Page 88 of A Storm of Fire and Ash
But the second I stepped into the hallway, I felt it—her. The real her. I gasped for air, holding the stone wall to steady myself. Her glamour dropped, and her power rolled through the walls, beneath my fingers, like thunder through my bones. She’d revealed her true form.
And it nearly brought me to my fucking knees.
She was fully Fae now—just behind this wall I was desperately grasping onto. No glamour. No human mask. Her energy called to mine like flame to kindling, and I swore—for a moment—I forgot how to breathe.
It took every ounce of control I had not to turn around, bust down my door, and claim her the way every primal instinct in me screamed to.
She was everything.
And I couldn’t have her. Not like that. Not yet.
So I kept walking, jaw tight, fists clenched, heart caged in wildfire.
Windaria.I thought of the kingdom I spent too much time in. Where I was trained to be an assassin for the King—my father. That would get Elara out of my mind.
The air in that palace was colder than here—cleaner, sharper—but it didn’t clear my head when I went back for a few weeks.
I stood before my father, the high King, King Thrandor Crestwood, as he gave his newest command. Same smug look. Same voice that tried to disguise hunger as strategy.
“Aymon’s hiding something,” he said. “Nymeria says he’s got a dragon. Locked away in that cursed realm of his. You’ll find it. You’ll free it.”
Nymeria. The strongest Mage I have ever met. Though her loyalties were confusing, she did whatever benefited her. She harnessed dark, forbidden Magecraft, but the King allowed it because she worked for him. She did everything for that piece of shit, probably even kept his bed warm. What sickened me the most was how desperately he leaned on Nymeria to cloak the truth.
He was never made to rule.
I would have felt it—every heir to the throne is marked when chosen by fate. And I’d never felt a damn thing. Not a spark. Not a tether.
My pulse kicked. “If a dragon is true… send it where exactly? And how? I am not Elementara.”
“Trap it, bait it, I don’t fucking care, just lure it here,” he said, eyes gleaming. “My Mage and the Warlock are ready. We’ll bond it to me with the old ways. The forbidden kind. With a dragon under my command, the Fae Courts will crumble. I’ll take them all. And Aymon’s castle. All of it.”
There it was.
His real plan. Not just uniting kingdoms. Ruling everything. Destroying what he couldn’t possess.
I didn’t flinch. I didn’t argue. I just nodded once.
“I’ve heard nothing of a dragon,” I lied.
I knew there was a dragon in the human lands. I dreamed of her rose-quartz scales almost every night. Though she never spoke to me, I felt our connection. I still hadn’t figured out why, or where she is, or even spoken to her, but she was close.
And I didn’t dare say a single word about Elara.
Because if he knewwhatshe was… who she was… what she meant to me…He’d try to use her. Break her. Or worse.
And that would be the last mistake he ever made.
I knew the moment I saw her—truly saw her—that day in the wildflower field. She stood beside the prince like she belonged somewhere else entirely. The breeze had shifted, and her scent hit me like a blade to the chest.
Summer berries. Wild magic. Rain on stone.
Gods, I couldn’t stand seeing her with him. Seeing her laugh, seeing him touch her. It made me sick. Made me want to rip his gods-damned head off. I was supposed to befriend him, make him trust me, so he would tell me where theweaponis. We became ‘friends,’ but the prince never knew anything of a dragon or any other weapon for that matter. I was glad they weren’t together anymore. He didn’t deserve her.
My mind went back to the night I pulled Elara from her burning house. Her magic was strong, ancient, and it didn’t burn my skin when I touched it.
She was so broken. So sad. She was confused and scared, and I wanted nothing more than to hold her in my arms and never let her go.
I carried her away from the fire as the roof collapsed behind us. I didn’t stop until we were almost clear of the house, until the flames were further away. She was tucked beneath my warding shield of air, which I placed around us both.
