Текст книги "Desire in His Blood"

Автор книги: Zoey Draven

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Chapter 44

Gemma

Rye Hara’s face crumbled.

His shoulders began to shake. His whole body started trembling. And the sound that emerged from his throat was one I could only describe as animal-like in its wailing.

I began to cry too. Fat, clear droplets that rolled down my cheeks as I watched, as I listened.

I didn’t know how long he cried. I hadn’t seen him break down like this since Mother’s death, his terrible roar echoing outside by the lake, waking me from a dead sleep.

My father wiped his eyes with the heel of his palm. “How…how…how did you find that feed? From the Kylorr you married?”

“Did you know who she was?” I asked. “Did you even know her name?”

His shoulders shook. He dragged in a deep, shuddering breath.

“It was war, Gemma,” he rasped. “It was war! You can never understand the—”

“The war was over,” I said, stepping forward, snatching the Halo orb from the air and pocketing it. “It was over. The victory had already been claimed. You didn’t answer me. Did you know who she was?”

Rye Hara swallowed thickly. I heard it across his office, and he stumbled over to his desk chair, sinking down, his boots crunching over glass.

“She was a war officer. A Uranian Federation officer,” he told me. “Brought on to try to rally the Pe’ji for one last battle against the United Alliance.”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “She was a peace ambassador, tasked with negotiating the terms of the victory on behalf of the Pe’ji.”

His head shook. “No. No, that’s not…” He took a deep breath, wiping at his face. His hands were shaking and he reached for a whiskey glass that wasn’t there on his desk. “That’s not what Nb’aru said. I had my orders, Gemma. I was trying to save lives. Human lives. Not Pe’jian lives. So many had already died.”

“The war was already over,” I repeated, my heart cracking in my chest. “And you made her suffer. Your unit taunted her as she tried to fight back. And you stood there and let them.”

Enough fun, my father had growled at his unit when he’d finally stepped forward on the black feed, raising his plasma gun. Let’s finish this.

His expression shuddered. His eyes were so glassy they were practically glowing like an orb light.

“Her name was Aina,” I informed him, her name gentle in the room, where we’d just witnessed her tragic death all over again. “Her name was Aina of House Sorn. She was my husband’s aunt. His mother’s only sister. Her twin. She was protected by the Kaalium, and you killed her in the darkened streets of Pe’ji and then covered it up.”

My father swayed in his chair before he planted his palm on the smooth desk to steady himself.

“No,” he breathed. “No, it wasn’t like that. We…we were following orders, Gemma. I trusted my superior. This Aina was a war officer. She was coming to try to take back the victory. To deny the United Alliance and the Voperians their dues. And I…I…”

He trailed off, shaking his head, before he dropped it into his hands.

“Did Mother know?” I whispered in the sudden quiet. A question I’d wondered since I’d first seen the video, since I’d first discovered the ugly truth. “Did you tell her what you had done on Pe’ji?”

I couldn’t see his face. I could only hear his rasping breaths as he dragged them in deep.

“Yes,” he answered quietly. “She knew.”

I bit my lip, a fresh wave of pain stabbing me deep in my gut.

“She was horrified,” he said softly, his hands fisting in his graying hair. “Even after all the Pe’jians I had to kill, it was this death that made her not want to look at me anymore. She didn’t have the stomach for war. But she certainly liked the wealth it brought us.”

The bitter words felt me breathless.

Father dissolved into tears again. “I…I’m sorry, Gemma. I shouldn’t have said that. Your mother…she was…”

I went to him, my feet taking me across the room, my thin boots slapping through spilled whiskey on the floor. Placing my hand on his shoulder, I said, “Is that why we were given this estate?”

His body felt like a furnace underneath my touch.

Finally, he said, “One last task. One last task to win this war. Then you can go home. That’s what Nb’aru told me. He made it clear. Kill the officer…kill Aina”—he shuddered under my touch—“and I would be rewarded. My whole unit would be rewarded for our service to the United Alliance.”

