Iron Flame (The Empyrean, #2)

by Rebecca Yarros

“Be careful of the medium you choose to hold the rune. A bit more power and that board would have gone up in flames.” “Why does no one teach this?”

“It’s a skill the Tyrrish once controlled and perfected, but it was banned a couple hundred years after the unification of Navarre, even though many of our outposts and Basgiath itself were built upon them.

You see, riders are naturally more powerful, given the amount of magic we channel and the signets we wield.”

“A rune is only limited to how much power you choose to temper, how long you want it to last, and how many uses it has before it depletes. They banned runes so they wouldn’t fall into the wrong hands.” She glances at the fliers. “Your hands, specifically. Get good enough at runes, and you can compete with a fair amount of signets.”

Before sunset, I manage to weave an unlocking rune, but I’m not the first. Cat has that honor and, unlike the rest of us, no scorch marks beneath her feet.

“This is why you left me that book in Navarre, isn’t it?” I take the next strand and form the circle that should stabilize the shapes within and place it around the rune. That should do it. “I wanted you to have a head start,” he says, picking up Warrick’s journal from where I abandoned it on the desk and thumbing through it.

I grin at the domesticity of it. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to keep it just like this between us. “My father taught me.” I shrug, examining my rune for anything I might have missed. “And Dain and I used it as a secret code when we were kids.” “Never pictured Aetos as the Old Lucerish type,” Xaden notes.

“A variation of it, yes.” Holding the best rune of my attempts, I lift my pack to my shoulders and slip my arms through the straps as I stand, turning to face him. His torso is still gloriously bare, but unfortunately—or fortunately for my schedule—he has pants on.

“You can do the unlocking rune. It’s simple enough.” He shrugs. “I added an element of need into the rune. So, you can’t walk up to any door and open it just because you want to, but if the dagger’s on your body and picks up on the need for a door to unlock, it will. If you’d made it up to the forge at Basgiath, it would have opened to your need.” Sitting on the edge of the bed, he puts on his boots. “I had the key the entire time?” My eyebrows rise, and if I didn’t already love him, I would have fallen right then.

“There’s not a person alive who knows how to replicate this. Colonel Mairi was the last.” Liam and Sloane’s mom. I take the palm-size stone and study the intricate lines of the rune. “It had to have been giant when she tempered it.” “I assume so. She must have collapsed it to fit when placing them into the stones.” “Stones?” I look up at him. “As in more than one?”

“Did. It’s a protection rune, but it was only intended to be used once.” He runs his hand through his damp hair and pauses. “As you get better with runes, you can pull elements into them.

This particular rune was made to protect someone of my father’s bloodline.” “You.” I look up and hand the stone back. “You’re his only child, right?”

“Each of the children of the officers were given them before our parents left for the Battle of Aretia. We were told to carry them at all times, and we did, even to the executio...

“It was designed to counter the signet of the rider whose dragon would kill them.” He swallows. “But it could only activate when killed by dragonfire.” “Which is the primary method of execution for traitors,” I whisper.

“The rebellion relics?” That must be why the swirling marks always start on the marked ones’ arms. He nods. “Our parents knew they’d die one way or another, and the last thing they did was make sure we were protected. I keep it purely for sentimental reasons.”

It’s on the tip of my tongue to question why he didn’t tell me about the deal he made with my mother and ask if it influenced his feelings for me.

“Yesterday’s outburst of violence was absolutely unacceptable,” the fliers’ professor starts, her auburn braid sliding over her shoulder as she turns her head, addressing all cadets, not just the fliers. “Working together is what’s going to make a difference in this war, and it has to start here!” She turns her finger on the rider cadets. “Good luck with that,”

“You will respect one another as equals. We may be in Aretia, but as of today, we’ve decided the Dragon Rider’s Codex still applies to every cadet.” “And as their guests,” the flier professor says, placing a hand on her ample hip, “all fliers will abide by it.” A disgruntled murmur rolls through their half. “Is that clear?”

“So choose carefully, because tomorrow, the rider or flier you hold contempt for may be off-limits.” Oh shit. My stomach drops. There’s only one reason someone couldn’t call a challenge, but they wouldn’t…would they? “Challenges between squadmates are forbidden under the Codex,”

“Catriona Cordella and Violet Sorrengail,” Devera announces. “Disarm and take the mat.” “Don’t do this.” Maren tries to talk Cat out of it, but there’s nothing but determination in her narrowed gaze. “Of-fucking-course.” I hand the conduit to Rhiannon.

“Scratch her eyes out,” Andarna suggests. “Really. The eyes are the softest tissue. Just jab your thumbs in there—” “Andarna! Use some common sense,” Tairn snaps. “The kneecaps are a much easier target.” “Quiet time, now.”

