Chapter Forty - Brotherly reunion

The word brother clings onto every part of me. My lips part, but nothing comes. Just deep exhales as I look between them.

They're brothers... how—how is this possible?

"Are you not going to come to greet your brother?" Darius lilts casually, but Lorcan doesn't answer. He glances at the floor and grinds his jaw. "Last time you'd tackled me to the ground, now you can hardly look at me."

I still can't form a sentence or the courage to question it, not now, not like this.

Darius laughs again, weak but not without his teasing edge. "Pity really, remember when we were kids, and you'd beg for me to tell you stories—"

"Enough," Lorcan's voice sharpens, unlike ever before, as he turns and storms up to Darius. The shivers running through me don't stop. It freezes to the point of pain as I watch Lorcan point his index finger at Darius in a harsh promise. "You and I will never be brothers."

If any of the Venators knew this, they hid it well; their faces now ripple in severity—a warrior stare. Darius's golden skin pales by the second even as his lip tugs up at the corner in response. Although it fades too soon as he looks to his left, and the General, along with the queen, emerges from the woods, both with a pleased look on their faces.

Sarilyn spots me straight away, and all my strength evaporates before her as my eyes roam her red ruby gown, similar to Noctura night. It slides among the grass like a river of blood and shimmers as if she'd sourced it from the tree of Neoma itself.

"Naralía, darling, so glad to see you aren't hurt." Her hand skims over my shoulder as she walks around me, and I shiver at the fiendish smile shaping her lips. "If it weren't for you, we would have never found out what a simple tree could do to weaken and drain a dragon of its powers."

My gaze flickers over Sarilyn's shoulders to Darius. Hurt flashes his eyes, and I shake my head, starting towards him. "I didn't—"

"Who knew the youngest child of Nathaniel's would prove useful to us." The General's spiteful voice stops me. Even as I look at him, the disgust on his face matches his tone.

Sarilyn chuckles. Whatever kindness I'd seen in her at first has long been gone since the dungeons. "Now, Erion, Naralía has always proven she has the qualities of what it takes to become a Venator. Her brothers will be so proud," a cruel whisper as she smiles. She knows how to get to me. She'd threatened me with my brothers in the dungeons, and she will carry on doing it as much as she pleases.

My fingernails curl into my palm, and it trembles. My entire body does. Is it fear? Worry? I've always hidden it so well, and now I can't seem to at all.

She lets out a breath of satisfaction, glancing over at Darius. "Shackle him."

"No, don't!" I shout without thinking, steadying my arms out as if that were to stop every Venator.

"Nara." Lorcan proceeds forward, his tone a warning before Sarilyn raises her palm in the air and he halts.

"No need." Her eyes stick to me. "Do you object to this Naralía? I thought we already established whose side you were on."

*You threatened me.*

*You made me kill a fledgling.*

*You used me.*

"They're not any different to us," I whisper through clenched teeth, and her gaze doesn't sway from me. It's like she's digging and twisting a blade to find another answer.

"Well," She breathes as the whistle of the breeze breaks her out of her scrutiny. "If you believe that, perhaps you should join him." Her eyes shift behind me, and a Venator grabs me by the elbows, forcing them behind. I struggle and notice Darius suddenly trying to break free as the Venators grip digs into my skin.

"She doesn't," Lorcan says, and my head swivels in his direction as he cuts a pointed gaze at me, hoping I'll agree. "Right, Miss Ambrose?"

Silence mystifies the air. My gaze jumps from Lorcan to Darius, and our eyes meet for a split moment before he bows his head. I've broken his trust, no matter how I feel about his kind.

And even if I agree, Sarilyn knows my true feelings. I can tell in her eyes, in how she speaks to me. And she uses that as another means to mess with me. Cruel and what I imagine Aurum must have acted like with mortals.

As Lorcan waits for my answer, a twig splits through the clearing, Sarilyn shoots her head to the sound, and then a blur of fire hearths and fur rolls past, shouting, "Murderers, murderers, murderers!"

