Like he just might drift away into the Void forever and not come back.
“Baldur. Are you sure about this?” I kneel before him now, clasping his hands as I let him catch his breath. I don’t want to gainsay my Fourth Drake; he’s been on death’s door, though, ever since the Black Dragon cursed his heart and made him nearly leave this world, for good.
As I see him now, and feel how faint his life-force is through our bond, despite the cosmic brightness of his inner dragon, I know how tentative his grip on this world still is right now.
Baldur has always had faith that what he was doing was right. As he gazes down at me now, however, I see something in him I didn’t expect—doubt, as his dark eyelashes flicker and that diamond fire in his blue eyes dims.
For the first time, I see him doubt his aims and his mission in our Bloodbond. He loses the shining brightness of his faith, as he reflects on whether coming out of his stasis early was a good thing or not.
In the next moment, his resolve firms, though, as he sets his jaw. Hestares at me hard now, with a stubborn look that’s almost like Bjorn, then nods.
“Show me the scrolls,” he says, even though his breath is a hard rasp, labored and uneven. “Iwillget us something useful to fight the Black Dragon with, Rikyava. Something we can take that black hellbeast down with, for good. I know it.”
I don’t refute him, only nod at his decided, forceful words. But I don’t miss the small flicker of doubt that passes through his eyes again.
Which used to be filled with so much certainty.
Even as Baldur reassures me he can do this, and get us what we need from Hedda’s ancient scrolls, he suddenly rubs the nasty, searing curses where they devour his wrists.
As he does, I watch them flare with a diabolical crimson and oilslick-black light. I feel something flash through Baldur then, like a snarl of rage. He quickly blocks me from feeling it through our bond. As it happens, however, I watch his curses from the Black Dragon surge ferociously.
Then devour a half-inch of his un-cursed flesh upon his chest.
It’s just a slight resurgence of his curses, but it’s enough. As the horrible work of the Black Dragon sears once more upon Baldur’s chest, in from his strong shoulders along his stark collarbones, I feel a cascade of darkness wash through our Bloodbond.
Because even though Baldur is our bond’s brightest light, what’s been done to him is of the darkest night. That night is still trying to take him over, as I feel his light gutter to all that intense darkness still devouring him.
Threatening to snuff all his brightness out—forever.
“Baldur!” I exclaim as I see that nasty resurgence of his curses.
As if he didn’t even know it happened, Baldur blinks down at his chest. He pulls one side of his shirt off his shoulder, evaluating his curses as a complicated look comes into his dark blue eyes.
I see them flash a fiery crimson-gold now, as rarely happens for him, but did the first time we met at Mikkel and Lærke’s club in Sweden, The Vault.That searing fire in his eyes means Baldur’s experiencing intense emotions, as I suddenly feel a hot whip of pure rage snap from him—hate, about what’s just happened.
It cracks through the air, blistering a nasty crimson Bloodwind around him—far more powerful than any of his regular magic. Worse, the edges of that diabolical magic are on fire with the auric flame we’ve all been able to create recently.
Black and diseased at the fire’s edges—the same oilslick color as the Black Dragon itself.
“Well, that’s not good.”
My Third Drake, Mikkel Thorsen, has arrived with his twin sister, Lærke. Mikkel looks far better today, dressed in his classic color, black, wearing a sleeveless leather jerkin with a high collar, tight leather breeches, and tall boots tooled with silver.
A flowing shirt of utterly black silk completes the ensemble. I can’t help but gape as he arrives, shocked at just exactly how much he looks like a pirate, something I’ve always compared him to.
Swashbuckling and deadly, yet hot as sin, Mikkel’s strong jaw is set, his level, dark brows pensive as he takes in the curses resurging upon Baldur. Mikkel’s skin is pale and almost angelically luminous, his hair is so dark brown it’s nearly black, as a scattering of auburn highlights shine in the torchlight.
With his jet-black eyes and full lips, he looks like a diabolical angel, if that angel fell to sailing the high seas and made his enemies walk the plank. I feel the dark, mamba-like drake of his Bone Magic surge as he enters the room, though it’s far less than his usual.
Still, Mikkel’s energetic wrath of raw power makes me feel like I’ve been zapped by an electric sub-station in his presence. His twin sister, Lærke, is no less, though I’m not Bloodbonded to her; with a wrathful energy as deep and still as Mikkel’s is turbulent, Lærke sweeps forward now.
Taking charge as she comes to Baldur.
Dressed in beautiful tawny women’s fighting leathers embroidered with silver, which makes her almost vampiric complexion absolutely stunning, Lærke’s waist-length platinum hair is bound half-back today in fighting fashion. Her full, crimson lips scowl now as she kneels by Baldur’s chair. As she touches his bared shoulder, she examines it with her striking violet eyes, seeing the curse-work’s resurgence.
She snarls, her stoically beautiful visage becoming ruthlessly fierce, as she looks up at him.
“I thought Mikkel and I cleared these curses from you yesterday?!” She bites now, even as she begins a deep healing with her magic, helping ease the blistering nastiness that’s crept onto his chest.
