SWNOVELS Chapter Skyshade: GOLDEN
Isla had surprised Oro in his chambers. The following day, everything could change.
She wanted a piece of happiness, a slice of summer, something to hold on to during the bloodshed. So she had put on a red dress that molded against her every inch. And now, she waited.
Isla felt his heat before she saw him, a radiance that nearly brought her to her knees, and then he was filling the door, and staring at her, and she wasn’t sure he was breathing. He had gone still, fingers still curled around the door’s handle.
She smiled, pleased. “I take it you like it.” Her voice was a rasp she almost didn’t recognize.
His own was strained. “If by like, you mean I want to tear it to shreds with my teeth, then yes. I like it very much.”
His words were like embers catching fire, a heat dropping right through her. She wanted him now. She wanted everything.
He closed the door behind him and stalked toward her, eyes intently studying her dress the way she had watched him study maps and battle plans. He looked at her like he was trying to navigate the easiest way under it.
A moment later, he had her against the wall, and she inhaled sharply. He ducked toward her mouth, but she stopped him with a hand against his chest.
“Can we pretend?” she asked.
“Pretend?”
“Pretend for just a moment that you’re not the king, and I’m not your enemy.” If only. If only.
He frowned. She didn’t like to upset him, but she secretly loved it when he frowned; it reminded her of the Centennial, back before she had admitted to herself that she could tolerate the Sunling king. “Isla,” he said against her forehead. “You could never be my enemy.”
Her voice trembled. “I’m Nightshade. I opened the portal without realizing. I helped him find the sword. I made it possible for Grim to destroy everything.”
Anger flared in his expression. “You didn’t know. Most of this happened in the past.”
“Can we pretend there’s no past, then? That it’s been you and me from the beginning?” She wanted that so badly. More than anything.
For a moment, she wondered if he would send her away.
But then he said, right against her lips. “Tonight . . . we can pretend anything you want, love.”
Need prickled her skin. They had all night. All night to pretend like they might not all die the next day. “I want you to do something for me. I want you to make my dress gold.”
He seemed confused. “I’ll call for Leto after all this is over.”
A smile tugged at her mouth. “No.” She looked down at her dress and was met with the sight of her chest, straining against the low, tight bodice. She heard him swallow, also watching her. “The one I’m wearing. Turn it gold.”
She knew what gilding meant to him, the trauma behind it. She wanted to take that trauma and turn it into trust.
He hesitated, so she went on her toes, and said against his mouth, “I trust you. You won’t hurt me.” It was true. He was the only person in the world who had earned all her trust. Then she whispered, “Turn it gold. Please.”
The hand he had pressed against the wall next to her head flexed.
Slowly, slowly, his fingers lightly gripped the side of her waist, thumb rubbing down, and they both watched as the red fabric of her dress gave way to the thinnest gold foil, down her stomach, to the floor. It was an impractical choice. The gold foil was so thin, even the slightest movement would rip it.
He made a primal sound, watching, seeing her in his realm’s color. Just when he was about to reach for her lips again, she said, “Now melt it off me.”
His brows came together. “I’ll hurt you.”
“You won’t.”
Before he could protest again, a Starling shield raced across her skin.
His eyes widened in surprise, then intensified, taking in the gold and glittering silver. She felt powerful. In control.
“Now,” she repeated. “Melt it off me.”
It didn’t seem like she would have to ask him again. He ran his knuckles down the center of her chest, to her stomach, and watched the dress melt down her body like a candle, revealing every inch of her little by little. The gold slipped into a puddle that hardened in a circle around her feet, and she was completely bare in front of him. Her Starling shield fell away.
The way he was looking at her . . . it made her remember when he said, I wish you could see yourself the way I do. You would never doubt yourself again. “You’re looking at me like I’m something to worship,” she said, nerves swirling in her stomach.
He made a low sound of need as he stepped forward, leaning into her. His voice was just a rasp as he said, “Do you want me on my knees for you, love?”
Her answer was immediate. “Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
She nodded, ready. She felt raw, needy, desperate to feel him. “I think I might die if you don’t touch me.”
Slowly, eyes never leaving hers, he sank to his knees before her . . . and that heat turned to a pulsing, relentless ache. “We wouldn’t want that,” he said.
Then, he gripped behind her knee and hooked her leg over his shoulder.
She gasped. At the first press of his mouth, she bucked against him, making a sound that mixed with a whimper, and he pinned her against the wall with a hand against her lower stomach. She writhed below him, pleading, making the types of promises that made him growl against her.
