The First Dawn (Daughter of the Phoenix Book Three)

by Victoria J. Price

He looked to each of them, and Fia thought he seemed every inch the leader of his people. Someone who would stop idle gossip spreading, someone who would defend his friends, who would forgive wrongdoings. Someone who would protect Ohinyan, no matter the cost. She’d come a long way, but so had he.

  “I don’t have enough food tonight to feed you all, but if you head to the tavern for dinner I’ll have beds ready for you all by the time you return,” Ahrek said, tearing Fia from her thoughts.

  Two Nords leapt over the wall, brothers Fia recognised from Maab’s ship. “Ritni’s or Aven’s?” the first one asked.

  “Ritni’s,” the second said, “Aven’s tavern is a shithole.” The pair broke into laughter, and the rest of the Nords followed, then Maab and Noor.

  “Fia,” Noor said as she caught sight of her. “You look well. What of Erebus?”

  Always straight to the point. “He’ll be back for me soon. He’s gone to find Lorn,” Fia said. That earned a look from Alexander, but she couldn’t read his expression.

  Maab simply grabbed her arm in greeting, a warm smile across her face. “You are resilient, Fia, I’ll give you that.”

  “I can’t tell you how relieved I am to see you all made it back in one piece. Thank you for looking for me,” she said. She meant it. They’d gone to another world for her. It was for Ohinyan too, but they could have stayed. It mattered that they’d chosen not to. She glanced around for Osara but saw no sign of her. “Is Osara with you?”

  “Osara is dead,” Noor said. A flicker of emotion lit up the witch’s eyes and she frowned for a moment. “Okwata, Ahrek,” she nodded to them both as she passed them. She paused to rest a hand on Okwata’s shoulder and said quietly, “You kept your secrets well, Tahjiik,” before making her way up to the lab after the others.

  Fia wasn’t surprised Noor had figured it out. She’d have pieced it together from whatever snippets she’d discovered in Evina’s world. The witch didn’t look back at them as she walked away, just rested her glider over one shoulder and strode up the path as if she walked the route every day, oblivious to the butterflies fluttering around her even though they were the size of small birds. Noor rarely showed her emotions, but Osara’s death had meant something; Osara had meant something to Noor, that much Fia could tell.

  Maab muttered quietly to Alexander, but Fia couldn’t hear what he said. She wanted to ask about Osara, but something in Maab’s expression told her to wait. He gave a curt nod to Okwata and Ahrek and made his way up the path to the lab, just as Rainn and Jax helped Evina over the wall, Aura close behind them. None of them looked surprised to see her, neither had the others. But it wouldn’t have taken much to figure out that Erebus would take her and Lorn back to Ohinyan eventually, and she brushed aside the thought that he could probably find her even on Ornax if he wanted.

  “Welcome, Your Majesty,” Okwata said, turning his chair to face Evina. He didn’t wheel closer or offer a hand. Fia realised now that he’d probably met his fair share of royalty.

  Evina nodded, and Alexander made the introductions. “We’re still not in Ohinyan, but it’s just this way, through Okwata’s home. We’re going to get something to eat and then return here to rest.” If he was exhausted from the journey, he didn’t let it show.

  “It might not be fit for royalty, but we will make sure you are as comfortable as possible,” Okwata added. Fia bit back a laugh. Evina had adapted to Erebus’s prison, she was certain the queen could adapt to the comfort of a warm bed.

  “This way,” Alexander said, and led the way back up to the laboratory.

  The angels made no sound as they passed through the window into Ohinyan, but Evina looked as if she’d felt it. Something told Fia the queen would. She thought of what it might mean to Evina to come to the world where her sister died. The queen had seemed so hardened to her sister’s death when they spoke of it. But years had passed. Did time soften the blow? Fia couldn’t imagine the ache in her chest would ever go away completely without Sophie, and for a moment a sickening panic washed over her that she might forget her sister and that in the forgetting, she might let her go.

  Alexander’s fingers brushed her elbow as they stepped out into the streets of Djira. “Fia?”