“Unconscious or taps out,” Cat finishes without taking her eyes off me. “We know.” “Begin.” Devera steps off the mat, and I block out the noise around me, giving all my focus to Cat as she takes a familiar fighting stance. I do the same, keeping my body loose and ready for movement. If she’s quick on the attack like Imogen said, then I’ll need to play defense.

combination of punches that I block with my forearms, shifting my body so the blows glance off without their full impact. It’s…easy, like I know the choreography. Like it’s muscle memory. Her stance adjusts, and I jump back a second before she kicks out. Connecting only with air, her balance falters as I land, and she stumbles sideways. Holy shit. She fights like Xaden. He trained both of us.

“Does it bother you?” she asks, lowering her voice as she raises her hands. “Knowing he taught me first? That I had him first?” “Not at all, since I have him now.” I swallow the sour jealousy that rises with the burn of bile in my throat. “Really?” She jabs, and I weave. “The thought that I know what he tastes like?” She throws another combination that I block, then retreats as if it was nothing but a test. “How his weight feels above me?”

“I think it does bother you,” she says softly as we circle again. “Seeing me here, where I belong. Sleeping right down the hall. I bet it keeps you awake at night, knowing I’m a better match for him in every way, counting the seconds until he tires of your frail excuse for a body and comes back to the woman who knows exactly what he likes and how he likes it.”

“That you’re obsessed with fighting over a man.” Rage fuels my movements when I go on the attack, but she’s ready for every combination I have. Because they’re all fucking his. “You going to do something about this?” I hear someone ask from outside the haze of anger that’s slowing my reaction time.

“You seem angry, Violet. Are you just now realizing you’re nothing special? That you’re just a convenient placeholder he can fuck?” Her laugh is low and cruel. “I know how good he is. I’m the one who taught him that little trick he does with his fingers. You know, the one where he curls—”

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I snap. “It is not my fault that he doesn’t love you!” “Of course he doesn’t!” She grabs hold of my arm and rolls with astonishing speed, twisting it behind my back. White-hot agony streaks through me, making my mouth water. “He’s not capable of loving anyone,” she hisses in my ear. “You think I’m so petty that I’d attack another woman over love?”

Anger and envy pound through my veins with every heartbeat, strangling logic until I’m nothing but rage. “You’re too short-sighted for him,” she says quietly, like she’s afraid of being heard. “He thinks ahead, just like me. Gods, do you even know why he didn’t kill you that first year? I do. Because he trusted me to look ahead with him.”

She knows about the deal with my mother. He told her. My fingers tingle, and I know I’ll lose feeling in the entire limb soon, but that doesn’t stop my body from trembling with fury…with rising power.

“Look at where we are. Riorson House.” Her mouth is close enough to my ear that I can feel how hard she’s breathing. “Who wouldn’t love all that power and the case it comes in? But I’m sure as hell not fighting you over a man’s affections. I’m going to war with you for a crown.

That was the reason we were engaged. It was promised to me, and I’m not giving it to a damned Sorrengail who chose to drop the flier instead of her squadmate. Your entire family deserves to die for what you’ve put us through.” A crown? Engaged? My chest aches because it all makes sense. Two aristocratic families in need of an alliance. And I’m nowhere near nobility. “And gods, get some control over your emotions, would you? You’re so fucking weak it’s pathetic.” Her words are a string of hisses. Fuck her.

I’m going to fucking kill her. How dare she come after me, like I had a choice in Luella’s fall? Like I had anything to do with Xaden’s choice to leave her? Fuck that. How dare she come after what’s mine. He isn’t a crown. He isn’t a stepping stool for power. He isn’t a tool to elevate her standing. He’s everything. Her face turns a mottled shade of red, and her eyes widen with panic. “Violet!” someone shouts. A woman. A friend, maybe?

There’s only the swirling, chaotic vortex of anger and jealousy and— She’s fucking cheating, using mindwork. “Get out of my head!” I scream so loudly my throat burns.

“Because she cheated!” Imogen shouts. “She used mindwork!” “She’s the one who’s unhinged!” Cat’s voice breaks multiple times, and she jabs her finger at me. “I’m unhinged? I’ll show you unhinged when I kill you for fucking with my head!” I lunge against Xaden’s arms, but he holds tight. “Let me know if you actually mean it.” He lifts me off my feet. “Catriona!” Professor Kiandra forces her way through the line of fliers. “Tell me you didn’t…” She glances from Cat to me and back again. “Let go, Cat!” “Fuck her!”