*Tibith.*

My grin is that of relief, knowing he must have followed us out. Venators stare at him racing around, swinging past legs, some unsheathe their swords, and the Venator's hold on me loosens enough for me to take advantage. I throw my head back, and he cries out as a crunch resonates in my ears. I tear free from him, twisting halfway to see him stumbling backward.

I turn to run for Darius but stop short once the queen slams her hand down onto the ground, catching Tibith by the neck. He uncurls, thrashing and kicking as she raises him to eye level. "What a curious little thing," she muses, and a wave of protection charges through my veins as I urge myself forward. However, the Venator whom I'd hit grabs my arm once again. "Who would have thought a thief had a Tibithian care for him."

"Let him go," Darius rasps. He sounds so defeated, growing weaker by the second. He'd collapse if it weren't for the Venators holding his arms.

My lungs tighten like someone's pressing an anvil on me, restricting movement. I'm culpable of this. I'm the reason for them figuring out that blood weakened dragons. I'm what caused Darius to get caught.

The queen makes a sound of fake sympathy, pouting her lips. "But such a creature would do wonders in the Draggards."

"Darry was right about you!" Tibith swats his arms at her, but she just looks amused. "A ma-maniacal monster!"

I do not dare hide my proud smile at that. Sarilyn doesn't notice as she rolls her eyes at Tibith and hands him to the General. "Throw him in a cage, will you? I tire of him already."

Glowering, I pull at my arm as an instinct for Tibith, but Sarilyn blocks my view when she saunters over. "So," she says, twirling a strand of my hair between her fingers. I try not to flinch. "What will it be Naralía?"

For several minutes I stare at the twilight in her eyes and the narrow of her brows. Something in the way she looks at me makes me think of the Liars Dice. A game of deception, lies, luck...

"I'm waiting," she says in total mockery.

*Make her think you are vulnerable, play on your luck, lie to her no matter if she knows the truth.*

I dip my chin and exhale roughly out of my nose. "I don't believe it." I lift my gaze at her. "Your majesty." It takes all my effort to say that without a bite to it.

She perks up with a smile, yet the Venator still doesn't release me. Turning her back to me, she walks towards Darius. Lorcan has his gaze on me, but every prick of guilt stabs at my skin.

"I'm going to enjoy getting answers out of you." Sarilyn drags her nail down the center of Darius's wound, and he hisses at the contact.

My teeth threaten to shatter at how hard I bite down, hating what she possibly means with that.

Darius cocks his head to the side, huffing a laugh though he's barely conscious. "What makes you so sure you'll get any?"

Sarilyn's shoulders go rigid. I can tell that angered her, maybe threw her off even. She clears her throat, flicking her golden nail off Darius's skin, and says to the two Venators, "Take him away and inform the city of the great news that we finally—" she drags the word cheerfully. "—have the Golden Thief."

With a curt nod of their heads, the Venators start dragging him away. The other Venator finally lets go of me, and Sarilyn gives me one last smug glance before following the others out of the forests. The stone-cold glare I want to provide her with dissolves completely when Darius looks over his shoulder at me. A swell forms in my chest at the tightening of his jaw. He's not mad; he's disappointed.

*Trust me;* I want to say,*just please trust me, I can still fix this.*

His eyes leave me, and the clearing becomes larger than before once everyone mounts their horses. I hear the creaks of cell doors from a cart opening and shutting, and then I'm standing with Lorcan as the only ones left.

We stare at each other, and the dull ache in the back of my head from when I hit the Venator now surfaces. I don't let it show. I'm more speechless than anything.

Lorcan's chest heaves with a deep breath as he presses against the horse's saddle and lifts his legs off the floor to climb onto it. Stopping by me, he reaches his palm out, but I don't grab onto it. I can't.

He sighs in frustration, looking down at the horse as he dismounts it. He treads with caution towards me, his voice a strain as he says, "Nara, please."

I ignore that 'please.'

"Brother," I can hardly say it, shaking my head before emphasizing, "He's your brother."