  She looked up at his crystalline blue eyes, concern etched across his face. “I’m fine,” she said with a weak smile. Just a few more stolen moments. Erebus would return soon, and Fia felt certain he wouldn’t miss the opportunity to try and harm Alexander. Because you love him.

  They walked quietly to the tavern, Fia’s attention flicking to every shadow and trick of the light. First thing in the morning she was going to the sky spirits, and even then, it might be too late. She tried to cast aside the other selfish reasons she had for wanting to stay in Djira for a few more hours as Alexander held open a door to Ritni’s tavern for her. Warm air mixed with ale hit her as she squeezed past him, his gaze falling from her eyes to her mouth for a moment, and then to the gold cuff on her wrist, and those selfish thoughts tried to push their way to the surface again.

  That thread seemed to tug tighter between them, and she felt him follow her even as she walked towards the table where the Nords looked to already be well onto their second round. Or maybe third.

  A fire hissed and spat in the centre of the tavern, with four great metal pots hanging over it and a number of Asharians attending to whatever was inside them. Beside a bar cut from stone stood the three Asharians Fia had seen earlier outside the passageway. They seemed way past counting rounds; Netti was telling a story with such enthusiasm that ale sloshed from his mug and he elbowed his companions every other sentence for a response.

  Alexander shot her an amused look as he caught her watching.

  “I like you in this uniform,” she said quietly as they weaved their way through the crowd.

  His expression hardened. “I have a feeling I’ll be needing it soon enough, and there won’t be time to return to Alythia for my own armour.”

  Fia didn’t know what to say to that. Only that she had a feeling he was right. She paused, suddenly feeling the heat of the tavern was too much, too overbearing.

  “Fia?” Alexander held a hand lightly to her elbow.

  She smiled at him as convincingly as she could. “I’ll be right behind you, I just… need a minute.”

  Alexander looked as if he might protest, but Maab was already walking towards them, and Alexander followed Fia’s gaze towards the Nord.

  Fia used it as an opportunity to back away. “I’ll be two minutes,” she said and turned to dart back through the crowd to the entrance.

  But the cool air didn’t relieve her as she’d hoped when she stepped back out into the street. She paced, her magic thrumming in her chest as if it were trying to calm her.

  “The streets of Djira are no place to linger alone at night,” a voice said from behind her.

  Fia spun around, blue sparks already alight at her fingertips.

  “You followed me. I told you to find Lorn.” Her chest flushed with anger, her sparks growing to flames in her hands. Of course he hadn’t listened.

  Erebus took a step closer, his skin clammy with a sickly pallor in the light of her flames. The black veins already seemed to have spread up his neck and across his throat to his jaw in the last few hours.

  “Stay back,” she said, sending a ball of blue flames in his direction, but the anger etched across her face must have shown because he dispersed into his shadows and spiralled out of the way of her fire.

  “Fia—” Erebus began, but she hurled another fireball in his direction. He evaded her once more, lingering above her.

  She wouldn’t be taken again. Not like this. Not by him. “You can’t dodge me forever, you know.”

  “I’m not here to take you, Fia. I came to tell you I thought about what you said. I’m going to find Lorn.”

  “Don’t lie to me,” Fia seethed. “You know the best way to prove you mean what you say? To actually do it. Show me. Show me you mean it. Help Ohinyan. Bring her back
here.” Fia felt the edge to her words and knew he would see it written across her face, somehow, even in his ethereal form.

  The shadows moved closer for a moment and then seemed to hesitate, but Erebus didn’t say anything, just shot up into the night air.

  Fia watched him go, her flames diminishing, her chest heaving, and exhaled deeply. She paced for a moment, not quite believing their exchange. He’d left. Why? There’s nothing to stop him coming back. A shiver ran down her spine at the thought, and she pushed open the door to the tavern without another look towards the sky, letting the sounds from within drown out her feelings.

  She took a seat opposite Noor and Maab, beside Alexander, and his arm brushed hers as he leaned on the table. She noticed he still wore her black hair elastic around his wrist and resisted the urge to reach out and touch it, to calm her nerves after seeing Erebus.

