Oh! No, I knew that look, that slow smirk over sharpened teeth and dilated pupils paired with fluttering breaths and flaring nostrils.

Madness. Hunger. But not for food. Not for sex either. A sadistic sort of glee I hadn’t even seen on Bracken’s face directed towards me. Bloodlust. But why?

“You will help by sacrificing greatly, little moth. Tell me, emissary, are you willing to do whatever it takes to keep that light shining bright? To suffer beyond what you can bear for the greater good? Be a hero, Clem, to nocs and humans?”

He lifted his dark wing skyward towards Tsuki in his purest form, moonlight, and sighed, enraptured by visions of my suffering that somehow I could see in my mind.

I hesitated and then said as forcefully as a mothian could to a nightwing, “Yes, of course.”

“Goood,” he purred. I would’ve mistaken him for a panthera in that heated moment.

I shuddered as Nguyen’s claws scraped gently against my chin before piercing ever so slightly as he snatched me by the fur around my neck. His tongue darted out to lick my tears–when had I begun crying?–and I forced myself not to wail in fear. I knew enough now to know it would only excite him more. Despite his mission to help Tsuki by arming me, Nguyen may yet rip me to shreds.

Then, just as quickly as his assault began, he went rigid. His head hung at perfect tilt. Before swiveling around completely, his neck twisting and flesh bunching at the base. I grunted in fear and wondered if this was the same revulsion Sun felt the first time he saw the unnatural angle of my noc neck snapping to and fro.

A figure emerged.

“Get. Away. From my Clem,” Bracken breathed through flaring nostrils, suddenly gripping Nguyen’s arm and then sliding down, allowing his claws to shred his robe. “Before I gut you and string you from a branch with your intestines, loathsome filth.”

He stood up to his full height, towering above Nguyen, who didn’t flinch as he turned his neck back to me. Instead, he yawned and waved his free hand dismissively. But I saw it, that brief moment of surprise, of confusion.

It dawned on me that a grandmaster of magic wouldn’t have left us unprotected. I hadn’t heard the sounds of Sun, Kiar, Bracken, and Hadi mating, even though they were so close to me. Had Bracken smashed through some invisible shield to get to me when I hadn’t returned quickly enough? I didn’t even know how long I’d been gone. And my eyelids were heavy and misty, as if he’d cast a mirage and trapped us in another mirror world as Tsuki had before.

I beamed at my master. The bruising pressure he was applying to Nguyen’s wrist was a far cry from snapping it in two, as he would’ve done not too long ago, making me watch as he used the bones as toothpicks. He was being diplomatic, as much as a batbeast could, because he too could sense the importance of the nightwing’s presence, though he didn’t display an ounce of shock on his face.

“You brutes bore me to tears,” Nguyen snapped. “Let go.”

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