“And fuck her entire family. I hope you all die for what you’ve done to us!” Surging against Xaden’s strength does no good. He has me locked down. But power whips through

me and releases with a searing crack. Lightning strikes simultaneously with thunder, flashing white across my vision. Cadets scream and the scent of smoke fills the air. Xaden flings a hand outward, and shadows stream toward t...

“My house. My chair. My woman.” He punctuates each claim with a flick of his thumb, popping button by button free. Need floods my body, flushes my skin with a heady, addictive rush.

He’s the only person in this world I can’t get enough of. The only one I constantly crave. Love. Chemistry. Attraction. Desire. Everything between us keeps me constantly burning like an ember; a single touch is all it takes to send us both up in flames. By the time he breaks the kiss, his breathing ragged as he orders me to lift my hips, I don’t care where we are as long as he puts his hands on me. The whole Assembly could walk through those doors and I wouldn’t notice, not with the way Xaden’s looking at me. The heat in his eyes could melt iron.

Shimmering onyx wraps around my mind and everything intensifies. A driving, pounding, uncontrollable need courses through me with every beat of my pulse, demanding an outlet, demanding I rip through the confines of the leather and trade her sweet taste for the incomparable perfection of sinking into her when she comes. Xaden. I gasp for breath, gripping the conduit so tightly I prepare for the sound of breaking glass. It’s his desire flooding our bond, compounding my own. His desperation. His power brushing against mine.

“And I don’t particularly care if Cat lives, but I’m not cheering for her to die, either. She’s a necessary yet volatile ally, and Syrena would be a disastrous enemy to make. But I do care that you would have regretted killing her.”

“We’ll get to that in a second. The betrothal clause of the alliance kicked in when she turned twenty.” The table creaks as he fully sits back against it. “We tried it out for about three-quarters of a year, but we weren’t compatible, and it came to light that Tecarus was never going to let us have the luminary anyway. He wanted us to use it there. I ended the betrothal, which, as you know, caused some problems.”

Felix won’t miss the conduit if I throw it at Xaden’s head, will he? “Oh really? You heard what she said. How would you feel if one of my previous lovers had you on the mat for a challenge, then told you that he knows how I taste?” He tenses. “How I feel on top of him?” I lower my tone, letting sex slide over every single word. “How he had me first and insinuates that he plans on having me last, too?”

“I knew that the second he kissed you after Threshing. It looked awkward as fuck.” He shoves his hand through his still-mussed hair. “And to answer the question, I’d feel jealous, which is something you have a unique ability to bring out in me. And then I’d kick his ass, partially because that’s what I do when someone challenges me, and more importantly for implying there’s any other future besides the one where you and I are endgame.”

everything she had at me, and it worked.” “Anger, I understand. She said a lot that pissed me off, too.” He shakes his head. “But inferiority is something you’ll have to explain, considering you’re more powerful than any other cadet.” “It has nothing to do with signets.” I gesture to the giant chair I’m seated on. “She pointed out that you’re a Riorson.” “You’ve known that since Parapet.” He taps the rebellion relic along his neck. “That’s not what I mean. You just called this chair a throne.”

“Cat was right in one regard. She is the better match. She’s noble by birth, brave for becoming a flier, driven, ruthless, and mean as hell, just like you.” Fuck, they’re pretty much the same person.

“Violet, you were just in my thoughts. You know I think you’re perfect, even when you frustrate the shit out of me. Now tell me about the insecurity. I thought we handled that last year.” “Sure, before I knew you were leading a revolution, and before you declared you’d always keep secrets, and way before some beautiful aristocrat who you used to be betrothed to but conveniently was never mentioned appeared with her big brown doe eyes and sharp-ass claws at our bedroom door half naked—”

“She can take you from irritation to full-on rage in the span of a minute or two. And yes, she’s really fucking powerful, but so are you. But the only weapons she wields are the ones you hand her. You want to keep control of your emotions? You need to have control in the first place.”

“You are a creature of logic and facts, and everything you know got turned upside down and shaken. You’ll never know how truly sorry I am for that. But you can’t just sit there and hope. You want it to change, then you have to figure it out, just like Gauntlet. You’re the only one who can.” He says it a hell of a lot kinder than he did last year. “But how do I find my center while in the middle of a Cat storm?” I moan.

“You asked to see me?” Dain folds his arms across his chest. “Of your own volition? No orders or anything?” For a second, I hesitate. Then I remember that he stabbed Varrish, he called the formation to split the quadrant, and when the truth came to light, he chose exile with a group of people who despise him because it was the right thing to do. “I need your help.” “All right.” He nods without waiting for an explanation. And just like that, I remember why he used to be one of my favorite people on the Continent.