Onyx Storm (The Empyrean Book 3)

Sometimes the best gift the god of luck can give is his absence.

—Zehyllna: Isle of Zihnal by Major Asher Sorrengail

No. No. NO.

I stare down at Trager’s unseeing eyes as Ridoc and I lower him to his back, and a muffled sound comes from the left.

Ridoc’s chest heaves and his fingers tremble as he presses them to the side of Trager’s throat. He looks over at me and shakes his head, telling me what I already knew.

“No!” I shriek, but nothing works past my throat.

“Do not react!” Xaden’s wingleader voice barrels through the roaring in my head, and his hands grip my shoulders.

Ridoc’s eyes flutter shut and he bows his head as I’m lifted to my feet.

Trager’s dead. It’s my mission. My responsibility. My fault.

“Focus on me,” Xaden orders, turning me in his arms. “You react, and he will have died in vain.”

My head swims, and the world slows again, my thoughts drowned out by the sound of my racing heart. It pounds against my ribs and beats in my ears as I look right.

Drake’s arms bulge as he holds Cat back, his hand covering her mouth.

That muffled sound.

It’s her screaming.

Drake’s face crumples for the length of a heartbeat as he whispers in her ear.

Her feet stop kicking, and she sags against his chest.

Garrick sets Ridoc back in formation, his stunned gaze locked on the ground. No, not the ground. Trager’s body. Garrick’s hands steady Ridoc’s shoulders for another couple of heartbeats before he leaves him to stand on his own in front of the silent, waiting crowd.

“Violence,” Xaden demands.

My focus drifts toward him, but it catches as I look past Ridoc and across the field. Every dragon holds their head lowered and aimed in our direction, but the gryphons are all facing inward—toward Silaraine.

She stumbles forward with her neck arched, her silver feathers shining in the sun. Three steps. Four. Five.

Kiralair follows, then moves to Sila’s side, shouldering some of the gryphon’s weight. Sila strains for one more step, like she can reach Trager if she just tries hard enough. But her ankles give, then her shoulders, and she collapses, her beak sliding down Kira’s side before her head slams into the ground.

My eyes sting, and my fingernails bite into my clammy palms as the gryphons slowly turn to face the crowd, their eyes all narrowing in time with our dragons’.

Andarna roars down the bond in a tidal wave of grief and rage that rattles my soul.

“She is gone,” Tairn says, and Kira extends a wing over Sila’s body.

Something wet tracks down the left side of my face.

“VIOLET!” Xaden shouts, and his voice cuts through the haze. “I can’t do this for you. I wish I could, but they know you’re in command.”

In command. I’ve never hated those words more.

I suck in one full breath, then another, and the world spins back to normal speed. Wrath stiffens my spine, and I cut off the part of me that cries for Trager and Sila, leaving only the weapon Basgiath forged me to be. But it’s not my blade the situation calls for.

Fighting would be too easy. Killing them all for what they’ve done would be a fitting punishment.

The relentless sun beats into my leathers as I step out of Xaden’s grasp and turn slowly toward the crowd. I look past Aaric and his clenched, bleeding fists, past Garrick as he moves back into formation near the bucket, and find Mira staring at me. Her eyes say what her mouth can’t.

Handle this. Even with her arm wrapped around Maren, holding the flier upright, she’s never looked more like our mother.

And our mother died so we’d have a chance to fight this war. If we fail here, we lose the army they offer. If I fail, we will have lost another squadmate, another year-mate for nothing.

With a nod, I square my shoulders and face Calixta, finding the archer at her side.

I take the two steps that bring me to Trager’s body and lock eyes with the weathered man who took his and Sila’s lives. The weight of the crowd’s silent stares only serves to harden my resolve as I lift my chin before bowing my head.

And expel another piece of my humanity.

“Thank you.”

Fuck them.

• • •

Eight hours later, Mira, Xaden, Aaric, and I return to the moonlit field where the rest of our squad waits with Trager’s and Sila’s bodies. A straggling group of onlookers still sits in the stands, drinking and celebrating.

Tairn opens one golden eye as I approach, then closes it, falling back asleep with Sgaeyl’s head resting on his back. Andarna is passed out close enough to feel secure, but a wing’s length farther away than when she was a juvenile.

Every gryphon and dragon but Cath sleeps, and the red flicks his swordtail as if to remind any onlookers who lurk in the stands that he’s on watch. I can’t blame them for their exhaustion. They’ve basically flown from Unnbriel without a break, and they swept over this isle today, looking for Andarna’s kind while we negotiated.

And the irids aren’t here. They aren’t fucking anywhere. Fire burns in my stomach, and for the first time, I allow myself to consider what happens if we don’t find them. Andarna will be crushed. Melgren will be furious. Aetos will throw us all into a cell for dereliction of duty.

We could lose the war to the dark wielders.

I refuse to let that happen.

“At least we’re already in with the enemy,” Tairn grumbles.

“Go back to sleep.”

Xaden isn’t the enemy. He’s been infected by it.

We find Cat sitting against Kira’s side, her head on Maren’s shoulder, and the others hovering nearby. Everyone’s gazes turn our way as we join them.

“Is it done?” Drake asks.

“It’s done,” Mira answers. “Aaric agreed to terms, which were oddly favorable to us. They’ll send an advance party within the next couple of months and the rest of their troops whenever we’re ready to receive all forty thousand of them.”

Drake nods and looks Cat’s way. “We’ll be able to man thousands of cross-bolts, drive wyvern to the ground for a waiting infantry, increase patrols—”

“I get it,” Cat interrupts without lifting her gaze.

She’s better than I am, because I don’t.

“Did you all eat?” I ask Ridoc.

He nods. “They brought us food and offered us beds in town, but…” His gaze darts left, to where Sila and Trager lie.

