Blood Oath (Darkest Drae #1)(82)

I smiled at him. “I’d like that.”

After a long moment, Dyter said, “He followed you when you left, did you know? He’s been there, all night, watching over you.” My mentor tilted his head to the rolling hills behind us. “If I could kill him, I would.” He cleared his throat and added, “But being a Drae and all . . .”

His comment startled a laugh out of me. A strong reminder I hadn’t lost everything. “Thank you, Dyter.”

“What for?” he asked. In his haunted eyes, I could see he blamed himself for everything.

For being alive. “For being here,” I said.

Dyter smiled, but it faded a moment later. “Ryn, I know this isn’t what you want to hear right now, but Tyrrik”—he arched a brow at my dark scowl—“said you will make the transformation to Drae in just a few days’ time. He said when that happens, the emperor will become aware of your existence.”

A few days. Not long enough. My life had changed so much. I wasn’t ready for it to change again. What would happen to me? Would I still be me when I transformed? Unfortunately, I refused to speak to the only person in Verald with those answers. “Why is that a problem? He can’t kill me, right?”

“You know there are worse things than dying by now, Rynnie.”

I did know.

He rocked me in his arms as we sat quietly in the burned remains.

“It’s all gone,” I said. How would we ever get back to what we had been? It wasn’t possible, I knew. But we’d also defeated the king. “But maybe tomorrow . . .”

Maybe I could find the hope I needed tomorrow.

“Well, now look at this, my girl.”

My Phaetyn power was healing me, my energy returned with a slow swelling, and I shifted to look at his scarred face. His gaze had softened and was fixed on my hand.

I wiped my eyes and gazed down.

Soft blue petals, a pale version of my scales, were blossoming between my thumb and forefinger. The flower was small, but as the breeze moved the solitary bloom, the petals glowed in the starlight. My heart skipped a beat as I stared at the only bit of life for as far as the eye could see.

“I’ve never seen a flower like this before,” Dyter remarked.

I had.

Every day since I was two, Mum had held me up to stroke the petals of the welded flower in the Market Circuit. When I’d grown old enough, I reached to touch it myself whenever I passed it.

This was that flower brought to life.

My flower.

A flower that belonged to Mum and me—and to everyone who had perished in the last few months.

“It’s a new flower,” I answered him in a firm voice. A reminder of who I was today, and who I’d loved at this moment. In a few days, I would transform into a Drae, but I would always have this flower here as a sign of who I’d been once.

Dyter squeezed my other hand, and I returned the gentle pressure, whispering as I looked to the sky, “It’s called a Tyr.”

“A Tear,” Dyter said, misunderstanding the name as I’d known he would. “That’s a beautiful name, Ryn. I hope more grow.”

My heart squeezed, but I took a breath, and air finally filled my lungs.

“As do I, Dyter.” My gaze flickered to the rolling hills concealing Lord Tyrrik. In a handful of days, he wouldn’t be the only Drae in Verald anymore. I’d be a monster, just like him. I took a shaking breath. “As do I.”