“So it wasn’t you that killed the Pe’jians’ war general during the final battle?”

Which was what we’d always been told was the reason he’d been promoted through the military ranks. Why he’d been called a hero.

The shake of his head was gut-wrenching. “N-No. It was a stray plasma blast that killed the general. We had just been close to him when it happened.”

So everything had been a lie.

My father had been given the estate as a reward for killing Aina. And that realization alone nearly made me want to vomit.

“Where is she?”

Father raised his head. His eyes were bloodshot. He looked drained, exhausted. Old. When had the years caught up with him? And why hadn’t I noticed?

“What?”

“What did you do with Aina’s body?”

“Gemma…I can’t,” he told me, shaking his head, his eyes suddenly fearful. “You don’t understand. I promised my unit we would never tell. If this feed got out…”

“You killed a peace ambassador for the Uranian Federation,” I said. And though I wanted to scream at him, though I wanted to cry with him, I couldn’t. “My husband’s family. It’s too late.”

“What do you mean?” he asked, his watery blinking up at me, quieting. “Gemma, what do you mean?”

“I’m asking you to turn yourself in to War Crimes,” I told him, crouching next to his desk so that we were eye level. I kept my hand on his shoulder, squeezing tight, as the words felt like shards of glass coming up my throat. “I’m asking you to turn yourself in to the High Quadrant Council. Along with your unit. For Aina’s murder. Because that’s what it was, Father, despite what you might think.”

He fell back in his chair, his eyes wide with disbelief and horror. He stared at me.

“You…” He swallowed. “You would turn this feed over to War Crimes? You would put me on trial? Sentence me to live out my life on a prison planet, never to see you again?”

I didn’t point out that he’d already been prepared to never see me again when he’d handed me off to Azur on Nulaxy.

I hated him. I loved him. I felt pity for him while also feeling disgust and anger. I couldn’t make sense of my emotions, and so I focused on his eyes, eyes so much like mine.

I couldn’t let me face crumble. Thankfully, I felt like I was out of my body. I didn’t feel present as I said, “I’m giving you the chance to try to make this right. Even though it can never truly be right.”

“It’s been seventeen years, Gemma,” my father said. “Seventeen years. And I’ve lived that war every day of my life since. I’ve done my time. I served the United Alliance and I followed orders. I was a solider. Nothing more.”

“You profited off her death,” I pointed out softly.

He blanched. Then he argued, “She was marked for death. Since the moment she arrived on Pe’ji. It would have been done regardless.”

“But it was you,” my words clipped. “It. Was. You.”

He began to cry again and I cried with him, deep wrenching sobs tearing up my throat.

Through my tears, I said, “I’m asking you, as your daughter, to please make this right!”

“I—I don’t think I can,” he breathed.

“For us,” I whispered, pressing forward. “For Mira and Piper. For Mother. For me. For Aina and her family, who have been kept in the dark for years. You don’t know their pain, but it runs deep to this day. Please, Father. I’m asking you to make this right. Give them her body back. Let them grieve. And let your fate be decided by the law of our universe. You are not above that.”

“We would lose everything,” he told me raggedly. “We would lose everything. Your sisters…”

“We’ve already lost everything. You don’t see that?” I exclaimed. “Our home is stripped away. Mother is gone. Greed and pain has destroyed us already, and the collectors would have taken everything else.”

He slumped against me. “I know. I know,” he breathed. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Gemma. You will never know how much so.”

Sorry enough to try to borrow again from collectors behind my back, I knew. It was an addiction for him. The credits. He thought it was all he had left. But he couldn’t see what was in front of him. Not anymore.

“Mira and Piper would want you to make this right,” I said, knowing it was the truth. They would be horrified once I told them. Another difficult conversation that would implode their entire reality, just like it had mine. “You haven’t been the same since Pe’ji, have you? This has weighed on you. I know it has.”

His shoulders shook.

