Page 202 of Of Blood and Banes
It couldn’t be…right?I look back down at the page, staring at the letters. Melaina’s words echo throughout my mind from a few days ago.
“What’s odd, though…is he said this wasn’t translating the same as the prophecy we all have known since we were children. Some of the words look similar but are different.”
“Give me a pen!” I shout and everyone turns to me in confusion. But I can’t take my eyes off the words, for the fear of losing my train of thought. “A pen! Hurry!”
Gavin races off and returns with a pen, Melaina and Archie watch me in confusion.
“The translation is wrong…” I explain as I search the page. I cross out words and replace them with other similar sounding ones.
The onesonsun, chosen to lead them all.
Wasn’t asonsun butmaidmade.
Until binds of death did that grave deed bade.
In death, blood is shed. But from blood there is life.
Restored byairheir andnightknight to end all strife.
Archie whispers, “What does it mean?”
Unable to drag my attention up from the page, I shake my head. My thoughts buzz as all the pieces come together. Cyrus had a son. And considering Cyrus was born of sun dragonblood…it would have made his child a hybrid as well. Granted, that child would likely have a more diluted bloodline. But still magical all the same. Ancient whispers flutter around me.
Fire incarnate.
Flame in flesh.
Blood of power.
Brushing my fingers across my father’s journal, his voice echoes in my mind,“It’s something of a family heirloom. It wasoriginally my father’s, but he died before he could write in it, and before I could meet him.”
I stop.Wait…
I tap my finger against the page as I wrestle my way through each tangled cord of thought. And despite the hushed whispers around me stilling to a silence, my mind roars.
If my father never met his father because he died…why would my father have written a letter to Cyrus labeled as‘sire?’ Unless he meant it as a title of respect. But then that would mean I’m not related to Cyrus. And if I’m not…how could we have possibly made it through the invisible barrier at Vitalis? Or unlocked the door into the royal tomb?
I glance down at the Blood Ring on my finger. Could it have been magically strong enough to negate the need for Cyrus’s bloodline to enter?
The entire room whirls into a blur of color, becoming a wash of varying shades of red. All those nights back in Arterias where I dreamt of fire and blood resurface like a current screaming for my attention. Until I pinpoint exactly where I’ve seen those shades of red—vibrant like any roaring fire, and rich like fresh blood.
Everything is drowned out by flashes of my memory played back in slow motion.
The wall of fire I saw back in Blackfell. The figure behind it a shadow, until a man emerged from the other side. His glowing amber eyes with slitted pupils burning with otherworldly wrath as the reflection of flames danced in his eyes. Concealed raw power rolling off him in waves. How inexplicably drawn I feel to him. His tousle of flame-red hair.
“He’s not even my father,”his voice echoes in the deepest roots of my mind.
Just as I begin to accept the truth that’s been in front of me all along—I’m overwhelmed.
Using my blood to pass through the Vitalis barrier and the tomb only worked because it wasn’tjustmy blood.
How my nightmares always disappeared when he was near.
How his eyes almost glowed amber, and the way they reflected flames so clearly.
How he roared in battle like he was more beast than he was man. That pulsing, drowning rage.
“Find Cole, and take her back to the Dragon Lands,”my mother’s voice calls in my memory.
