Prologue
The Eye of Azureal fell from Nadine’s hand. The golden pendant and its chain hit the stone floor with a clink, and Magnus went rigid alongside everyone else in the darkened vault.
The Ebronian woman crouched to the ground and scooped up the sacred artifact they’d all come here for. She’d just tested it on the enthralled imp. Had it worked? Had it freed the creature from the Soul Thieves’ influence as they’d hoped? The imp now lay panting at Magnus’s feet.
Nadine stood and walked into the circle Magnus formed with his brothers around the prostrate imp. Magnus cringed at the sight. She was moving much too quickly and without caution. Just as she reached for the veligiri, Magnus’s arm shot out to catch hers.
Golden eyes flashed up at him. “Get your hand off me.” The woman’s lips curled back in a sneer, so much like the hellcat he’d often likened her to in his mind.
“Its teeth are venomous.” Magnus inclined his head toward the red-skinned imp. “Claws, too.”
Magnus absorbed the heat of her glare. It stirred his blood, not the effect he was sure she’d intended. Another time he’d have been distracted by it. Charmed by it. Challenged by it. Not now. Now he was focused on the mission that called them all—him, his brothers, and the Ebronian emperor the desert folk called Mushar—beneath this temple. The thought of the Mushar and his half-dozen guards standing nearby reminded Magnus to release the hellcat’s arm.
The underground rumble hummed in Magnus’s ears, reminding him of home. They were deep within the royal deposit where Ebron’s treasures were hidden. Stacks of glimmering bullions, high rafters inlaid with rubies, wax-sealed pitchers of oils—and those were just the initial wonders. Yet Magnus cared only for the prize clutched in the hellcat’s hands.
The Eye of Azureal. The key to his best friend’s salvation.
Nadine turned away from Magnus with a huff and extended her fingers toward the limp creature’s neck. Magnus kept his gaze on its skinny tail, watching for the telltale swish that might indicate it was about to attack. If it did, he’d have his boot to its throat before it could pierce the Ebronian’s skin. He'd much rather fight than watch quietly while they tested the Eye. Had all this—the hope, the suspense—been for nothing?
Magnus held his breath and waited out the silence as she checked for a pulse.
“Unbind it,” she commanded.
Magnus exchanged wary glances with his brothers. He and Sigvard moved to do as she bid. They unwrapped the ties with cautious determination. When the imp was bare, Magnus gave Sigvard a nod. They counted down together. On three, they released the creature and lunged away. Magnus swept an arm to the side, brushing a scowling Nadine back with him.
Every eye in the chamber fell to the imp.
It didn’t move.
Hollen, the Dokiri chieftain and oldest brother, crept forward to nudge it with the toe of his boot. It moved with his foot, then settled limply back on the hard ground. Magnus shot an uneasy glance at his brother Ivan. Dread deepened the pit of his stomach as he returned his gaze to the imp.
Wake up, you filthy cretin.
Nadine sighed and unsheathed a dagger from her belt. She marched toward the prone creature like an avenging goddess. Panic shot through Magnus. If she killed it, he’d be that much further from his answer.
“No, wait.” He reached out a hand to stop her.
Nadine dodged him with stunning grace, ducking low to bring the end of her dagger down into the monster’s thigh.
The air stalled in his lungs as he forced himself to take in the creature’s reaction. Nothing. The imp didn’t even whimper.
“Dead in the mind, if not in the body,” the Mushar muttered.
Ice spread through Magnus’s veins. The Eye of Azureal hadn’t freed the imp’s mind. It had simply cleared it. The legends were true. Magnus’s fists tightened at his sides.
No.
Magnus couldn’t accept that. He wouldn’t. The Dokiri had made allies of Ebron, those stubborn bastards, and only after bleeding rivers of blood from a battlefield in the sky. They’d defended this nation, kept the Soul Thieves from adding it to their ranks, and finally they’d retrieved the Eye. Exactly as they’d set out to do.
So, a single imp hadn’t recovered its wits. In Magnus’s experience, imps had none to begin with. The results would have to be different on an intelligent being. As far as he’d heard, the Eye had not been used on a man in a millennium. Perhaps never on a Na Dokiri.
A sense of calm overtook Magnus as Nadine stood and turned toward the Mushar. Excitement lit her eyes, and her full lips parted. “It worked.”
Magnus swallowed down his doubts. It had. And it would. He just had to have faith. He’d come this far. He’d do whatever it took to get the Eye into the heart of the mountain. He’d take it to those Soul Thief raksas and he’d tear each of them apart until he found his friend. And then? Arvid would live.
People were chattering around him, and the Ebronians’ words were growing more heated. Magnus straightened. He’d let his mind drift, but he was centered now. He had a plan. A plan it seemed the little hellcat had a problem with. What was it she objected to, exactly?
Hollen regarded the Mushar. “Your generals have agreed to send a company with us, yes? To help us fight beneath ground.”
It was the other reason the Dokiri had come to Ebron: allies who knew how to fight on the ground. Magnus, like his kin, was made for the sky. His true power resided in mastery of his wyvern mount, an advantage he couldn’t take with him under the mountain.
The Mushar tilted his head, a glint of amusement in his eyes. “Indeed.”
Nadine followed with a smug grin on her lovely face. “Who do you think will lead that company, savage?”
Magnus’s heart sped up. His brothers were looking at one another like they’d each swallowed a nest of wild hornets. Not Magnus.
Magnus smiled, his eyes fixed on the wondrous woman before him. The feel of destiny nettled at him, and he recalled the moment he’d first seen her outside the gates of Lapour. She’d been all fire and bloodlust. A woman like he’d never seen, and one he’d not been able to forget. Not that he’d tried.
Hollen cleared his throat. “I don’t think that’s . . . wise.”
The Mushar spoke next. “With respect, young sky-rider, I don’t defer in military wisdom to foreigners who haven’t the slightest notion of our methods.”
Magnus coughed to hide the snort of laughter building in the back of his throat. For all the Mushar’s boasts about being well informed, it was clear these Ebronians knew almost nothing about their Dokiri allies. Erik, his second oldest brother, ran an elbow into his side in warning.
Hollen drew in a sharp breath. “It’s not your wisdom or judgment I question, Mushar. In truth, I don’t question you at all. It’s only that . . . ”
Nadine scoffed. “If being led by a woman offends you, savage, I suggest you open your small mind before it gets crushed.”
The Ebronian had no idea. Hollen was a diplomat at heart, and worse, he was desperate. He was chieftain to a clan of refugees whose only hope of returning to their mountain home rested in making this alliance work. He wouldn’t balk at something so trivial as taking orders from a woman. None of them would.