“This is your chance to come clean,” I murmured in his ear, holding him close when he sunk into me. “Please. Please.”

The father I’d known, the father I loved would do the right thing. I knew he would. I knew he would with every part of my soul. That man was still deep inside him, and I needed to know he was still there.

It still hit me like a boulder in the gut when he finally spoke the words. Whispered into my hair, as his arms tightened around me.

“All right,” he said, his voice fractured, his will broken. “I’ll do it.”

I squeezed my eyes shut. Relief and despair and an aching sadness made the room sway.

His arms were like vines around me, trapping me close.

“I’ll tell you where we buried her,” he said.

I thought of Azur. I thought of Kalia. Of the icy touch in the hallway in the south wing and the moon winds rising in the Kaalium, and I prayed that it would be enough to bring them peace.

“I’ll make this right,” Rye Hara said, his lips pressed to my cheeks as his tears dripped into my hair. “I promise.”

Chapter 45

Azur

Kythel found me on the roof.

He swooped down, circling overhead, before he landed with a heavy thud next to me, sprawling his bulk out.

Wordlessly, he plucked a vial of lore from his pockets, packed the glass vessel, and ignited the leaf within. He handed it to me and I took it silently, dragging the silver smoke in deep, but even lore couldn’t help the tension in my shoulders and the fucking ache in my chest.

Kythel took the lore from me and inhaled deeply. We didn’t speak for a long time. Only passed the thin, cylindrical glass pipe between us, smoking. Watching the moon sink in the night sky as gentle waves lapped against the cliffs of the terrace.

It had been five days since Gemma had left Krynn.

And every day she was gone brought a new wound, throbbing and stinging and prodding. Today, the hunger had finally made me turn to synthetic blood rations. I refused to drink from another. The thought made me feel nauseous, like I was betraying my kyrana. I only wanted her. I would only ever want her.

The rations had tasted like thick, muddy sludge and had done nothing to ease the hunger. I’d given up after my third package and locked myself away in my office, growling at anyone who’d tried to disturb me.

Zaale had given up eventually. Maybe he’d sent my brother in his stead. Because Kythel was the only being on this entire planet that I could stand right now.

Kythel finally said, “Thaine and Lucen returned to their territories. They told me to tell you their goodbyes. They knew you didn’t want to be found. Not right now.”

“You don’t need to stay either,” I finally spoke. My voice sounded like I’d swallowed rocks, gravelly and raw. “You and Kaldur. You’re needed in your own territories. You’ve already been gone too long.”

“Kaldur makes his own decisions,” Kythel said. “And if our positions were reversed…you would not leave me, Azur. Why do you expect me to leave you?”

I took a deep drag of the lore, feeling the delicious burn before I blew out the smoke. Even smoking made me think of Gemma, and my body tightened, remembering her reaction to the lore the night of the ball.

Until everything had changed.

I cursed.

“No news?” I rasped.

I knew there wasn’t. I had my Halo orb on me at all times. If Gemma was trying to reach me, I’d be the first to know about it.

“There is news,” Kythel told me, making me straighten. He frowned and amended, “Not about Gemma. About the kyriv attack that happened before the harvest.”

For a moment I was confused. But then I remembered. It just seemed like eons ago.

“Why didn’t you tell me a damn kyriv had managed to breach Laras’s borders?” he asked. “And why didn’t you tell me you took it down alone? You should’ve waited for the soldiers to assist you.”

“It was too late,” I told him. “It was going after the lore fields. I’m having barracks built along the wall. I’ll station soldiers there instead of keeping them clustered in the northern end of the villages. But until then, I have patrols stationed there until the last of the lore is harvested and packed.”

Kythel shook his head. “There’s much you haven’t told me, brother. And there’s a lot that you don’t know yet—about this Maazin.”

“Zaale told you,” I guessed, raking a hand over my tired face. “Is the news about him?”

“Yes,” Kythel said. “He’s dead.”

The two words were matter-of-fact. Firm, soft, but said without feeling.

