Soul of Flame (Imdalind Series #4)(63)

“You’re alive.”

The irritation that was so normal in Thom’s voice was choked by his joy, his face pale from where he stood in the doorway. I moved to the side as Thom rushed to his friend, embracing him as a brother. The two men clung to one another as Wyn and Sain helped Ryland into the room, his agitation obviously growing alongside the heightened emotions that surrounded him.

They moved in slowly until Sain caught sight of the scene in front of him. He froze in place, the deep emotion that I had wanted so desperately to see over the past few days glistening down his cheeks.

“M?j syn,” he whispered, and although I didn’t understand the words, I caught the meaning, the joy at seeing his son alive.

Sain rushed forward before the echo of his voice had fully faded, his feet stumbling over themselves in his desperate need to reach his son.

“Tatí,” Dramin whispered, the break in his voice making it clear that he, too, was weeping, but I didn’t see that.

All I saw were his hands wrapped around my father’s. His father’s.

All I saw was the greeting that I had so desperately wanted, the love behind it one that I wasn’t so sure I hadn’t pushed away.

Jealousy rocked through me, green and bitter in my veins. I stumbled away from Ilyan’s side, fighting the need to run away and destroy something, to scream, to mourn what I had lost when Cail had murdered my mother.

A family.

The realization rocked through me, my heart clenching as it felt what I had been trying so hard to ignore. I think a large part of me had healed Dramin because it was the right thing to do. However, another, much smaller part had broken my father’s rule in desperation to gain back the closest thing that had felt like family.

To prove that I didn’t need him.

“My boy, my boy,” Sain said as tears streaked down his cheeks, his words adding yet another stabbing pain to my heart. “You’re alive. After so long…” Sain’s voice trailed off into Czech as he clung to Dramin’s hand.

My heart seized with want as I watched them, pain moving through me as it tried to drum up the anger that I was working so hard to hide. I couldn’t stay here. I let the shaking sadness out and moved toward the door, staying in the shadow and as close to the shelved wall as I could in an attempt to go unnoticed.

“I don’t understand,” Sain said, “Joclyn saw your death. How is this possible?”

I froze in place at the sound of my name, my eyes shifting toward them as I pressed my back into the high shelving. For the first time since Sain had come to him, Dramin looked up to me, his eyes widening at where I stood, waiting for the reprimand to come. I looked into my brother, but instead of frustration, I saw the pride that he had looked at my father with a few minutes before. My chest loosened with that look, my heartbeat steadying with the hope of being welcomed.

“Joclyn healed me, Tatínek.”

To me the words were a calm, comforting cloud of acceptance, however my father heard anything but. His focus snapped to me, the pride in his green eyes vanishing.

“You healed him? After I commanded you not to?” Sain asked, the disgust in his voice catching me off guard, and I flinched, wishing I could hide myself into the shadows for one breadth of a second before the girl I had become came shining through, leaving the girl my father had abandoned behind.

“Commanded me?” I asked, unable to keep the scoff out of my voice. “You wanted me to let him die.”

“It was what your sight guided you to do.”

“The sight was wrong.”

Sain’s eyes widened at my words, his anger strong before it slid from his face, leaving him blank. I knew I should have felt bad for saying that, to deny something that I knew he revered, but I couldn’t stop the words. I couldn’t lie to him just to try to win his affection. It was not who I was. Not anymore.

“The sight was wrong? How can you say such things? No Drak would say such things.”

“Then maybe I am not a Drak, Sain,” I said, snapping his name out in disgust. “Letting someone I love die is wrong.”

My words were hard; I knew it. I knew it, and I didn’t care. This wasn’t like the fight with Ilyan—when I had said things that I didn’t mean—because I meant these. I needed him to understand me.

I stepped closer, my eyes pinned on Sain, knowing that if I looked anywhere else, my resolve would weaken.

“Do not deny the gift the earth… the mud has given you…” Sain said, his voice finally moving above that calm tone to rumble through the air around us.

“What gift?” I interrupted him, the screech in my voice hitting a level I hadn’t heard since before Santé Fe. “You make it feel like a curse. A curse I want nothing to do with. I do not want to die. I do not want him to die. Not every sight can be true, Sain.”

“You speak of things you do not understand,” Sain hissed, the sound as quick and painful as if someone had slapped me.

“I can’t understand what I don’t know,” I snapped back, hating how my defenses had gone up just by looking at him. “I can feel the power of the sights in my bones, but even with that, how can I walk into battle knowing that I am going to die? How can I let Dramin die if my magic begs me to heal him?”

I extended my hands toward him in hope of an answer—almost pleading with him to tell me—but he stood still, the hard glaze in his eyes boring a line of pain right to my heart.