To widen the distance between himself and Kyril, Corvin edged a step back, roughly drying his tears on his arm. He couldn't tell whether they fell in mourning of something lost or of an emotion still felt, but he wished they'd stop either way. He had to be rational, to keep his distance. That was how he'd survived the past week and he had to carry on. This was a strange, double-edged dream of a nightmare, and it would end soon.

The soft warmth that lingered on his cheek disagreed. So did his burning scars.

I'll always love you. He hissed in a sharp breath, forcing back the lump in his throat. "How did I even get here?" His gaze bounced from one side of the cavern to the other. "Where are we?"

Kyril spread his hands in a theatrical shrug. His small fangs poked out in a tentative grin, as if they couldn't stand being trapped for more than a moment. "I rescued you."

That answered neither question, though Corvin's guesses were believable enough that he saw no use asking again. Much as anxiety twisted his stomach, it wasn't incorrect, not in Kyril's eyes. He had been in danger in that arena, fatally so. Making one ally hadn't made any other mage less eager to see him dead.

He swallowed hard, shoving the thoughts to the back of his mind. They twined too easily with the memory of the night before, of Nyla's stony glare amid the darkness and the horrid taste of blood. Even recalling it dried his voice of any strength. "Where's Meag?"

Another shrug. "Somewhere safe, if she knows what's good for her." Never able to remain still, Kyril's feet tapped a rhythm beneath him, guiding him into a slow, swirling pace. His red, bushy tail flicked out to swish behind him. "I left no beast behind. We fleded, once we had what we came for." His glance was pointed and tinged with mischief.

Corvin's heart dropped like a stone. That awful, metallic sensation flooded his tongue with its full echo, tripping a chill down his spine, except this time his mind provided images of screaming humans in their hoards and mages battling back eager claws and fangs. "You did all that for me?"

Either Kyril didn't detect the fear in his tone or chose to close every ear to it. "Of course." He ventured forward again, stopping short like a barrier stood between them, though his gaze was no less clinging. His furry ears bent, tail dusting the floor beside his feet. "I love you." Yearning swelled within his eyes. "I will do whatever it takes to save you."

Instinct beckoned Corvin's hand to his arm, where it rubbed up and down, skin prickling with exposure. It kept the tears at bay. His fingers snagged on the triplet of scars curving over the thin muscle.

Kyril's attention trailed every gesture; he noticed immediately, and his shoulders sloped, lips pinching. He raked a hand through his russet hair and spun, looking away. "Oh, Corvi," he muttered, "I felt so guilty." He peeked through a ragged wave of locks. "I was so afraid I'd lose you, it nearly broke me."

Emphasis poured through with nearly every word, thickening his voice with emotion. Corvin went stiffer with each one. Kyril had never wanted to settle, never been content to sit and wallow, always pouncing on the next big idea or positive thought to banish any sorrow, but even so he did not appear anything like a broken man. His eyes were bright with their natural sun-kissed-earth shine. The same energy as always thrummed through him. If anything, it doubled within a single moment, eking out as excitement as he whirled again to rush forward.

"But now you have so wonderfully returned to us..." He grinned, bouncing on his heels. "You'll love the progress we've made. It's happening, Corvi. The stage is finally set for our war."

If there was any fight left in Corvin, it trickled out of him then, leaving his bones heavy with an empty, sinking feeling. The sun outside had never felt further away. He slid to the ground, tucking his chin into folded arms as he stared blankly ahead. "Our war," he echoed.

Kyril was swift to join him. Tail flicking, he flopped against Corvin's side, outstretched hand painting an arc in the air as his words filled in the picture's details. Corvin didn't want to glance over nor listen to anything more, not about this same old obsession, not about war and the destruction to come, but he did anyway. He always listened.

