City of Blood (Godstone Saga 6)

The king shrugged. “No idea. My guess is that she’s got more finesse than me. I have a sense of the other gods, but their power has a feeling of being spread everywhere.”

“Hey! Does this mean I have powers the same way Rayne does? Can I heal people or make protective bubbles?” Adrian called out with a mouthful of bland noodles. Apparently, Rayne didn’t have anything to flavor their meal with other than a bit of salt. Not great, but it filled the void in his stomach. At least if he went back to Stormbreak, he’d get a real meal again.

“My guess? No. The connection between us is very small. I was afraid to do anything more and risk hurting you.”

Adrian grunted. That made sense, though he couldn’t deny the wiggle of disappointment in his chest. He wasn’t expecting to be crazy powerful, but a small gift would have been fun. And definitely useful in the fight that was headed their way.

Caelan and the others discussed the messages that would be prepared and sent to General Morgan, the royals of Caspagir, and Omari Nori of the dragons. Adrian’s eyes were locked on the noodles he was shoveling into his mouth, but his attention was on the glittering thread he could feel tied to some wispy part of him deep within his chest. The more he inspected and mentally plucked at it, the more it crackled and sparked with energy. It soaked into Adrian’s cells.

Lifting his gaze, he found Caelan watching him with a tiny smirk while he continued to talk to Rayne as if nothing was wrong. The king knew exactly what he was doing. Had he gifted him with a little more power? Had Caelan felt his disappointment?

There was something in that smirk. As if the godling was saying, “If this blows up in your face, it’s on your head.”

There was no point in asking Caelan what, if anything, he could do now. Caelan wasn’t even sure of his own powers. How could he possibly know what Adrian could do? With any luck, Adrian would figure it out before it was too late.

FOUR

Drayce Ladon

Drayce crawled out of the tent they’d managed to procure in the last town and stretched his arms over his head. He twisted left and right, attempting to work the kinks out of his spine. Caelan was still asleep inside, tangled up in their meager blankets. Thank the gods the temperature was staying relatively mild. It also didn’t hurt that the godling slept wrapped around a dragon for warmth.

Adrian had left them for the Erya border two days earlier and seemed to be making good progress. The royal guard sent a single text each day as an update. But for the most part, they were keeping their phones turned off to conserve battery power. Not that it would matter for much longer. By Rayne’s estimate, they would reach the Ordas in a couple of days, the land where no electronics worked.

He was going to miss his phone.

What he didn’t miss was the damn boat.

After parting with Adrian, they’d passed one more day traveling by boat with him knocked out in the lower cabin. When they’d made camp that night, Caelan had declared it was safer if they traveled the rest of the way to the border by land, using the excuse that they were passing too many towns and homes, risking attracting attention.

It felt like a lie, but Rayne and Eno didn’t offer up a single argument as they offloaded everything they could carry. Yesterday Eno had acquired a beat-up, barely running car for them. Now they were traveling by night and camping in remote, lonely bits of land during the day. Drayce had caught a glimpse of the local news, but Brightspire and the Ilon government were in chaos. King Caelan’s name was being thrown around in relation to the death of Prime Minister Jasper Feroz, but he wasn’t sure if people thought the king was still in Ilon.

For now, it was safer if no one spotted them.

Not that they were going to be any safer when they crossed the border into the Ordas. It was a wild, unpredictable land where everything would attempt to kill them. And that was only going to get worse now that Zyros was free.

Oh, and she was teamed up with her former-lover-slash-former-betrayer Lore. That wasn’t going to be good either.

Drayce barely swallowed his groan as he dropped his arms to his sides. Why did his brain have to think of all these ugly things as soon as he woke up? He’d fallen asleep locked in this tangled knot. Couldn’t his first thoughts have been about something good, like breakfast?

Ooooh…breakfast.

Even if the sun was setting and he should be thinking about dinner.

The scent of sausage wafted to his nose, and Drayce turned toward the campfire to see Eno carefully flipping over sausage patties in a pan. Not Rayne.