  Rainn, Aura, Jax and Evina sat at the end of the table, their quiet echoing Noor and Maab’s. Only the rest of the Nords seemed to be in good spirits, no doubt thanks to the alcohol.

  Alexander shot her a look, as if he were asking if she was okay.

  “Is anyone going to tell me what happened?” Fia asked, looking from Alexander to Noor and Maab. She had to raise her voice over the noise of the tavern as someone began to play an instrument that sounded remarkably like a flute in a hidden corner she couldn’t see.

  “Osara betrayed us,” Maab said. “She was not a Nord, but a shifter from Deganis, working for Randin.” He seemed to be fighting with his feelings as he spoke.

  “A spy?” Fia looked to Noor as she said it. Had Noor known all along? She glanced between Noor and Maab. It must have come as a blow to him; he’d thought highly of Osara, Fia knew that well enough. Or he wouldn’t have let the Nord, no, the shifter, accompany her to see the sky spirits. “What can a shifter do, exactly?” Fia asked.

  “Take on any form they choose,” Noor said as a barman placed steaming bowls of stew in front of them along with jugs of ale and water. “She was a spy, yes. Her Igran gave her away.”

  “And you let her warm your bed anyway?” Maab asked. His face had darkened, not with anger for Noor, Fia thought, but at himself. She knew how much the disappointment that he hadn’t seen it sooner would have been eating away at him. How he’d be blaming himself for Osara’s infiltration. Noor didn’t answer him.

  A conversation whispered its way through Fia’s thoughts, one between her and Osara when she’d first escaped from Erebus. When I was a child, I would shift to escape my worries and fears. But as I grew older, I realised they followed me no matter what form I took. And now she’d never take another form, ever again. No matter what Osara had done, the thought still weighed heavily on Fia.

  “She told me…” Fia began, “not entirely the truth, but a half truth. About being a shifter, I didn’t think…”

  Noor laughed. “The best lies are formed from the truth. It makes them more believable. It makes them easier to weave.” Okwata had said as much earlier, and Fia could see how easy it would have been for Osara to pretend.

  She reached for the water jug at the same time Alexander did, their fingers touching as he wrapped his hands around the jug. It felt so normal. To be here, with him. Like they were just out eating dinner with friends and not on the precipice of Ohinyan’s very existence.

  He smiled at her and poured them both some water but said nothing. His warmth was a comforting presence beside her, the wing nearest to her cocooning her closer to him on the bench. She wished there was no one in the tavern but them. That the world would just fall away from them. Down the table, the Nords were getting louder, banging the table and laughing. At least they were in good spirits.

  “Osara took on Noor’s form and attacked me,” Alexander said.

  Fia almost dropped her mug. “She did what? And you killed her?”

  “I did,” Noor said, looking at Alexander.

  Fia looked between the three of them and blew on her stew. It would be a waste not to have any, even though she’d already eaten. She was fairly certain she needed it. Again, she saw a flicker of emotion across Noor’s face, something that told her Osara had meant more to Noor than Fia knew. Not love, maybe. But something.

  Now was not the time to question Noor further. Fia told herself she’d find a quiet moment to speak with her, to offer support. She bit back a laugh—not that Noor seemed the type to accept it. But no one wanted to walk through life alone. Perhaps it was why the witch had found some comfort with Osara in the first place.

  A heavy silence had fallen over them, and for a moment Fia let herself think of her exchange outside the tavern with Erebus before she shoved it aside. “When did you meet her?” she asked Maab, hoping her voice sounded as steady as it had before.

  The Nord prodded at his food. “She joined us in the battle in the south, against Lorn and her minions and proved herself to be a formidable fighter. She’d been journeying with us for some time before that. But I should have known better. My judgement was clouded.”

  Fia knew he was talking about Enne, his partner. That Maab somehow thought his grief had made him make bad decisions. If anything, Fia thought, grief had given her a sense of clarity she’d never had before.

  “She was a snake. Do not think your love for him a weakness, Maab. And remember, not all spies have ill intentions,” Noor broke into a smile and placed a hand on Maab’s forearm, and he looked up and caught her gaze.