"Everything is perfectly in place." Kyril's grin was unshakeable. "Lyxxira is incredible, I must say. She's rallied forces from across the dunes. Now we've struck once"—his elbow levered into Corvin's ribs—"we'll have shaken their arrogance a little, but they're so sickeningly full of it that they'll think it's over. They think they've won like always, but they don't yet know the full extent of what we're capable of." He looked over, face so shiningly lit with glee and desire and all of it tossed somewhere past Corvin's shoulder, out at something hidden amid the flowers' threaded shadows that only he could see. "The next time we attack, their city will crumble."

The image scrawled itself within Corvin's mind. He saw clouds of powerless grey dust staining the horizon in place of their smoke, piles of pale bricks spilling into streets, and Kyril perched atop the destruction, sun blurring his face in a smudged circle like a crown. More details filled in today. He pictured Raya's house gone, the caged room where he'd sheltered caved in on itself. Glassy-eyed bodies littered the ruined streets, the scene he and Meag had caused out in the desert multiplied many, many times. He smelled blood.

This was no new revelation. Kyril had stood alone in the dream for a long time. Dead beasts surrounded him too, a sacrifice only one of them was willing to make.

Fear slithered up Corvin's spine, reaching up an icy fist to freeze his tongue. Pain sank into the grooves of his scars. His heart sped up, beating in apprehension until his ears rang. He stared into Kyril's glittering gaze, lost, plunging downwards, the abyss below parting seamlessly with no attempt to stop his fall.

Kyril's brows knitted together, sewing in a focus Corvin didn't want. He curled both hands around Corvin's arm and pushed into a crouch, furred chin tickling the skin between his fingers as he peered in. He smiled softly. "Don't be afraid, doe. You want to live freely, don't you?"

Corvin's voice was little more than a whistle, cracked through the middle, but he forced it out. "Not like that."

A sharper, shadowed glint flickered to life in Kyril's eyes. His claws were cold against Corvin's skin.

A chill wrapped his heart, and he made his next words equally as cold, despite how they shook. If it ended the same, so be it. "Nothing has changed," he said. "I still want no part in your war."

Tension fogged the air between them, thick and venomous with silence. The places Kyril's claws dug in began to sting. He noticed and teased them away, but not before sticky beads of blood trickled the curve of Corvin's arm, a deeper scarlet than his missing robe. Where was his robe? He cared little for clothes, but he felt cold without the extra layer of protection now. Curled against the wall with his gaze warily tracking Kyril's push to his feet, he hardly dared breathe, skin a patchwork of itches and shivers.

Claws interlacing behind his back, Kyril swept into a pace, then paused, focus distant. His tail coiled half a spiral against his back, its bristles stiff. Stone carved his locked jaw and sealed him in silence. He was a statue, an imitation of Kyril. The difference was not him, yet it sat upon his features with ease, smoothing and poising each one to perfection as if he were a reflection in something molten and colourless.

The quiet was a poison. It dripped as if from a beast's jaws, hissing without sound, grating Corvin's nerves. He ached for it to be full, yet the moment he opened his mouth to explain more, his feeble words were drowned out.

"Fear is natural." This version of Kyril's voice was lower, too, softly laid on a bed of growls. "It brings confusion. You don't know what you want."

Corvin wished the rebuke swelling in the back of his throat wasn't so withered. "Ky—"

"I know, though." Kyril turned his face, freckles gilded in virescent silver. The light outside was dying as evening approached. Its leaking rays were bolder in shade, deepened to a vague crimson that wove strands of flame into his russet hair, ears, and sparse patches of fur. Green light swamped the rest of him, sharpening the shadows that shaped his expression. "You'll see, once we have it. You're not the only one I've had to convince."

The words' pricklier undertone wasn't difficult to pick out, nor was their message: either way, Corvin didn't have a choice.

He felt that as a weight in his bones even as a smile flickered to Kyril's lips, returning a fragment of warmth to his eyes. He stretched out a hand. "You only have to trust me, and I'll protect you. Will you do as I say?"

The answer was already on Corvin's tongue, flat as it was. His held-back sigh faded out, and he accepted the hand, legs obediently folding as he allowed himself to be pulled to his feet. "I always do."

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