Her pleasure was a wildfire, razing the world, setting it aflame, flaring with every stroke, every nip. Their eyes were locked when it all crested. She gasped. Her hand hit the wall, and energy spiraled out of it, cracking the stone in several directions. For a moment, they just stared at each other, eyes ablaze. Chests heaving. No one had ever made her feel this way: cherished, like the full force of the sun was upon her, shining, melting all her troubles away. She trusted him fully, and that trust deepened every moment they shared. Every connection.
Oro gently set her on the ground again, and she shook her head, spent and still aching for more. “How are we ever going to leave this room?” she asked. She meant it.
“If it was up to me, we never would.” Then, he reached down, swept her into his arms, and carried her to the bed.
As soon as her body pressed against the silken sheets, she reached for him. Her hand pressed against his chest, and they watched as his shirt burned away, the flames licking his skin. She was using his power.
He looked at her like he was seeing her for the first time, like she was something wondrous and rare, and she couldn’t take it anymore. She wanted everything with him. She wanted it while they still could. Who knew what the next day would bring?
With a burst of energy, she pulled him under her and climbed atop him, straddling him. Slowly, she ground her hips against his, and they both groaned at the contact. Her head fell back, and she balanced her hands behind her as she moved against him, pace quickening.
“I want you,” she said, panting. “I want all of you.”
He sat up, gripped her backside, and shifted them both until his back hit the headboard. Her hands fell to his shoulders, and he reached his own hand between them.
She gave him a look that said that wasn’t exactly what she meant—that she wanted all of him—but when he touched her, she groaned, and her eyes fell closed again. “More,” she said, reaching down to direct him where she wanted him, deeper. When he did, she gasped and leaned down to press her forehead against his. They were both breathing too quickly, sharing breath, and she looked him right in the eyes as she said, “I love you. I could never not love you.”
I love you.
He pressed his thumb where she liked it, and she curled her nails into his shoulders.
She moved on him with abandon, arching her back, wanting it to last, wishing this fire she felt when he touched her would rage forever. He stared up at her, transfixed, his other hand curved around her hip, tightening when she cried out.
“Oro,” she said, eyes blazing into his as her body tightened and he sat up quickly, as if he couldn’t help himself. His hand at her hip curled around the back of her neck, and he pulled her lips to his, tongue stroking her through her pleasure. It was a savage kiss, hard and desperate, like they might not see another night, like he could memorize the taste of her.
“I love you too,” he finally said when she stilled, melting against him. “No world exists in which I do not love you.”
At that, she pressed her lips against his neck, and went lower. Lower. Suddenly, she was off him and removing the rest of his clothing.
“Isla—” he said.
“Oro,” she responded near his hips, looking up at him, before continuing her exploring.
The first press of her lips against him, he fisted the sheets in his hands, and they burned away beneath his fingertips.
The rumble of her laugh against him seemed to undo him, because he groaned.
She groaned too, the sound melting into a gasp. Her body twisted.
Only to scrape against hard rock. A dream. It had been a dream of a memory, and—
At once, she remembered herself. Where she was.
Who she was with.
Oro sat on the other side of the cave, watching her. His eyes had darkened to a shade she had just seen, in her mind. He looked like he hadn’t slept at all.
She opened her mouth. Closed it. “I—did I say anything. . . . in my sleep?”
“My name. Constantly.”
Right. Her cheeks burned. “I—”
“Nothing I haven’t heard before,” Oro said, before standing.
Her eyes slid to the entrance, and she saw that the storm had cleared. “Why didn’t you wake me?” she demanded.
“You looked like you were enjoying yourself.”
Anger replaced any remaining shred of want. Then, shame. Enjoying herself.
The longer it took her to figure out how to close the portal, the more people would suffer. How could she be this guided by feeling?
What would Grim think, with her gone so long? Would he panic? Was he okay?
If something happened to him because she was taking too long, she would never forgive herself. She shook the sand from her clothes quickly, dressed, and met Oro outside.
The sun was gone, and part of the heat had lifted. The tooth in her pocket trembled. Still, even though it was supposed to lead their path, Oro stepped in front of her.
She frowned. “How—”
“There’s only one structure out here, past the gates. Unless your pages are buried in the sand, I know where we’re going.”
Oh.
In the relative coolness of night and after a bit of rest, she moved across the desert quicker than ever.
It was hours before her head began to throb again from dehydration. Her tongue felt heavy and rough in her mouth. It hurt to swallow.
Her eyes stung with every blink. Her sunburnt skin was painful to the touch. Everything felt dry, and she was desperate for the oasis Oro had promised.