“Good choice,” Xaden says, his hand resting on the small of my back.

“We have to bury him,” Maren says, and her jaw trembles for a second. “And burn her. Gryphons…they prefer to be burned.”

“We should burn him, too.” Cat’s voice is flat, her eyes vacant. “He would want to be with her.” She blinks, then looks up at us. “Not here. No part of them remains here.”

“Understood.” I nod, my ribs threatening to crush the air from my lungs. I owe her whatever she wants. Maren, too. And Neve, and Bragen, and Kai and… A boulder wedges itself in my throat. I’ll have to tell Rhi I lost Trager when she’s worked so hard to keep us all alive.

“So we take them south to Loysam in the morning?” Dain asks, standing with his arms crossed next to Garrick. “The riot won’t make it past the coast if they don’t get some rest tonight.”

“Not there, either. We can’t trust anyone not to dig up whatever’s left of her bones out of morbid curiosity.” Cat shakes her head. “There are dozens of uninhabited minor isles within a day’s flight north. Pick one.”

“Cat, that’s going to deviate us from the charted—” Drake starts.

“Fucking pick one,” Cat snaps. “We can get back to all the good this”—she gestures around us—“is doing us after we burn them. I think they’re worth losing a few days off the schedule.”

Sova’s head rises to the right, and he clicks his beak. Drake looks in his direction, then nods. “Fine by me.”

“Will that mess too much up?” Maren asks me quietly, as if Cat isn’t right next to her.

“No.” I shake my head. “We can split up after they’re given to Malek and search the minor isles three times as fast. Most will only need a flyover.” I look Cat in the eye. “Then when you’re ready, we’ll depart for Loysam.”

She nods. “It’s kind of our last chance, isn’t it? We’re running out of isles.”

I ignore the insidious kernel of truth her words shove in my face and straighten my spine. “That means we have to be close. The minor isles and Loysam border the edge of every map we have.” The prospect of complete failure at such a steep cost is too heavy to swallow.

The group in the stands begins singing like they’re in a damned tavern, like today’s festivities are cause for celebration.

“Great, then we’ll get to go home…if it’s still there.” Cat draws her knees to her chest and glares over at the stands. “We’re sleeping out here tonight.”

Everyone agrees.

“Cat, I’m so sorry—” I start.

“Don’t be.” She lays her head back on Maren’s shoulder. “I’m the one who asked him to come.”

A half hour later, beds are laid out within feet of one another inside the circle the dragons form, and watches are assigned. I can’t remember ever being this tired before. The bone-weary exhaustion goes beyond fatigue, and my body is suffering for it. The dizzy flares, the screaming aches in every joint, the pain in my ribs, the urge to scratch out my stitches, and the knots in my muscles from trying to hold myself together are all getting worse by the day.

But it’s my mind that fights me the hardest as I stare up at the stars from my back, reminding me of everything we have on the line and every way in which I’m failing. Mira called this a fool’s errand, and maybe she was right.

Xaden pulls a light blanket over us as he lies at my side, then drapes his arm over my stomach. “We have six hours before third watch. Try and rest.”

I turn onto my right shoulder, protecting my ribs, then lay my head on his biceps and look up at him. “I froze today.” The admission is a whisper in my mind.

His brow knits and he splays his hand over my hip. “He was your year-mate. You didn’t freeze; you went into shock. It’s understandable and why we travel as a squad.”

“Don’t be nice just because you love me.” I rest my hand on the thin fabric of his undershirt, right over his heart. Except for our boots, we’re still dressed and ready to fly at a moment’s notice if need be. “This is my mission. Trager and Sila are dead. Cat’s heartbroken. And I froze.”

“Everyone in leadership loses someone under their command.” He strokes his hand absentmindedly up over my waist. “You pulled yourself together and completed the mission.”

“At the cost of their lives.” My chest constricts, fighting to contain the full confession that I can only give to him. “I’m not meant to lead. Mira should be in charge, or even Drake. If they won’t, then you.”

“Because my judgment is dependable right now?” He huffs a sarcastic sigh. “The best leaders are the ones who never want the job. This is your mission because Andarna chose you. Tairn chose you.” His hand rises to my face. “What they never tell us in the quadrant is that rank is well and good, but you and I both know that the moment we fly onto the battlefield, it isn’t the humans giving commands. I hate to break it to you, but you were selected by a general among dragons. You can choose to step into leadership, or he can drag you. Either way, you’re going to end up in front.”

My heart starts to race as his words pierce a shield of denial I wasn’t even aware I’d been hiding behind, exposing a truth so blatantly obvious I feel foolish for not having seen it before. Tairn will always lead, and I will always be his rider.

Codagh speaks through Melgren, not the other way around.

“Then Tairn chose poorly.” The lump in my throat grows, and I’m torn between the pathetic instinct to wallow in self-pity and the opposing yet growing urge to channel a power greater than Tairn’s—anger.

“Say that to him when he’s awake and see how it goes for you.” Xaden brushes his knuckles down my cheek. “I’ve seen the moments you don’t just rise to the occasion—you own it. Deverelli. Unnbriel. You poisoned the entire triumvirate of Hedotis, for fuck’s sake. Imagine who you’ll become when you finally learn to not just embrace that confidence but live it.”

“You?” I force a smile.

“Better than me.” His thumb grazes my lower lip. “You have to be. You promised to help me protect Tyrrendor, remember?”

“I remember.” I nod. “I meant it. I’ll stand by your side.” Exhaustion slows my breath and weights my eyelids. “And between Andarna’s kind and the research we’re compiling about dark wielders, we’ll cure you.” My eyes give in, sliding shut.

“There is no cure for me.” He presses a kiss to my forehead. “That’s why you have to become better than me. There’s only you.”