Page 68 of Ash and Feather

“So they’re escalating things because they think they have enough power and weaponry to deal a blow to both humansandthe gods?” she wondered.

“I’d call it hubris on their part, but…who knows what sort of weapons we’ll be dealing with? I suspect—as do many of the other Marr—that part of the reason for their assault on this realm weeks ago might have been about stealing things they could take back and corrupt into fuel for their weapons. I’m sure there are things that were taken while we were busy battling at the Tower of Ascension.”

“I hadn’t thought of that.” She went back to mapping out her thoughts in the sand, her brow creased in concern.

“So walking into Mindoth will not be without significant risk,” I said. “At the very least, the humans of that training compound will potentially glimpse weakness in our ranks. They’ll see these weapons that can actually do harm to the middle-gods.”

“Which is likely part of the goal of the elves,” Karys said. “It’s the same reason my fellow rebels and I destroyed temples and did our best to slander the role of the divine—to make the Marr seem more like flawed, fallible creatures.”

I nodded slowly, understanding. “To weaken the hold we gods have over humans, to encourage them not to worship us, and to keep us from becoming a united force against them.”

“Exactly.”

“An ambitious goal,” I said, frowning. “And again, I wouldn’t have thought it within the realm of possibility months ago, but now…”

She made a frustrated noise before swiping away whatever she’d been drawing in the sand. Her fist clenched more tightly around the stick as she looked over the ruined lines and symbols.

She started to attempt several more diagrams, but never managed to commit to any of them for longer than a few seconds.

Her thoughts raced. I could sense the anxiety surrounding them, could hear occasional bits and pieces of them—a jumbled mess of ideas, questions, plans. Nothing that took root. Every promising idea was met with painful realizations before circling back to a single defeated question, the same one I’d been asking myself all morning.

How do we even begin to fix this mess?

As if she heard the echo of this question in my mind, she turned to me with a decisive look and a quick suggestion. “You promised you would help me practice magic the other evening. We never got around to that, did we?”

“No, we didn’t.” I arched a brow. “I was ambushed in the stairwell, as I recall, and the rest of that evening is a blur.”

My sensitive hearing caught the sound of her heartbeat speeding up.

“A pleasant blur,” I added with a grin.

Another quick flutter of her heart, and this time my pulse skipped with it as images of that stairwell encounter flashed in my mind. My stomach clenched. My cock twitched at the thought of her pressed against the wall, surrendering to my strength, her skin hot and body quivering at my touch…

She tossed the stick aside. “Well, back to business this afternoon, then,” she said, clearly trying to focus through whatI assumed were her own heated memories. “If we’ll be heading into what sounds like a war zone, then I need to be ready.”

Chapter 18

Dravyn

Somewhat reluctantly,I cleared my mind of all other thoughts and said, “Agreed.”

Moth stayed behind, napping on the hilltop overlooking the pools, while Karys and I traveled farther north in search of a place that felt suitable for the work we intended to do.

The ground gradually became pale stone, smooth and shimmering, rather than grass. The hills straightened into a grey expanse that stretched beyond where we could see. The sky was darker here, the nearest forgelight now some distance behind us, casting everything in a shadowy, violet-edged, twilight kind of glow.

Finally, Karys paused, bracing her hand against a skinny tree, and said, “The air feels different here. Clearer.”

I nodded. “What should we focus on, then?” I asked. “Do you want to practice transporting again?”

She bit her lip. Shook her head. “I don’t want to practice running away.”

“No? Then what?”

She considered the question for a moment, focusing on twisting her hair into a long braid and tying it off with a strip of leather she pulled from her coat pocket. Her hands fisted together as she lowered them back to her sides. The clenching motion quieted the restless fire that had begun to stir within her—a trick she had employed often during these past weeks. She was remarkably good at keeping herself from erupting, in spite of everything she’d been through. It was a talent I sometimes envied.

But now that we were out in the open with no one to witness it, with the warm breeze weaving encouragement and temptation around us, her fire didn’t stay suppressed for long.

Little curls of flame appeared in the air, following the slender curve of her hand. She lifted that hand and stared at the smoke drifting up through the lines of her palm. Her breathing stilled and her eyes widened as though she was seeing her power—truly seeing it—for the first time.

---