Page 29 of Exquisite Monster
“And what are you suggesting I do?” Andaros asked carefully. “The dragon can still hear us.”
Even without seeing his face, I knew that the old man walked a tightrope. He clearly had a lot of leeway, but everyone had limits. From what I’d seen and just heard, Andaros’s limits were reached frequently enough to frighten people.
“What does it matter if he can hear? There’s nothing they can do,” Nelis said, but his volume lowered further until I could barely hear him. “As far as what I’m suggesting? Go the distance. At least send someone to Evrítha to see if there are signs of her escaping. If not that, then send a squad of draygs to recover her body.” His tone, even in whispers, showed what he thought of that. “If she is dead? Use her corpse to torture them. If not, bring her back and make them watch you kill her.Permanentlythis time. If you want to walk into dragon lands unopposed, this is how you do it.”
“And who says that’s what I want?” Andaros snarled. “What if I want the blood? What if I want to see them turn to ash and float away on the fucking wind? What of that?”
“You’re the king,” Nelis said. “That is your right. And you will still be the fool you’ve always been.”
The sound of Andaros striking him was so clear it felt pristine. “I told you to watch your words, old man.”
A snort. “As you and the dragon have both noted, I am old. I will not watch my words when I have little time left to live, and youarea fool of the highest order if you have the option torulethe dragons and murder them instead.”
Footsteps crunching away told me Andaros had stalked away from the man. But I was no longer fully listening, stunned.
Rulethe dragons. Rule the dragons? How in the?—
If you want to break them enough to control them…
Fallen fucking stars.
He wanted to break us so we could command the rest of the dragons. Controlling us meant controlling the whole world if he could mold our minds to obey. The Elders were an obstacle, but they were as vulnerable to scalefire as the rest of us. And if any dragon managed to slip through, Andaros would have both us and his weapons. No wonder Nelis wanted Lena dead. Butfuck.
Even if she had died, we would never let that happen. We would die first. At least we knew. Now we could understand and shield ourselves.
Z, I said.It’s so much worse than we thought.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
________
KATALENA
Iwiped away the sweat from my brow a second before it could fall into the cauldron in front of me and ruin the potion I was making.
Varíslept on the table nearby, having finally succumbed to his exhaustion. I was right there with him, but I couldn’t stop. I needed everything I could get.
With no true light, I had no way to mark the time other than when I allowed myself to sleep, but I had been here too long. If my count on the wall where we slept was at all accurate, I had been here two moon cycles, and I needed to get out of here. I needed toleave.
Since Gleym had first shown me the darts an entire moon had passed. And shortly after, the anxiety under my skin began to feel raw. When I left I needed everything I could get. I’d started brewing things long after I should have, storing the bottles I thought I would need.
It didn’t matter that I had no way to carry them. I needed them, and if my mind was going to race in circles thinking about them anyway, I might as well use that time to prepare for whatever hell I needed to get my mates out of.
They said they’d find me, and I believed they would try if they could. But Andaros would never allow that. He would rather die than release such a prize. And if anything, he’d been preparing for this far longer than we’d guessed. Who knew what horrors Craisos had to stifle dragons?
The potion changed and darkened. Became smooth and flowing. It was done. After testing it, I poured the entire cauldron into bottles to cool.
Varí’stail was tucked over his nose, and his scales were a pale shade of silvery gray. He was so deeply asleep that I didn’t have the heart to wake him up. Not when I was still so restless.
It had been a few days since I last tried, and though I didn’t have much hope, I still wanted to make an attempt.
I now knew the way to the room with thesheytenby heart. I kept my steps as silent as I could. There was no doubt Gleym knew I was not onlynotsleeping, given the amount of potions in the room, but I wasn’t going to give her any reason to change her behavior.
The closer I got, the more I felt it. Like a vibration in the air that wasn’t really there. No sound, but afeeling. Like my soul could hear it even if my body could not. It waspower.
The jagged surface of thesheytenwas different from the rock that made up the walls. It shone softly in the dim light of my potion bottle. Truly, the light it emitted was brighter than a flame, if more stark.
I sat with my back against the stone, listening to the invisiblethrum.
