Dream of a City of Ruin: Dreams of QaiMaj Book II

Chapter 15: Queen of Chraun: Dynat

Dynat pumped heat into Maia, so far gone with rage that he barely saw her. How dare she? She was his, she belonged to him, and yet she had gone sneaking around behind his back, fucking someone else. Fucking whore.

Underneath volumes of lava-hot anger, a voice within Dynat wondered why he was so angry with a Semija for sleeping with her own kind. It made no sense, unless . . .

Dynat loved her. That realization scared him, but there it was. A Semija, and he loved her. Look at her before you kill her, that little voice within said, for once his own voice, not the Fire Spirit, not Stasia, but his own conscience.

He forced himself to look. She was pressed against the boulder. Her skin was red, her eyes squeezed shut.

The sight dulled the edge of his anger, and Dynat drew back his wall of heat. Maia collapsed on the ground, sagging to her knees, pressing her hands over her chest.

Dynat fell to his knees as well, alarmed by the harm he had done, but still furious with her. When had she done it? With whom? Where had she found the time?

Stasia was yelling in the distance, hurrying toward them, pushing into his mind. He pushed her out, staring at Maia, hating her for making him a fool.

Stasia dropped to the ground beside Maia and healed her red skin. Had he truly burned her badly? The healing seemed to take a long time.

"I don't understand," Maia said when she was recovered enough to speak. "Why are you so convinced that I've bedded another man? Why is it so hard to believe I could bear you a child? We are made much the same."

Dynat was silent, considering. It had never happened before, but then, there was much he had accepted as fact in Chraun that was being disproven in this land. His own deity was a liar. Could this be a lie as well?

Stasia was answering for him. "Not that it gives him any right to harm you, but Maia, such a thing has never happened in the history of our people. And there have been many attempts, at least in Iskalon. I'm guessing in Chraun too."

"No," Dynat said sharply. "We don't sleep with our stock. We aren't perverse, like you."

Stasia fixed her golden-green gaze on him. You are a liar and a hypocrite. I've seen what you did. You desire your Semija just as much as Icers enjoy bedding humans. The only perverse thing about it is those you call "stock" have no choice. Dynat looked down, studying the pattern of the cobblestones on the ground.

"Stock," Maia said slowly. "Is that truly what I am to you, Dynat? A boareal to ride through the summer and slaughter in winter?"

"NO!" he said again, rising to his knees. Stasia hissed a warning, and he put up his palms. "Fire Spirit render me to molten lava. I love you, woman. My feelings for you make Bolv, the woman I loved for fifteen years, seem like a boy's fickle crush. I don't understand how or why. How? How could you have fucked someone else, right under my nose? When did you have time? By the Lava Lake, we spent every single night in the same furs. Did you sneak out? Or did you meet him during the day?"

"I swear to you, I never touched another man," Maia said. "But even if I did, you have no right to question me. I am not your property."

There was only one way to settle this, if she would not answer his questions. He would have to enter her mind and resolve his confusion. Then he would pass judgment. Perhaps she had been assaulted and hid her shame. Or perhaps she was a lying whore. He would know the truth.

Stasia said, "No. Do not do this, Dynat. I won't allow it."

"You can't stop me, Ice fairy."

"I can tell her," Stasia said.