The curious gleam had not left her eyes. There was hunger too, a thirst for answers she could not get elsewhere, and a strong will to find them. Dom was reminded of scholars back in the enclave, combing their archives for some scroll or tome, for word of Spindles, for any whisper of Glorian Lost. But I am not a shelf of books eager to be picked through.
She ran her hands through the grass like a child. It was a good act.
This wound will never heal if you keep cutting it open, he warned himself. But somehow Dom wanted to. He wanted to remember Cortael and give Corayne something to remember too.
Do not, he thought. Shut the door on those decades, and let them turn to dust as the centuries pass. Such is the Vedera way, our only defense against years of memory.
“You’re Spindleblood. Corblood,” he said flatly, if only to give her something. “Your ancestors were travelers of another realm, mortal as the men of the Ward, but set apart. Some say the Cors were born of the Spindles themselves, not another realm. But your kind fell with Old Cor, your bloodlines dwindling through the centuries.” Her eyes shone in the starlight, egging him on. “It makes you restless; it makes you ambitious; it gives you a want so deep you can hardly name it.”
Her black gaze seemed to deepen. He could smell the eagerness on her.
“I said the same to your father, decades ago.” The wound opened again, a tear through his heart. Dom winced against it, carrying on. “When he raged in his way, frustrated, a mortal boy among living statues, who could not make his flesh into stone no matter how hard he tried.” His breath caught. “I am sorry you had to grow up with no one who knew your blood, what it demanded. What it makes you,” he said quietly.
This time, she did not scold him for the apology. Instead her face turned hard, and her eyes were shuttered windows. Whatever she looked for, she could not find.
“And what of my father, raised by immortals, who could not even fathom what it is to live in mortal flesh?” she said. “If you pity me, you must pity him too.”
The sting burrowed deep, a needle of white-hot pain. Dom flinched and looked away. He heard Corayne stand, her feet rustling the grass like a rough wind.
“Elders don’t sleep, don’t eat, don’t age,” she bit out, standing. “But you bleed. Can you love? Did you teach my father to? Because he did not love me.”
“There is not a creature in any realm who cannot love,” Dom answered hotly. His ancient temper flared and guttered. It filled him; it hollowed him out. Anger was still foreign and corrosive in his body. Without knowing it, he crossed the grassy hill, until he stood over Corayne, tall as a mountain.
She held her ground.
“And I certainly loved your father,” he said. “Like a brother, like a son. I was there for his first steps, his first tooth, his first words, screaming as they were. The first drop of blood to fall.” Inside he roared, seeing it all over again. “And the last.”
Corayne’s mouth pressed to nothing; her questions finally failed her. Over her shoulder, Sarn’s open eyes were two burning candles.
“Go back to sleep, my lady,” he whispered, turning his broad back on Corayne.
She was happy to oblige, settling down with a very mortal huff. She stilled quickly, eyes firmly shut, but Dom could hear her heart beating rapidly, her breath uneven. Across the clearing, Sarn’s heart thumped a steady, slow beat. Her eyes did not close.
He was tempted to sneer at her, but an odd smell stopped him cold.
Smoke.
He stilled, head raised to the air. There was smoke, somewhere close, its scent curling around him in a phantom wind. He could not see it, but he could smell and taste the acrid burn. It was not woodsmoke, nor a brush fire. Nothing common.
But it was not unfamiliar.
This was the charring of flesh, hands cracked to bone, skin flaking to ash.
Terror lashed down his spine.
Sarn was already on her feet, her hood torn away, her body coiling with tension. She glared at him, reading the fear as it crossed his face.
“Corayne, get up. Sarn, the horses,” he barked, already at Corayne’s side. He took her by the shoulders, pulling her upright before she could open her eyes.
The Amhara made for the animals without argument, but froze at the tree line. The sword at her side sang free of its sheath. Her grip adjusted and she raised the blade high overhead, the steel like a bird of prey poised to strike from the sky.
Dom could hear the horses, undisturbed in their sleep, as if nothing were amiss. The smell of burned flesh only deepened, until Corayne clapped a hand over her nose, her eyes watering.