My first thought was of Gemma. Her pleading with me to not go after Maazin, saying he was young, that he’d made a mistake. He’d been kind to her, I knew. She’d worked with him for days on end in the records room. She’d enjoyed his company. She’d been shocked when she’d discovered the discrepancies within the records.

She would be distressed to hear about his death.

“How?” I asked, turning my eyes to Kythel, thinking about all the times Zaale had tried to interrupt my work today. Had it been about this? “When?”

“His body was sent to us. Delivered to our patrols at the northern borders this morning.”

A shocked breath rushed from my throat.

“That makes no sense. If he was a spy for Zyre, why would he send his own to us? Like a damn gift at our gates?”

Zyre was the king of the Kaazor. He’d taken the throne from his father five years prior after his death. While I didn’t like Zyre, I knew that he had tried to sway his father’s decision when breaking the treaty with the Kaalium. Zyre had wanted to uphold it. It had been his father who had flown against us ten years into it.

“Zyre said he didn’t authorize the kyriv attack on Laras. We received his message with Maazin’s body. He said Maazin was no Kaazor of his.”

I’d had the head of the kyriv beast sent to Zyre after I’d felled it. As a threat. As a warning. In a long missive, pinned between the beast’s eyes, I’d told him that he wouldn’t steal from House Kaalium again and to keep his spies on his side of the border unless he wanted a war.

“What is he playing at?” I wondered.

“Maybe nothing at all,” Kythel told me, lifting a shoulder. “Maybe he’s telling the truth.”

“Then who was Maazin selling lore to? And who sent the kyriv?”

“Zaale has been trying to speak with you all day,” Kythel informed me before inhaling a breath of lore. “Would you like to know what he found? He’s been quite busy since Maazin’s betrayal was discovered.”

“I don’t want to play games, brother,” I said. Tired. On edge. Aching for my wife, who might decide she didn’t want to be my wife anymore. “Just tell me.”

“Maazin was a Thryki.”

“What?”

Kythel nodded. “In his missive, Zyre said Maazin was no Kaazor of his. Now I think he meant it literally. Not a way to disown him and cast him out beyond his lands, but because he wasn’t a Kaazor at all. Zaale managed to trace his passage through the Kaalium. He entered at Salaire’s port from across the seas but under a different name. Taking work where he could find it until he paid for passage to my province, to Erzos, where he became Maazin of House Laan. He lived in Erzos for nearly four years, working the ports as a records keeper. Afterward, he disappeared for a year, and I think that’s when he must’ve made contacts in Kaazor. Probably dipping across the border in the northwest to avoid the worst of the patrol.”

“Then he came to Laras,” I guessed softly.

Kythel lowered his head in a nod. “He had enough history living in the Kaalium that Zaale didn’t think to check beyond five years. You should know that he feels responsible. He blames himself for hiring Maazin to begin with, for bringing him into the keep.”

“Of course he would,” I growled, shaking my head. “I’ll speak to him tomorrow. It wasn’t his fault.”

But if what had Zaale discovered was true…

As if reading my thoughts, Kythel said quietly, “It concerns me that a Thryki came into our lands with seemingly the sole purpose of stirring up trouble between the Kaalium and Kaazor. It concerns me that there’s another participant in this, deep within Kaazor’s borders, and we have no idea who it is. Maazin wasn’t acting alone in this. But I don’t think Zyre had anything to do with this either.”

Kythel and I matched one another’s grim expressions.

We continued to smoke in silence, thinking over the weight of the words.

War was coming. I could feel it. An ancient instinct, deep in my bones. But perhaps it wouldn’t be coming from the north, as I’d originally thought. Perhaps it would be coming across the seas instead.

I knew Kythel felt it too.

“Rest tonight,” my brother finally said, leaning over to clasp my shoulder. “You look like you’ve been to Zyos and back. I’ll light Aina’s way tonight at the shrine. Go to your bed and sleep.”

He stood, stretching out his wings.

