Page 111 of The Alien's Cruel Starfrost Domain

I can still see the shorter male Icecaix who’d dared to touch Lara, his bulbous eyes widening in terror as the firelord thundered toward him. His death was too quick—crushed beneath scaled claws—but at least I had the satisfaction of watching him fall. His companion hadn’t fared much better, her transparent gown offering no protection as she burned.

As I prepare for the journey to Earth, my mind keeps straying to Lara.

No more signs of her true nature emerging. Perhaps having her sister nearby will change that. Once they’re together, maybe then their powers will finally fully manifest.

They have to. Everything depends on it.

Hybrids.

There were probably more of them than anyone knew—after all, we’d been traveling to Earth, one of the few other inhabited planets that we knew of, for millennia of their years. But we didn’t know where any of the others were.

At least, none like these two.

“Your Lordship?” Khrint’s voice pulls me from my thoughts. “The travel arrangements are complete.”

“Good,” I murmur.

Soon we’ll return to Earth, to collect Izzy Evans. Then everything can proceed as planned.

Even if that means destroying the last remnants of my soul in the process.

CHAPTER 32

LARA

In the gray light just before dawn, Ivrael’s people pick through the still-smoldering ashes of the ballroom.

A giant cart has been rolled into the courtyard, I presume through the gates on the far side of the manor—gates that I’ve never seen opened. People I don’t recognize—human people, I realize after watching them for a moment—are busy piling what remains of burned bodies into the cart.

“Who are they?” I murmur to Kila.

She peeks out of the hood of my cloak. “Tenders of the dead,” she says. “They’ll make sure all the remains are properly staked and buried.”

Humantenders of the dead. Because, as Adefina informed me after my adventure in the Caix cemetery, normal Caix aren’t able to pass the iron gates. “You must have already left the burial ground by the time His Lordship found you,” she’d said. “There’s no way he could have come inside to save you.”

But she was wrong. Ivrael did come into the cemetery and save me. I just don’tknow how.

I turn my mind back to the ballroom massacre. Remembering Oriana’s face as it melted to nothing in the heat of the dragon’s fire, I whisper to Kila, “What about the ones who were burned to ashes?”

“All the ashes will be swept up and buried in iron boxes.” The tiny raya shudders. “With any luck, that will allow them to rest peacefully.”

I don’t see how that can happen, given how they died. The smell of old smoke and wet wood heavy in my nostrils, I trudge back toward the kitchen.

One of the footmen stands staring at the building in a daze, and I pause beside him. “Did you see the dragon?” I ask, then quickly correct myself. “I mean the firelord.”

Without looking at me, he nods. His tone is incredulous as he shakes his head. “He burned everything.”

“Where did he go after that?” I don’t even know why I’m asking. By all rights, I ought to be telling everyone what I heard, letting everyone know that Ivrael is the reason so many of his people are dead.

But part of me is hopeful I can use that information to force the duke to send me home, to convince him not to kidnap my sister and drop her into this bizarre life.

I don’t know for sure, but it feels like that may make me almost as much of a villain as Ivrael.

But the footman doesn’t answer—not directly. He simply shakes his head. As I stand there with him, Kila peeks out from where she’s huddled against my collarbone, using my body heat to survive being outside. “We’re not going back inside yet, are we?”

“You can’t stay outside much longer.” I can tell she’s about to argue when a shiver rocks her tiny body.

“Fine,” she says. “You’re right.”

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