By the time dawn broke, the tooth was practically shaking out of her pocket. They were getting close. Still, as the heat of the day intensified, her eyes began to close. She muscles went slack. She would have fallen right into the sand if it hadn’t been for a strong arm curled around her waist.
“Hey,” he said, somewhere above her. “The oasis is up ahead. You can make it.”
It was easy for him to say. He was Sunling. He was used to this unrelenting heat. It invigorated him, in some ways. She tried to reach for his power, seeing if it might give her a surge of energy, but she was too weak now. None of it held. It felt like she was falling again, and he jerked forward to catch her.
Then, she was off her feet and in his arms.
Her eyes opened the slightest bit, crusted in sand that they had kicked up on their journey, only to see Oro above her, looking forward.
He didn’t slow in the slightest, even though he was now carrying her. If anything, his pace quickened.
She should insist he put her down. Instead, she almost melted into his touch. Being Grim’s wife made him her enemy, yet she trusted him more than almost anyone.
That trust made her body stop fighting. She went in and out of consciousness. Her senses were snuffed out, one by one. Sun seared her skin, burning it, until suddenly, she was plunged into water.
Isla gasped and gripped Oro in shock. Her arms curled around his neck; her chest went flush against his.
The oasis. The water was hot, but with Oro’s ability it cooled, and she almost whimpered in relief, clinging to him, afraid she would lose consciousness again and drown.
“May I?” Oro asked, a hand outstretched.
She nodded, and his fingers carefully slipped across her skin. She flinched, raw, burned red; but under his touch, her pain eased. Carefully, he healed her burns, using his limited strength on her.
Her eyes closed, and she tried to focus on anything else but the careful, practiced way he touched her, like he had done it a hundred times before, because he had. He knew her body . . . and she knew his.
He was just healing her, she told herself. Helping her. It was innocent.
But there was nothing innocent about her pulse quickening. Or the heat that dripped down her spine.
“Thank you,” she whispered, far too close to his face, when he finished.
Then she fell backward, and he released her into the water.
Isla let herself sink. She relished the smoothness, the cold, the way the roots of her hair were massaged, how the sand separated from her body and clothes. She pooled water in her hands and drank greedily, quickly.
“Slowly,” Oro said. “You’ll make yourself sick.”
She wanted to drink the entire damn oasis, but she listened.
When she was satiated, she swam to the edge of the pool and turned away from Oro, then began stripping off her clothing. She rinsed each item and set them out on a cluster of smooth rocks to dry. It was only when she had sunk back into the water that she realized they were both naked inside of it.
Before—in the cave—that had been different. She hadn’t been herself. She had been fighting to survive in the heat. She’d been asleep.
Now she had most of her sanity back. She looked down. Her chest was nearly exposed, and she sank deeper. Covered herself with her arms.
Oro’s brows rose. She could practically read his mind. It wasn’t anything he hadn’t seen before, hadn’t touched before, hadn’t tasted before. But things were different now.
At least, they were supposed to be.
Traitor. The word echoed through her mind. In this very moment, she wasn’t quite sure who she was betraying. Maybe everyone, including herself.
His fiery eyes pierced right through her. “Are you happy?” he asked, out of nowhere.
Her answer came too quickly. “Yes.”
He looked unconvinced, and Isla almost asked him if it had been a lie. She was happy. She loved Grim.
But she loved Oro too.
The pool was shallow. She watched as he slowly approached her, water rippling around him, as if rushing to move out of his way.
Under the sun, in this place, he looked like a god. Golden hair turned darker by the water, wild strands clinging to his forehead. Sunkissed skin over rippling muscle.
He got closer, and closer, until he was towering over her.
“Why did you get married again?” he asked.
She remembered why she had told him about it in the first place. To make him hate her. To make him forget her.
She still hoped he would.
Oro had warned her before about using blood for power, and that was what she was doing now, to an even greater degree. Her skyre was still hidden by the thinnest snip of shadow, but if he learned about it, he would be upset. He wouldn’t understand.
She was dangerous. Reckless. Even without the prophecy, he deserved better. One day, she could hurt him without even meaning to.
“I married him again because I wanted to,” she said, hoping the statement held enough truth. Oro looked unconvinced.
He leaned closer, until his breath was against her forehead. “So that’s it? You’re my enemy now?”
She swallowed at his proximity and nodded.
He tilted his head at her. “That’s what you want?”
Yes. “I do. I—I hate you.”
He only dropped his gaze to her lips, then her collarbones, then her chest, still almost completely visible in the clear water. Then, he leaned down, breath skittering across her bare skin, so he could say, right against the shell of her ear, “Say that to me when you aren’t moaning my name in your sleep, and I might believe you.”