“Do you think that her bones are still on Pe’ji?” I asked. “After all this time?”

Kythel stilled.

“Mother believed that they were. She said she could feel them there,” he answered. “So yes, I do. And if your kyrana says she will return them to us…then I believe her. You got lucky, brother. You managed to secure yourself a little human warrior for a wife.”

If she still wants me, I couldn’t help but think, watching him stretch his wings.

“When I return to Erzos, I’ll ask around my territory. Ask about Maazin of House Laan and what exactly he was doing in my villages. Someone will know,” Kythel told me, shaking out his wings. “But I won’t leave until Gemma returns to Krynn. I don’t think Kaldur will return to Vyaan until she returns either. He’s felt quite guilty about it all.”

“And what if she doesn’t return?” I couldn’t help but ask, the question born of a sleepless night and the memory of her haunted eyes the evening that she’d left. “In the beginning…I was not good to her, Kythel. I didn’t treat her well.”

My twin’s lips pressed in a firm line.

“I was cold to her. Cruel. I wanted her to fear me,” I confessed.

“And did she?” Kythel asked, towering over me. “Did she fear you?”

“No,” I said, swallowing. “No, I think she’s quite fearless. Except when it comes to those she loves.”

Kythel grunted. After a brief lapse in silence, he told me, “She’ll come back to you, Azur. I have no doubt. But maybe…”

“What?”

“Maybe it’s you who will have to go to her first,” he said, turning his eyes to the sky. Then he left, launching himself up into the air.

He left me with the last of the lore, and I inhaled it deep until there was nothing left.

“Come back to me,” I willed softly, murmuring the words to the stars overhead. “Come back to me, and I will give you every reason to never leave again.”

A prayer.

A prayer to the stars meant for one soul alone.

Not for Raazos or Alaire or Gaara or Zor.

But for Gemma.

I had so many regrets when it came to her.

I needed to right them. If only she’d let me.

Just as I was about to push up from the roof, to retreat to my bed, where I could still smell Gemma deep in my pillows, I heard the alert come through on my Halo orb.

I nearly tore a hole through my clothes trying to reach it.

A message.

From Setlan. A close friend who seemingly knew everything about everyone. He was how I’d found Rye Hara to begin with, and it was Setlan who’d made contact with Mr. Cross with the marriage proposal. He’d grown up in Laras but now lived on a planet named Dumera.

Setlan’s recorded message popped up on my orb, the floating colored pixels forming the contours of his face perfectly.

“I’ve just heard it come through my sources, Azur,” Setlan said. “Officers have already been dispatched to the Collis. Rye Hara will be arrested by the High Quadrant Council soon, if not within the hour. Com me when you can and we can discuss our next steps.”

The message went dark.

I replayed it.

Then again.

And again.

Everything we’ve wanted, I thought, staring unseeing over Alaire’s sea and beyond to the stretches of the mountains in the north.

So why did it feel so empty? A hollow victory?

Because I knew how much Gemma was hurting right now.

Her whole world had changed in the last week.

Again, I forced myself to add. Coming to Krynn hadn’t been easy for her either. I had made it less so.

And instead of being with her, instead of comforting her and assuring her that I would take care of her and her sisters, that she had nothing to fear of the future, I was here. In the Kaalium. When I should’ve been with my wife, helping her through this.

My kyrana.

My laraya.

My heart’s blood.

“Vaan,” I cursed.

Rye Hara would be arrested for Aina’s murder. Charged and prosecuted by the highest council in the Four Quadrants, and he would likely spend the rest of his life on a prison planet, deep in the cosmos, with the rest of his unit.

Instead of relief, all I felt was determination to reach Gemma. Instead of victory, all I felt was a desperate ache in my chest because I knew how much pain she was in, even at this very moment.

On my Halo orb, I connected to Zaale, who looked startled since I’d avoided him nearly all day.

“Have a ship outfitted and get a crew onboard. Something small and fast. I need to leave for the Collis immediately.”