But then he’d look at Nyk, and his endless hope would make Tristan want to hope too, just like Nyk’s faith in Tristan made Tristan want to have faith in himself. He wanted to be the person Nyk seemed to think he could be, and he needed Nyk by his side to remind him of that.
He needed Nyk by his side because he never felt more himself than when they were together.
They continued to watch in silence as the phoenixes painted the night sky. At one point Nyk’s head drooped onto Tristan’s shoulder, and Tristan let his own head fall back against the rough-hewn wall.
Eventually the birds gave up the dance and returned to their roost. The night around them grew darker, until only Rex remained. With a last flash of light, he took his final descent into the shadows.
Tristan bade him good night and thanked him before moving to get to his feet. Nyk slumped against the wall, fast asleep. Tristan prodded him with a foot, then gave him a gentle shake with his hand, but Nyk was dead to the world. Everything about him was bright and vivid, as if Nyk didn’t do anything by half—couldn’t, even if he wanted to. When he ran, no matter how tired, he pushed until his legs buckled beneath him. When he talked about phoenixes and Riders and animal magic, his whole face lit up.
And even when he slept, he did so with reckless abandon—his shock of messy black hair standing on end and his mouth slightly open.
With a smirk, Tristan bent down and lifted him, carrying Nyk in his arms back into the stronghold. It was strange, holding him close like that—having Nyk’s face pressed against his chest. It was a relief to unburden himself when he reached Nyk’s bed in the servants’ barracks, but when Tristan stepped away, he felt strangely bereft as the cold air rushed into the places where Nyk’s warmth had been.
Tristan knew that he should have told Nyk about the eggs. But he’d feared the information would cause Nyk to leave, and the idea made Tristan miserable. There had to be a way. He would go searching himself if he had to. The last time he’d disobeyed his father’s orders, he’d been assigned extra lessons with Nyk—and the time before that, he’d found Nyk wandering the wilderness. Both instances had worked out far better than he could have imagined.
Maybe if he did it again, something even better would befall him.
Maybe Nyk would be made an apprentice and Tristan a patrol leader. And when it came time to choose his second-in-command, Nyk would be top of the list.
Together we could have been unstoppable.
- CHAPTER 26 -
VERONYKA
VERONYKA AWOKE SUDDENLY, DISORIENTED as she stared up at the wooden ceiling. She blinked into the darkness and saw the familiar rows of hammocks that filled the servants’ barracks. Slowly the night before came back to her: the stone-carved Eyrie, the fire-drenched phoenixes . . . and Tristan.
She must’ve fallen asleep, and—Axura above, did Tristan carry her to her bed?
Heat prickled her cheeks, and she couldn’t tell if she was mortified or pleased. It was kind of Tristan to let her sleep, but she’d begun to fear that kindness. She didn’t want to need it. As unrealistic as it felt, she wanted them to be equals. While he’d called them friends, she felt the imbalance between them: He was older, stronger, more experienced, while she was younger, weaker, and new to this place. He was the commander’s son and would rule one day. She was . . . nobody. Not even an apprentice. It was similar to her equally disproportionate relationship with Val, and Veronyka never wanted to feel like she owed someone her life again.
She reached into her pocket for her braided bracelet, fingering the familiar beads.
The Eyrie was at once better—and worse—than she’d been expecting. All the history and beauty was there, and the feeling of magic was powerful, as if embedded in the stones. But then there’d been that sense of wrongness, that fluttering, agitated tremor in the air.
Breeding cages.
Veronyka had never even considered such a thing. When she’d thought about the Riders trying to get more phoenix eggs, she’d always assumed that meant searching, not trying to produce them. Guilt gnawed at her belly, as if she were somehow complicit in their imprisonment. All this time she’d been here, there were females locked away in cages somewhere out of sight. How did people like Morra stand for it?
Val had told her that phoenix mating rituals were highly mysterious, that even the ancient Riders didn’t know much about them. They often bred and laid their eggs in secrecy, which was why caches of eggs could still be found all over the mountain, untouched for centuries, waiting to be hatched. It was only during the last fifty years of the empire that phoenix eggs were deliberately hidden to keep them safe. There was trouble brewing long before the Blood War, the divide between animages and nonmagical people growing more pronounced with each passing year.
The Phoenix Riders had always been a symbol of the empire’s power, the force used to unify the lesser kingdoms and to keep the peace and protect the people ever since. But where their loyalties lay was always somewhat elusive. In the beginning a Phoenix Rider always sat on the throne. First it was Elysia Ashfire, the Peacemaker, and then her daughter, Ellody. Many more followed, both sons and daughters, because when the Pyraeans took control of the valley, they vowed to respect and adopt the customs of all its people. Now the heir to the throne was always the eldest child, whatever their gender, and not the eldest daughter as it was in Pyraean culture, or the eldest son as it was done in most of the lesser kingdoms. The crown thrived, and for decades, man or woman, a Phoenix Rider sat in the empire’s golden seat.
If, as in the case of King Hellund, the heir was not an animage, they were swiftly married to one in order to keep magic in the royal line and to appease the animage supporters. During King Hellund’s reign—before his marriage to Queen Genya the General, a brutal fighter and Phoenix Rider—there were several recorded instances of the Phoenix Riders refusing to take orders from their king. Their allegiance was with their commander, which was often the position held by the local governor where they served. So, when King Hellund ordered the troops positioned in Ferro to fly across the empire to deal with a band of brigands terrorizing Arboria South, their Phoenix Rider commander simply refused. King Hellund’s marriage to Genya set things to rights, but not all the governors and politicians of the empire could forget that the Phoenix Riders’ loyalty wasn’t so much to the crown as it was to their own kind.
By the time Avalkyra and Pheronia were born, the foundation for the war between them was already firmly in place. Those without magical blood saw themselves in Pheronia, who had the support of the nonmagical councilors, merchants, and governors. Of course the Phoenix Riders sided with Avalkyra, who was one of them—and whose mother had been a renowned warrior in her own right—but that didn’t buy her political support. And the Phoenix Riders’ numbers were small compared to the empire’s growing army of conscripted foot soldiers. Eggs became highly valuable, things to hoard and hide, not parade out in the open, and it had been that way ever since.
A shudder ran down Veronyka’s spine as she thought of those majestic birds, trapped against their will and forced to breed. It was like caging and breeding people. Phoenixes were no ordinary animals; they were highly intelligent even without a bond and had powerful magic all their own. But what were her chances of ever getting a phoenix again without the cages? And furthermore, what were the Riders’ chances of expanding without more eggs?