Then, he lifted himself out of the pool and got dressed.
After that, they walked in silence. She tried her best to stay as far away from him as possible, to bury this building attraction, and he seemed content to do the same.
They kept going, walking all through the night until the horizon shaped into a mountain range, and she spotted a structure in the distance.
Relief nearly made her knees buckle.
A palace had been carved into the entire side of a golden cliff. It looked like a castle trapped in stone. Its façade was made up of thousands of sunlike symbols and countless doors. There were statues, stairs, and endless columns.
“What is this place?”
“A tomb,” Oro said, stepping past her. He stopped at the front. She made to walk through the door, but he caught her wrist. “We can’t enter yet.”
“Why?” They didn’t have time. Nightshade could be overrun by warriors by now. Grim could be in trouble. Oro wouldn’t care about that; so she instead she said, “Lark has made it to this island. She’s likely killing your soldiers right now, adding to her army.”
His jaw tensed. “Just trust me, Isla,” he said, and she would be a liar if she said hearing her name from his lips again didn’t make her chest constrict. “We need to wait.”
They did. And as they lingered at the front of the palace, she studied it more closely. The columns were made up of statues, a row of previous rulers. The pediments were filled with sculptural scenes showing a hunt. A wedding. A burial. All delicately crafted from the golden cliff face. Up above, at the very top—almost at the peak of the mountain—something flashed.
A flame.
Oro followed her line of sight. “That’s the forever flame,” he said. “It hasn’t gone out in thousands of years. Kings have risen and fallen, curses have been woven and broken, and through it all, the flame has endured.”
She watched it flicker. It wasn’t huge . . . but it was mighty. Strong.
The darkness began to shift, and Oro stood straighter. He motioned for her to step inside the palace. Finally. She did and was plunged into darkness. Her energy was spent, but she reached for Oro’s power, lighting the smallest of embers. His fingers curled over hers, snuffing it out.
“Unnecessary,” he said. He turned back toward the door. Waited a second. Two.
Then light poured into the hall in a glittering line, like melted gold. As dawn rose, the slice of sun streamed across the floor, illuminating an intricate design beneath their feet.
It was beautiful. She turned to Oro, only to find him already studying her.
They stared at each other for a moment before following the sunspun path down the long corridor and into a room that began flooding with light.
It was a tomb.
Oro moved carefully around the coffin. “Fire doesn’t work in here. Any flame is immediately extinguished, which means this room is visible only in the winter, at dawn, for just a few minutes.” It was aligned with the sun.
“We don’t have much time, then.” She took the tooth from her pocket. The moment it was freed from the fabric, it flew across the room, as if summoned, digging into the wall.
No, not a wall. A single page stretched upon it. The crimson red ink was faded, nearly illegible.
Carefully, she peeled it off the stone. Read over it quickly. Relief flooded her like an oasis in her bones.
“Does it have what you need?” Oro said.
She whipped around and nodded. “It’s exactly what I was looking for.”
The sunlight was already fading, its rays sweeping across the tomb. Beneath them, the metal glistened. Shademade.
Oro’s eyes locked with hers. It seemed they were having the same thought. He didn’t even know about Cronan, but he knew about Lark. “It can’t be opened. Many have tried.” Sensing her confusion, he added, “It’s rumored Horus had a relic. A bone from the finger of a god. Many have searched for it.”
The light was almost gone now. Isla didn’t waste a moment before cutting a line down her arm and smothering her own blood across her palms. She barely felt the pain, barely heard Oro’s yells in protest.
She pressed both of her hands against the tomb’s wall and pushed it open.
Oro stood still as a statue.
A body sat inside. Not bones, a body. The man was whole, his skin intact. He looked to simply be sleeping.
Horus Rey, one of the three founders of Lightlark. He had Oro’s golden hair. Sunlit skin. Straight nose. Sharp angles in his face.
“Is he . . . alive?” Isla asked. Was it possible all three founders hadn’t perished at all?
The man’s arms were folded across his chest, his hands stacked over his heart. Below them, gripped in his fingers, something was faintly glowing.
A bone.
Sunlight began melting from the room, as if drained. They didn’t have any time; but still, Oro hesitated.
“Take it,” Isla said. “It could help us against Lark.”
It could help her.
A moment. Two. Then Oro slowly reached toward the bone. Gently lifted it.
The moment it was out of Horus’s grip, his body became bones. The flesh turned to ash. He became a corpse.
He was dead, that was certain. Somehow, the power of the bone had preserved his body.
