The Horde King of Shadow (Hordes of the Elthika #1)

Chapter 5

SARKIN

“Think they’ll attempt to retaliate tonight?” Feranos asked me, sliding off Vorna’s back, and his Elthika leapt to the sky, disappearing into the dark clouds above. Zaridan was above us as well, circling, surveying, waiting. She grew impatient so far from home.

“No,” I answered, turning my gaze back to Dothik, the glittering city I’d once dreamed of seeing in person as a child. The Dakkari’s capital was impressive, though I was disappointed. Fantastical stories never mixed well with a true reality.

Dothik looked tired. Tired and unwelcoming. The middle of this continent was dry, hot, and drab. I didn’t know how most Dakkari lived here, how they lived on the inhospitable wilds of this place. The West Lands of their country, with its lakes and hills, held more promise. It reminded me more of home.

“For all the Dothikkar ’s faults, I don’t think he’s a fool. Neither is the heir,” I continued. I was sitting on the ledge of a mountain to the west of the city. We were camped on the other side for the night. How Feranos had found me was a mystery. “The Hartans learned to kneel to the Elthika. The Dakkari will learn to do the same.”

“The Elders will not be pleased that instead of a heartstone, we come home with a Dakkari princess,” Feranos warned.

“I always deliver what I promise, don’t I?” I asked, cutting a look over to him.

“But the heartstone?—”

“Is but one ,” I finished, cutting off his words. “One dying heartstone. That’s not what we need. We must be patient, for a little longer.”

Feranos went quiet. “The princess?”

“Yes,” I said. “Zaridan knows what she’s doing. I might not understand it fully quite yet, but I’m beginning to. I trust in my Elthika more than anything, just like any Sarrothian. Wouldn’t you trust in a mate Vorna chose for you?”

“Yes,” Feranos said, his voice hushed in its quiet reverence. “I would.”

Unlike Feranos, I’d never believed in fate…but after today, I wondered if I’d been wrong. I’d heard my dragon’s song—the sy’asha —and I remembered the dizzying jolt of my future wife’s words.

I have seen your forests of heartstones. Perhaps you’re greedy for just one more.

She thought us greedy? She was wrong.

We were starving for mere scraps.

There was ancient Elthikan magic here—I could feel it. The heartstones had infused their power into this land. It breathed life into this place, cultivated itself in its sons and daughters. It flowed in the rivers, it enriched the soil, it was in the wind that blew from the north and in the waves that crashed against the cliffs in the south.

One thing was clear to me, however. It was diminished here too, just as it was in Karak. The Dakkari didn’t seem to realize what would happen when that power was depleted entirely.

But we did.

“I still think we should take the heartstone, Sarkin,” Feranos said, shaking his head. “We should try , at the very least, to take it to the Arsadia. To see if it will take.”

“No,” I said, the word sharp and firm. I inhaled a long breath, looking back to Dothik. “One thing we know about the Dakkari is they are a spiritual people. To take the heartstone is to offend their goddess. They will never forgive it. It once belonged to great kings here. Let it rest and die here. We won’t need it soon anyway. And forging a path in peace is easier than in blood.”

“The Hartans know that,” Feranos said, his low laugh echoing along the mountains. I heard the great gust of wings overhead from our Elthika.

I inclined my head. “And if Elysom’s council decides that we conquer this territory for Karak…well, by then the Dakkari will already be kneeling.”

“Sometimes I forget how you are,” my friend said suddenly. “It’s been too long since you’ve had a challenge. You get restless without one.”

With a grin, I look back to Dothik. I wondered which glittering turret my future wife was in. I wondered if she would sleep this night. That restless part of me—the one Feranos spoke of—almost wished she would run…if only so I could hunt her down.

“Get some rest,” I ordered my second rider. “The journey home will be long tomorrow with the storms coming in.”

Feranos nodded…yet he didn’t move.

“The scar on her face, Sarkin,” he finally said, quietly. “I’ve never seen a bonding mark like it. You…are certain?”

Not for the first time, I wished I could open my mind to Zaridan. But it was one of the powers that had been lost to us with the depletion of the heartstone magic. I wanted to ask her why . Why this female?

“No,” I said, the truth escaping my lips with a harsh breath. “But my Elthika is. She’s never led me astray.”

I met Feranos’s worried gaze.

“And she won’t now.”

“ If Zaridan is wrong, you know what would happen,” Feranos said, his tone careful and hushed, like we would be overheard or that I might take offense. Because he knew. He might’ve been one of my oldest friends…but I was still his Karath . His king.

My jaw ticked.

“I won’t lose the citadel. And I won’t lose the horde. Not with Zaridan at my side, not with you, not with the riders. Elysom wouldn’t dare take it,” I rasped.

Feranos inclined his head. “Your aunt only looks for opportunities to take it from you. I don’t mean anything by it, Sarkin. It’s nothing you haven’t already thought yourself.”

“We’ve weathered worse,” I gave him, letting the words slide because I knew they came from concern. “Haven’t we?”

The corner of his scarred lip turned up. “Yes, Karath , we have.”

“This will be no different,” I said, nodding at Dothik in the distance. “Their dying heartstone stays. I will complete my duty as promised and in full. Once and for all, I’ll silence Elysom.”

“And this time you get a pretty little wife out of it.”

My mood soured, and I scoffed.

Standing, I tapped at my inner wrist, at the black cuff that emitted a sound undetectable to our own ears. But I heard Zari respond, approaching.

“In title only,” I rasped. “You saw her. She’s not strong enough to stand at my side, much less bond with an Elthika of her own. The Sarrothian will never accept her as their true queen.”

Besides, I’d never intended to marry. Ever.

“Then why?—”

“Because Zaridan knows we can use her,” I said, looking at Feranos’s perplexed expression. He would need to know eventually. “She knows where there are more heartstones.”

“Truly?” Feranos asked quietly, going still.

I nodded.

“So let Dothik have their dying one. We will have more than we know what to do with soon enough. And then no one on this planet—not the Dakkari or the Hartans or the Selkavars—will ever be able to stand against Karag power again. Our home will be protected and secure for the rest of our days. That is what I want.”

Zaridan circled overhead before landing on a ledge along the mountain cliff.

“I won’t stop until it’s done,” I promised.