He swallows, anger flooding his eyes like before. "Not by blood."

I huff a hysterical laugh and shake my head at what I'd just learned. His brother, meaning the man obsessed with dragons was Lorcan's father, he had picked Darius up and raised them both. "Blood or not, he is still your family."

He focuses elsewhere except me, and at this point, I'm not sure whether I want to scream, cry, or have the pleasure of making the queen feel the same way I have since that day after Noctura.

"Does the queen..." I trail off, and Lorcan's nod proves me correct.

"And the General," he says.

How could I have been this stupid? When Lorcan said, I knew Darius's name at the dining table, Sarilyn and the General didn't seem phased. My head spins. "All this time, we've spoken of him, and you never once told me—"

"Because he killed my father when we were still children, Nara. He bit him, and I had to watch my father die a painful death," he says that last line like I'm supposed to be horrified by the ordeal.

"But you've also killed hundreds of his kind," I argue, my face burning enough for the volcanoes up north to erupt. "Some were still hatchlings. That's newborns, Lorcan!"

"I don't expect you to understand—"

"Because you don't tell me anything!"

"Neither do you!" It's the first I've heard him raise his voice in this manner. An unleash that sounds almost beastly. "Did you think I wouldn't question why you're trying to defend him? Or... your moment with him at the Noctura ball?"

I almost stumble backward at him, having known. "Did the queen tell you?"

A tight-lipped smile as he says with lethality, "You just did."

My lower body becomes numb that I fear I won't have anything to grip on if I fall.

"I suspected it from the moment he came in as Archer," He goes on, leaning his head forward. I don't move as he lowers his voice. "Your nerves at the idea of dancing with him, the strange thought that I knew him from somewhere."

Now I realize why he'd pulled me aside in the Draggards and told me how if anything was ever wrong, I could tell him. He'd looked at me like he knew I was hiding something. He wanted to see if I would mention Darius, yet I didn't.

"It may have taken me years to catch him, but I know Darius, I know what he's like, and he himself knew he'd eventually get caught."

"Hate can drive you to immense extremes, Miss Ambrose," Lorcan had uuttered that to me the first day of training. Had he meant Darius? The reason he now is a Venator.

He touches my arm, soft and attentive, my gaze shifts to it as he says, "Look, Nara, I need you to tell me if he took you to any hideout, any place where other shifters might be."

The den, Gus, all the dragons Darius had taken into his care. I've lied to Lorcan too often, too much, but I can't in good conscious tell him I know where other shifters reside.

"Just an abandoned cottage," I partially lie, and his silence either means he doesn't believe me or he's choosing otherwise.

"Did he... hurt you?"

My eyes jump to his at the worry tinted with anger in his voice. No, he took care of me.

Without being able to voice it, the words lodge in my throat, and I shake my head. As much as I have more questions, I can't seem to ask them. My chest cracks each minute I spend out here, knowing Darius is on his way to a cell and Tibith to the Draggards.

Lorcan releases a breath, one of stress, tiredness, and everything I imagine myself to feel. "Let's go." He gets back on the horse, and that same palm is out, waiting for me to accept it.

I can't.

I still can't.

"It's late, Nara," he says, a hollowness to his tone. "Please don't make this any harder."

Any harder?

My molars grind, and my vision is a teary blur. I was the one returning for you. I was holding my crescent thinking of you.

Temper nestles in me, and I decide not to grab him. Instead, I climb onto the saddle myself. His hand is left untouched as I wrap my arms around his middle.

"The first person I met at the jewelers wouldn't give up so easily," Darius had said, and I'd foolishly become defensive.

Lorcan stares at his palm for a few seconds more before he tugs at the reins, and the horse gallops past the trees.

"She would fight to win," Darius's words whisper in my head, and the speed of the horse's hooves clapping on the ground causes my hair to wave behind me with the brisk air.

I shut my eyes then open them up to the moon above the trees, glistening in silver starlight.

I'm choosing to fight.

And I will make sure to win at all costs.