Chapter 1
Author's Note: it's Officially here. The third book in the Undoing Series. If you are new and haven't read any of the two books, don't be troubled, you won't miss too much. But of course I will recommend reading them to know some basic details.
And since it's been more than a month...or more since The Call of the Night King ended those who read it would likely feel a little lost and need to refresh their memories.
I recommend reading the part where Veyla goes to find her sisters in the desert. That should refresh you ๐
Now that's out of the way, let's ride on with the story.
Updates: twice a week subsequently ( not written in stone or anything though. Updates will change when I complete my other ongoing books )
Chapter 1 --Nyra
Visions flashed behind her closed lids, visions drenched in blood. Nyra had never seen so much blood, so much slaughter. Even as a wolf, she had never witnessed war.
She stood atop the walls of Iron Claw City and stared down as the vampires descended into the streets, setting wolves ablaze wherever they went. The moon was absent from the sky, swallowed by darkness. The wolves could not shift. They could only rely on their swords and arrows.
Nyra's own fingers bled from loosing arrow after arrow, the skin split open by the fibre of her bowstring and burning with every pull. Her quiver hung empty now. Still, she had to keep shooting. It did little more than slow the vampires. Only severing their heads or tearing out their hearts ensured they would never rise again.
With a cry for strength, she rushed toward the body of a fallen vampire struck down by her arrow, summoned her wolf's claws, and ripped his heart from his chest. The blood dried up and turned to char the second it hit the air, it shriveled completely in her hand.
Another appeared behind her, his face and body hidden by a hooded robe, the fangs in his mouth dripping with the blood of fallen wolves.
Nyra noticed him too late. He was right behind her, long fingers already reaching for her throat.
"Dodge, Nyra!" Kale's voice warned.
A heartbeat later, fire erupted from his mouth.
Nyra dropped to the ground beside the vampire she had slain, whose body was already crumbling into ash.
The flames engulfed the vampire behind her, eliciting a terrible screech from it. Still burning but alive, the vampire rolled on the stone floor.
Kale shifted into human form and hurried to her side. He seized her arm. "Torvren asked me to get you," he said.
"Torvren!" Nyra shouted over the explosions and screams of the dying. Smoke stung her nose and watered her eyes. "Where is he?"
"Just come."
Kale tugged her forward to the edge of the wall. Then he transformed into his dragon form, and she climbed onto his back.
Instead of flying toward the castle, Kale headed in the opposite direction.
"Where are you taking me?" Nyra screamed, striking his scales.
Below them, the city was already flooded with vampires. One bite, and any wolf within their reach was doomed. Torvren should still be in the castle.
"Stop, Kale! We have to get him."
"This is what he wanted," Kale said, teeth clenched with pain. "I have been placed under the Word. I cannot disobey." He choked immediately after, succumbing to his pain.
"Kale." Nyra shook helplessly atop his back, tears finally spilling down her cheeks. "Where is Dravenor? Is he with him?"
"I am here."
As if summoned, Dravenor appeared below her on horseback.
"I am with you, Nyra. Let Kale take you to safety."
She looked down from Kale's back and found Dravenor riding beneath them. His back was bare of his usual armor, leaving him in nothing but a simple shirt. A longsword remained firmly gripped in one hand. Vampires pursued him like wraiths, their dark forms gliding through the grassy plains.
"I will kill the pursuers," he declared. "Kaleโ "
"I know!" Kale shouted, sounding almost angry. But he climbed higher and higher into the clouds, carrying Nyra farther and farther away from the people she could not bear to lose.
"Dravenor!"
She shouted herself awake, her hand reaching for nothing.
The sky above her remained dark, and the moon was still missing. If not for the hard ground beneath her and the rough fabric draped over her body, Nyra would have believed it had been a dream rather than a memory. She would have believed that Iron Claw City, the place she had come to think of as home, had not been destroyed.
