Fate and Destiny (The Fated Series, #2)

Chapter 88 - Rohana - Recon

The day moves by slowly despite our morning excitement. I haven't told anyone what I thought of the Avyanan rulers yet, nor do I think doing so would be pleasing. In simple and rather nice terms, they were rude and disrespectful, but thank the Gods they smelled of fear by the time we misted back. They are clearly well-practiced in the art of masking their fear from the eye, but not masking it entirely.

I was impressed with Kat and her words, and hold more respect for the young lioness than I did before. I knew she was brave and strong-willed, but I didn't expect her to tell a King and Queen to fuck off. Especially a King and Queen in which we're asking for aid. She did so rather beautifully, as well, not shrinking away from them.

Nothing made me smile more than watching the Mater stare down the steely Queen and then breaking it, not giving the other woman the satisfaction and keeping her eyes anywhere else but back at her. I still see the Queen of Avyana's face in my mind and feel my lip twitch in satisfaction. Her cheeks reddened in anger, her mouth and jaw setting in a harsh line. Her eyes bore into Clarice's face as if she could cause the Mayer pain with her gaze alone. On a normal occasion, I would've had the Queen against the wall for the dark thoughts, her crown thrown off her head and a knife at her throat. They're lucky we need them.

The other King and Queen that still trail us are not much more amusing, let alone tolerable. The only reason I haven't snapped at them is that they've stuck to the opposite end of our traveling party.

I realize that my thoughts have turned rather violent, even for me, more recently. It's this damn ball. The stakes, the dangers, the fucking power-hungry man himself...it has me wanting to train out my worries and hunt demons just to annoy him. But it's also because both Serephina and Tsillah have returned a day early, yet none of the others do. I realize that them not being here means they've likely succeeded in the mission they've been sent on, but the reminder makes me wonder if something might've gone wrong instead.

I think of Tsil and Kathika, knowing Tsillah would've cloaked the whole eastern continent into darkness if anything happened to her partner. If Tanith was gone then I wouldn't be able to speak to those nearby without moving my lips. But Branka...Darius said it earlier when we first started riding this morning. The northern continent is an unknown. Aside from the stories of Mortala's Garden of Lost Souls and the fact that there are minimalistic facts to know about the northern continent, we know nothing. She knew nothing when she left to find the supposed twelfth kingdom, and I currently know nothing of whether she's vividly alive, or on the edge of death. She's not dead, that much I know. Otherwise, the continent would be underwater beneath Willa's pain.

So much potential for death and yet the real war hasn't begun yet.

"Go ahead," I tell Dee, having heard the howl of another hellhound too.

The dog's numbers increase the closer we get to the castle, but of all the creatures Xaxias has risen, the hellhounds are one of the easier to kill. They don't require a beheading, burning, or loss of their heart to be finished. Just a normal slit of the throat or stab in a crucial area.

People often mistake the hellhounds for the scariest and most ruthless animals of the underworld, but they're actually more like the rats of the burning realm. It's the ten-foot Chimeria you have to worry about. Its body consists of the head and body of a lion, a goat head that emerges from the lion's back, and a tail that ends in a snake's head. If that isn't odd and bad enough, all three heads breathe scorching white-hot fire. Much as I believe Darius can handle the flames, anyone else will be instantly charred before they could scream.

"Rohana?"

I pull my horse back at the Mater's call, coming to ride alongside her and Katarina who has joined her once again on Víđarr. "Yes?"