  They’d both move on from this, in time. Maab muttered something back and Noor laughed, elbowing him gently. Fia didn’t think she’d ever heard him tell a joke, but when he looked up and caught her watching him, he winked.

  One of the Nords had begun to sing about snow-capped mountains and being home, and a chill ran down Fia’s spine.

  This felt like home. The angel beside her. The friends in front of her.

  Alexander must have felt her tense because he nudged her closer with his wing and whispered, “Are you sure you’re alright?”

  “I’m okay, really,” she began. How could she explain that it already felt like a memory, that the sense of dread about what was to come crept its way into every thought and made her feel as if they were all already falling away from her. That she would do whatever it took to save Ohinyan, no matter the cost. She was about to say more when someone called out to them from across the tavern.

  “Alexander.” It was Malachai, Alexander’s right hand, and beside him…

  “Fia!” Runa, Malachai’s wife threw her arms around Fia’s shoulders.

  Fia glanced up and returned Runa’s smile, her emerald eyes bright and shining.

  “We’ve received word from scouts further south. Kaliz was attacked. Lorn is stationed just outside, and Randin’s army is heading straight for her in airships of their own,” Malachai said, breathlessly. As if they’d been searching all of Djira for Alexander.

  Alexander rubbed his chin. “She’ll come here. It’s a point of control and one that she’ll want to seize as a position of power.”

  If Lorn was coming to Djira, then Erebus would be returning soon too. Fia fought to keep her expression calm. Her time was almost up. But it wasn’t fear that had her hiding the trembling of her hands. It was anger. No one else would die because of her. She wouldn’t allow it. She had to go and see Terah, to find out whatever she knew about rekindling the sun.

  Days, Okwata had said. It was a matter of days before the sun died, and Fia would do everything in her power to stop it from happening.

  Chapter Twenty–Nine

  Alexander

  A lexander had barely slept. Ahrek had prepared separate rooms for him and Fia, but at some point in the night, she’d knocked on his door, dressed only in a thin shirt that barely skimmed her hips, and asked to come in. She’d climbed into bed and they’d lain there as if neither of them could believe it was real. As if it were borrowed time.

  He’d sensed her hesitation, as if she were still afraid of hurting him. Or was it something else? His past worries tried to f
ight their way to the surface—that he had brought her into all of this. But Fia made her own decisions, he knew that.

  It had felt so natural, to lie in bed together and pull her close, as if it were something they could do every night. As if they could pretend the world was not about to end. To have her pressed close to him, their bodies perfectly moulded together, it had almost been enough to wash away that gnawing feeling, like they were lying in quicksand. It was partly why he couldn’t sleep, for fear he’d open his eyes and she’d be gone.

  He’d stayed awake for hours, her hands pulling his close to her chest, a wing tucked around her where the sheet had fallen away, not an inch of space between them.

  Alexander wasn’t sure when he’d fallen asleep, but when he’d awoken Fia’s limbs were draped over him, her shirt hitched up her thigh and pulling his thoughts to the way her back had arched when he’d run his fingers across it the last time they’d been alone together. And yet still that gnawing feeling hadn’t stopped him needing a cold shower after spending the night lying beside her.

  They’d both risen early, Fia to send messages from Okwata’s lab, and Alexander to plan for Lorn’s arrival. Alexander made his way to the observatory, ideas and strategies turning over in his thoughts.

  The Makya already stationed in the city would be difficult to identify from Lorn’s soldiers in the middle of a fight, and he wanted to ensure there were minimal casualties. He made his way up a winding stone staircase so narrow his wings brushed the walls on either side. Every so often a crevice in the wall held a candle made from boiled azarna spice and the scent permeated the stairway. It seemed odd that Okwata would choose candles with his grasp on technology, but Alexander had to admit, he preferred the candlelight to the harsher lamps.

  He didn’t want to miss the opportunity to accompany Fia to see the sky spirits, but this meeting couldn’t wait. The observatory was housed inside one of the towers that were banded in gold, and Alexander wondered how Okwata had ever made his way up there as he stepped inside.