Her throat burned. She sat up and covered her face as tears filled her eyes. She did not understand how everything could change so quickly. One moment she had been at a ball, teasing Torvren and dancing with Dravenor beneath glittering chandeliers. The next, she had been watching vampires bleed her people dry and waltzing into a city once thought impregnable.
Her fingers stung when her tears touched them. The wounds were torn open and caked with dirt.
"Why are you crying?"
Dravenor's voice arrived like a fresh wind, brushing through the tangled strands of her hair. Nyra lifted her head and took him in.
He was covered in wounds. His face was streaked with soot and black ash. Sweat darkened his clothes, and dried blood stained his sleeves.
But he was alive.
"Dravenor!" She gasped as he swept her into his arms, buried his face against her neck, and inhaled deeply.
"You survived," she cried into his shoulder, her body trembling.
"This is not like you, Princess," he said. She could hear the smile in his voice and was almost deceived into believing everything was as it should be.
But the memory resurfaced again, the fire, the blood, the screams. She swallowed hard and pulled away to meet his black eyes.
He brushed her cheek with dirt-stained fingers, noticed the tear tracks cutting through the grime on her olive skin, and smiled with quiet regret.
"Don't cry, Princess," he said softly.
Nyra forced the tears away, wiping them angrily from her face before fixing Dravenor with a steady stare. "And Torvren?"
He did not look away. He did not hide his face, nor did he reveal anything. Yet Nyra's heart quaked.
"Is he dead?" She had not meant to yell, but the words burst from her throat, brimming with horror and terror so intense she could barely breath through it.
How could Torvren be dead? He was the Master Beast Tamer, the strongest warrior in all of Iron Claw. He would not simply fall. He commanded countless beasts. Even if the vampire attack had come without warning, Torvren could summon over a thousand creatures. They would have devoured those vampires in moments. Surely.
"I am sure he is alive."
Dravenor smoothed his thumb across her cheek again, smearing dirt across her skin and somehow looking even more regretful. "I plan to go back and find him."
Nyra shot to her feet, her wrinkled gown rustling around her legs. She slapped at the fabric irritably and straightened her spine. "I will go with you."
Dravenor remained kneeling. A careless laugh slipped from his lips. "I knew you would say that."
But instead of rising, he dropped onto the patch of grass she had just vacated and crossed his legs. He laced his fingers behind his head and stared up at the dark sky.
"But then Torvren would kill me if I waltzed back in there with you after he went to all that trouble to make sure you got out."
"What are you saying?" She swept tangled hair from her face with mounting irritation. "You do not want to live. You long for death. So it does not matter."
He barked out a laugh. "That was a long time ago, Nyra. Now I want to live."
His grin widened. "I want to grow old with you, get you pregnant with my pups. You would look beautiful carrying my children."
He sighed dramatically. "Though I worry if they take after you and start disappearing too."
"Shut up." Her lips quivered despite the sharpness of her tone.
She knew exactly what he was doing. He was trying to distract her, trying to pull her thoughts away from the nightmare waiting beyond those hills.
But Torvren was her husband. He was still back there in a castle flooded with vampires. How could Dravenor speak as though they could live without him? As though life could simply continue?
She had never even wanted children. Her lack of heat made such things impossible anyway.
"You will not abandon Torvren," she said, scrubbing more tears from her face. "You love him even more than I do, Dravenor."
He sat upright so suddenly, a startled look on his face. "You love him?"
The words sounded foreign on his tongue. Then he smiled. "He would have loved to hear that with his own ears."
Nyra turned away. Memories rose unbidden. The night Torvren had joined her and Dravenor in bed. The way he had cupped her face between his hands and said,
"You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen, Nyra. You make my heart stop every time I look at you."
She could have said the words then. She could have told him she loved him.
But she had not. It was not her way to be so emotional, to wear her heart openly. Instead, she had huffed and rolled her eyes.
"If you are going to join us, you had better be ready to fuck me."
Dravenor had laughed so hard he nearly fell off the bed. "She is a barbarian. Why are you wasting poetry on her?" he had asked.