Quickly, before the light all but faded, they pushed the tomb’s top back on. The room was quickly drenched in darkness, dust, and decay. Oro grabbed her hand, and together they found its exit. They slowly inched down the hall.
Just before they stepped back into the desert, the sand began to tremble. Rise.
Oro cursed. “Another storm.”
They didn’t have time. She had to go, now. Her voice was a frustrated growl. “They happen this often?”
He nodded. “It’s why few have reached this place.”
“What do we do?”
He looked around at the entrance of the castle and sighed. “We wait.”
For an hour, they sat in near silence, staring at the raging storm. Slowly, Oro’s eyes began to close. He must be exhausted. They had spent days walking. He hadn’t slept the night before, and he had drained himself considerably to heal her.
His head leaned against the wall. His breathing evened.
She watched him, remembering what it was like to curl up next to him. He looked almost at peace now, across from her, one hand reaching in her direction, as if he was drawn to her even in his dreams.
Slowly inching forward, she ran her hand gently down his arm the way she used to, when they slept side by side. He groaned in his sleep, leaning toward her. He didn’t even feel her grab the bone.
He was so content—so happy, so deep in sleep—that he didn’t even hear her leave.
The storm bellowed around her. She had tied her shirt around her nose and mouth, remembering what Oro had said about inhaling the sand. She couldn’t afford to lose herself to her emotions, not now.
Oro was right. Lark was all of their problem. But he might not agree with her solution. That was why she needed to leave him, even though it killed her inside.
The bone glimmered through the fabric of her pocket. She had read the missing page. It highlighted every instruction to open a portal—and close it. It required multiple skyres, as well as powerful objects to draw from, and this bone would be central to her plan.
All she needed now was to get back to Nightshade.
When she couldn’t see the palace any longer, she slipped her ring off her finger. A miniature storm swirled inside the orb, in sparkling gold.
She had to get back to Grim. She had to make sure Oro couldn’t catch her before she got beyond the gates and their hold on her portaling.
She remembered what Azul had said about trapping storms. Shaping them.
With all the strength she could muster, she broke the stone between her fingers—
And the storm came tumbling out of it. Her storm. She kept her grip on it, as if it was still in an orb in her palm. Her teeth slid together as it fought against her hold.
Slowly, she gained control of its winds with Skyling power and hollowed it out into a vortex, piercing the other storm to form a tunnel for her to safely travel through.
Then she ran through it as fast as she could, knowing that soon, Oro would wake up and realize she was gone. Soon he would notice the bone was missing. He would suspect she had her own hidden plans.
And then he would chase her.
She pushed down the guilt, the lingering feelings, anything that would slow her down, because she couldn’t afford to do anything but move.
Isla hoped he hated her. She hoped he forgot her. It would make things so much easier for all of them.
The miles were endless. Her limbs felt heavier and heavier. The roaring of the golden wind tunnel sounded like an ocean, one she would drown in if her control on the storm faltered for even a moment.
It wasn’t long before the heat slowed her down again. Her eyes began closing. This time, there was no one to catch her when her step slipped. She barely maintained the tunnel while she shot back up, breathing hard.
You have to keep going, she told herself. Trying . . . that’s the hardest part.
Isla remembered the bloodless soldiers, how they had cut down innocents and Grim’s warriors with the same efficiency. Lark was nearly unstoppable. She would burn this world to its embers, stripping away everything that made it good. It wasn’t perfect, but it deserved a chance to be better.
They had a chance. With this bone, and the skyres, and the instructions on the page folded in her pocket, they could send Lark away forever. But not if Isla died in this desert.
The heat and sand that had made it past the fabric messed with her mind. She saw the past like she was walking through memories.
She thought about her best ones. Running through the forest after training, smiling up at the treetops, singing with the birds. Finding her starstick below the floorboards. Portaling into her former friend’s Starling castle for the first time. Seeing the world from far above, in the hot-air balloon with Grim. Walking through the fields of nightbane, their dark purple color like night being reflected up to the sky.
Azul, showing her the singing mountains here on Lightlark. Rebuilding Wild Isle with Oro, watching nature revive a dead place.
There were her worst memories too. So much loss, betrayal, and danger. But there was beauty here, in this world—more good than bad. And she was willing to fight for it.
With a groan scraped from the depths of herself, she gripped the storm harder—and felt it sweep below her feet, lifting her into its center, sand orbiting her body. Higher. Her arm trembled with effort, with control, her skyre setting her skin aflame, and the sandstorm became a wave she rode across the desert. It rippled below, tearing across miles and miles. She knelt, her fingers running through it, feeling its power surging.
Oro won’t catch up, she told herself.
She might reach the gates before he even knew she was gone.