Page 122 of A City of Flames

“I never did.” You can hear the sincerity in his voice, and when I look at him, it’s the first he seems upset—at least from what I’ve seen of him so far, lately I’ve seen different sides to him. Still, I carefully nod as a response, but regardless of it all, I don’t think I can forgive myself anytime soon for what happened that night.

I stare at my feet and bite the side of my bottom lip. He’d looked so disappointed in me that moment he was dragged away. Maybe he’s lying, or maybe he’s right and I assumed wrong that day because for whatever reason, I cared about the idea he could have been that... disappointed in me.

Something else pops into my mind, a question I want to know even if it’s not the right time. All I’d learned from Lorcan is that Darius had bitten his father, but why did he? Was it intentional?

Insults from other cells intensify, plucking me from that thought. Venators. I pop my head up and glance over my shoulder. Making a quick decision I look back at Darius and say, “I’ll return in a minute.” And without a second thought I take the crescent from my sheath and lay it flat in his palm.

He parts his lips with a frown and clutches it before I tell him, “To take the pain away. I always believed it was quite magical so...” I trail off. I’m not one to just give the carving out to anyone, especially someone like... well someone like Darius. And I don’t know if it is because it belongs to Lorcan that I’m giving it or because every time I look at it, it’s now a reminder of him. And that despite the other night, these three days he’d reverted to his cold self, the one everyone thinks he is.

Pressure clamps down on my chest at that thought and I turn to walk out before it gets worse.

“Goldie,” Darius calls out, and I stop, realizing it’s the first he’s said that today. I look over at him. His brows are furrowed in a pensive stare, and I wonder for a second what he might be thinking so hard about. “Tibith,” he says but it also seems like he wants to add something else. “Is he—”

“He’s safe,” I answer before he finishes because it’s all I can tell him. Tibith believes in me enough to save Darius and it’s what I plan to do.

I walk out at that, pulling the lever and resting my back against the gates. My breaths come heavy, like I’ve done strenuous work.

“Once you get him out, go with him, Nara,” Freya had recited a thousand times before I left the barracks. “Go with him and don’t worry about your brothers, Rydan, Link and I will make sure they’re safe, I promise.”

Squeezing my eyes shut, I let out an involuntary sob, no tears, no sting, nothing, just frustration rising in my chest because I don’t want to leave them, but I can’t leave Darius here, as much I should want to leave him.

I rest my hand on my chest and inhale slowly before pushing myself off the gates. I walk stealthily through the pathways with determination settling in my gut to find a set of keys and if I must fight a venator to get them, so be it.

Fire torches flicker as I pass them until a cry for help causes me to halt. It’s distant, painful to even make out but it happens again. I turn my head to the source and notice it’s coming from the dark passageway beyond the stone stairs.

Twisting my whole body towards it, I clutch my hands into fists. The hallway grows darker the more I look at it, and I know I should leave it, carry on with what I came here to do but when I turn around to walk away and hear the same voice, my legs move before I can think straight.

I’m cursing myself with each step as I tread down the stairs, carefully with one step at a time. I expel a shuddering breath as a gush of coldness washes over me. No torches are ignited in this part of the dungeons but a small crack of light seeps from above, enough for me to make out more cells that lead into depths of gloom. I walk closer, my eyes scrunching as I try to take a better look.

“Help—please,” the voice comes again, and I whirl to the side to a man lying on the floor of his cell. Fingers like those of a skeleton twitch and as I drag my gaze to the auburn hair covering half his face, horror jumps in my throat.

“Adriel,” I breathe his name out in a chilling gasp and run toward him.

Clutching the cell bars, I frown yet he doesn’t look at me as he falls unconscious. I shift my gaze to someone resting his head against the back wall of the cell next to Adriel and recognize him too.

It’s the man who’d pleaded with one of the venator leaders to spare him from paying taxes the day I was with my brothers. So many down here are all breathing, most unconscious, malnourished but breathing.

It’s suddenly hard to draw in any form of breath without panting. Why are they here? Adriel is supposed to be dead. I saw his bite marks. He was pronounced dead as they did with Oran. I watched him on his deathbed as he spoke to me, told me of the creature—

The creature.

My hands go slack from the bars and fall to my sides as I shake my head, taking a step back from the cell. I almost trip over my feet as I whisper a “no” and everything spins.

They say it’s worse than dragon shifters or a rümen.

You should know the rümen that attacked us wasn’t normal.

It was never a dragon... it’s always been the new breed—

“I knew soon enough you would come down here.”

I turn to stone, immobilized with the pieces fitting all together before I find the power in my legs to slowly turn around.

The general’s face appears through the shield of shadows covering his upper half as he takes a step down the stairs, then another step and another, like an animal unleashed from its cage. His eyes skim past me to everyone inside the cell and he lets out a breath as if this was an inconvenience to him. “They all look so...” He flicks a hand. “Lifeless, don’t they?”

* * *

“You’re the one creating the new breed,” I state as calmly as I can, but I am far from that. My gaze shifts to the stairs, wondering if I can pass him and run but that is also the last thing I want to do.

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