"I have hope that one day she will return the sentiment."
Torvren had pressed a kiss against her shoulder, and her heart had skipped. That day would never come if they did not go back.
Nyra strode to Dravenor, grabbed his hand, and tried to haul him to his feet.
"Please, Dravenor. Let us go back." Her voice cracked. "I do not want this. Let us save him."
"He is the king." Dravenor still refused to rise. "Why do you think he would not already be leagues away from the castle by now?"
"Because I know Torvren." The words came out fiercely. "He loves his city more than he lets on. He will stay until the very end."
The strength drained from her legs. Nyra collapsed into a crouch, fingers digging into the damp grass.
She was not the type to cry. She was not the type to fall apart. Yet a desperate urge to throw back her head and scream at the sky fought itโs way through her throat.
"Why did they attack on the Night of No Moon?" she wailed. "Why?"
"This is war. The vampires are using Iron Claw as the first declaration," Dravenor said seriously, his eyes drifting to the side.
Nyra did not fully understand how Valmorra worked. In the first place, why did wolves live alongside vampires when a natural enmity flowed through their blood?
One bite from a vampire would kill a wolf. It had never seemed like a land where they could coexist. And vampires could not step into Lykeria. It was balanced.
Yet Iron Claw and several other wolf clans had shared this land with vampires for centuries, until this night, when everything had fallen apart without warning.
"Tell you what, Nyra." Dravenor sat straighter and faced her. โYou will get as far from here as possible, and then I will go back and look for Torvren. At the very least, I will bring you his body."
He placed a fist over his chest. "I swear it."
"I want to go with you." She tried to hold his gaze, but Dravenor rose too quickly.
"Then it is decided. I will go back and save Torvren."
"He could already be dead!" she shouted, scrambling to her feet as well. "The longer we stay here, the more likely it is that he... that Torvren..."
The words refused to leave her lips. She could not say them again. It broke her too much.
"Kale."
Dravenor turned toward the dragon, who had returned in human form and was just stepping back into the circle of firelight cast by the burning pit.
"Yes?" He did not sound pleased.
"You are under the Word, aren't you?" Dravenor asked.
"Yes. I must take Nyra as far from Iron Claw City as possible."
"This is not far enough." Dravenor turned to Nyra and grinned.
She shook her head immediately, tears already gathering in her eyes.
"I want you to take her farther. Back to Lykeria. To Duskari."
"What?" Nyra lunged for his hand, but he stepped away.
"No, Dravenor. Let us do it together. I have your back, you have mine. That is what you said." He had promised her.
"I will be back, with Torvren. Alive or dead, we will find you." That same wide smile spread across his face. "Nothing will keep us away from our little princess."
Nyra shook her head and threw herself toward him.
But Kale had already transformed. Massive talons wrapped around her waist and lifted her into the air before she could reach Dravenor.
"No!" she screamed. "Dravenor, please! I can help you. Let me help you!"
He simply waved.
And then she noticed it. Only then.
His side. The dark stain hidden beneath his shirt. The sharp scent of blood buried beneath rosemary and other herbs.
He had concealed it so well she had not smelled it at all.
Her screams grew louder.
"Kale, I beg you, please do not take me away! Dravenor!"
She reached for him with all her strength.
But unless someone released Kale from the Word, he would not listen. He was bound to Torvren. If Torvren died without transferring the bond, Kale would lose his reason, becoming no better than the untamed monsters wandering the wilds of Valmorra.
He needed Torvren alive. Yet he was under the Word. He could not protest. He could not disobey. He could do nothing except obey the command given to him.
And so he climbed higher and higher into the sky. The cold wind whipped through Nyra's hair and stung her wet cheeks as the ground shrank beneath them.
Below, she watched Dravenor pick up his longsword and sprint into the trees, disappearing toward Iron Claw City. Towards the fire and the smell of death.
Nyra wept harder than she had ever wept in her life. She could not understand how the happiness she had only just begun to hold had slipped through her fingers in a single night.
